Balalalalalala!
Baymax is the lovable big white robot that is a companion to the main character
in the movie Big Hero Six. Baymax is a robot who can diagnose any health
problem and figure out the perfect treatment plan for your body. In some ways,
Baymax it like a MRI or a PetSCAN machine, it scans your whole body looking for
problem areas. But Baymax is also like the automated service that gives you
treatment for your symptoms online. He is all that combined into one whom is
also a crime fighting hero! His specifications as a healthcare companion make him a potential product of
our life time!
One
of the scariest things about Baymax though, is that he is a robot who is
controlled through one small personality chip. At one point Hiro (the main
character who gets Baymax when his brother dies) changes the chip from Baymax,
a harmless medical helper to a fighting machine that has no morals or any sense
of preservation of humanity. This is when we are forced to look what exactly it
means to be human straight in the face. Humans need to have emotions, and to
know right from wrong. They need to know when something is causing pain or is
not acceptable or monstrous. When Baymax has that insane fighting
chip in him, he does not have any of those qualities. These things, I think,
are some of the scariest fears about robots. The merciless, tormenting, cold
figure with only one purpose, destruction, comes to mind when Baymax has that
chip dictate his actions. But when he has his normal chip in, he can gauge
emotions and try to offer support and he makes decisions that he knows may or
may not be best for the people involved. He knows when he is uncomfortable with
something, and he tries to find his limits. Those qualities however, definitely
challenge what we deem as human. He is an inflatable balloon, but can show
emotions and make decisions just like a human can. He has the capacity to grow,
which is just like any of us. Who wouldn’t love Baymax as a companion?
I totally agree with you that the personality chip is terrifying. It's also interesting to consider the appearance of Baymax. Of course it was designed in a human shape in order to provide comfort and support to patients. It was white, soft, harmless. It had limbs and could smile and hug. I wouldn't feel comfortable if a square computer with a rectangle body was telling me there there. But it also brought me to think about that people (or just I actually), at one side prefer the things with human shapes or can mimic human behaviors, like dogs, parrots, and Baymax, and at the other side we are frightened when they are too human.
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