How will robots be as teachers?
--of basketball?
--of philosophy of science?
Dennis
Dennis Mazur
It seems that your intention is to separate two bunches of abilities: those related to bodily movement, and those related to high-order reflection (which apparently involves thinking, consciousness, etc.).
First, if robots (i.e., artificial entities) are ever employed in this capacity, they should be *better* than people. Because there is no point in replacing something *good* with something *worse*. Unless, of course, some side factors are considered (cost? robots are expensive. Scarcity of resources? Human teachers have all died away?).
Second, the bodily aspect and "the mind" are not that separated, as attested by various theories and research programs relating to "embodied cognition". What about kung-fu teachers portrayed in various class-D films from the Far East? They mostly talk to their students about philosophy (three quarters of the film...).
Third, "artificial intelligence" was mostly a failed program. It was largely replaced with "artificial life" involving "virtual creatures". Such creatures (some of them - extensions of a body of a "player") will be able to play perfect basketball. Why, they are also able to fly, to disappear, etc..., as far as they stay within the "virtual effect". When they return, they can no longer fly. They can also no longer use their virtual body to play virtual basketball, because the virtuality effect is now gone.
Fourth, although computers can now play chess quite competently, they still cannot *walk* nicely and freely.
Fifth, teaching is not only about *telling* or *showing* something. It is also about interacting (I know, ELISA, but she, and her children, is a toy) and empathizing. Hard problems. Possibly the hardest ever.
I totally agree with Dr Brzezinski - the 'great strides' that have been 'made' in AI are generally the result of doing the easy part. Now comes the hard bit, where we have to make the resulting device operate in the human environment. Since it takes maybe 15-20 years to educate a human to the required level of academic, ethical, moral and social attainment before he/she can be trusted to live reasonably independently, I don't see how it will take a lot less to do the same for a robot. And with all the talk of overpopulation - why have robots anyway? Because they're cheap? They aren't that cheap - and what happens when they start demanding salaries themselves, and are subject to the same taxation and obligations that humans are? As Dr Brzezinski says - not so easy.
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