Robots are coming to the kitchen − what that could mean for society and culture

 

Robotic kitchens aren’t on homemakers’ must-have lists yet, but they are starting to gain traction in restaurants. Robert Michael/picture alliance via Getty Images

Automating food is unlike automating anything else. Food is fundamental to life – nourishing body and soul – so how it’s accessed, prepared and consumed can change societies fundamentally.

Automated kitchens aren’t sci-fi visions from “The Jetsons” or “Star Trek.” The technology is real and global. Right now, robots are used to flip burgers, fry chicken, create pizzas, make sushi, prepare salads, serve ramen, bake bread, mix cocktails and much more. AI can invent recipes based on the molecular compatibility of ingredients or whatever a kitchen has in stock. More advanced concepts are in the works to automate the entire kitchen for fine dining.

Since technology tends to be expensive at first, the early adopters of AI kitchen technologies are restaurants and other businesses. Over time, prices are likely to fall enough for the home market, possibly changing both home and societal dynamics.

Can food technology really change society? Yes, just consider the seismic impact of the microwave oven. With that technology, it was suddenly possible to make a quick meal for just one person, which can be a benefit but also a social disruptor.

Familiar concerns about the technology include worse nutrition and health from prepackaged meals and microwave-heated plastic containers. Less obviously, that convenience can also transform eating from a communal, cultural and creative event into a utilitarian act of survival – altering relationships, traditions, how people work, the art of cooking and other facets of life for millions of people.

For instance, think about how different life might be without the microwave. Instead of working at your desk over a reheated lunch, you might have to venture out and talk to people, as well as enjoy a break from work. There’s something to be said for living more slowly in a society that’s increasingly frenetic and socially isolated.

Convenience can come at a great cost, so it’s vital to look ahead at the possible ethical and social disruptions that emerging technologies might bring, especially for a deeply human and cultural domain – food – that’s interwoven throughout daily life.

With funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation, my team at California Polytechnic State University is halfway into what we believe is the first study of the effects AI kitchens and robot cooks could have on diverse societies and cultures worldwide. We’ve mapped out three broad areas of benefits and risks to examine.

You aren’t likely to have a robotic home kitchen anytime soon, but several companies are making them and marketing them to early adopters.

Creators and consumers

The benefits of AI kitchens include enabling chefs to be more creative, as well as eliminating repetitive, tedious tasks such as peeling potatoes or standing at a workstation for hours. The technology can free up time. Not having to cook means being able to spend more time with family or focus on more urgent tasks. For personalized eating, AI can cater to countless special diets, allergies and tastes on demand.

However, there are also risks to human well-being. Cooking can be therapeutic and provides opportunities for many things: gratitude, learning, creativity, communication, adventure, self-expression, growth, independence, confidence and more, all of which may be lost if no one needs to cook. Family relationships could be affected if parents and children are no longer working alongside each other in the kitchen – a safe space to chat, in contrast to what can feel like an interrogation at the dining table.

The kitchen is also the science lab of the home, so science education could suffer. The alchemy of cooking involves teaching children and other learners about microbiology, physics, chemistry, materials science, math, cooking techniques and tools, food ingredients and their sourcing, human health and problem-solving. Not having to cook can erode these skills and knowledge.

Community and cultures

AI can help with experimentation and creativity, such as creating elaborate food presentations and novel recipes within the spirit of a culture. Just as AI and robotics help generate new scientific knowledge, they can increase understanding of, say, the properties of food ingredients, their interactions and cooking techniques, including new methods.

But there are risks to culture. For example, AI could bastardize traditional recipes and methods, since AI is prone to stereotyping, for example flattening or oversimplifying cultural details and distinctions. This selection bias could lead to reduced diversity in the kinds of cuisine produced by AI and robot cooks. Technology developers could become gatekeepers for food innovation, if the limits of their machines lead to homogeneity in cuisines and creativity, similar to the weirdly similar feel of AI art images across different apps.

Also, think about your favorite restaurants and favorite dinners. How might the character of those neighborhoods change with automated kitchens? Would it degrade your own gustatory experience if you knew those cooking for you weren’t your friends and family but instead were robots?

Robotic kitchens are beginning to show up in restaurants, particularly fast-food places. CFOTO/Future Publishing via Getty Images

The hope with technology is that more jobs will be created than jobs lost. Even if there’s a net gain in jobs, the numbers hide the impact on real human lives. Many in the food service industry – one of the most popular occupations in any economy – could find themselves unable to learn new skills for a different job. Not everyone can be an AI developer or robot technician, and it’s far from clear that supervising a robot is a better job than cooking.

Philosophically, it’s still an open question whether AI is capable of genuine creativity, particularly if that implies inspiration and intuition. Assuming so may be the same mistake as thinking that a chatbot understands what it’s saying, instead of merely generating words that statistically follow the previous words. This has implications for aesthetics and authenticity in AI food, similar to ongoing debates about AI art and music.

Safety and responsibility

Because humans are a key disease vector, robot cooks can improve food safety. Precision trimming and other automation can reduce food waste, along with AI recipes that can make the fullest use of ingredients. Customized meals can be a benefit for nutrition and health, for example, in helping people avoid allergens and excess salt and sugar.

The technology is still emerging, so it’s unclear whether those benefits will be realized. Foodborne illnesses are an unknown. Will AI and robots be able to smell, taste or otherwise sense the freshness of an ingredient or the lack thereof and perform other safety checks?

Physical safety is another issue. It’s important to ensure that a robot chef doesn’t accidentally cut, burn or crush someone because of a computer vision failure or other error. AI chatbots have been advising people to eat rocks, glue, gasoline and poisonous mushrooms, so it’s not a stretch to think that AI recipes could be flawed, too. Where legal regimes are still struggling to sort out liability for autonomous vehicles, it may similarly be tricky to figure out liability for robot cooks, including if hacked.

Given the primacy of food, food technologies help shape society. The kitchen has a special place in homes, neighborhoods and cultures, so disrupting that venerable institution requires careful thinking to optimize benefits and reduce risks.

Patrick Lin, Professor of Philosophy, California Polytechnic State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

What is the Shroud of Turin and why is there so much controversy around it?

 

An image of the Shroud of Turin, which purports to show the face of Jesus. Pierre Perrin/Sygma via Getty Images

The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin, Italy, houses a fascinating artifact: a massive cloth shroud that bears the shadowy image of a man who appears to have been crucified. Millions of Christians around the world believe that this shroud – commonly called the Shroud of Turin – is the cloth that was used to bury Jesus after his crucifixion and that the image on the shroud was produced miraculously when he was resurrected.

The evidence, however, tells a different story.

Scientists have questioned the validity of the claims about the shroud being a first-century object. Evidence from carbon-14 dating points to the shroud being a creation from the Middle Ages. Skeptics, however, dismiss these tests as flawed. The shroud remains an object of faith, intrigue and controversy that reappears periodically in the public sphere, as it has in recent weeks.

As a scholar of early Christianity, I have long been interested in why people are motivated to create objects like the shroud and also why people are drawn to revere them as authentic.

The shroud and its history

The first public appearance of the shroud was in 1354, when it was displayed publicly in Lirey, a small commune in central France. Christian pilgrims traveled from all over to gaze upon the image of the crucified Jesus.

Pilgrimages like this were common during the Middle Ages, when relics of holy people began to appear throughout Europe. The relic trade was big business at the time; relics were bought and sold, and pilgrims often paid a fee to visit them.

Many believed that these relics were genuine. In addition to the shroud, pilgrims visited Jesus’ crib, splinters from the cross and Jesus’ foreskin, just to name a few.

But even in the 14th century, when the relic trade in Europe was flourishing, some were suspicious.

In 1390, only a few decades after the shroud was displayed in Lirey, a French bishop named Pierre d’Arcis claimed in a letter to Pope Clement VII not only that the shroud was a fake but that the artist responsible for its creation had already confessed to creating it. Clement VII agreed with the assessment of the shroud, although he permitted its continued display as a piece of religious art.

The shroud and science

The shroud has been the subject of much scientific investigation in the past several decades. Data from scientific tests matches what scholars know about the shroud from historical records.

In 1988, a team of scientists used carbon-14 dating to determine when the fabric of the shroud was manufactured. The tests were performed at three labs, all working independently. Based on data from these labs, scientists said there was “conclusive evidence” that the shroud originated between the years 1260 and 1390.

Results from another scientific study over 30 years later appeared to debunk these findings. Using an advanced X-ray technique to study the structure of materials, the scientists concluded that the fabric of the shroud was much older and could likely be from the first century. They also noted, however, that their results could be considered conclusive only if the shroud had been stored at a relatively constant temperature and humidity – between 68-72.5 degrees Fahrenheit and 55% to 75% – for the entirety of two millennia.

This would be highly unlikely for any artifact from that period. And when it comes to the shroud, the conditions under which it has survived have been less than ideal.

In 1532, while the shroud was being kept in Chambéry in southern France, the building it was housed in caught fire. The silver case that held the shroud melted; despite intricate repair attempts, the burn marks in the fabric remain visible to this day. It was saved from another fire in Turin as recently as 1997.

Despite the ongoing debate, the carbon-14 dating results have continued to provide the most compelling scientific evidence that the shroud is a product of the Middle Ages and not an ancient relic.

The shroud as religious art

The shroud is undeniably a masterful work of art, crafted with remarkable skill and using methods that were complicated and ahead of their time. For centuries, many experts struggled to understand how the image was imprinted onto the fabric, and it wasn’t until 2009 that scientists were successfully able to reproduce the technique using medieval methods and materials.

Pope Francis once referred to the shroud as an “icon,” a type of religious art that can be used for a variety of purposes, including teaching, theological expression and even worship. Without addressing the authenticity of the shroud, the pope suggested that by prompting reflection on the face and body of the crucified Jesus, the shroud encouraged people to also consider those around them who may be suffering.

It is at least possible that the shroud was created as a tool that would encourage viewers to meditate on the death of Jesus in a tangible way.

Ultimately, the shroud of Turin will continue to intrigue and draw both believers and skeptics into a debate that has spanned centuries. But I believe that the shroud encourages viewers to think about how history, art and belief come together and influence how we see the past.

Eric Vanden Eykel, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Ferrum College

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.