Ranking of sci-fi robots

movieweb.com/best-female-robots-in-sci-fi-movies/

Robot versus robotic is one problem (i.e. Stepford), but also the definition of Robot has expanded.

I like to think in terms of robots (mechanical-looking humanoids) and Androids (humanized synthetic machines), Cyborgs (machine inside, human outside), and AI (talks and responds like human).

The Cylons are a case in point where they went from terrifying metal monsters to profoundly sexy women (androids) who deliberately abused the boundary between human and machine, and also tossed in religion.

And where do we classify creations like the Avatars in Cameron's movies, which are chimeras with human drivers. 

Or completely biological beings (maybe enhanced biology) with synthetic brains?  Sexbots?

Or completely robotic bodies with human brains. 

Fun stuff to play around with in speculative fiction.

But robots have definitely morphed since I started reading robot novels in the 1950's, going from metal monsters to beings indistinguishable from actual human (by other than advanced means), or even superhuman.

But I still think we need more precise terms than just 'robot'. 

Especially given a bot can now be anything, even just a software algorithm. 

Shadar

If they can successfully identify a truck, or a stoplight, they aren't a robot.

MackTheMouse2 wrote:

If they can successfully identify a truck, or a stoplight, they aren't a robot.

Those image identification tests are going to become useless pretty soon. AI can easily discern shapes now. Soon it will be built into every operating system whether from Microsoft, Google or Apple, all of whom are planning on incorporating generative and pattern-recognizing AI into upcoming releases of the base OS. 

Have you seen the ads for Google phones that can identify and swap faces on the fly? That's on a friggin' phone. Photography, even the journalistic variety, which has long been regarded as Truth (albeit with a slow erosion in recent decades), will become completely relative, virtual and just another form of fiction that can't be differentiated from reality. 

Hold onto your hats... big wind coming. The Post-Truth era. 

Shadar

shadar wrote:

But robots have definitely morphed since I started reading robot novels in the 1950's, going from metal monsters to beings indistinguishable from actual human (by other than advanced means), or even superhuman.

Shadar
 

In the 1950's I was reading Dick and Jane: See Spot. See Spot go. Go, Spot Go!