Turing Roach
June 1st, 2006NewScientistTech has a story on cockroach replicants that infiltrate cockroach societies and become their leaders. The article notes:
The researchers behind the robot believe it could be used to catch cockroaches and that bots designed to mimic other animals could one day work on farms controlling flocks of sheep and chickens by similar means.Yeah. Sheep and chickens. That’s right.
It’s an interesting premise, though. Science fiction always has the robots as these “Terminator” type killing machines. The best way to end humanity is to trade on our herd mentality.
June 1st, 2006 at 3:09 pm
Great, now we just need a Turing blog bot to herd the bloggers around…
June 4th, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Or I’d point out Asmov’s wise story “That thou art mindful of him” from the collection The Bicentennial Man. I used to use it back in the early 90s when teaching social science and comptuers. The greatest robots get around the 3 laws of robotics by making robotic insect eating birdlike things that fit into the ecosystem… but are designed to evolve over centuries to take over the earth. I ever was an Asmov fan, but this one…
June 4th, 2006 at 1:35 pm
Asmov, I. (1976). “That Thou Art Mindful of Him.” The Bicentennial Man and Other Stories. New York: Doubleday. p.p. 61-87.
June 14th, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Sounds like half a dozen Philip K. Dick stories. In particular “Second Variety” and “The Mold of Yancy.”