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posted by mrpg on Saturday July 21 2018, @10:46AM   Printer-friendly
from the obviously dept.

Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd

The majority of robots are white. Do a Google image search for "robot" and see for yourself: The whiteness is overwhelming. There are some understandable reasons for this; for example, when we asked several different companies why their social home robots were white, the answer was simply because white most conveniently fits in with other home decor.

But a new study suggests that the color white can also be a social cue that results in a perception of race, especially if it's presented in an anthropomorphic context, such as being the color of the outer shell of a humanoid robot. In addition, the same issue applies to robots that are black in color, according to the study. The findings suggest that people perceive robots with anthropomorphic features to have race, and as a result, the same race-related prejudices that humans experience extend to robots.

Source: Humans Show Racial Bias Towards Robots of Different Colors: Study


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  • (Score: 2) by Arik on Sunday July 22 2018, @07:22AM

    by Arik (4543) on Sunday July 22 2018, @07:22AM (#710686) Journal
    If anyone is actually 'white' then it's albinos, and even they I would be tempted to characterize as more 'pink' thank 'white.' "White" is a mostly US-centric "racial" code that typically means something like 'caucasian' yet more subjective with cultural connotations added. At any rate, people coded as "white" in this sense are NOT "white" in the sense of color, they range from pink to tan or dark olive perhaps, but the one color people don't actually come in is white.

    Which takes the whole thesis to the edge of absurdity. Both things are said to be "white" but the word is being used in two entirely different meanings. "Strong" can mean able to move a relatively large amount of mass around, or it can mean durable, or it can even mean stinky; and it could even be used cleverly to imply more than one of those things is true at the same time. And using one sense at the beginning then switching to a different sense of the same word midway through is a common and powerful technique for creating humor.

    But doing the same thing in an ostensibly serious, logical argument is not a great technique. It's actually a fallacy, called equivocation.

    In a syllogism with alternate meanings indicated in parenthesis this might be a little easier to spot.

    Since only man (kind) is rational,
    and no woman is a man (male,)
    Therefore no woman is rational.

    Classic equivocation, "man" in the first line is used in its primary meaning; mankind, the human race; but in the second line it's used in a much more restrictive double-derived sense (man vs woman, a modern delusion, woman itself being wyf-man, a type of man.)

    So what we're seeing here is not a logical syllogism, it's a weaker form of logic, but the same trick is being played with the key word. One moment it means one thing, one moment something entirely different, but the authors pretend they are the same thing.

    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
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