Once robots are capable of imagination and compassion will humans be obsolete?

[SuperFerret]

Animals are a product of their environment. They adapt to what they need to do to survive. AI will probably be a product of it's environment. If you surround the AI with war programs and simulations, then it will probably be hostile. But if you surround it with programs that don't promote such hostility, then it could be more docile. And if you don't threaten it's survival, but treat it with respect, then it would have no need to develop aggressive traits.
EDI from Mass Effect 2 could be a good example of a docile AI. The crew of the Normandy works with her, and respect her eventually because she saves them at one point. But she's also concerned with her survival when her ship is attacked, so she finds the best way to fight back.

AnimalsLifeforms also mutate and adapt in seemingly random ways, not all of which are beneficial to their survival. They also alter their behavioral patterns. Also, they do this on their own, without conscious effort on their part or on the parts of lifeforms that oversee them.

A.I. will not ever be alive, therefore it should be always under human control, and should never be progressed to the point where it could even remotely have the potential to be self-aware, imaginative, or anything remotely similar to actual intelligence.

 

[Speedball]

^ Yeah, it's all hypothetical of course. I highly doubt anything like Skynet or HAL will ever happen, but it's fun to think about.

 

[SuperFerret]

I've never hidden my dislike of technology and the rate at which it's advancing, it doesn't take much imagination to see how I feel about the concept of sentient A.I.

 

[Alex The Great]

Idiots, when Robots get imagination, we will all be transported to a LOTR like world. Has Futurama tought you nothing?

 

[mongoose-mania]

Chancellor:You are obsolete, Mr.Wordsworth!

Wordsworth: A lie, no man is obsolete!

Chancellor: You have no function, Mr.Wordsworth. You're an innacuranism, like a ghost from another time....

Wordsworth: I am nothing more than a reminder to you that you cannot destroy truth by burning pages!

Chancellor: You're a bug,Mr.Wordsworth. A crawling insect. An ugly, misformed, little creature, that has no purpose here, no meaning!

Wordsworth: I am a human being...

Chancellor: You're a librarian, Mr.Wordsworth. You're a dealer in books and two cent finds and pamphlets in closed stacks in the musty finds of a language factory that spews meaningless words on an assembly line. WORDS, Mr.WORDSworth. That have no substance, no dimension, like air, like the wind. Like a vacuum, that you make believe have an existence, by scribbling index numbers on little cards.

Wordsworth: I don't care. I tell you: I don't care. I'm a human being, I exist....and if I speak one thought aloud, that thought lives, even after I'm shoveled into my grave.






Granted, the episode is about a librarian deemed obsolete (and thus put to death) by the state because there are no more libraries. Still, you should watch that episode of The Twilight Zone. If not for the message within its dialogue, then for the awesomeness that is Burgess Meredith!

Amen.