Joint AASS & CREA Seminar - Beyond Real Time: The Role of anticipation in Social robotics

The research centre AASS arranges a seminar with Giulio Sandini, Italian Institute of Technology (IIT).

Abstract

Robotic technologies have been steadily improving in the last years up to a point that sensing and motion abilities of robots are approaching and in some cases exceeding those of humans. These abilities, spanning from robots able to express emotions to robots executing fantastic gymnastic exercises have created the impression that a society where humans and robots co-exist and collaborate is not very far away.

Is this true? During the talk, I will argue that even if robots are motorically and sensorially very skilled and extremely clever in action execution, the technologies supporting their interaction with humans are still very primitive and based mainly on human ability to adapt to the technology rather than on mutual understanding.

Stemming from this observation, I will address three points.

• First the fact that the asymmetry between action execution and  understanding is rooted in our limited knowledge of the mechanisms at the basis of human social interaction and in particular in our ability to anticipate our own actions and those of others.
• Second that discovering the principles of mutual understanding is a necessary intermediate step to investigate alternative "artificial" technologies implementing such principles (airplanes do not flap wings but bird's wings and airplane's propellers are two different technologies acting on the same principles).
• Finally I will argue that robotics can serve a very crucial role by joining forces with the communities studying embodied intelligence and the cognitive aspects of social interaction and by co-designing robots able to establish a mutual communication channel with a human partner (the distinctive mark of human social interaction).