Robots are increasingly seen as mankind's future saviours. Robots will, according to many discourses, help with the demographic shift; remove the human body from warfare; and increase safety in manual work. These imaginaries of all the good things robots can do are as of today often far from the truth. Technically, there are still many challenges to overcome before robots could co-exist in our physical environment, be social and intelligent, and perform tasks autonomously. Autonomous robots of today are simple and would not be able to work without human aid. However, imaginaries of robot capabilities, that often come from pop-culture, are being tested through Wizard of Oz methods. By wizarding a robot in a natural environment, researchers can test how more advanced robots of the future would be able to behave and measure the perception of the potential user. The methodology, however, raises questions about how robots really would act in the future, and if the wizard is fooling people to believe in a vision that might never come true.  

To this panel, I would like to bring attention to potential dubious effects Wizard of Oz methods might have on the current and future imaginaries of robots, and if this method should have clearer guidelines for usage. For example, the standard in these kinds of studies is that the participants are told afterwards that the robot was controlled, but have not the users already formed their mental model of what robots can do by then? Furthermore, there is a question of whether the wizard should act naturally (as a human) or try to act as a robot of today or by imagining how robots will behave in the future. These choices create a lot of varieties in what wizarding means and could help form an unreal imaginary of robots.