“The problems of society can be solved entirely by mechanical people” is the bold statement by Mitsumi Frendee of Kyoto University. Mitsumi’s department deals with the application of Mechanical Person and Machine Intelligence technology to society at large. She goes on, “For nearly a century, one of the greatest outstanding problems in computer science has been achieving smooth interaction with society at large.”

Early attempts to achieve this were through “Human-computer interaction”, and there were whole university departments devoted to this. While many useful functions were performed by electronic computers at that time, their goals could not be achieved without the intervention of large numbers of humans, to perceive and assign the goal, and to interpret the results in a meaningful way.

“Much early work in Machine Intelligence [Artificial intelligence, as it was sometimes called] was distracted by the perceived need to involve humans” asserts Frendee-san. “What has happened here is a common phenomenon as you look through the history of technology: While seeking a solution to a problem, the nature of the problem has changed.”

Her report, which took the scientific world by storm last Thursday, admits that the problem of getting humans and machines to communicate smoothly is far from solved. However, it argues, the importance of this problem has reduced to insignificance. The problems of identifying and assigning goals, taking into account new factors that bear on a problem, and making the connection from abstract analysis to concrete action - traditionally the stronghold of the organic brain - have been satisfactorily addressed by Machine Intelligence technology. Indeed, in many cases, MI excels where OI gets bogged down.

Frendee-san expects to see Japan governed exclusively by Mechanical People by “around 2050″.

MPs currently occupy up 90% of manual jobs in Japan and 30% of middle managment jobs.

80% of MPs in Japan are female.

Timeline:

2005: Early prototypes are introduced to the public. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4714135.stm

2007: The Special Interest Group in AI in Physical Human Machine Interaction is formed headed by MIT’s Akira Morimuto.

2009: SIGAPHMI publishes its now famous mission statement in which it claimed the principal fault with all former AI work was the paucity of data gathered from the environment.

2009: Project “Lilee” commences, placing a small number of Repliees into education as if they are human infants.

2010: Project “Congree” commences, where Repliees are turned loose in a controlled environment to learn from each other and their surroundings. The Discovery Channel Asia-Pacific runs a popular series following their progress. Public demand for Repliees as companions booms.

2011: Congree Frendee is launched in Japan and is very popular amongst those that can afford it.

2016: With the release Sport Frendee, the fourth-generation Congree Frendee, the market in used Frendees overtakes that of used cars in Japan.

2017: the first Repliee take a responsible job outside of the lab.

2018: the first Repliee-staffed research team is formed at Osaka University. An extension of Congree, its focus is in the ability of Repliees to acquire abstract knowledge and to learn indirectly, through self-started projects and interaction with other university departments.

2023: Controversy over a brawl involving two Repliees and five businessmen in a Kyoto restaurant results in a “special citizen” legal status being assigned to Repliees. Repliees are subject to the same obligations, and afforded some of the protection of, the law as applied to human citizens.

2029: In what is now known as EMPA (the Emancipation of Mechanical People Act), after 8 years of increasingly sophisticated lobbying and PR activities by the Repliees themselves, “special citizens” are allowed to function without the patronage of a “full citizen”.

2030: Department of MP Studies formed at Berkeley by Repliees