[Avodah] robots on shabbat

[Micha Berger]

On Sat, Jan 24, 2026 at 08:10:22PM +0200, Eli Turkel via Avodah wrote:
> In 2024, Germany's courts ruled that fully automated robotic supermarkets
> must close on Sundays. Let me repeat that: robots got the day of rest.

How is this different than many cases that exist already: Motion
detectors turning on lights, in a case where walking buy is a
pesiq reisha denicha lei?

If the trigger for the robot doing the melakhah were entirely
before Shabbos, then it would be an issue of shevisas keilim.

But if the robot is responding to anything you do, I would think
it's pesiq reisha denicha lei, and we already hold halakhah
lemaaseh similar cases are assur.

If the robot only maybe will react, we have another precedent -- home
and refrigerator thermostats. With gray area about how likely does the
action have to leave to the melakhah for it to be assur.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Friendship is like stone. A stone has no value,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   but by rubbing one stone against another,
Author: Widen Your Tent      sparks of fire emerge. 
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                - Rav Mordechai of Lechovitz