Emotional Robot: empathy?
A robot with empathy sounds like the stuff of sci-fi movies, but with the aid of neural networks European researchers are developing robots in tune with our emotions. The tantalising work of the Feelix Growing project is grabbing the world’s attention.
Through the combination of cameras,sensors, artificial neural networks and software development ICT results are developing robots that can respond to human emotions.
If someone shows fear or cries out in pain, the robot may learn to change its behaviour to appear less threatening, backing away if necessary. If someone cries out in happiness, it may even detect the difference, and one day fine-tune its responses to individuals.
These developments can be promising to all kinds of employments:
Robots that can adapt to people’s behaviours are needed if machines are to play a part in society, such as helping the sick, the elderly, people with autism or house-bound people, working as domestic helpers, or just for entertainment, according to Canamero.
In the video on the website you can see some of the actions and uses of these robots, it is amazing.
Their main website: ICT Results
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July 26, 2008 @ 10:14 pm
Love the design of your site. Very professional and easy on the eyes. Nice, nice, nice.
As a sci fi buff and jack-of-all-trades, robots have interested me for a long time. I, too, believe we are on the cusp of amazing technology. Will we end up with the controversies predicted between man and machines? Probably not in my lifetime, but eventually the line drawn between the two will be come fuzzier and fuzzier. Shades of “The Matrix”, “I-Robot”, and “Wall-e” all rolled together. Not to mention the fiction of the master of them all, Isaac Asimov. He was a smart feller, that one. Japan is already using his guidance for their own concerns: “Safety guidelines to be set for next-generation robots” (See it here: http://asia.news.yahoo.com/060520/kyodo/d8hn7ki00.html )
Robin