Human — Can we manufacture ourselves?

Servant — Can we delegate labor?

Prosthesis — Can we extend ourselves?

Lover — Can we manufacture intimacy?

Protector — Can we delegate protection?

Weapon — Can artificial agency project violence?

Guardian — Can it decide who may pass?

Oracle — Can it know what we do not?

Mirror — What does it reveal about us?

Monster — What if it escapes our intentions?

The golden maidens can act.

Talos can guard.

Pygmalion's statue can live.

The Golem can obey.

The Argo can advise.

But their defining abilities are generally given to them.

What happens when the artificial being can change itself through experience?

Machine as Learner.

A traditional machine is built in a particular state and executes a structure provided by its maker.

A learning system differs in one decisive respect:

its encounter with the world changes what it subsequently does.

experience → internal change → changed future behavior

LEARNING + MACHINE

The history of machines is also the history of what humans have wished to externalize.

strength

movement

memory

judgment

companionship

agency

learning