The 4th Industrial Revolution will happen when “we start talking to computers like we talk to people and computers start taking care of parts of our lives for us, like doing the shopping, tidying the house”. But that’s not all, says Professor Arlindo Oliveira, “emotions will also end up being a natural development for computer systems”.
In the context of the 4th Industrial Revolution, entertainment, teaching and work itself will be completely different, says the author of the book Digital Minds: Science Redefining Humanity. This is a reality, says Arlindo Oliveira, for which small companies are better prepared than large ones and where it will be necessary to invest heavily in training.
“Emotions will end up being a natural development for computer systems and there will be systems with emotions,” says Arlindo Oliveira.
What do computers, cells and robots have in common? All the complexity that exists in today’s world came, over millions of years, purely from biological systems and cells. The world we see now is about 200 years old and would be completely alien to a person who lived 500 years ago. Cars, televisions, airplanes, telephones – 500 years ago people couldn’t have conceived of any of these things. We’re used to the reality that was created with the industrial revolution – the 3rd Industrial Revolution, which brought us computers, information technology, changed cell phones, changed the way we interact with the world. We walk around with our computers on our backs, always connected to the internet. The 4th Industrial Revolution, which will be when computers start behaving intelligently, will probably bring more changes. This is what is meant: at first it was cells, then brains and then computers. This will be the next version and an extension of human beings in some respects.
What will this 4th Industrial Revolution be like? It will happen when we talk to computers like we talk to people and computers start taking care of parts of our lives for us, like shopping or tidying the house. When the industrial revolution happened and we started building skyscrapers, railways, airports and airplanes, we changed the nature of the planet. Now, with these 3rd and 4th industrial revolutions, we’re going to make an even more profound change.
What examples do you see of technology supporting humanity’s evolution to the next stage? That’s a more long-term question. This environment in which people are constantly interconnected via their cell phones is something that is going to be more and more intense, which is going to increasingly affect all areas of activity, from education to entertainment. All these areas are going to change a lot. Technologies will probably evolve, although we can’t predict what they will become.
What role do emotions play? They are very important in the human species. They are not there by chance, but because they have developed in the evolutionary process, creating a series of actions and reactions in the human being. Fear, for example, leads us to run away from dangerous things, love leads us to reproduce. Emotions evolved because they give human beings a competitive advantage. Some say that emotions are the most advanced form of intelligence because they are the most difficult to automate.
“Although I’m not anticipating that one of these ‘assistants’ might wake up one day in a bad mood and respond badly, it seems reasonable to me that if we shout at him he might react with astonishment.”
And can they exist in these computer systems? At the moment, we tend not to associate emotions with computer systems. However, there are already many systems that can detect people’s emotions. It’s very natural that, as we want to improve the interface of these systems, they do this themselves and can have basic reactions and emotions such as “I can tell you’re tired” or “I can tell you’re bored”. The second step is to empathize with these emotions. Although I’m not anticipating that one of these “assistants” might wake up one day in a bad mood and respond badly (I don’t think that’s reasonable), it seems reasonable to me that if you shout at it, it might have a surprised reaction, because that makes the interaction more natural. It would be strange to have a system that is, for the most part, human, but then doesn’t get upset, doesn’t get angry, always responds in the same tone. Emotions will eventually exist in these systems too.
How will they be programmed? These systems are no longer programmed in detail. Instead, they learn from interaction. I think many of them will end up being trained to display certain sets of emotions that facilitate human interaction. Often, the emotions are on the side of the person perceiving the emotion. For example: animals don’t talk, we don’t know what they think, but it’s very easy to attribute emotions to them (angry, hungry). There are a number of experiments in which robots have been trained to relate to people in the same way that animals do. So people end up attributing emotions to robots and empathizing with them. I believe that we are going to have systems with emotions, probably more controlled and less oscillating than human beings.
Will we be partners or rivals of computer systems? I hope we’ll be partners. There’s no point in being rivals. If we get into that situation, it means we’ve done something wrong. But it’s not impossible that when we design systems we set them objectives that conflict with our own. For example, we could ask a system to prevent global warming, but the best way to prevent it is to walk, and then there could be a conflict of objectives. I hope that when very complex systems are designed, it will be guaranteed that humanity’s interests always come first.
What examples do you see of this alignment of objectives? For example, in autonomous cars, safeguarding human lives must always be the top priority, although sometimes choices have to be made. That’s where we have to ensure alignment. Imagine a 100,000 euro car, programmed to avoid destroying itself. At some point, it may have to choose between destroying itself and falling down a ravine, or running over a person. These decisions have to be made. These problems also exist when you’re a driver, but you don’t usually have time and your reactions are instinctive. Computers, as they are much faster, will almost always be able to decide and make the choice of whether or not to run someone over. We have to make sure that the decisions made by the computer are aligned with human interests and values.
(excerpt from an interview published in the magazine Tecnologia & Qualidade 5, in January 2018) Full interview available at https://www.isq.pt/os-computadores-vao-extensao-dos-seres-humanos
