"For routine medical procedures, general purpose robots with enough dexterity to do autonomous medical operations don't exist yet. What we could have is a clust

"For routine medical procedures, general purpose robots with enough dexterity to do autonomous medical operations don't exist yet. What we could have is a cluster of talented medical robot operators (in india? somewhere cheap) doing a dozen operations a day by telepresence with hospitals outfitted with standard medical robot equipment." Not per se, but we're coming damned close in this area. Surgical robots are becoming quite dexterous, and even though most of them require remote operation, it's not because of limitations in the dexterity or precision of the machines -- it's because of limitations in the AI. Also, as with most things in medicine, the elephant in the room is liability. Who's liable if a fully autonomous machine malfunctions in a surgery, or is improperly maintained, etc? The hospital? The manufacturer? The machinist/programmer? The doctors who were present in the same room as the machine? Nobody wants to be stuck holding the bag on that one.