Pericle Salvini

Design for Acceptability: Improving Robots’ Coexistence in Human Society

This paper is about design and acceptability of service robots that interact with individuals and coexist in environments inhabited by humans. In its current usage, we argue, the term acceptability is “user-specific” or “user-centred”, that is, it is based exclusively on the study of the relationships between a product and its users. In this paper, we argue that resistance towards service robots operating in public environments may also originate from properties which are not related to the user. For example, fear of the robot may generate resistance at the bystander level; lack of legal regulations for robots’ deployment may generate resistance at the legal level; concerns about possible job reductions caused by the robot may generate resistance at the worker level. Therefore, it is necessary to go beyond the “user-centred” notion of acceptability and widen its scope so as to include any kind of potential resistance and not just those originating from the users. By adopting a broader view of the possible critical factors affecting service robots’ acceptability, it will be possible to design robots that are good for users and acceptable to other people and society.

DustCart, an autonomous robot for door-to-door garbage collection: From DustBot project to the experimentation in the small town of Peccioli

We report on the design and the experimental results of DustCart, a wheeled autonomous robot for door-to-door garbage collection. DustCart is able to navigate in urban environments avoiding static and dynamic obstacles and to interact with human users. The robot is managed by an Ambient Intelligence system (AmI) through a wireless connection: it navigates to collect garbage bags to the houses of users and then moves to discharge the collected waste to a dedicated area. The architecture, navigation and localization systems are described along with the results achieved in different urban sites. In particular, a localization approach based on optical beacons was used and guaranteed position errors sufficient for a safe robot navigation. We report also the first results of a long-term experimentation of the DustCart robot in Peccioli, a small town of Tuscany (Italy). This can be considered as a first step in using robotics in the everyday life of a real town for providing a real service.

An Investigation on Legal Regulations for Robot Deployment in Urban Areas: A Focus on Italian Law

This paper investigates the administrative, criminal and civil aspects of Italian law in order to find out whether and how current legal regulations impact on robot deployment in urban environments. The paper is based on a case study. The objects of this study are two autonomous mobile robots designed to carry out urban hygiene services in pedestrian areas. The paper points out a major problem in Italian law — the lack of legal qualification for autonomous mobile robots operating on public roads. On the contrary, at present, no relevant implications are identified with regard to Italian criminal and civil law. As a matter of fact, although autonomous, the robots that are at the center of this study can still be considered as properties and, therefore, are excluded from any personal liability in case of damage to people or things.

Scientific models and ethical issues in hybrid bionic systems research

Research on hybrid bionic systems (HBSs) is still in its infancy but promising results have already been achieved in laboratories. Experiments on humans and animals show that artificial devices can be controlled by neural signals. These results suggest that HBS technologies can be employed to restore sensorimotor functionalities in disabled and elderly people. At the same time, HBS research raises ethical concerns related to possible exogenous and endogenous limitations to human autonomy and freedom. The analysis of these concerns requires reflecting on the availability of scientific models accounting for key aspects of sensorimotor coordination and plastic adaptation mechanisms in the brain.

The Robot DustCart

Peccioli, a small medieval town in Italy, became one of the first places in the world where a robot was used (not demonstrated) to carry out a public service in the urban environment (from 15 June 2010 to 7 August 2010). Thirty-five real users accepted to trash their domestic waste using the robot DustCart, a mobile robot designed to collect, transport, and discharge rubbish bags in complete autonomy. During the testing period, the robot safely traveled along the public streets of Peccioli, carrying out its daily service and sharing the urban environment with the passers-by, bicycles, and cars, without causing any problems.

RoboLaw: Towards a European framework for robotics regulation

Abstract This paper intends to sum up the main findings of the European project RoboLaw. In this paper, the authors claim that the European Union should play a pro-active policy role in the regulation of technologies so as to inform the development of technologies with its values and principles. The paper provides an explication of the rationale for analysing of a limited and heterogeneous number of robotics applications. For these applications, the following issues are addressed: whether robotics deserve a special case of regulation; the direct and indirect role ethics can play in regulating technology; the transformations of both vulnerabilities and capabilities, and the effects of liability law in favouring the socially relevant applications. In conclusion, a reflection on the possibility to generalize some of the RoboLaw findings to other technologies is proposed, with respect to liability and ethics.

Yet Another Robot Application? [From the Guest Editors]

The articles in this special section is to find out what lies beyond the fascination toward robots that we have inherited from popular culture, the pleasure of learning with robots derived from the gamification of learning, and the strong appeal for robotics technologies given by its aura of innovation. Are there authentic ways in which robotics can improve education, and what affordances does robotics, in particular, provide for such educational transformation? Indeed, one of the biggest gray areas of educational robotics concerns the lack of empirical evidence on the educational (pedagogical as well as psychological) effectiveness of robots that is related to both the lack of standardized evaluation criteria and the methodological difficulties in conducting sound scientific tests.

On Ethical, Legal and Social Issues of Care Robots

According to recent figures, in the next years, Western developed societies will be supposed to face the “aging problem”. The population aged 60 will surpass that of younger people and, to make things even worst, current trends in social relations indicate that family carers are no more willing to look after their older relatives. Such a situation has given more emphasis to the rise of robotics as a possible solution to deal with the demographic change and the new social norms in the care of elderly and disabled people. The ways in which robotics has been proposed to address the “aging problem” are manifold: ranging from humanoids, general purpose robots, to less invasive, distributed and task-specific systems. This chapter intends to provide the reader with an overview of the main ethical, legal and societal challenges concerning the use of care robots.

Teaching with Minirobots: The Local Educational Laboratory on Robotics

In this paper, we are going to present and discuss a few activities related to the application of minirobots in school education. The activities have been carried out in the framework of the Local Educational Laboratory on Robotics (LELR), which has been developed by Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna (SSSA) in collaboration with local Municipalities (i.e. Valdera Union) and a network of primary and secondary schools (i.e. Costellazione Network) in the Valdera area of Tuscany, Italy. The LELR is part of SSSA efforts to actively participate in the scientific and technological education of young generations, starting from school age. The laboratory is based on the deployment of robotics, in its several manifestations. in teaching activities. Drawing on preliminary activities and experiences, the paper will report on and discuss a few projects about teaching with minirobots in primary and secondary schools education, pointing out the relevance of promoting an interdisciplinary approach to minirobots educational activities – namely not limited to scientific and technological subjects – as well as developing a critical attitude towards scientific and technological progress in students.

Presence, Reciprocity and Robotic Mediations: The Case of Autonomous Social Robots

In this paper, the author proposes a theoretical framework for drawing a line between acceptable and non-acceptable technologies, with a focus on autonomous social robots. The author considers robots as mediations and their ethical acceptance as depending on their impact on the notion of presence. Presence is characterised by networks of reciprocity which make human beings subject and object of actions and perceptions at the same time. Technological mediation can either promote or inhibit the reciprocity of presence. A medium that inhibits presence deserves ethical evaluation since it prevents the possibility of a mutual exchange, thus creating a form of power. Autonomous social robots are a special kind of technological mediation because they replace human presence with a simulation of presence. Therefore, in interactions between human beings and autonomous robots, attention should be paid to the consequences on legal, moral, and social responsibility, and, at the same time, the impact of simulated forms of presence on human beings.