Ethical Robots and Robot Ethics
As the field of robotics progresses, robots increasingly share the public and private space with humans. Think of self-driving cars on the roads, carebots in elderly homes and Rumba and its next iterations taking care of household chores. When robots co-exist with humans they need to conform to social norms, first and foremost those norms relating to safety. When you visit someone in their home, you don't take the shortest route to the living room if this means stepping on their pet. And neither should a robot.