Azimov's laws in perspective

2013-02-25 20:04:43 | Packaging Digest: In the early 1940s, when science-fiction master Isaac Azimov laid out his three (and later four) "Laws of Robotics," robots, themselves, were entirely fictitious. At that time, automation technology had barely progressed beyond the Jacquard loom. Half a century later, things that can be legitimately characterized as "robots" are all around us. Periodically I get treated to the spectacle of my wife screaming into her cellphone at some slug-brained automated system with whom she's trying to negotiate an online transfer of funds to pay some bill. She screams because the obstinacy of even the politest automated clerk inspires anger and frustration.