Rubberface Robot Shares Feelings

Robot In Touch with Its Emotions
By Tracy Staedter, Discovery News

The ability to express feelings is difficult enough for humans, but now a humanoid robot named Kansei is able to frown or smile according to a flow of artificial consciousness

Kansei's ability to communicate feelings makes it one step closer to recognizing when humans are happy or sad, an important characteristic for machines expected to one day help care for the elderly, clean house, or greet people at a reception desk.

Kansei, which means "sensibility" and "emotion" in Japanese, also contains speech recognition software, a speaker to vocalize, and motors that contort artificial skin on its face into expressions.

Fish is fresh. Are you my friend?


As with humans, the word "fish" may elicit different, simultaneous memories and reactions, both positive and negative. The same is true with Kansei.

In the case of "fish," Kansei says "Fish is fresh" and smiles.

"If we establish the mechanism, the robot could find nice food in a market and even research new delicious foods for humankind," said the Kansei project leader Junichi Takeno, a professor at the Robot and Science Institute of Meiji University in Japan.

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