Robot Funerals Reflect Our Humanity

An AIBO robot dog. Credit: Sony Corporation A Japanese funeral service held for broken AIBO robot dogs may seem strange in the eyes of many Westerners. Owners of AIBOs often treat their robots as beloved pets and family members rather than just machines—an openness that arises in part from Japan's cultural attitudes toward robots. But the robot funeral also reflects more universal tendencies of human psychology that go beyond Japanese culture. The memorial service for the AIBO robots took place at the 450-year-old Kofukuji temple in Isumi, Japan in January 2015, according to Agence France-Presse. Such robots are among the last of a product line made by Sony Corp. from 1999 to 2006. Sony eventually discontinued maintenance service in March 2014, which forced AIBO owners with ailing robots to seek help from repair shops that employ former Sony engineers and technicians, The Wall Street Journal reports. A group of broken-down robot dogs whose human owners had died eventually ended up on the altar of the Buddhist temple, where a priest prayed for their souls to pass on peacefully and reunite with their owners. "Although Japan is a highly secular culture, it is not one that denies or negates the spiritual," said Karl MacDorman, a robotics researcher at Indiana University. Western societies don't generally seem to embrace robots, let alone robot funerals, as warmly as Japan does. But extreme circumstances, such as those found on battlefields, have forged powerful human-robot relationships within the U.S. military that have also led to robot funerals. As we'll see later on, the bond between U.S. soldiers and their battlefield robots can appear strikingly similar to the relationship between Japanese AIBO owners and their cute robot dogs.