Month: October 2024

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The Uncanny Social Robot

The uncanny valley effect is a famous hypothesis. Whether it can be influenced by context is still unclear. In an online experiment, Katharina Kühne and her co-authors Oliver Bendel, Yuefang Zue, and Martin Fischer found a negative linear relationship between a robot’s human likeness and its likeability and trustworthiness, and a positive linear relationship between a robot’s human likeness and its uncaniness. “Social context priming improved overall likability and trust of robots but did not modulate the Uncanny Valley effect.” (Abstract) Katharina Kühne outlined these conclusions in her presentation “Social, but Still Uncanny” – the title of the paper – at the International Conference on Social Robotics 2024 in Odense, Denmark. Like Yuefang Zue and Martin Fischer, she is a researcher at the University of Potsdam. Oliver Bendel teaches and researches at the FHNW School of Business. Together with Tamara Siegmann, he presented a second paper at the ICSR.

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Robots in Prison

On October 22, 2024, Tamara Siegmann and Prof. Dr. Oliver Bendel (School of Business FHNW) presented their project “Robots in Prison” at the ICSR in Odense (Denmark). They investigated whether collaborative and social robots can and should be used in prisons. One result was that modern industrial robots such as cobots and classic service robots such as transportation and cleaning robots hardly create any added value. Instead, they take work away from inmates. In contrast, social robots are conceivable and useful. They bring something to imprisonment that is common in freedom. And – an important point for resocialization – they can combat the loneliness of inmates. The International Conference on Social Robotics is the most important conference for social robotics alongside Robophilosophy. The paper “Social and Collaborative Robots in Prison” will be published in a proceedings volume by Springer at the end of the year.

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A New School of Computer Science

All four cantons supporting the FHNW approved the global budget of CHF 204.7 million in September and October 2024. This also clears the way for the new Hochschule für Informatik FHNW (assumed name FHNW School of Computer Science) with a main location in Brugg-Windisch and a secondary location north of the Jura (Basel-Landschaft and Basel-Stadt). It is due to be founded at the beginning of 2025 and will begin its studies in fall 2025. From this date, it will take over the existing computer science courses at the FHNW School of Engineering. During the 2025 – 2028 performance mandate period, the plan is to establish further education and training courses and develop research and development activities. The aim of the new university is to educate and train the IT specialists required by business and administration in Northwestern Switzerland. The degree programs and courses offered by the FHNW School of Business in business information technology, artificial intelligence, and robotics are not affected by this change.  The FHNW School of Computer Science will be the tenth university under the umbrella of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland (Photo: Pati Grabowicz).

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Back to the Future

Elon Musk presented the prototypes of his new Cybercab and his new Robovan in October 2024. In this context, he once again said: “The future should look like the future.” (TechCrunch, 10 October 2024) This is an astonishing statement, because if you know a little about the history of robot and vehicle construction, you know that Elon Musk is orientating himself on ideas that were popular 20 to 80 years ago. Brass, copper, silver, gold, and large, matt or polished surfaces – reminiscent of Elektro (1939) and his animal companion Sparko (1940) as well as futuristic vehicles such as Gil Spear’s Chrysler two-seater (1941). Science fiction and fantasy are also likely to play a role in the design of Tesla and co – think of steampunk and cyberpunk in general, and think of movies like “Metropolis” (1927) and “I, Robot” (2004). Elon Musk generally likes to mix ideas from fiction in his developments, for example the large language model called Grok, which takes its name from “Stranger in a Strange Land” and is intended to fulfil claims formulated in “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”. TechCrunch also points out the backward-looking nature of the Robovan: “The Robovan has a retro-futuristic look – somewhere between a bus from The Jetsons and a toaster from the 1950s. It features silver metallic sides with black details, and strips of light run-ning parallel to the ground along its sides, with doors that slide out from the middle.” (TechCrunch, 10 October 2024) Robots and robotic vehicles could look very different in the 2020s (Photo: Eirik Newth; cropped by Robophilosophy).