Bots didn’t. Rosa Parks did.

Even though there isn’t usually much winter in Montgomery, Alabama, the evening of December 1st. 1955 was quite chilly.

After a long day of work, Rosa Parks, a 42 year old black woman, boarded the bus that would take her home and took a seat in the “colored” section.

As the bus filled up, the driver, James F. Blake, ordered Parks and three other African American passengers to give up their seats to white passengers.

This was a common practice under the city’s segregation laws.

The other two passengers complied, but Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat.

As her refusal to leave her seat continued adamantly, she was arrested and charged with violating segregation laws.

News of Rosa Parks’ arrest quickly spread, sparking outrage and leading to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, a mass protest against segregation on public buses. The boycott, organized by civil rights leaders, lasted for 381 days and played a significant role in the eventual desegregation of public transportation in Montgomery.

It was clear that Rosa Parks’ act of defiance became one of the most important milestones in the civil rights movement, inspiring more protests and actions aimed at ending racial segregation and discrimination in the United States.

Malcolm X referred to Rosa Parks by saying: “She was the spark that ignited the modern Civil Rights Movement. She never fired a gun, but she did more than any other person to put a bomb in the arsenal of the Civil Rights Revolution.”

She wouldn’t praise herself in the same way Malcolm X did. When asked why she wouldn’t give up her seat, Rosa Parks said she was “tired from work”.

“She was the spark that ignited the modern Civil Rights Movement. She never fired a gun, but she did more than any other person to put a bomb in the arsenal of the Civil Rights Revolution.” Malcom X
The sparks that ignite great things often do so without being aware of it. Or without wanting to be.

This is not due to a type of ‘machine unconsciousness’, something characteristic of a robot not knowing what it’s doing. On the contrary, it’s a lack of awareness that no bot, no algorithm, nor any artificial intelligence has been able to experience so far.

And it will probably always continue to belong exclusively to humans.