Rommetveit, Kjetil and Gunnarsdottir, Kristrun and Dijk, Niels van and Smits, Martijntje (2012) Working paper on the state-of-art of assessments of the societal impacts of autonomous robots. [Report] (Unpublished)
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
The purpose of this Working Paper for WP4 is to map the state-of-art of assessments of societal impacts of more autonomous robots. This includes to “assess the assessments” and begin the process of identifying relevant actors / epistemic networks and a small set (1-3) of targeted policy questions to develop the case study. The creation of (more) autonomous robots may be seen, on the one hand, as an important instantiation of converging technologies. On the other hand, more autonomy for robots seems to be as old as (modern) robotics, and so should not be taken for granted, even though there is little doubt that robotics development is rapidly advancing. This case study will engage with the efforts of one large consortium of European researchers (75+ partners) formed around a proposal for a FET flagship status. In case of funding this group will be joined with partners from industry, education and public services. It is organised around strategic planning of how to create the next generation of more autonomous, possibly sentient, robots, i.e., Robot Companions for Citizens (manifesto at http://www.robotcompanions.eu/). in mapping out this technoscientific vision and what has been assessed to-date, we set this case study in motion in preparation for the embedding phase of EPINET.