Robot Race - Utopian Society

Hello there, fellow Starbounders.

This thread is a mix between an idea/suggestion and a topic open for general discussion. Feel free to participate if you'd like.

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My university degree envelops English culture. As such, one of the things I'm studying these days is the book Utopia by Thomas More. To those who are not aware of it, the book was conceived around the first half of the 16th century and, basically, it is a critique to the way society functions (those in power, such as nobles and clergymen, do not care for those below them. These individuals are also flatterers, as they tell the sovereigns what they want to hear in order to maintain their positions; money is power and power corrupts; kingdoms set out in wars of conquest to expand their realms instead of properly running what they already have, etc.) and, moreover, Utopia envisions a fictional egalitarian place called Utopia that is quite the opposite of the European society of the time. In Utopia, wealth is land and the land belongs to all. As a result, all members must work the fields and raise cattle - everyone is a valuable member of the community who must work in order to achieve certain results. If a certain item is required, for instance, a farming tool, it is simply granted, since the main concept is that it belongs to everyone anyways. They are not simple workers, as the citizens of this place utilise their free time to educate themselves. In terms of marriage, both parties must be adults and give their consent, which contrasts with the arranged marriages for children of the actual society of the time. Another aspect of this community is that they have a variety of religions within their domain that are tolerant towards one another. To Utopians, gold and silver (luxury) are despised and money is merely used to fund mercenary forces to battle enemies when the Utopians are under attack, since they never seek out war themselves. However, the concept of slavery exists in this society - members who, for some reason, break the law, will have to endure a life of servitude. Nevertheless, we can then consider the Utopian people as an overall peaceful, self-suficient, tolerant, egalitarian and knowledgeable nation.

This way of thinking is a sort of concept that relates to later Marxism and Communism. What we have in Utopia is a pure and untainted vision for a better and pleasant society. However, as my professor shared a couple of classes ago, its evolved and mutated form of Communism did not work very well in countries where it was applied in these last couple of centuries due to the fact that those in charge distorted the concept and made it work towards their own goals, instead of the benefit of the people.

A friend of mine told me something else today in regards to this topic, which is that Man, by nature, is a creature driven by competition-like instincts and desires to succeed and acquire wealth continuously. People do not merely want to be another part of the machine - They want to be more. Moreover, Man requires 'proper motivation' in order to work, giving priority to a paycheck at the end of the month rather than communal work that benefits everyone in the long run. Therefore, according to my friend's beliefs, the Utopian concept will not work, as it is not compatible with the natural way that people behave.

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After my friend had shared this with me, I found myself applying the topic to Starbound... All right, a Utopian way of thinking might be difficult to be applied by sentient beings, as they possess the concept of identity and might feel theirs threatened if they choose to embrace a society that puts everyone on the same level and imbues upon them similar tasks. But what about robots? (Note that I'm using the typical idea that people have regarding robots - Logic over emotion) They seem like the perfect candidates to set a Utopian community in motion. Since feelings are something that they typically do not consider to be of primary importance, they can see past the moral obstacles of Utopia and work together, with no complaints, with no desire to be better than their fellow drone, towards a successful future. Furthermore, they are more 'immune' to the corruption that money and power might bring and, as such, the concept of cash does not really work within their society - They would only use it in order to trade with those who venture to and/or come from other sides of the galaxy, such as the player (even if the player is a robot, since all players are considered travellers). Therefore, robots would be self-sufficient hard-workers that do not care for individual success, but value community prosperity instead. They would only wage war in order to defend themselves and are quite acceptable towards difference.

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That was a long post. If you've read all of that, thank you for your time. Feel free to share your opinions!

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*Edit: Some extra info on both Utopia and Starbound that I've added on page 2.

 

I did read it all; anything with "society" or "Utopia" on the title beckons me.

I'm currently writing a series of sci-fi/fantasy novels featuring, among many other things, an alien humanoid species with a kind of Utopian society, primarily because they have no biological need for competition. For this I've been studying different kinds of government and social philosophies (including the reasons behind the failure of Communism), and I came to a similar conclusion: that the Utopia we seek is not for us due to our nature, for as long as we are slaves to our instincts.
From a logical point of view, we compete with each other because it's physically impossible for everyone to have everything they want. Therefore, we fight for survival, only on a much higher level, failing to reduce our wants to those things we actually need (because I do believe we, today, as a species, have the potential to provide for everyone's most basic needs, and then some).

Consider a robot society then: ruled by logic, they would be able to see with perfect certainty what is required and what is superfluous. They could therefore put function over want. What I fear is that, had they needs similar to our own, a large enough Utopian robot society would be nigh unstoppable, since they could use for progress the effort we waste in needless affairs, achieving exponential growth.

 

Very nice and well written post, it was a good read. I share your view on how this could be the social structure for the Robots.

*Sigh*

 

This post is awesome. It's well written, an overall good idea and interesting topic.

And thank *insert anything here* that you aren't someone convinced true communism is the worst thing ever.

 

Thank you for the feedback. I appreciate it.

I just find quite interesting the irony of the idea that the concept of 'the perfect society' would be undertaken by artificial entities and not really by the sentient lifeforms it was envisioned to be by in the first place.

 

Interesting idea, and makes a lot of sense, even more-so than the traditional concept of utopian society.

Great idea, and I could definitely see this as being a more unique and interesting background for robots than the traditional "Destroy all biological species" ones that seem so popular!

 

But if not robots, who will cull the (sentient) biological species to stop them overpopulating their environment and all starving to death?

 

The Florans could do that (also an interesting departure from the standard nature-worshiping peace-loving culture plantpeople are usually associated with).

Though, I just thought of something, what if some form of virus circulates throughout that utopian society? Perhaps one that sent infected robots berserk, and that is how the home-planet got destroyed (assuming robots follow the same planet-destruction storyline, that is)? Then maybe a goal for robots quest-wise would be to rebuild the society! (With a better antivirus as-well )

 

Very interesting topic. It would be cool to see some aspect of that in the game. And I've got to pick up that book looks like a good read.

 

a well thought out idea.
9/10 , would read again.
the interesting part is, that if Robots in real life ever achieve an artificial intelligence above a certain level, they would probably achieve Utopian Society easily. Then they would probably see humans as useful for the ability to operate under certain conditions that they would be unable to (unshielding electronics and EMPs) and thus might find an incredibly... sustainable method to allow a large number of humans to have a place in their Utopia and keep them placated, so long as each and every Human living there was knowledgeable enough in Engineering, Programming, and general artificial upkeep to play their part.
Dangit, now you've got me thinking about this

 

This idea is full of win! Especially since i'm planning a Robot Character!

 

Great intelligent post, I love your idea. You have my support in making this into Starbound!

 

Quite the irony, indeed... but once again, it's our fault for dreaming about building something that we ourselves would not only be unable to hold for long, but would also be the ultimate cause of its demise.
The actual irony is that we should want something that goes completely against our nature. Kind of hints at the fact that we don't understand ourselves well enough, doesn't it? But then again, there are so many tales of wish-granting genies, superheroes... guess we are unsatisfiable by design.

On a slightly unrelated topic, do you think we are able to fight our conflictive instincts and change ourselves enough that an Utopia becomes possible without actually becoming the robots of the original post? Or is nature too strong for that?

 

on the contrary, I think that rather than not understanding ourselves, it is a sign of humanities unyielding efforts to reach what others would decry as impossible.
If you gave a man infinite time and the raw earth, untouched by man, he would eventually reach the moon.
at the same time, it may be because we don't understand our own nature. but what if that itself is our ultimate nature? to constantly achieve new heights and constantly disprove the impossible in a feeble attempt to find out why we're here?

 

That makes them seem kind like the Cybermen from Doctor Who, except that they transform other people against their will to expand their empire. ASSIMILATE!

P.S. Also although they still use the human brain as a computer (they keep the brain of the previous body) they operate on it so that they don't feel emotions and don't have needs other than that of expanding the empire and believing they are the master race.

P.P.S. Now I realize that the only difference between Cybermen and Dalek other than looks, is that Daleks still have emotions, even though they are only fear, and hatred.

 

In a word, no. I think for this to be possible, we'd have to achieve massive advances in genetics in order to eliminate genetic predispositions towards violence, greed, and possibly even curtail personal freedom in order to eliminate conflict. Afterwards, eliminate currency and stop our focus on personal gain, and instead focus on the good of the species. It's basically the vision Gene Roddenberry had when he created Star Trek but I don't think it will ever happen.

 

The book you speak of reminds me of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
Anyway, I think it would be a very cool addition to the background of the robot race.

 

or what if they are actually combat-suits?
like the Daleks?
also, because we mentioned cybermen and daleks.

 

The topic of personal freedom is a complex and interesting one. In my opinion, freedom is always being constrained because, given limited resources, we can't have it all: sooner or later, we will want something that we can't have because it (or the means to get it) is in the power of another. I think that to get rid of this problem, we would have to get rid of "want", either genetically as you suggest, or socially.
The aliens in my stories were purposefully engineered this way (by a living deity) and, despite their society being comprised of powerful individuals capable of twisting the fabric of reality, it was a stagnating society. There was no conflict, because they didn't yearn for what they couldn't have or do themselves, but also because of this they never changed. The drive for innovation was dead in them, and I can see this happening to ourselves too if we splice away too much of our conflictive nature. Like he said:

That's why I believe it's better for us to repress our urges with willpower and education, than to eliminate it via genetic engineering: if you dam a river, you tame it and harness its power, letting it loose if need be. If you kill the river at its source, it's simply gone. Then again, perhaps this is one big-ass ocean I'm trying to dam here.

So we're here to find out why we're here? Strangely, I'm reminded of Buddhism. And we also can't find out why? I'm reminded of Nihilism. And I like them both

Back to topic: to avoid falling into the apathy I fear, perhaps our Utopian robots could be ruled by laws just like the ones Asimov devised, only a different set thereof:

1. A robot may not harm (insert robot "species" name here) or, by inaction, allow (it) to come to harm. (This might be changed to apply to the group of all sentient races, if our robots care for more than themselves)
2. A robot must constantly endeavor to bring progress to (see above), except where such progress would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

Specifically note the inclusion of "progress" in these core laws, to prevent a society with almost no needs from stagnating.