Day 13 – Part Deux – I Rowboat

“I am a human being” is just another way of saying “I am not a robot”. But part of me wishes I was a robot. Think about it: you’d be super-strong, calculations involving mathematics would be a joke, and you could turn off your emotions whenever you wanted. I think that last one would be the most useful, especially if you were heading into some big negotiations, like the merger of two large multi-national corporations. This way, your opponents couldn’t use psychological manipulation – well they could try but it wouldn’t work.

The only way the other side would be able to figure you out is if they had a robot of their own that was conducting the negotiations on their behalf. But then you run into the problem that if both robots are in autonomous mode (this would of course be a pre-condition in using one in the negotiations) there would be a non-zero chance of them falling into a Turing Loop. The only way out of this is if one of the robots loses power. And that’s a hell of a way to conclude the negotiations, let me tell you.

I’m bringing this up because last year Deutsche Bahn fired all it’s train conductors and replaced them with robots. It’s still too early to tell but the decision has been an complete success. And the service has never been better. In the first six months alone delays longer than 1 minutes have dropped to zero. I’ve read some reports that in early 2012 they will be starting Phase Two. I hope it’s as successful as Phase One. I can’t think of anything more exciting than having robots fly all the passenger jets originating from and destined to Frankfurt Airport.