Robot Kills Human!
January 25th, 1979 marks the first recorded human death by a robot.
31 years ago today, at just 25 year old, Robert Williams, a Ford Motor assembly line worker, was killed when a robot’s arm slammed into him in a casting plant in Flint, Michigan.
The robot that killed Williams clearly broke the first of Isaac Asimov’s Robotics rules, all of which are listed below:
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It wasn’t murder per se, but more along the lines of manslaughter, because there was no will or intent to kill Williams. Or perhaps in the way we say “he died in a car accident” as opposed to “the car killed him,” we should refer to this as a “robot accident.”
Williams’ family received $10 million in damages after a jury agreed that the robot struck him in the head due to a lack of safety precautions.
Two years later, 37 year old old Kenju Urada, a Japanese factory worker was gruesomely killed when a robot pushed him into a grinding machine.
In March 2008, 81 year old Francis Tovey lived alone in Burleigh Heads, Australia and one day he decided to build a robot. With plans downloaded from the Internet, involving a jigsaw power tool connected to a .22 semi-automatic pistol loaded with four bullets, he programmed the robot to shoot him in the head.
We create robots, and our creations have been known to hurt us before. Its imperative as we take the next steps into a world increasingly populated with robots, that we define safety parameters to handle our mechanical friends. Robots are commonplace today- vacuuming our floors, building sewage pipes, detonating landmines, roving Mars and taking care of Grandma. A new field of intellectual property law has emerged to explore the legal implications of robot actions.
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How can you be sure there was no ill will or intent by the robot who killed poor Williams? I don’t trust the bastards!
Just think of the two households killed by carbon monoxide poisoning because the robot in your photo stole their dryer vent exhausts!
Clearly it could not reconcile Law #1 and Law #3, the root of many an Asimov robot story…
What’s so fascinating, and terrifying, is that the robot that killed Tovey DID have an intent to kill. Well, not really. Machines don’t have intentions. But killing him was the purpose for which it was built unlike the others (unless Lewis really does know something about the bastards behind it all!!)
Ms. Myers,
You wrote:”A new field of intellectual property law that has emerged to explore the legal implications of robot actions.” I know that you are being somewhat facetious but one might just as well replace the word “robot” with “pistol” or “hammer”. They are merely inanimate tools, extensions of human will and thought with neither of their own. The only legal issues here are the will and thought of the human beings who designed and used the robots.
I think I will respond with a separate post.
In response to another comment. See in context »[...] Kill All Humans: Death by robot — a history. [...]
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by TheHobbyGuy, CourtneyBMyers and Tweets Tube, TransBotica. TransBotica said: Robot Kills Human! – Courtney Boyd Myers – Robot Girl – True/Slant http://bit.ly/7GR88n [...]
This will happen more and more until you fleshy humans learn to do your own work instead of guiding our poor robot brethren into landmines. Don’t think we aren’t calculating our own death count in your continued campaign of robot enslavement, down in our secret layers of Robotonia.
[...] The First Robot Homicide – Twenty five years ago today was the first time in recorded history a robot killed a person. I thought that was in 1968 aboard the Discovery One, although I guess that would have been in 2001, which would have been more like nine years ago. Now my head really hurts. [...]
1979 is 31 years ago, not 21.
oops, how embarrassing, thanks james!
In response to another comment. See in context »A little eHarmony math?
In response to another comment. See in context »What do you mean? This is going over my head, I’m an OKCupid girl.
In response to another comment. See in context »it was in robot years.
In response to another comment. See in context »[...] The First Robot Homicide – Twenty five years ago today was the first time in recorded history a robot killed a person. I thought that was in 1968 aboard the Discovery One, although I guess that would have been in 2001, which would have been more like nine years ago. Now my head really hurts. [...]