Hironori Matsuzaki, University of Oldenburg, DE
Service and personal care robots are starting to cross the threshold into the wilderness of everyday life, where they are supposed to interact with inexperienced lay users in a changing environment. In order to function as intended, robots should become independent entities that monitor themselves and improve their own behaviours based on learning outcomes in practice. This poses contradictory challenges to robotics, which can be described as “autonomy-safety-paradox”. The integration of robot applications into society requires the reconciliation of two conflicting aspects: increasing machine autonomy and ensuring safety in end-use. As the level of robot autonomy grows, the risk of accidents will increase. Emphasizing safety, however, impairs the autonomous functioning of the robot. In Japan, the solution to this problem is to obscure the idea of the autonomy of a technological entity. Instead of seeing the robot as an individual entity, a strong emphasis is placed on safe implementation of relational structures, which are derived from interhuman relationships. This paper aims to provide an insight into the Japanese concepts of “appropriate” user-robot interaction, by focusing on the notion of kūki literacy. In order to become safe partner-like existence, a robot should be built in such a way that even beginners can intuitively grasp how it works and start to use it right from the first day. To that end, it is necessary that its agency be embedded into the local interaction frame. My empirical data suggest that acquisition of the ability to sense social atmosphere (kūki) is considered a precondition for a robot being “japanized”.
