a machine is a robot when it makes us sit with uncomfortable truths about ourselves
By this definition, both my washing machine and my dish washer are robots, and so is my bathroom scale
a device that automatically performs complicated, often repetitive tasks
Under this definition, a washing machine is a robot.
Is there a difference between a machine and a robot? I would say yes.
A dishwasher to me would be a machine, similar to a air-conditioner or a car for example.
The podcast “Robot or Not” have been trying to decide whether various things are robots for over a decade now. I feel like they did do dishwashers at some point. https://www.theincomparable.com/robot/
Holy shit, John Siracusa is involved in that? That’s gonna be IN DEPTH
https://www.theincomparable.com/robot/212/
They talk more about the various ways to prep plates for a dishwasher and not the canonical question, but it’s clear that (by their definition) a dishwasher is not a robot.
As a meme, this is a good article.
As a genuine discussion on the definition of Robot, this is stupid af.
FWIW - literally all things are social constructs if your definition of social construct is “a category of things that includes/excludes things based on our perception & interaction with it”
According to this space-age video from the Handy (Jam) Corporation, a spring is a robut
