Ethical and cultural

Growth of computer technology

In the 1980s, a few people began using a PC on their desk

When people began surfing the web, they were using three or four computers at once
one to look at the web page
one to retrieve the web page
and a couple more to pass information over the Internet


Today, you probably routinely use 20 or more computers simultaneously without even being aware of most of them!
What computers are you using when you are
At home
At school
In town
In a car

Computers in healthcare

What jobs can robots do?

Will robots replace humans?

The game of Go is an ancient game invented in China, played on a 19 x 19 grid

There are about 10 to the power of 170 possible combinations of moves

Recently, the world champion Go player was beaten by a program called AlphaGo


The program taught itself to play by splitting itself in half and play itself millions of times, learning from each victory and loss
This technique has broad applications in Artificial Intelligence

Accountants, cashiers, sports referees, legal secretaries and cleaners are already being replaced by robots

Maidbot is a company building robots to clean hotel rooms

Another company has invented an automated hamburger making machine
The UK has lost 31,000 jobs in the legal profession
It is estimated that by 2018 there will be 35 million service robots ‘at work’

There are around 165,000 healthcare apps for smartphones

By 2017 they will have been
downloaded an estimated total
of 1.7 billion times

Wearable technology can offer
continuous, long-term monitoring

This can lead to improvements in the
way that diseases like epilepsy, asthma
and diabetes are managed


The healthcare robot

Mabu, the healthcare robot, was introduced last year

Mabu sits on the owner’s bedside table as a “personal healthcare companion”

The robot talks to patients and reminds them to take their medication

It is intended for patients managing chronic diseases

When Mabu was collected from patients after trials, many objected:
“She’s like a member of the family”