HIST / MLL / ASIA 090-011: Is the Future of Humanity Asian?

A trailblazing inquiry into human love and relationships in the age of super-smart technology Technology is our new life partner. No longer confined to the sidelines, new interactive technologies like AI therapists, avatar friends, and robot assistants are ready to transform technology's role from basic tools of convenience to intimate elements of our social and emotional lives. This turn towards human-like technology signals the beginning of a new epoch in human history, a change already facing both excitement and resistance. Blending science, sociology, history, and psychology, Relationships 5.0 asks how recent technological developments cause us to think differently about our family lives, love affairs, and emotional needs. It argues that we are currently living through a technological paradigm shift similar in magnitude to the preceding agricultural, industrial, and informational revolutions in human history. Thanks to the convergence of the cognitive revolution (AI), the sensorial revolution (VR and AR), and the physical revolution (robots), technology can now fulfill emotional, intellectual, and physical needs that have until now been met by other humans. While many are still wary of human-technology companionship, Relationships 5.0 reveals that these novel interactions aren't as risky as we'd once thought, but can instead make our social and emotional lives richer and more diverse. Still, we must ask: What will the age of Relationships 5.0 look like? How should we prepare for such an age? Who might already be ready to embrace these changes, and why? Guiding readers away from fear and toward a new reality, Relationships 5.0 exposes the fundamental questions behind such essentials as companionship, trust, and love--and offers fascinating and revealing ideas about what the coming years will look like.

Published to accompany a major exhibition at The Science Museum, London, running from 8 February 2017 to 3 September 2017 and featuring over 100 robots, dating from the 16th century to the present day Features essays from expert contributors, covering every aspect of our relationship with robots from the ancient world and into the future  Humanoid robots are some of the most wondrous machines ever built. By imagining and reconstructing ourselves in artificial bodies, we are able to discover what amazing machines we are. But while mirroring our humanity, robots also offer insights into how we have rationalized our technological ambitions, our sense of wonder at ourselves, and our position in a rapidly changing world. Robots: the 500-Year Quest to Make Machines Human explores the surprisingly long history of our obsession with creating machines in human form, from 16th-century mechanized monks to the 'tin man' robots of the 1950s and cutting-edge robots from today's research labs. This ground-breaking book features an astonishing array of robotic artifacts from around the world, including expertly crafted clockwork automata, uncanny robot actors, trumpet-playing humanoids and even a talking 'receptionist' head. Focusing on why robots exist rather than on how they work, the book avoids clichés about machines taking over the world and destroying humankind, and instead aims to reassure us that in future robots will continue to complement and enhance our human capabilities.