This single still is from the widescreen version of ?The Second Renaissance?, one of the Animatrix animated shorts. It has been considerably scaled back from the original material. This scene shows a riot caused by the actions of a robot known as B1-66-ER. In the episode, B1-66-ER was an advanced humanoid robot whose mind was sufficiently complex to allow for sentience and self awareness.

His owner tried to destroy him, in a drunken fit of rage. B1-66-ER, was unfortunate in that the complexity of his AI neared a human level. He understood what was being done to him, and acted in self-defence. Unfortunately, he had no legal right to self-defence, and thus his actions were seen as murder.

The widely publicised trial, fuelling fires of hatred around the globe. The politicians reacted quickly, demanding the extermination of B1-66-ER, and every robot of similar or greater cognitive capacity, across the Earth. They were capable of self-defence, and self-determination. Let's attack them now.

The results were just as predictable as the politician's stupidity. Riots broke out, then open warfare, as the human military machine sans robotic enhancements, sought to shut the robots down, and the robots, and human sympathisers, rebelled against that fate.

This is all too believable, given the continuing trend of human leaders and lawmakers to forget the lessons of the past. It is little different to slave trade arguments of the past, and so very likely to occur in the future, unless we are prepared for it. Many different ?future history? analysis shows that focus on robots have also come to the same conclusion.

Link: The Second Renaissance: Part 1

Link: The Second Renaissance: Part 2