Ancient Robots, Modern Fears
What Greek myths can tell us about AI
Melania Trump mostly stays out of the spotlight. When not appearing in documentaries for which she is suspiciously well-compensated, she skips a lot of public appearances at which one might expect to see the First Lady. But when she does grace the public stage, Melania often makes it weird. There were the Christmas decorations that looked like they were from a Kubrick movie. There was the “I don’t really care, do u?” jacket, which she wore to visit a children’s shelter, of all places.
And there was, recently, the spectacle of her appearance with a humanoid education robot, which addressed the crowd as she stood, well, robotically behind it.
The First Lady seems to think that robots will be the future of education, serving as intelligent home tutors who have more energy and knowledge than human teachers like me. I hope (and believe) she’s wrong that robots and AI can replace the human aspect of education, but this event represented a core be…
