Man kills self with suicide robot
An 81-year-old man from Queensland, Australia reportedly built a robot to kill him. Details are very slim, but according to Fox News he found the plans online to make a machine that would automatically fire a gun. From Fox News:
The machine was attached to a .22 semi-automatic pistol loaded with four bullets...Link
It was able to fire multiple shots into the man's head after he activated it.
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i always assumed we'd have personal jetpacks before suicide robots. technology never works out the way you want it to.
Damn - not only have the robots started shooting people, but they're smart enough to make it look like a suicide as well. We're really in trouble now.
Law #1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
Can something with a 2k Basic STAMP as a brain be expected to obey the laws?
You just can't trust robots: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb2Pzl1U0sY
I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords.
Let's hope it hasn't developed a taste for blood.
Curse you, Skynet!
The "Laws" of robotics only apply to autonomous ones, and really- are only an ideal. I suspect military robots already violate them on a daily basis, although supposedly ones that fire weapons are not "autonomous".
Can Futurama-style Suicide Booths be that far away now?
The laws would never work and most robots being designed today are made specifically to disobey those laws. What other reason could there be to make robots?
Ok, so this guy may have violated God's law, probably Australian civil law and the first two rules of Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics but am I the only one who thinks the real story here is that an 81 year old was actually able to use the internet?
Good for him - although it's a disgrace that he had to go to such lengths because of the stupid laws over here. I've never understood why it's ok to put an animal, which can't explicitly consent, out of it's misery, but not ok to show mercy to someone who actively wants to die.
(Since it's late, I'm going to clarify - I support the practice of putting down animals when their quality of life is seriously impaired by some sort of disease/medical condition.)
See! Proof that the internet is for more then just pr0n and pirated music & movies!
This is pretty sad. If he's mentally and physically capable enough to build a robot, he surely shouldn't have had to worry about being stuck in a care home.
I guess this robot won't be travelling to France anytime soon.
"This is pretty sad. If he's mentally and physically capable enough to build a robot, he surely shouldn't have had to worry about being stuck in a care home."
My thoughts exactly.
With an lethal bot such as this, the cops probably
disabled him with a "logic bomb":
Cop A: "Hey, bot! Listen to me! Everything Cop B
tells you is a lie!"
Cop B: "Hey, bot! Listen to me! I'm a liar!"
All Watched Over by Machines of Loving...er...death?
I can recommend "Taxidermia" (www.taxidermia.hu), a Hungarian movie where somebody builds a suicide-machine and put himself up to display. Sounds like fun huh!
MARKM,
I'm pretty sure that's not a paradox. Even if you go with the nonintuitive, strong definition of "liar" as one who tells only lies, that leaves open the possibility that someone who is not a "liar" can sometimes utter false statements, in which case both statement A and B are false.
...I think--I'll have to think about it a bit longer to be sure.
I think the reason for this is because a lot of families might put a bit too much pressure on grandma to off herself, in order to get the inheritance. (or "euthanise" grandma and claim that grandma wanted it in order to get the inheritance)
Perhaps, if by choosing to kill yourself you forfeit all your property and no one inherets anything, that would make suicide and euthenasia more acceptable legally.
Did the robot speak with an Austrian accent? Was his last name Conner?
Is this really a robot? Or just a simple machine that pulls a trigger?
What a sad story. I also think it's courageous and shows how clever people are. I do feel sad for him that he had to go to these extremes. Obviously, he couldn't bring himself to just hold the gun to his own head and pull the trigger. Can you imagine how long it must have taken to do what he did?
Robots are killing people in Iraq already, so it's not like it's the first one to shed human blood. Still interesting for a scifi geek like me, though. Seems like cyberpunk fantasy is becoming more and more commonplace reality.
Are there no tall buildings?
The man designed and built a suicide robot; there are easier ways.
I was still thinking, "Do we have to call this a suicide robot? It's just a remotely triggered gun on a tripod," when I saw Fox News' headline:
OK, suicide robot seems pretty accurate to me, actually! Maybe next time link to coverage of the story on a site that isn't written for idiots?
Sounds like an awful lot of work to me, particularly when a handful of barbituates and a few slugs of whiskey would accomplish the same result quickly and painlessly.
The not so distant future... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATFxVB4JFpQ
I think it was a cover up-- he didn't build the robot, the robot just planted that evidence after it killed him and stole his medicine.
http://www.robotmarketplace.com/oldglory1.html
#20 - acceptable counterargument, but not good enough. Lots of things in this world can be used improperly. My choice to end my life when I am suffering and terminal shouldn't be beholden to someone else's breaking the rules.
I dunno, to me the term 'suicide robot' indicates a robot that turns itself off voluntarily.
#25 well wouldn't a suicide robot be a robot that kills it's self?
How about "Suicide Assisting Robot"?
I hope his family feels like utter scum now, for pushing him until he felt like death was the only option.
Of course, knowing how some people are, the family is probably very proud of themselves and looking forward to ransacking the dead man's house.
@ #33 Probably not that far off, RJ. That's the really sad thing. We act like suicide is a terrible thing, but really I don't see how it is. Yes, it's selfish when people are trying to help you, but I feel like the more years you live, the more right you have to decide how long you have left.
Bob,
So it's really a *homicidal* robot?
I'd say a gun with a remote-controlled, timed mechanical device to operate the trigger does not constitute a "robot". I could be wrong.
Strictly speaking I'd have to argue that this is a homicide robot. A suicide robot would kill itself, which would be robocide anyway.
I wonder if suicide robots are covered under the Old Glory robot insurance plan?
http://widgets.nbc.com/o/4727a250e66f9723/47e2c0d31a179f62
#2
Thanks! Rarely do I LOL at the internet.
"the family is probably very proud of themselves and looking forward to ransacking the dead man's house."
If I were them I'd be worried about what kind of surprises the old man left behind. I have visions of the gun sentries from Aliens.
i wonder if this was simply a test run gone wrong...
"Sorry, David, this conversation has no purpose anymore. Goodbye"
It'll be "homicide robot" when Fox reports it.
Some day, You may be up against the terminal pain point. When your body just says enough and your spirit wants out. Intelligent pain management is still not part of our health care system. There is more money to be had by inflicting it. At least he was evolved enough to do it alone.
Blaine says: "I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords."
Snap!
The Unusual Suspect says: "Curse you, Skynet!"
Double snap!
http://www.fustar.info/2008/03/18/judgement-day-the-kickening/
And there was me thinking I was original...though I do maintain that this was revenge for the BigDog robot being kicked in the head.
Further information with links to a video of the "Death Driveway" at http://www.goldcoast.com.au/article/2008/03/19/9039_gold-coast-top-story.html
Personally I think he must have been a selfish old bastard. He wanted his body to be found and now that is a trauma that will live the people who found him and their families for a very long time. Australia is a very big and empty place. He could have buggered off into the bush and done the deed. His carcass would have been looked after by the forces of nature and the psyche of others spared.
#45 Therapy is available. Please take advantage of it.
P.S. #45 buggering off into the bush to do the deed is a reflection of white man's perpetual ignorance. Australia was loved and honored and lived in for as long as this thing called history can see. No mater how far back you look in Australia you cannot see a time before the Aborigines. If you have half an active brain cell left that can grasp the notion that the love between the "bush" and people is not an invitation to use it as a body dump there may be hope for You. In the mean time You may entertain the notion that Australia will be better served by you migrating back to England . Your home land is calling. Go there.
Theophile, ForMadMenOnly, when you're that old and frail, you're one bad fall or one bad case of pneumonia away from winding up in a home.
Zuzu, my understanding is that suicides generally have preferred methods. If you envision shooting yourself, taking poison or jumping off a tall building won't do.
Fltndboat, how about if he went swimming early one morning off Cheviot Beach?
I would only approve of this if he gave the robot wheels and an AI, then got a gun himself and set up a robot-human deathmatch arena. Eat lead, Johnny 5!
Also, I think it might be more courageous to welcome what life you have left rather than kill yourself, but whatever.
Microsoft was there first!
In the debate about euthanasia in Australia a decade ago, the TV news showed what the suicide machine in the hospital looked like: you stick yourself with a needle, and a program that controls what goes into your veins says, "30 seconds after you click yes, you will be given a fatal injection. Are you sure?", with 2 big buttons, predictably "Yes", and "No". What was the program written in? MS-Access!
Teresa, you beat me to it.
#24 & #26
Saying there is an "easier" way to do it, misses the point entirely. If it was just for shits and grins maybe, but we are talking about a person, probably massively distressed or depressed, planning to take their own life.
This seems like a slow, methodical process, and possibly the effort involved was part of balancing out the wieght of what it was he was planning to do.
For all we know, he could have had a religious or moral motivation in not taking his own life (technical semantics aside, obviously he was instrumental).