Sophia the robot’s co-creator says the bot may not be true AI, but it is a work of art
Sophia the robot was made a citizen of Saudi Arabia last month, but a lot of people weren’t happy about it.
Some noted the grim irony of a robot receiving ‘rights’ in a country where women were only recently allowed to drive. Others said it set a bad precedent for how we might treat robots in future. (AI ethicist Joanna Bryson told The Verge the stunt was “obviously bullshit.”) Some were annoyed about the perception of Sophia itself — a robot that’s also a media star, with magazine cover-shoots, talk show appearances, and even a speech to the UN. Experts in the field sometimes decry Sophia as emblematic of AI hype, and say that although the bot is presented as being a few software updates away from human-level consciousness, it’s more…
