IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - March 2015 - 150

Figure 1. Like the sphinx, Girard's theory classifies humanoid robots in the uncanny
valley as monstrous doubles. Kismet was developed by Cynthia Breazeal at the
Massachussetts Institute of Technology. Geminoid was developed by Osaka University
and Hiroshi Ishiguro Laboratories, Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute
International (ATR).

other creatures of intermediate humancum-animal status. His argument goes
against the preconceptions of human
judgment. We are invited to think afresh
about familiar situations, e.g., someone
seeing a monkey for the first time. The
claim is that a human person may possibly decide that a monkey belongs to the
human race. Surprisingly, Augustine
find a reason for this not in the likeness
of a monster but in our own history and
experience: "No matter what unusual
appearance he [anyone born a rational,
moral animal] presents in color, movement, sound... no Christian can doubt
that he [is a human being]" [8].
Augustine's reasoning can be applied
to humanoid robots, but one must be
warned against its direct transposition.
It does not follow from Augustine's
argument that humans who are ignorant of what they see will necessarily
perceive humanoid robots as being
human. Such may be a hasty implication, but the error will soon be corrected, as the agent will get to see the robot
moving or interacting. Indeed, even if
the profile of the uncanny valley is shifted for moving robots, its presence
remains well attested. The transient

150

IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

mistake of identification is no more
than an amusing psychological fact.
Another, more stable and fundamental consequence of Augustine's argument
is that even if we correctly identify the
humanoid robot as a robot, we still enter
into mimetic interaction with it, much
in the same manner as we imitate and
are imitated by a monkey or another
human being. Humanoid robots are as
good as monkeys in imitating humans
and better yet in provoking mimetic
rivalry, due to the higher resemblance
and stronger undifferentiation between
them; therefore, Augustine's argument
can be seen as a feeble illustration of the
robot-human interaction dynamics. To
follow another of his examples, when we
interact with a sphinx, whether playfully
or, like Oedipus, through a game of riddles, we measure how well she mimics
the standards of our kind, and the judgment about the monster's humanity
depends on the success of such imitation. Even if someone tells us "This is a
sphinx!" the phrase alone does not nullify our experience of past interaction nor
does it break the bond that connects us
with the sphinx. Similarly, the phrase
"This is a robot!" does not explain our

MARCH 2015

reaction in a deep way. We may not be
fooled anymore, but we have been
engaged in mimesis and social interaction anyway. Thus, the process uncovered by Girard is a basic cause of all
social moves, including those that help
to socialize humanoid robots by including them in our patterns of living
together. Robots become as good social
partners for us as monkeys or sphinxes
were in Augustine's imagination. The
explanation of our interaction with
them relies more on their proximate,
mimetically constituted social status
than on their ontological otherness.
CERNA, the French ethics committee for research in information technology, recently published an opinion on
robotics that includes a recommendation that researchers evaluate both the
relevance and necessity of emotions in
affective robotics and of biomimetism in
humanoid robots [9]. It is all too easy to
understand this recommendation as a
precautionary warning against technologies that are too bold. Girard's theory
gives an opposite reading. Human-
robot interaction must contain a good
measure of emotions and morality lest
the human partner remain forever
locked in a crisis of differences.
References
[1] M. Mori, "Bukimi no tani [The uncanny valley]," Energy, vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 33-35, 1970.
[2] R. Girard, Violence and the Sacred. (Original
French edition: Grasset, 1972, Consulted ed.). London, U.K.: Continuum Press, 2005,
[3] Aristotle, De Generatione Animalium, IV, 3.
[4] M. van der Lugt, "L'humanité des monstres et leur
accès aux sacrements dans la pensée médiévale," in
Monstre et Imaginaire Social. Approches Historiques,
A. Caiozzo and A.-E. Demartini, Eds. Paris, France:
Créaphis, 2008, p. 136.
[5] Z. Hanafi, The Monster in the Machine. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 2000, p. 63.
[6] Ovid, "The same mistake that beguiles his eyes
excites them," Metamorphoses, 3, 429.
[7] Z. Paré, E. Grimaud, and Ch. Minato, "Le Bouddha dans le robot. Rencontre avec le professeur
Masahito Mori," Gradhiva, vol. 15, p. 180, 2012.
[8] Augustine, De Civitate Dei, XVI, 8, 1-2.
[9] CERNA Report. (Oct. 2014). Ethics of research
in robotics. [Online].Available: http://cerna-ethics-allistene.org

http://cerna-eth http://www.ics-allistene.org

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - March 2015