Research Archives - Page 2 of 7

Category Archives: Research

Humans, robots and rules: what the Covid-19 pandemic tells us about decision-making and rules

27th March 2020 Mike Ryder Comment

As we all set ourselves up for weeks, or even months, of self-isolation, never has there been a better time to think about rules, and the reasons we do the things that we do.

While the UK government has imposed new rules, telling us that we need to stay at home, these rules are only ever an approximation of the ideal rule, which in this case, is the idea that everyone needs to stay at home. The issue here is that while universal isolation is all well and good in theory, we still need health workers and we still need to keep the electricity flowing and the water running.

Appearance on TRTWorld’s ‘ROBOTS: time to think about the laws?’

24th January 2020 Mike Ryder Comment

I was recently invited to take part in a roundtable discussion for TRTWorld’s Vision 2020 series. You can watch the show below.

It could be time to start thinking about a cybernetic Bill of Rights

11th December 2019 Mike Ryder Comment

Like it or loathe it, the robot revolution is now well underway and the futures described by writers such as Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl and Philip K. Dick are fast turning from science fiction into science fact. But should robots have rights? And will humanity ever reach a point where human and machine are treated the same?

Dwayne Johnson and the myth of hard work

2nd July 2019 Mike Ryder 3 Comments

Everywhere you look these days, people are ‘working hard’ on social media, telling us about their lives, their jobs, their children and all the many things they do to fill up their time. And when they’re not working hard, they’re spending their time telling us about how hard they’re working, or how much they’ve deserved the break they’ve given themselves from all the hard work.

But what really is work, and why do we do it? Is there even such a thing as working too hard?

I can’t say that I have all of the answers at this point, but I do have several thoughts…

Robotic consumption – what Uber’s new ‘quiet mode’ tells us about the human and the machine

22nd May 2019 Mike Ryder Comment

Taxi app Uber has announced a new ‘quiet mode’ for customers using its premium Uber Black service. By selecting the option via the app, users can order a cab where the driver is instructed not to talk. While this change has proven positive with many users, some taxi drivers have responded negatively to the new quiet mode, with some critics claiming it treats taxi drivers more like robots than human beings.

While these critics may certainly have a point, they miss the essential fact that all taxi drivers – and indeed, all humans being – behave, and are encouraged to behave, in a robotic fashion. This blurring of the human and the machine isn’t really anything new, but rather, has been going on for a very long time indeed.