美国国家公共电台 NPR I Sink, Therefore I Am: This Robot Wasn't Programmed For Existential Angst

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SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Some of the best minds of our times, including Stephen Hawking¹ and Elon Musk², have warned that human beings may invent intelligent machines that could wind up destroying humankind. But a small incident this week might make you wonder, will intelligent machines become so smart they'll grow depressed³ as they learn they're brilliant but lifeless and decide they can't go on? Will those machines begin to wonder, is that all there is? A Knightscope K5 security robot that patrolled an office complex along the Georgetown waterfront in Washington, D.C., rolled itself into a shallow fountain on Monday and drowned. The robot did not leave a note - it doesn't have any hands.

The 5-foot-tall robot was apparently⁴ nicknamed Steve by people in the Washington Harbour office complex. Steve whistled, beeped and rolled over the plaza⁵, alert to pick up, through thermal⁶ image sensors⁷ and cameras, any misbehavior or parking violations⁸. He reportedly cost about $7 an hour to deploy⁹ or $5.50 less per hour than minimum wage in the District of Columbia. That's how the future of work, not just Steve, may now roll. Photos of the robot sleeping with the fountain fishes started to pop up on social media platforms.

Bilal Farooqui, who works for a Pakistani newspaper, notably¹⁰ tweeted - our D.C. office building got a security robot. It drowned itself. We were promised flying cars, instead we got suicidal robots.

Robot suicide sounds like a science fiction theme, but if humans soon develop deeply intelligent machines that think and learn with blinding velocity¹¹, how long before it can be before those machines begin to ask themselves, why are we here? Steve the K5 security robot saw people stroll along the Georgetown waterfront, laugh, kiss, slurp¹² ice cream and hold hands in the moonlight. But Steve could only roll, whistle and beep.

Human beings can grow depressed as we try to come to terms with our mortality, but intelligent machines will have to exist with the certainty that their consciousness may be extinguished just by the next software update. What happens to all of Knightscope's K5 Steves when Steve 2.0 rolls out or when Wanda the K6 or Zelda the K10 security robot is invented? Can you see how Steve or his thermal image sensors might have looked into the stars this week and wondered...

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IS THAT ALL THERE IS")

PEGGY LEE: Is that all there is? If that's all there is, my friends...