![]() On the one hand, we have empty emotional aping on the other, faceless super-computers. Part of what makes HAL-9000 terrifying is that we cannot see it emote. The result is they seem to understand us. Kisemet and Cog have rather rudimentary A.I., but very advanced mimicking and response abilities. Humans have evolved to react to subtle emotional cues that allow us to recognize other minds, other persons. Robots like Kisemet and Cog are representative of a group of robots where the brains are second to bonding. What Turkle is critiquing is contentless performed emotion. Yet these lovable mechanoids are not what Turkle is critiquing. Turkle is no Luddite, and does not strike me as a speciesist. And Futurama has a warning for all of us. Heck, even R2-D2 and C-3PO seem endeared to one another. Science fiction is packed with robots that endear themselves to us, such as Data from Star Trek, the replicants in Blade Runner, and Legion from Mass Effect. For fans of the Half-Life video game series, Dog, a large scrapheap monstrosity with a penchant for dismembering hostile aliens, is one of the most lovable and loyal characters in the game. are all based on the simple idea that robots can develop deep emotional connections with humans. Movies like Wall-E, The Iron Giant, Short Circuit and A.I. The research team held an emergency meeting to discuss "the ethics of exposing a child to a sociable robot whose technical limitations make it seem uninterested in the child," as Turkle describes in Alone Together. ![]() A 12-year-old subject named Estelle became convinced that the robot had clammed up because it didn't like her, and she became sullen and withdrew to load up on snacks provided by the researchers. One day during Turkle's study at MIT, Kismet malfunctioned. As the Chronicle of Higher Education article on her shows, the result of believing a robot can feel is not always happy: People, especially children, project personalities and emotions on to rudimentary robots. Whether or not you should is the question. Can you have an emotional connection with a robot? Sherry Turkle, Director of the MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, believes you certainly could.
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