Astroboy, Japanese manga, 1952-present
As robots become more common in the household, as domestic help, pets, companions, or medical assistants, their design and functionality may vary based on cultural factors.
Japan, as perhaps the world's largest producer and consumer of robotics, is an interesting case. A rapidly aging population, along with a reticence to bring foreign domestic help into the household, combine to create an ideal situation for the introduction of household robotic helpers. In addition, there are some who think that the Shintoism and animist belief systems of Japanese make them more accepting of robots than Westerners.
Westerners, with some religion-based strictures against idol-worship, may have negative feelings toward robots in daily life.
The following quotations from a Japanese scholar and a roboticist illuminate some aspects of Japanese culture and spirituality in relation to robots.
"In Japan, most people still have an animist sensibility. We've always prayed to water gods or whatever. In the same way when we see a robot, we respond to the spirit. We feel like we have to take care of it and respect it." - Rie Nakamura, Waseda University
“If you make something, your heart will go into the thing you are making. So a robot is an external self. If a robot is an external self, a robot is your child.” - Masahiro Mori, Japanese roboticist
(http://factsanddetails.com/japan.php?itemid=873&catid=26&subcatid=163)
Examples of Japanese Robots
HRP-4C, developed by Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 2009
Toshiba ApriPoco prototype, 2008
Honda Asimo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tRo6a4VhvU
Examples of U.S. Robots
Anybots QB, 2010
iRobot Roomba 780 vacuum cleaner
Though the above photos are anything but an exhaustive sample, it does seem that Japanese domestic robots are anthropomorphic to a greater degree than their U.S. counterparts. The HRP-4C (pictured above) has a human-like face, and the Honda Asimo looks like an astronaut and is depicted playing with children. The U.S. produced Anybot, on the other hand, was described by WIRED Magazine as “a self-propelled Skype cam on a stick” (WIRED, May 2010), and the iRobot Roomba is much more closely related to a frisbee in form than anything animal. Do these divergent design tendencies suggest that cultural differences affect how robots are envisioned? Are Japanese more willing to accept domestic robots as beings, while Americans are more likely to see them simply as tools?
Perhaps the answers are not so clear cut. It turns out that Americans also like to anthropomorphize their robots. Remember that Roomba? A Georgia Tech professor recently published a study revealing that many Roomba owners develop emotional bonds with their robots, naming them, traveling with them, and even dressing them up. (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21102202/)
What is clear is that we will increasingly interact with robots in our daily lives, and will develop “relationships” with them. The tension between the desire to see domestic robots as beings versus their strictly functional intent and actual lack of emotion will accompany the proliferation of domestic robots. Though it requires much more investigation to determine how, and to what degree, it is certainly likely that culture affects how individuals and societies negotiate this tension, and how readily they will welcome robots into the family.
思創生活/ Eli Kao
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