George Meliese's silent films and automatons were at the core of the beautifully illustrated and written YA novel from the mid-2000s named The Invention of Hugo Cabret [0].
[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Invention_of_Hugo_Cabret
It reminds me of a story I was told about a certain vault in Hollywood that contained hundreds of priceless films that were destroyed in a fire...but they locked up the vault and pretended everything was fine. And to this day...
Nowhere does the article refer to something like "depiction of a robot", no it explicitly talks about robots captured on film. This is not that.
It's definitely a cool glimpse into early filmmaking, but it's not a robot.
Well, where are we now? If that robot is a driverless car, it can pretty much run over humans with impunity. The owner and manufacturer of the car will suffer minor penalties (compared with the victim being dead or maimed). They will not be required to change their actions. The robots will continue to be allowed to harm people in public.
Personally, I liked it better when we told ourselves stories about breaking the damn things as soon as they hurt someone.
Considering this took place before I was born, you might not be aware of the multiple times it's already occurred.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Williams_(robot_fatalit...
Ironically, adding intelligence will probably result in robots that are far safer and kill fewer people.
In the second case, machine intelligence is supposed to keep us safe. That intelligence is controlled by people or companies that may or may not have the public benefit as motive for their actions. The typical response to that is to legislate, or publicly advocate for change. But what if the entity that controls the robots also controls the laws? That means there’s no way for regular people to revoke consent to the presence of dangerous robots.
So, cleanly, what if the CEO of a self-driving car company donates money to a government that provides it immunity from the actions of its robots? Who do we trust in that case?
I still prefer a world where we solve the robot problem early, with clubs and fire.
> (The word "robot" didn't appear until 1921, when Czech dramatist Karel Čapek coined it in his science fiction play R.U.R..)
Why does NPR call Gugusse "a human clown" ? He is not wearing clown clothes.
Gugusse looks more to me like the "mad inventor" of the robot, with a comedic bald head.
1: <https://www.loc.gov/item/2026125501/?loclr=blogloc>
2: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gugusse_and_the_Automaton>
Strange of you to criticize NPR for that bit seeing as they didn't come up with that description for Gugusse. From the LoC page for the video:
>> Gugusse the clown appears to control the actions of Pierrot Automate, a child-sized automaton standing on a pedestal. By turning a crank, Gugusse makes him march and wave a stick. As Gugusse turns the crank, the automaton gets bigger until it is the size of a grown man. Suddenly the automaton is controlling his own limbs. He hits Gugusse on the head with his stick. Gugusse pulls the automaton off the pedestal and picks up a large hammer. As Gugusse pounds the automaton on the head, he gets smaller and smaller. At the final stroke of the hammer, he disappears.
So they're using the supplied description of Gugusse. If you have an issue with it, take it up with the Library of Congress.
Strange of you to defend a news site for reporting incorrect information.
> If you have an issue with it, take it up with the Library of Congress.
When a news site reports incorrect information, we take it up with the news site because it is LITERALLY THEIR JOB to check their sources.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrot
From the Wikipedia entry...
*His character in contemporary popular culture—in poetry, fiction, and the visual arts, as well as works for the stage, screen, and concert hall—is that of the sad clown [...]*
A modern "Pierrot" style clown is:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puddles_Pity_Party
I have to admit... I wouldn't know about the Pierrot style of clown if it wasn't for Puddles...
You still occasionally see them at state functions (Trump wore an infamously poor-looking one when visiting Queen Elizabeth in his first term, iirc, and you can find photos of people like Reagan in it looking a bit less uncomfortable). I think they were standard/required clothing for arguing in front of the Supreme Court through the 1970s or something.
It’s the kind of jacket one might imagine a stereotypical cartoon mayor of a town wearing for a daytime ribbon cutting… because, not that long ago, that’s exactly what they would have worn.
It’s an almost, but not quite, dead piece of clothing, but it was still quite familiar when this was made.
[0] <http://1890swriters.blogspot.com/2015/10/victorian-clowns-an...>
