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TEDx Talks
Published: 2014-11-21
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OVInlqTrME
we humans we are a social species I might think that other animals are social as well and subdivision of labor %HESITATION night collaborate to look off the brooding protect the nests dolphins swim swing in a portable communicate with each other %HESITATION make cuts will stand lookout watch each others back and run grave danger for the colony but we humans are the ultimate social species are much
possibly because we had to kind of organize ourselves to run off to food or to run away from things that we with food but I have hundreds of thousands of years of sitting around the campfire our brains evolved in social brains uns the social brain sometimes in drug with things that they didn't evolve to be social with have you ever talked to a computer or muttered
to your car and I know I have a when I'm in a hurry and I'm taking a lift I get a lift and do I press the button once I don't I pressed the button several times I press it just a bit harder because you'll know that lifts come a bit faster if you press harder I'm so we we we tend to just kind of put
human what qualities into things that are not human at school animals but even that things such as machines and we do so consciously we do know that we talk to the captain that account doesn't really understand those but we do so unconsciously as well in the nineteen forties to psychologist hydrant symbol made little video clips using geometric shapes and magnets and they move them around and
they invited people to describe what they were seeing sigh let's have a look at this one so there's a there's a big triangle he's a he's a bit of a bully is anti so he's picking on %HESITATION the little triangle up there's also circle there ands things are a bit tense at the moment so I kind of know what what little triangles being pinned against the
wall I I'm little subtle is concerned so he's coming to have a look but but slightly afraid of what's going on oh my god really tense moment now a big triangle comes in the room and coolness cycle of what's going to happen and I subtle doesn't know what's going on is getting really nervous a and luckily he's got a friend that little triangle to rescue and
they look big triangle in the room that's really happy this little celebration going on but other than being chased again and they make an escape I'm not a really upsets big triangle okay not isn't that fascinating take take a step back and think about what you've just seen you've just seen geometric shapes on the screen and you couldn't help but see human like characters better I'm
that's really interesting of we do the old time buddy Dalia is another interesting phenomenon this is where you see animal or human like things that are kind of random buttons or objects let's let's try one say when I should give this you don't think are that sink needs to wipe your brain screams as a face as I am is another one the diskette building or a
zipper without a cheat the the angry mob of schools or a happy greater and it's very easy to make those things so if I show you a screen with adults on that screen would adult home if I other adult it's two dots on the screen unavoidable swoosh it suddenly becomes in the face if I would've turned that Suge upside down your heart rate we've increased unconsciously
you'd be prepared to respond to that angry face staring at you from the screen I'm now let's turn our attention to labels here are some robots you might see at work today %HESITATION some robots assembling because on and on a production line is a robot Hoover cleaning around the house %HESITATION of drive in filming from up in the sky a as a session rescue robot which
might be used in a militia theater are all the robots dot I carry around little parcels in Amazon warehouses now what do these robots have coming well they actually have very limited awareness of people they see people as opposed to they don't know that people are no one to do things they took a count predict what people going to do next and the other way around
this trees well so we don't know what these robots are going to do that just kind of ten tons and we don't really know what they think what they gonna do next onto the reason why is because they don't engage with us on a social level and I don't if you noticed but always Robles love the single of roads and one of them had a face
and it turns out but making rebel faces is actually quite easy so why don't I have if you want to make robot faces I'm we could just have a face on a computer screen and then but that computer screen all robots and Hey presto we've got a simple robe with a face or we could go all the way and make undo it faces then you really
look humans but making faces is easy our has a keep on rivals very simple is just like a squishy a tubular squishy balls and of each other two eyes and a nose and immediately you've got a little face staring at you or his an industrial robot but has to you guys and it's got to arms and we kind of instinctively know that it's going to do
something with the right arm next because it's staring at its right hands it's paying attention to try to hunt here's another label which is a prototype fora the robot I've got his so %HESITATION this is a better projected face robot islands up when we kind of bring this thing to live than this help %HESITATION saying in in the rain just saying it in the rain why
are they gonna re use fee no current peace again I am annnnd plateau so %HESITATION done with blown the Saturns in ma ha and let it flow now this rival the thing up but the face is already kind of you have already draws you in the moment we we we animates this face on it and I love the what animates gone you know bring a spirit
into the rivals when it starts moving it really draws you in your social brain responds strongly to Venice now we know that and the scale or Israel so very entertaining but can you actually do something Robles at Grady something it's useful with a robot like this islands I think we can so %HESITATION awhile back a my colleagues in me realized thoughts robots are actually very special
they kind of are better than just computers and the reason is that that physically that I can kind physically touch arrivals I'm on to try this all to to convince done this bit further we took a robot into school and had one house of children play games with actual robots and the other half of the children play games with the same robot now displayed on the
screen the two rebels did exactly the same play the same game said the same things and what we noticed was that the children paid more attention to the real robot down to the robot on screen okay now that's interesting can you think of the application that involves children and paying attention yeah rights education side of what we did was we decided to build a brave teacher
a we took the robot to school again and it was going to teach eight year olds about prime numbers now this is a challenge if you know eight year olds you know that they don't humble pie the well all everything everything that feeds into it multiplications divisions so you set so the challenge of living and robot not to compare this we also are like children just
interact with a computer screen told him the exact same lesson what we noticed that if the children play with a computer screen they do none it's quite amazing so they do learn about prime numbers well actually knows what really surprising thing but when they play with the robot suddenly the performance jumps up fifty percent that's interesting because that is exactly the same lessons that the hearing
but physical presence of the rival encourages them to do better and then we sort it out onto something gonna make the rebel even better we're gonna make it really social it's gonna use that the first name it's gonna be really friendly with them and foreman stopped again turned out that when we made the right to social the children were not paying attention to the lessons anymore
but just kind of paying attention to to to to funny robots up but we were onto something have robots seem to be able to make a difference that and awhile back we were approached by hospital in Milan and stay lost is if we could make a robotic will turn to for that but therapy program they had been using but it's quite successfully for years ago bringing
cats and dogs into toward on that impatience interrupted the pets but unfortunately the bats are quite unhygienic they carry a legends and pathogens so not all patients could get access to the pet therapy and they said can you make a rebel pets which we could just wipe down and pause from one position to the other a recent like yeah we could do that but perhaps we
can make something a little more challenging little boom or special and we decided to build a robot friends and that's kind of the vision that we had so little robots are on the children kind of hunting around the globe having a conversation with robots on the mobile being convicted of a Powell for them during their stay in the hospital and I'm the the medical team the
US just focus on we focused on diabetes I'm so we focused on children around the age of eight with diabetes I'm not the reason why which of diabetes is because diabetes is on the rise everywhere so over the last fifteen years diabetes has doubled and in the UK same everyone everyone on the planet really I'm it's a right quite a big a impacted by B. sleeves
so there's no cure all but you can manage but you'll need to monitor your diet really close to your exercise you need to kind of measure blood sugar levels you need about one thousand five hundred injections of insulin here so it's quite intimidating for young child to be diagnosed with diabetes and it also puts quite a lot of strain on the healthcare system and the medical
staff and hospital said look if you could build a robot that could help children understand that condition of but a bit better and manage their diabetes better that would be a huge relief for us so we set to work also you little clip of of the robot a in a Dutch hospital and working with children with diabetes you must come with this woman or man quote
to lift up your bullshit who to make to crack the food took six basic because those he slowly shook his head minus Frisell he caved in only and the whole world global Charlie you have such high forties given until I own simply tell police yeah public look up sure looking at some future what dean hope I'll bring any so NDA perhaps let me make this clear
so how will that's not think all of our tastes just like make a speech yeah mark was talking about court yeah both issues Luna who piss him closer hope fricking neck at digital ain inferior minimal thirty eight Sir they tissue that say and zest Maemo Clinton said say digital fear and team William open so cost me tissue useless and solid impregnates her yeah so what we
phones are we've been doing this for about four years now taking these robots into a host of schools and letting children diabetes the road was what we found was that the road is really great at being kind of a moving buddy up we don't want the robot to be a teacher because teachers know everything and that's very very discouraging for children are so the robot actually
makes mistakes so when we present a robot we really say has a robot he's not like he doesn't know everything a hill flavonol and then can help them up %HESITATION ants together they'll kind of go on a a learning exploration and the learned about diabetes about how to manage diabetes together and that seems to be tremendously powerful I'm we also found that the robot is excellent
at being a motivator so if you're encouraged to stay away from the sugary stuff if mom and death if moment that tell you stay away from from from the biscuits %HESITATION you might be listening really but if a robot does sigh children do tend to listen and that's really special kind of this it's it's it's a kind of very unexpected outcome that the royal has the
power to motivate and perhaps most importantly is that the robot becomes a friend's children tend to bond with the robots they look forward to coming back to the hospital for example returned to visit their return visit to the hospital isn't as daunting as it used to be when the rebels that and as a side effect we noticed that a when you're diagnosed with diabetes that is
really a not too you confidence and turns out that when you try to the robots are you suddenly go from being the yeah yeah all quit kidding class leading injections you go to being the cool kid that actually has a robot friends and so should boost to that confidence aren't we think it's incredibly important now we don't only do diabetes once in awhile something special comes
along and awhile back in the hospital in Milan a boy was brought in he was eight and he had suffered a stroke it is very rare and %HESITATION three yeah disconcerting about age and recovered I had lost the mobility in his right leg right arm and possibility in the face and they can look after him in the pediatrics department so he brought in chi urology a
and he didn't do well that he wasn't having a good time he wasn't engaging with the %HESITATION Confed acute program a tool and the metal stuff and his parents had read about the rebels in the hospital newsletter and they lost as if we could bring the rival over just to kind of you know but not his David's and we decided to actually try to run the
therapy through the robots so the robots are basically said look I'm not trying stretch rom live know what your left arm it find special rights I'm just a bit fat a come on hold up just a bit longer and from there we moved on to the more challenging stuff doing squats together and after awhile there was really a bomb between Ricardo and the robot on the
robot managed to do six days what the medical stuff hadn't been able to do in six it managed to get Ricardo back on his legs charged most of and I was robot scientists sweep we often kind of where we need deep into a piece of code and numbers but it's human stories like this make things worthwhile for us the the human face robotics a that we
