Autonomous

by Annalee Newitz

At least bots could earn their way out of ownership after a while, be upgraded, and go fully autonomous. Humans might earn their way out, but there was no autonomy key that could undo a childhood like that.

Bots, who cost money, required a period of indenture to make their manufacture worthwhile. No such incentive was required for humans to make other humans.

She wasn’t sure which motivation made better fuel for innovation: naïve but ethical beliefs, or the need to survive.

Once bots gained human rights, a wave of legislation swept through many governments and economic coalitions that later became known as the Human Rights Indenture Laws. They established the rights of indentured robots, and, after a decade of court battles, established the rights of humans to become indentured, too. After all, if human-equivalent beings could be indentured, why not humans themselves?

But now we know there has been no one great disaster—only the slow-motion disaster of capitalism converting every living thing and idea into property.