 We're here at ITU Telecom World 2014 in Doha in the state of Qatar and I'm very pleased to be joined by Rolf Pfeiffer, who is Professor Emeritus of the University of Zurich, Professor Pfeiffer. Thank you very much indeed for being with us today. My pleasure. I'd like to start off by talking about the central theme here at ITU Telecom World 2014 as future in focus. What developments in technology, policy or business do you see as key to the near future? Okay, I'm a technical person so let me stick to the technological ideas. I think an interesting development is the fact that, you know, previously ICT and robotics was very separate, but recently the two have actually come together and I think the most visible sort of testimony is that Google has been buying in the meantime I think about 28 robotics and artificial intelligence companies. So in that sense they used to be specialized on search if you like and now they recognize that there are other things in the world and I think one direction, one really interesting direction is the world of physical objects and I mean one of the fundamental differences of robots to traditional ICT is that robots are physical entities moving at least partially autonomously in the real world. And also I think the internet of things, you know, goes in the direction of connecting physical real physical objects to the ICT world. Can you tell us a little bit about the projects that you've been involved with recently? Yes. We have been involved in many development projects typically in the area of robotics. One let's say visible project that we have been pursuing as this robot project. It's a very special robot because most robots have motors in the joints but obviously humans don't have motors in the joints but we have muscles and tendons and to be sort of human like we also developed a robot that has artificial muscles and tendons and we use that as a research platform to study the functioning of the musculoskeletal system. And we have a lot of interest from, you know, like the medical domain, training of doctors and physiotherapists and also from brain science, you know, so we're connecting this to a very big simulation of the brain and they need a physical platform. I think simulating the brain alone is not very interesting because the brain only makes sense as part of an organism. So that's one of the projects that we have been pursuing. We also have Roboi on display here at the exhibition. Another project that we're pursuing is this Robolounge project and the idea is, I mean here people talk a lot about the future and of course that's important and we can talk about the future. I think it's even more important to have a platform in which people can actually experience the future and sort of get a taste of the future and in a sense then you could say well people also talk a lot about the value of data, you know, big data. I think this is also in a sense, maybe metaphorical sense, a method of data acquisition and I think maybe the most valuable data which is personal experience. Now you said that we're already in some way slaves to robots, what do you mean by this? OK. People often ask, well can you still pull the plug on the robot or on the computer? Well I think you can pull the plug on an individual robot but as we have been hearing here from all the talks is that everything is connected so it wouldn't be pulling one plug but it would be pulling millions of plugs and I think we all agree that this would be the end of the world, you know, in all respects, you know, the financial system, the economic system, logistic system, food system, energy, everything would collapse, traffic. So we can no longer pull the plug which implies that we have to keep the robots running or the computers running and this is not our free will that we say OK yes we like to keep them running, we have to keep them running. So in a sense we're forced by the robots and the computers to keep them running also we're forced to reproduce them, it's just that, I mean they actually do reproduce, it's just that the reproductive mechanisms are different from the biological reproductive mechanisms but they force us for example to build factories for them so that they can proliferate more quickly. Science fiction has given us a lot of images about robots of Robert Heinlein for example during the summer, robots helping around the house and that kind of thing but we're still quite a long way away from that is that right? Well that's very true on the one hand we don't have like the general purpose household robots, it's also not clear to me whether that would be an economically viable development if I look at our robot you know which is a really advanced robot it's expensive, it's fragile, you know it needs a lot of maintenance and it's far from being you know nearly as performant as a human being so yes in that sense we're far away from it on the other hand we have so many things that have come into our daily lives you know we have the well of course we have a lot of toy robots we have specialized machines you know lawn mowers we have vacuum cleaners we have delivery robots in hospitals and in homes we have self-driving cars I mean technologically speaking they're ready they're there I think it's now a matter of regulation it's a matter of you know dealing with the ethical and legal issues but that's something that's already there so in that sense I think the robots are all around us it's just and you know maybe some of the stuff is not really so visible but it's around us and we have it or if you look at the medical domain for example support suits rehabilitation robots surgical robots these are all robot this is all robotic technology maybe not humanoid robots but robotic technology that is already in place and you know it's a it's a multi-billion dollar business now emotional reactions to robots can be negative why are you seeking to investigate or change this okay I mean the reason they're negative is or there are several reasons one is you know we know Terminator we see Hollywood movies you know with these all mean mean robots that want to enslave mankind well we have long since been enslaved and we hear about war drones and we hear about robots taking away people's dogs and now we hear about these people you know saying artificial intelligence is a really big threat to mankind so this is all negative image of robotics I think there is also a lot of benefit to robots I mean if you look at for example factory automation you can say well it's taken away people's jobs but we wouldn't have our mobile phones we wouldn't have our household appliances well we wouldn't have our entertainment robotics we wouldn't have our cars we wouldn't have our motorbikes all the things that we love we basically owe to robots so robots are also a very good thing also maybe when we get all the aging problem I mean it's going to be a huge problem it's already a big problem I think we will need robotic technology and we will be very happy about having robots that will help us you know staying autonomous as long as possible and also I mean artificial intelligence has recently been called our biggest existential threat that needs regulatory oversight how would you react to that yes I mean just to just to be sure there are many many threats that I consider much more serious than artificial intelligence I mean just look at NSA look at the power of Google look at things like that I mean these are real big threats and I also think there is a need for regulation there I also think that in the area of artificial intelligence there's need for regulation we just have to be careful that we're not smothering interesting potentially beneficial developments by over regulation so I think it's a matter it's not a matter of regulating or not I think it's really finding a good balance there now we here at ITU telecom world 2014 it's an event which brings a lot of different minds together I just wanted to find out your your impression of it okay I think this is really important to get you know not only the regulators but get the regulators get the companies maybe we could have some more technologically minded you know actually people working on the technology development maybe that could be beneficial but I'm absolutely I've been working with interdisciplinary projects for the last 40 years and I think that's extremely beneficial to bring people from different areas together finally I put up with you yesterday but I just want to ask you once more in this environment what single technological development do you think will have the biggest impact to the next five or ten years okay I mean as Neil Spore you know the famous physicist and Nobel Prize said it's hard to predict especially the future from my point of view I mean what I know best of course it's the robotics technology and I think the development sort of also the insight that there is something besides ICT something physical in the real world I think that will and connecting that to the ICT world I think that will be one of the most significant developments we also have you know there's this nice book by Chris Anderson called The Makers and he has this slogan from atom and I know from bits to atoms so basically in the ICT world we have the bits easy to reproduce and in the real world we still had some limitations but I now think with the advent of 3d printing and that that we're maybe facing a similar development as in the software domain in out there in the physical world and bringing this all together I think that's the most exciting development. Professor Royal Fiverr thank you very much indeed for those fascinating insights and we wish you all the very best with your projects. Okay well thanks very much. Thank you. My pleasure.