Siddhartha Shome

Stanford University

Philosophical Transformations and the Technological

Imagination

From the industrial revolution to the information age, there have been many

instances of technological transformations leading to social and cultural

transformations. However, the world of technology is itself embedded in society and

culture, and is subject of social and cultural forces. This paper looks at how

transformations in philosophy and culture have played a major role in determining the

trajectory of one important field of technology: robotics.

Machines intended to mimic living beings have always fascinated humans.

Known as automata prior to the twentieth century, and robots since, these machines

have been shaped not only by technological advances but also by the philosophical and

cultural attitudes of the societies that built them and embraced them. Early in the

eighteenth century, under the influence of the Cartesian Mechanism philosophy,

scientists and engineers imagined automata in purely mechanistic terms, and focused

on replicating the physiological aspects of living beings. By the beginning of the

twentieth century, however, following the decline of the Cartesian Mechanism

philosophy, and influenced by other philosophical and cultural transformations, it was

increasingly recognized that the key functional ingredient of life was purposiveness, or

the ability to collect information and to respond actively in accordance with some

objective. Thinking on automata and robots transformed accordingly, shifting from

replicating physiology to exploring the possibility, complexity and implications of

purposiveness in machines. This paper traces this fundamental transformation in

thinking about robots and automata, and explores how philosophical and cultural

transformations influenced it.