
The word ‘robot’ is meaningless - benbreen
http://fusion.net/story/205093/stop-saying-robot/
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taylorzane
I feel like trying to convince people to use the term 'automaton', when
referring to devices that look similar to humans but are non-biological, is a
feeble venture. The term 'robot' is just so ingrained in our society to
describe a humanoid-like piece of hardware...

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JoeAltmaier
Isn't the word 'Android' already invented for that class or organism?

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taylorzane
They could be used interchangeably, 'automaton' predates 'android' by a
margin, primarily because an 'automaton' doesn't necessarily have to be an
electronic device. It could be a water-powered wooden nutcracker. So yes,
'android' is probably the best candidate to describe the 'robots' that the
author is referring to.

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qbrass
A roomba is an automaton, but not an android.

Automaton refers to acting on it's own. Android literally means humanlike.
Electronics have no bearing on either.

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somebodyother
Also true for pretty much every other term I've seen mainstream journalists
'learn'... hack, app, cloud, algorithm...

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PeterWhittaker
Best line in the article, the one that convinced me: _Robots are things that
don’t do useful things. Once they eventually work, we call them what they are,
like "dishwasher" or "toaster" or "drone."_

