"I couldn't possibly fail to disagree with you less."
14 April 2005Head gamesDo we want our robots to look, well, robotic? Last year, Dallas inventor David Hanson, founder of Human Emulation Robotics LLC, said no:
Most people doing social robots believe that human faces will turn people off and will disturb them. I think that's ridiculous. The human face is perhaps the most natural paradigm for us to interact with.
I have yet to make up my own mind here, but I have to admit, I can see myself getting into a conversation with Hanson's "Eva," whom you can see here [link requires QuickTime and, at 17.2 mb, much patience] for yourself. At least there's a chance she wouldn't glare at me like those real girls. Posted at 6:26 AM to Entirely Too CoolYeah -- Commander Data with C-3PO's face (but please not C-3PO's voice or personality!) would probably be more widely accepted, at least at first. Especially if the human face costs extra. Once people have had a decade or so to get used to the idea of interacting with robots, then maybe the human face would be more marketable. Posted by: McGehee at 10:15 AM on 14 April 2005Right now, I think I can deal with a 2D simulation (think S1M0NE in that absurd Al Pacino movie) a lot easier than I can deal with a 3D artifact that's, you know, actually there, sort of. |