{"id":26205,"date":"2015-05-20T22:54:55","date_gmt":"2015-05-20T19:54:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ngradio.gr\/?p=26205"},"modified":"2015-05-21T01:58:12","modified_gmt":"2015-05-20T22:58:12","slug":"the-icubs-are-coming-how-robots-could-teach-our-kids-and-do-our-dirty-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ngradio.gr\/en\/news-el\/technology-en\/the-icubs-are-coming-how-robots-could-teach-our-kids-and-do-our-dirty-work\/","title":{"rendered":"The iCubs are coming! How robots could teach our kids and do our dirty work"},"content":{"rendered":"

They dance, play, swear and beg you to touch them. They may even let you snog someone on the other side of the planet. Meet the robots of tomorrow.<\/p>\n

A bedside table on wheels is practising three-point turns around the room, rising up and down and cheekily cocking its head as it glides, while a furry white creature emits plaintive mews from the room next door, flapping its flippers for attention. Nearby, hundreds of wiry insects buzz about on a glass tray like angry cockroaches awaiting their lunch, while a team of drones whirs to life in the corner. You have to watch your step in the basement lab of Sheffield Robotics, where even the furniture has a mind of its own.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were wondering what would be an appropriate way for a table to talk to you,\u201d says Tony Prescott, the centre\u2019s director and a professor of cognitive neuroscience at the University of Sheffield, as the balletic bedside table comes to a halt, like an obedient dog called to heel. \u201cBut it might actually be better if it didn\u2019t talk and just got on with its job. Maybe your table doesn\u2019t need to have a personality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such existential questions have occupied Prescott and his researchers for the past four years, while working on everything from assistive robots, geared to helping the elderly, to whole swarms of them for search-and-rescue missions. But what really drives Prescott, whose background is in psychology, is the ultimate quest: to build a robot with a sense of its own self.<\/p>\n

He introduces me to iCub, a toddler-size humanoid with a streamlined plastic head from which two huge doe-eyes emerge, complete with seductively drooping eyelids. Little red lights then blink behind its mute white mask, displaying a downturned mouth and a severe frown. It appears I may have angered the robo-baby. Was it something I said to the table? \u201cThat\u2019s his working face,\u201d says Prescott. \u201cHe\u2019s still in the early stages of learning. He\u2019ll smile when he achieves a task or gets something right.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Sheffield is one of a small group of European universities testing out the possibilities of this \u00a3250,000 robot, developed by the Italian Institute of Technology as an open-source vehicle for investigating human cognition and artificial intelligence. It is one of the most advanced humanoids of its kind, with 53 degrees of movements in its limbs, a sense of touch and hand-eye coordination, allowing it to grasp objects, play catch and even dance to music<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When I reach out to touch it, a monitor shows exactly where and how hard my fingers are pressing. When its voice is switched on, it gets a bit creepy. \u201cI like when you touch me in this way,\u201d he says<\/a>, in a matter-of-fact monotone. \u201cPlease, caress me again.\u201d And he\u2019s a bit sweary, as three-year-olds go. When he misses the ball in a game of Pong, he cries: \u201cBloody hell! That isn\u2019t fair!\u201d<\/p>\n

Sheffield\u2019s iCub is run by a system modelled on the cognitive architecture of the human brain, so it can \u201cthink\u201d and learn from the world around it, as a toddler would. Over the past couple of years, the team has been developing iCub\u2019s object-recognition skills and its sense of its body, all the time building up a kind of autobiographical memory to start creating its sense of \u201cself\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe next stage is giving him understanding, consolidating his experiences for future prediction,\u201d says Prescott. \u201cBut we probably don\u2019t want to let him evolve his own motivation and drives. That\u2019s a bit of a risk.\u201d<\/p>\n