FREAKY-DY-FREAK

TOKYO, June 5 (Reuters) - Kansei frowns when he hears the word "bomb," smiles at "sushi" and looks scared and disgusted when someone says "president" -- and he isn't even human.


"What we are trying to do here is to create a flow of consciousness in robots so that they can make the relevant facial expressions," said project leader Junichi Takeno, a professor at Meiji University's School of Science and Technology.

Kate's thoughts:
"..... to create a flow of consciousness in robots"...... can we "create" consciousness? Is consciousness created? What is consciousness anyway? A set of learned behaviours or emotional reactions? A set of learned standards or values?

You wouldn't teach a dog to read 'cause that's not what dogs do. Why is it important for robots to have consciousness?

The robot has 19 movable parts underneath the silicone face mask. When the robot hears the word "president," the online database picks up associated words such as "Bush," "war" and "Iraq" and creates an expression which the researchers said is meant to mix fear and disgust.

Now now..... that's not fair! If we really want Kansei to utilize his so-called consciousness, we'd have to allow him to draw his own conclusion in regard to associations and emotions. Oh wait! Robots can't feel. Even if they are able to make an expression (which researchers take the liberty to translate for us) as fear and disgust, that doesn't mean they they actually feel scared and disgusted.

With Japan's population expected to slide by around a quarter by 2050, and immigration a sensitive issue, some laboratories have developed humanoid robots that can work as maids.

Does that mean they'd rather create robots than to loosen immigration policies so real human beings can be hired as caretakers? Can someone get me a lab technician to translate/explain the rationale behind it?

Though you do have to give Japanese engineers some credit.
No one would ever mistake Kansei for a nationality other than Japanese.