Honey, The Humanoids Are Here !!

Honey! The Humanoids Are Here

A Look At Digital Assistants With A Human FacePhoto by Rock’n Roll Monkey on UnsplashThe course of history as a whole is no object of experience; history has no edios, because the course of history extends into the unknown future.” — Eric Voegelin

In very crude terms, we are a combination of our intellect (measured by Intelligence Quotient) and our emotions (measured by an Emotional Quotient). I say crude specifically because IQ and EQ’s are formulas that capture a limited aspect of our humanity. On the other hand of the spectrum, we have a least understood concept-consciousness. However, without EQ, it’s hard to imagine AI becoming more human every day. This article looks at how different businesses are busy putting a human mask on Artificial Intelligence to make robots seem more natural to actual people. While AI is undergoing a human transformation, it is also transforming the client experience and raising client expectations every day. This article looks at the evolution of AI and ends by asking a bigger question: are humanoids just another mile stone on the high way to cyborg town?

C 3po, Star Wars — By Source (WP:NFCC#4), Fair use

Does, art always imitate life? To a large extent, yes. However, it is almost uncanny how life imitates science fiction. If you are a Star Wars fan as I am, you were wondering when droids (by the way, the word “droid” is a registered trademark of Lucas Films) like R2 D2 and C 3po would become a reality? Guess what, that time has come.

A journey that began by making pieces of software automating mundane tasks and moved on to chat bots and digital assistants like Siri, Alexa and Cortana is now moving on to the next phase i.e. disguising AI with a human mask. The ramifications are easy to understand — AI with a human face can literally do everything humans do today just faster. In other words, the market for humanoids is limitless. Although, the technology is still in its early stages, its potential is overwhelming.

From Humans On A Telephone To Human Looking Machines On A Video

At first, there was globalization. The world of financial services and the business world in general exploited the economics of labor market in developed and developing economies to outsource contact centers to inexpensive English speaking nations like India. Information Technology Enabled Services (ITeS) became a major growth engine for India just like outsourced manufacturing became a growth engine for China. This continued until the wage differential narrowed to the point where it was no longer so obvious to outsource. Then came the search for smaller English speaking nations like the Philippines. Philippines now leads the world in English speaking contact centers.

Today, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence (ML&AI) are undergoing a new renaissance where automation is taking over where the economics of outsourcing were no longer very appealing. Robotic Process Automation (RPA) has automated a lot of routine batch work and advanced ML and AI algorithms will keep consuming higher order human work freeing up humans to be more creative. From drones to medical robots, robots are slowly taking up an increasingly vast array of work. Don’t get me wrong — outsourcing is still a massive industry. It’s just that the slew of alternatives have expanded to include AI. Humanoids will have a key role to play in replacing human labor within the business world.

Dude, How Many Robots Are There?

The word robot comes from a Czech word ‘robota’ meaning forced labor. The term was first used in K. Čapek’s play R.U.R. ‘Rossum’s Universal Robots’ (1920). However, there are many synonyms associated with robots. A robot is a much broader term that includes human looking robots and non-human looking robots. An Android is a robot with a human appearance. An android is a type of humanoid but not all humanoids are androids. Humanoid is a much broader term. Perhaps, the best way to describe is when the outward appearance of the robot is a human form. Then, there are cybernetic organisms i.e. humans with chips embedded. In other words, biological tissue merged with chips. At first, lets look at pure robots. Period. They may not look like humans. One of the broadest category of these robots are robotic pets or robotic vacuum cleaners.

Sony aibo (