On man-machine co-evolution

Most people forgot about R.U.R by Karl Capek — written in 1921 with one eye on the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. It introduced introduced the word “robot” to the English language, chosen as having been in Slavic language as “robota” (forced laborer), a term which classified those peasants obligated to compulsory service under the feudal system widespread in 19th century Europe — a view that seems prescient in regards with the recent article on digital feudalism by Sebastien Soriano, the President of the French telecom regulator.

With the birth of the three Laws of Robotics, Isaac Asimov’s robots are the firsts to translate the rules of co-evolution in a way that could be understandable to humans — and it should not be forgotten that Asimov was an avid commentator of the Bible.

The idea of artificial intelligence in itself first appeared at the Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence in 1956 where it is supposed to have been coined by John McCarthy, Marvin Minsky, Nathaniel Rochester and Claude Shannon. It lived as a research field for a while, but it became better known to the public thanks to the work of cyberpunk writers from the 80’s and the 90’s, giving finally birth to the concept of singularity.

Then, the concept of singularity got picked up by transhumanists.

And here we are.