Bio-inspired cognitive robotics vs. embodied AI for socially acceptable, civilized robots Morasso 10.3389/frobt.2026.1714310

Abstract

Although cognitive robotics is still a work in progress, the trend is to “free” robots from the assembly lines of the third industrial revolution and allow them to “enter human society” in large numbers and many forms, as forecasted by Industry 4.0 and beyond. Cognitive robots are expected to be intelligent, designed to learn from experience and adapt to real-world situations rather than being preprogrammed with specific actions for all possible stimuli and environmental conditions. Moreover, such robots are supposed to interact closely with human partners, cooperating with them, and this implies that robot cognition must incorporate, in a deep sense, ethical principles and evolve, in conflict situations, decision-making capabilities that can be perceived as wise. Intelligence (true vs. false), ethics (right vs. wrong), and wisdom (good vs. bad) are interrelated but independent features of human behavior, and a similar framework should also characterize the behavior of cognitive agents integrated in human society. The working hypothesis formulated in this paper is that the propensity to consolidate ethically guided behavior, possibly evolving to some kind of wisdom, is a cognitive architecture based on bio-inspired embodied cognition, educated through development and social interaction. In contrast, the problem with current AI foundation models applied to robotics (EAI) is that, although they can be super-intelligent, they are intrinsically disembodied and ethically agnostic, independent of how much information was absorbed during training. We suggest that the proposed alternative may facilitate social acceptance and thus make such robots civilized.