This is not at all my area of expertise, but it's a compelling question. I do recall a passage from Aristotle's Politics where the author states that slavery would be unnecessary if objects could move themselves. It reads:

"There is only one condition in which we can imagine managers not needing subordinates, and masters not needing slaves. This condition would be that each (inanimate) instrument could do its own work, at the word of command or by intelligent anticipation, like the statues of Daedalus or the tripods made by Hephaestus...if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves."

Aristotle was most definitely not against slavery, but it's an interesting question in the context of the contemporary period. This has happened, and slavery is still very pervasive.