It’s Time to Make a Luddite Turn – We’re Confronted with Neo-Tayloristic Vampire Robots

摘要

The robot rights scholarly debate has outpaced debates concerning pressing societal issues related to the repressive robotic enslavement of humans. Clearly, the robot rights debate can co-exist with critical political discussions in robophilosophy. However, in academia, we do not reside in an isolated philosophical bubble. Our voices are echoed in the society’s debates on AI and robots. Here, the public opinion and policy making is poorly informed and shaped by techno-optimistic and, often, false and overconfident predictions about the capabilities of AI and robots. Therefore, we should be cautious when insisting on continuously advancing the robot rights debate. Explorations of this exotic topic attracts media attention and intensifies common sci-fi myths and misperceptions tied to the public debate on AI and robots. Consequently, we should cease discussing whether robots ought to be included in the moral circle. We have more pressing, but less media catchy issues to discuss as robots increasingly enslave humans. Consequently, it is time to face the challenges of neo-tayloristic robot tyranny. It is time to replace the relational turn of the robot ethics debate with a Luddite turn.