Japanese Find Robots Less Intimidating Than People 278
bik1979 writes "The Christmas issue of economist has an interesting article on 'why the Japanese want their robots to act more like humans'. The article says how people in japan are accepting robots into their daily life, more so than accepting other people. From the article: 'What seems to set Japan apart from other countries is that few Japanese are all that worried about the effects that hordes of robots might have on its citizens. Nobody seems prepared to ask awkward questions about how it might turn out. If this bold social experiment produces lots of isolated people, there will of course be an outlet for their loneliness: they can confide in their robot pets and partners. Only in Japan could this be thought less risky than having a compassionate Filipina drop by for a chat.'"
That one droid in KOTOR.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:That one droid in KOTOR.. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Damn you batman!!!1! (Score:2)
Hey. What makes you think it's so outrageous [wikipedia.org]?
Have a very Merry Slashdot Christmas!
MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:5, Interesting)
The japanese in particular seem to have made large strides in the field of robotics, it makes sense that they would be the first to accept them into their lives.
As for why, I think it's two factors.
1. They probably understand what robots are better than the general populace of America. People are less afraid of what they understand.
2. The "anonymous internet effect" as I call it. A robot isn't a human, it doesn't have emotions, it won't get pissed off if you insult it/don't remember its birthday/whatever.
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:3, Insightful)
And of course, these words are heard over what?
The TV.
The Radio.
Online News Sites.
All three are 'electronic gadgets' (TV's, Radios, Computers), perhaps the biggest and most widespread of them all. And their main purpose is to do what?
Allow people to communicate.
If it becomes: Radio, TV, Internet, Robots, Chronologically speaking, then robots are sure to be accepted into our lives. Robots are quite differen
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:2)
What Isolates are Poor Attitudes/Uses of Tech (Score:2)
The explanation, I suppose, is that the physical distance between people has nothing to do with loneliness. It's psychic distance, and in Montana and I
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:3, Insightful)
And alternatively, Japanese people are scared of minorities and foreigners, to the extent that police will arrest and check for the papers of people just for looking foreign, or speaking in a foreign language. Literally any crime is blamed on foreigners. The real story is, why is Japan more willing to spend billions of dollars for absurd pie-in-the-sky visions of robot
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:2, Insightful)
Japan is schizophenic about foreigners.
A lot of Japanese women seek out gaijin (at least Caucasian) boyfriends, and most of the Japanese people I've met in my brief stays were very friendly. On the other hand, some merchants will pretend not to even he
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:3, Insightful)
So is everybody else, but no-one wants to admit it because it would be "racist". Bah, humbug!
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots. (Score:3, Insightful)
Ethnocentrism [reference.com]?
This is a problem that it literally takes several generations to overcome. You can see progress; This isn't an area where it's easy to "catch-up" to the ideals of another group. The younger generation, while they welcome forei
Re:MP3 players, portable DVD players, now robots~ (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not sure about this. It seems like there's some places where diversity is good, and some where it causes big problems. Many "international" or "cosmopolitan" cities are that way because they have many people of different cultures living together (and getting along): New York City, Vancouver, Hong Kong, etc. Places like this have significant minorities of people from other cultures, but they're actually richer because of it, and don't have probl
Japan is full of coolness (Score:2)
We should export some brit comedy, good ol' fashioned toilet humour. Then they would build some crazy mecha-monster and it would start destroying world landmarks.
still! full of coolness.
America could learn something from Japan (Score:5, Funny)
just wait... (Score:3, Funny)
Remember the Scene... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well EVERY SINGLE DAY we have the equivalent of this happening, only with credit card transactions, paypal, stock exchanges, etc.
If this analogy is off topic: What I mean to say is that the robots that we're capable of producing now are simply code in motion. Sure, very complex code, but still, they're programmed. They're not to a level of intelligence and mass production where we worry about having to welcome our new robot overlords, and I doubt they'll even need anything as complex as Asimov's 'Three Laws' for a VERY long time.
We depend on code in our computers every day to carry out tasks, just as I'm depending on it now to get this comment up on slashdot - the robot equivalent would be a very quick messenger robot. Again, code in motion. The Japanese are wise to accept robots as just this, instead of cross-applying way too many bad science-fiction movies that couldn't be realizable today even if a malevolent force WAS trying to get robots to take over the world.
~Ruff_ilb
(P.S. It's all a lie! THEY made me type it!)
Re:Remember the Scene... (Score:2)
Someone give this man some Karma.
Re:Remember the Scene... (Score:2)
Remember, just because you coded it, doesn't mean it will behave predictably or reliably. Software crashes all the time. Keep in mind that a robot could also be vulnerable to a virus or attack.
I do agree though that true Artifical Intelligence is not a worry at this point, and won't be for a long long time. I personally believe that we will never get to true AI due to physical limitations on how complex we can make a processor. I think we will h
Re:Remember the Scene... (Score:2)
Of course (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Of course (Score:4, Funny)
I'll Replace You With Machines - Guided By Voices (Score:2)
It sounds like most of Japan's culture is rather maladapted to life as it currently is. The language is stuck in
WE NEED ARTICLE MODERATION! (Score:5, Insightful)
The Japanese like robots more than people. Right. Please this is insulting to the Japanese and to slashdotters.
WE NEED ARTICLE MODERATION so that we can stop this spate of crap articles.
I'm posting anonymous because every time I point out the obvious, that slashdot has become super lame, I'm modded "troll".
But damn it, I can remember when slashdot wasn't a pit of stupidity. WE NEED ARTICLE MODERATION!
Re:WE NEED ARTICLE MODERATION! (Score:2)
there is a switch (Score:2, Funny)
Re:there is a switch (Score:2)
Oh, good. I don't have to be afraid of jetliners or cars or blenders any more!
Better things to worry about (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe because they are too busy dealing with Godzilla, Mothra, and all those other giant radioactive monsters.
Re:Better things to worry about (Score:2)
Maybe because they are too busy dealing with Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and all those other giant radioactive monstrosities.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:3, Insightful)
I find that rather hard to believe. It's more likely that their social norms and rules work differently than ours. It might appear inept to us but it's quite normal for them. In fact, a lot of what you just described also applies to the Chinese, which is my heritage.
There are cultures other than us who tend to be non-confrontational and indirect. There are advantages and disadvantages to that. Being indirect means pr
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
I've always considered the Japanese/Chinese custom as very sensible, but here in Norway we do as the Fins, too - every house generally has a hallway in which to hang your coat and put your shoes.
It keeps the floor and carpets clean. Due to the changing seasons we also have good insulation, carpets - or even heated floors in most new houses. No need fo
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
shoe etiquette (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:4, Informative)
Anyway, here is a blog from a American teacher in Japan, it's funny (and insightful) reading of over there:
http://outpostnine.com/editorials/teacher.html [outpostnine.com]
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:3, Interesting)
And of course, that is true for any society. Also, if you're a non-Japanese - and especially if you're the kind of person that reads and comments on
I've lived here for some time now, and I find this to have no more more basis in fact here than anywhere else. After seeing supposedly always
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Well, it can certainly be interpreted as inept in a Western way, but I think the ineptitude is relative. If a culture behaves in a certain way, it's part of the accepted culture, and there doesn't have to be anything strange with it. It's only strange when contrasted with a different culture.
Sometimes, I feel that people speak of Japan after having watched a few documentaries, or a boatload of anime episodes. Not
Re:Japanese lack social skills (Score:2)
Yes, you're so pissed and upset that parent poster has no second chance. And you won't forgive him.
Population Density (Score:3, Insightful)
That said though, for anyone familiar with Japan or having lived there before, those that live in the city have a very, very different way of life than in places like the United States. The pace of life is faster, the population density is higher and there is a generally an absurd amount of strangers that you pass by on a daily basis. The fast, brisk level of interaction required to perform your daily tasks with others is just an automated response after awhile. It's no surprise to me that Japan is the leader in automation, simply due to this constant barrage of hit-and-run interaction.
I would venture that the Japanese have simply become accustom to automated systems and technology, having evolved around the idea of using non-human tools to help them throughout the day. If you asked another person in a fast paced city such as New York or LA versus a slower city like Austin or Memphis on their opinion toward robots, I would imagine you get a correlation between pace of life and comfort level with robots (or automation).
My 0.02 hypothesis at least.
Automation has nothing to do with interaction (Score:2)
This is more to the core of why Japan has lead innovation vs. population density. They're a very small na
You had me... (Score:5, Insightful)
...and I was with you 100%, right up to the "compassionate Filipina" bit. Where the hell did that come from?
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
Re:You had me... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:You had me... (Score:5, Informative)
Cost of opening Japanese borders to foreigners: Zero yen. Oh yeah, and society will have to open up a little too.
As you can see, it's inevitable that the Japanese develop robots. The cost of not doing so is too high for the Japanese populous to bear, or even contemplate. Seriously, the Japanese are nice people and all, but they really insist on dividing the world into "Japan" and "everybody else" in a way that's not healthy at all. I like Japan, but they're going to have make some changes. On their current path, they're either going to end up like Europe, with a bunch of isolated and pissed off foreigners living inside their borders or like techno-Europe, with a bunch of isolated and pissed off robots living inside their borders. Or, heaven forbid, they could follow the US/Canadian model and integrate foreigners into their society, instead of isolating them and maybe the people would think of themselves as Japanese. But they might not have black hair, so scratch that idea.
Or! (Score:2)
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
they're either going to end up like Europe, with a bunch of isolated and pissed off foreigners living inside their borders
A friend of mine recently returned from an extended stay in the US, I think Boston... he had a lot of stories to tell, but one that caught my attention with regard to this comment was a place called Martin Luther King boulevard (?). He said that's one place where white people don't go. There are many isolated ghettoes and racial divisions in America, so I really wouldn't start holdin
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
I generally don't respond to trolls, but this is like shooting fish in a barrel..
Well, with an entire four year's history of immigration
Yup, and we have still achieved more than America has in four hundred. Maybe you would like to take lessons?
almost as long as Ireland's alliance with the Nazi government
Ireland never had an alliance with the nazis, as an alliance would indicate mutual military operations and shared resources. Italy had an alliance. Ireland had neutrality. I realise that being
Re:You had me... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well I know I got a good chuckle out of you. Grow some balls, sign in, and take your karma like a man. I dare you.
I'm electing myself unofficial ambassador from the USA on this one. Sorry 'bout this guy. In my newly elected position, I'd like to say the United States officially apologizes for him and people like him.
You see, we're at a really strange point in our history.
We've fought a dozen or so major wars and done pretty well. Up until recently, war was something that you go and do, not something that happens to you. When we went to war, we would ship out. War never happened here.
But a few years ago, it did.
Enemies of my country wiped out a few blocks in NYC. We fought Hitler, the Kaiser, and the Imperial Japanese Navy and never once had so much as a single inch of continental US soil touched. Then...NYC.
And we've kind of reacted the way the largest kid on the playground would if the smallest kid bloodies his nose. Surprise, then shock, then anger. All fueled by fear. (If the smallest kid can do this...I need to take precautions! Assert myself!) And we do. Loudly and ignorantly. It's ok to be dumb, just so long as you're fierce, don't you know!
And that's where we're at. The loudest Americans you see are the ones most afraid. You'll see them chanting "USA number one!" loudly, in the desperate hopes that it's true. They're currently signing away things our founding fathers fought and died for so that they may feel "safe". And if you point that out, then you're a goddamn liberal hippie who wants the terrorists to win.
We're at an ugly time in our history. Please bear with us, and hope as I do that we'll get over it sometime soon.
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
Re:You had me... (Score:2)
As they say around here RTFA. They are starting to need people since the japanese are not having enough children, and a lot of other countries would like to come in - like people from the philipines, but the Japanese don't want strangers in - which is why they prefer to build robots. They start by mentioning a filipina nurse (or something like that) but the old people don't feel comfortable with such
Sure, but (Score:2)
Americans on the other hand stare at any imminent danger like inquisitive puppies, waiting for their closeup.
Robots can only be good for humanity (Score:5, Interesting)
A. Robots remain good and helpful.
Compare this against the current state of affairs, where humanity is segmented into fundamentalist religious factions at war with each other, rapacious and/or clueless politicians bringing in 1984, big business cartels treating the citizenry as cattle, lawyers oiling the wheels of all the "legal" malevolance, plus an underbelly of simple criminals who care not about what they do to their neighbour. Yes, robot companions will become infinitely preferable to people, on average.
B. Robots do the Skynet or War Games thing and try to exterminate or dominate us.
This would undoubtedly unite us again, much like an alien invasion would do, because it's in the nature of humanity to unite against an external threat --- it's been happening throughout the ages, against attacks on one's country. So, at least there would be a silver lining for humanity amid the War Against The Machines or equivalent, until it's over one way or another.
C. The Culture scenario from Iain M. Banks' novels, ie. machine intelligence and capability becomes so incomprehensibly greater than our own that Man and all other creatures in the galaxy become their very well looked after pets.
Banks' scenario is good whichever you look at it: either mankind is happy as a pampered pet and wishes to remain so, or else mankind absorbs the technology of AI into itself and becomes one with it in order to remain the dominant species on the planet. The latter is Ray Kurzweil's expected future, as described in The Age of Spiritual Machines.
So, I see only good from the coming of the robot, regardless of its level of machine intelligence and the goals it develops for itself, if any.
Me. (Score:2)
Re:Me. (Score:2)
Re:Robots can only be good for humanity (Score:2)
While reading that line, it occurred to me: how much influence have human-friendly robots in many Japanese animes had on the growning cyber-phile genre in Japan?
Re:Robots can only be good for humanity (Score:3, Insightful)
D. Technologists promise the moon, fail to deliver, and disappoint the general public.
Think about it: we're already on the edge of falling off Moore's law. It's probably possible to make a computer a hundred times faster than it is today, but a million? Not likely using known physics. I think this will end up like the space race. Rockets kept getting more and more powerful in the 50s and 60s, so everyone assumed the process would continue indefinitely until we had moon bases and warp drive. Only, it turne
Maybe... (Score:2)
Wow. Can't believe it lasted so long without this. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Wow. Can't believe it lasted so long without th (Score:2)
Don't listen to him, he's a troll-bot. Oh, wait...
Invasion of the Marvins (Score:2)
Reason for Philippines comment (Score:4, Insightful)
Well the article is highly biased (Score:3, Interesting)
But I think there is a far simpler reason behind the lack of immigration. Japanese companies had a pact with their workers. You work hard and we give you employment for live. While this is changing on the whole a japanese company is far more likely to stick with the expensive locals then say an american company who is always looking to reduce labor costs.
As we are seeing now with the claimed shortage in tech workers (wich has been proven again and again not to be true) western companies are always looking for an excuse to get lower wage workers in place.
Immigrants do not complain and do not demand high wages or sane hours. When even they became to expensive entire production facilities were located off-shore and now even the office work is being put in low wage nations.
Because there is nobody to do the work here? No, because it allows them to scrape another percentage of the labor costs. Fuck the longterm economy, next quarters stock price is what matters.
Japanese companies operated on a slightly different moral principle. Their workers worked themselves into an easy grave and in exchange the japanese worker was assured a job for live (strangely enough with all that hard work the japanese get older then most westeners).
The west is currently having major problems with the results of it open immigration policy, right or wrong you can hardly blame the japanese for not wanting to have race riots in their cities. And no, not just in France. They have had them in england and in holland.
Perhaps we should ask why the west is so afraid of robots instead.
Fear of non-Japanese (Score:5, Insightful)
The closest thing I can imagine to Japan's racial attitudes in the US is something like a totally white community in the midwest, in the '50s. It's not that they actively hate other races, it's just that they grow up in an environment where everyone's the same race, and there are entrenched cultural expectations of what being a 'proper' citizen is. This results in a culture where there's lots of apprehention about foreigners, because they're an 'unknown element' that could disrupt social norms.
This, combined with the techno-phillia that's been in Japan since the '50s, is what makes robots more acceptable.
Another might be that robots can be programmed, foreigners cannot. This might be an important distinction in a society where education is seen as an important social stabilizer. The fact is, it might be easier to program robots to be 'Japanese' than naturalize foreigners, who will not be accepted as 'Japanese', anyway. There are still thousands of ethnic Koreans who were born there and aren't citizens because they have Korean names, and Japan's national identity is based heavily on race. A robot doesn't really have a racial identity aside from what it is programmed to be, I would guess.
Anyways, what I am trying to say is that the reason Japan prefers robots to immigrants is that they can be a very cosmopolitan, modern and advanced place as far as technology and consumer culture goes, but they can also be like a rural backwater as far as outsiders go.
Re:Fear of non-Japanese (Score:2)
Oh, trust me, the USA has that, too. Most of the nasty things Westerners see about Japan are just open admissions of the nastiest, most covered up bits of our own culture. Like how the "rugged individualism" that built America is basically dead, replaced with office buildings, high schools and strip malls.
Now bring on the robots!
oh dear... (Score:2)
we're all doomed!
Re:And here's why.... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:And here's why.... (Score:2)
Chiiiii? [tokyopop.com]
Re:And here's why.... (Score:2)
You mean it being ten feet tall and breathing fire is a defect?
damn.
Re:Really? (Score:2)
In Japan they do...
In Korea, only old people's robots have sex organs.
Re:Slightly to the West (Score:2)
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:2)
(I'm going to take it that Filipina is referring to nationality as opposed to ethnicity.)
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:2)
In most countries in the world, especially Japan, there's no difference between the two.
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:2)
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:2, Informative)
The Japanese have a reputation for being prejudiced.
I think this is want the last comment is referring too, Japans xenophobia.
http://www.hrdc.net/sahrdc/hrfeatures/HRF39.htm [hrdc.net]
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/11/12/10370 80728620.html [theage.com.au]
http://www.crnjapan.com/discrimination/en/ [crnjapan.com]
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=31436 [ipsnews.net]
Re:compassionate Filipina? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:5, Insightful)
Japan doesn't allow ready immigration mostly because of long-standing racist policies. Doubt me? There are generations of Koreans (and other Southeast Asians) who were born in Japan, have lived in Japan for their entire lives, and speak, read, and write Japanese fluently, but are denied citizenship because they aren't 'Japanese'. This is changing, which is good, but the speed of this change is glacial.
Most Japanese laugh at their religions (Shinto and Buddhism) and don't take them seriously at all; you go to the shrines on holidays, and for special occasions, but that's about it. Japanese people don't walk around in mystic-eyed wonder at the 'spirits' of the things around them. Why? Because that would be weird as hell; this might surprise you, but Japanese people act in many ways much like Americans, only with a hell of a lot more groupthink.
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, so Japan's a lot like Slashdot?
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
The situations I referred to were when the culturally foreign population rose up against the native population.
The benefit of being exposed to many cultures (food, friendship, etc) outweighs, in my mind, these smaller issues.
Ever consider that not everybody wants their culture annihilated by foreign influences? The ideology that you
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Sensible people.
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Disclaimer: I am a Japanese national who was born and grew up in Japan.
Japan doesn't allow ready immigration mostly because of long-standing racist policies
This statement is simply incorrect. The general racist attitude of the Japanese against Koreans has little to do with what you referred to as "racist policies." The Korean Japanese have historically been treated as collective scapegoats, whereas the long-held Japanese isolationist policies are largely due to the fact that the ways the Japanese inte
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
First off, anybody who cites 'Ghost In The Shell' as an important insight into Japanese culture is an idiot. Period. The Real Japan is not something yo
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
This is a common misconception that has been around for years. While at one time this was true, today it is not. Those Koreans CAN become Japanese citizens, but first they have to give up thier Korean citizenship and Korean names, both fairly reasonable, considering it's aske
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2, Informative)
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
The parent poster seemed, to me at least, to be implying that Japanese people are always actively thinking about the 'spirit' of every
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2, Funny)
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:4, Informative)
"The native religion of Japan, Shinto, teaches that everything has a spirit. While many poo-poo this as a backward and strange throwback to an animastic past the west shrugged off a long time ago, this view is much more practical than is often realised. Viewing everything as a spirit that exists in relation to everything else encourages the development of a much more sensitive and context aware mentality."
Shinto is the dominant religion in Japan second only to Budhism. Only 5% of Japan's vast population is Christian or Catholic. Christmas is still celebrated by most of Japan anyway. Shinto is a ancient religion, its origins date back the Old Stone Age between 100,000 & 10,000 B.C. It ranks as one of the oldest "active" religions on Earth.
The Shinto religion has no establish code of morality like Christianity and other major religions. Its a system based more on people policing their own behavior rather than following a set of pre-written commandments (ie; The Ten Commandments). Japan in general, is one of the few civilizations on Earth that still has a widely practiced Honor-based social system. Though the social-class was outlawed long before the onset of WWII, most Japanese live by the Samurai Code (Bushido Code) which calls for ritual suicide (seppoku) as a way to redeem one's lost honor.
They are a people of extreme contrasts. On one said they are one of the most technologically advanced cultures on the planet and on the other hand they a people who still have on foot in the ancient past. They are desparately trying to keep a hold of their ancient culture and beliefs in the fact of advancing technology. I blame the Tokogawa Shojunate and the closing of Japan's boarders during this era as the reason for Japan's precieved backwardness. When Admiral Perry sailed into Tokyo Harbor in the 1800's the world was experiencing the Industrial Revolution, but Japan was frozen in time and its people lived the same way they had as if they were still in the Middle Ages. Japan had to play catchup with the rest of the world and they did so with furocious tennacity. This is why the Japanese are more open to embracing new technology faster than most Western cultures.
-Information researched from the book "Japanese Culture" from Honolulu Univerity Press.
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Japan is absolutely hyporcritical about it, then. They saw no problem with mass emmigration, especially in the 1930's and 1940's. They'll go to the Philippines, annex the islands at the point of a rifle and shoot anybody that disagrees, but they won't allow Filipinos to voluntarily come to Japan to live and work?
Sure, what the Japanese did in the 1930's in the Philippines wasn't all that much better than what we did to them in the 1900'
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
Anyway, Japan is very crowded. Logically, more people should be moving out right now, not in.
Re:All Hooked Up (Score:2)
For the most part...no. And what minor problems have cropped up, we have gained much greater benefits that far outweigh any such problems. Being a diverse, multicultural society has benefited us greatly. And hell, I wouldn't exist if we weren't. By anscestry I'm a mix of German, Jewish, assorted Native American, English, and Black...and that's just as far as I have been able to trace. I'm proud of all those roots, they give me character
Re:America for Americans (and robots) (Score:2)
Re:Old /. semi-meme resurrection (Score:2)
Re:A Japanese version of the movie "I, Robot"... (Score:2)
Read more: http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=i