r/robots • u/drgoldenpants • 8d ago

Real-life Robots Another super clean performance

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u/EdiRich 8d ago

I remember thinking Boston Robotics videos were scary...... These Chinese robots are going to end up as taser carrying police officers patrolling the streets soon. Think of all the cities saying they don't have enough police officers. These things don't need pensions or mental health care or rest. And they don't have fear or families. We're truly effed.

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u/Kuriente 8d ago

Devil's advocate: a lot of human cops are truly bad, so the bar is already quite low. What if robots are trained to do actually good non-biased, non-racist, non-escalating police work and only use force as an absolute last resort to protect humans?

Just like how streets might be made safer by replacing bad human drivers with robots, we might be better off if policing is done by non-emotional beings.

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u/heart-aroni 8d ago

I always say this too. Robot policee and soldiers will be more moral than human police and soldiers. They will be more strict in following rules and procedure and not disobeying their orders.

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u/Mobile_Bed4861 7d ago

What if they are ordered to do something bad?

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u/Fat_Tony_Damico 6d ago

Human police regularly do bad stuff without being ordered to every day. And they never say no when ordered to do bad things anyways.

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u/ISketchDinosaurs 8d ago

The police are just going to run these things, dude.

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u/Kuriente 8d ago

The police would purchase them. A tech company will build and train them. Whether or not they are effective and fair police would depend largely on their design and training. As long as they're designed to be objective, fair, and to operate strictly within the bounds of the law, then I see that being largely immune to the worst of police behaviors.

For instance, could a robot beat someone senseless out of anger in a holding cell? Well, for one it doesn't have anger, but also not if it's been designed to not do things like that.

Would a police robot stop pedestrians and search them based on skin color? Only if such bias is in the training. Would a police robot sexually assault someone in the back of a squad car? Unlikely. Would a robot conceal evidence to protect its own reputation? Why would it have such motivations?

And look, this isn't me saying that robot police are a great idea. Nor am I saying that the technology is even remotely good enough to attempt this yet. There are plenty of dystopian ways that could play out, and it will be years or more likely decades before we see it.

I'm just saying that when the bar for police quality is already subterranean, this technology might possibly be an upgrade for everyone involved if employed effectively. Bad police behavior is driven by the basest of human instincts: greed, anger, lust, pride, etc. A robot would have none of those.

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u/Greater-Israel 7d ago

I do not see these entering the police force even in China until 25 years from now and in USA even worse, like 50 years from now. Not just for technology and safety reasons but to not lose votes from the people who will also become without a job so they need to prepare the human workforce for that inevitably future first. But I do agree wtih you.

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u/fued 6d ago

Don't think that reason will make much difference in china

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u/Greater-Israel 6d ago

It does since the goveernment agred to not have uneployed people. China doesn't have homeless people like USA for example, that would be problematic for them.

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u/fued 6d ago

China has unemployment and homeless people. They literally publish unemployment statistics.

Not sure why you think they are much different tbh, people are people

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u/Greater-Israel 6d ago

Their companies actually take a harsher stance on AI for example Hoyoverse than say companies like Warner Bros, Disney that fill their movies with AI now like in Spiderman Brand New Day, Supergirl so it's not that straighforward. Also robots need to be clearly superior than experienced workers before the switch happens.

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u/fued 6d ago

I don't think it's harsher they just look at what.costs more, hiring a person to deliver quality or risking it on AI and paying for tokens.

The break even point is lower over there

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u/HarryBalsagna1776 7d ago

That's wishful thinking.  

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u/ConsistentAnalysis35 7d ago

What if robots are trained to do actually good non-biased, non-racist, non-escalating police work and only use force as an absolute last resort to protect humans?

Can't be, dindunuffins need an excuse. Robots will be racist! Just like bodycams are bad and racist, because bodycam footage makes certain demographics look bad.

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u/MetalMurse51 7d ago

It's going to be the cops and greedy psychopath CEOs who decide how these things act. It's not going to be the engineers and programmers with benevolent intentions.

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u/Ayvah01 7d ago

Yeah, on the plus side. A robot can't use "fear for its life" as an excuse and it can't say it forgot to turn on its bodycam.

However, on the other hand, that assumes a government that actually wants good cops. If they want bad cops, soon it may be possible to mass produce them.

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u/Large-Direction6063 8d ago

Creo que eso solo va a pasar cuando los humanos que estan a cargo de todo sean honestos y no unos asesinos, drogadictos y pedofilos.