2012-10-03

Telenoid, a "minimalistic human" Jazz-singing robot

Telenoid R1 bot meant to be 'minimalistic human' | Crave - CNET


Telenoid is a child-sized telepresence robot through which users can interact with others from a distance. Created in collaboration with Osaka University and Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR), Telenoid is a tool for investigating "the essential elements for representing and transferring humanlike presence," according to Ishiguro and his team.

Telenoid

Features of Telenoid R1 include:
  • A novel minimalistic design that can effectively represent human presence
  • Soft and pleasant body
  • Low cost due to decreased numbers of actuators
    (Telenoid R1:9、Geminoid™ HI-1:50、Geminoid™ F:12)
  • Small-size body and simple internal structure by use of electric (DC) motors
  • Easy teleoperation based on the teleoperation technology developed by ATR
Source: Telenoid


Consciousness and All That Jazz

Could a robot that sings jazz be the key to understanding and harnessing robot intelligence?
That is the hopes of researcher Antonio Chella at the University of Palermo, Italy.

Jazz-singing robot could shed light on consciousness - tech - 27 September 2012 - New Scientist

Antonio Chella at the University of Palermo, Italy, is working with a Telenoid robot, developed by the Hiroshi Ishiguro Laboratory in Japan (pictured). To start with, the Telenoid will be trained to mimic the movements and simple sounds made by a human singer, as well as associate parts of music with different emotional states. Chella then plans to see if the robot can use these associations to improvise - choosing movements and vocalisations that complement its human duet partner.

Intelligence is often defined as the ability to find connections between existing entities - understanding that a key goes in a lock, for instance. But Chella suggests that a conscious organism should be able to go a step further and introduce novel connections - between, say, musical phrases - that result in the creation of something new. That, in essence, is the idea behind improvisation.

Jazz musicians interviewed by Chella talked of having a mental library of musical phrases that they were able to combine in new ways when prompted by other musicians. Importantly, however, this combination happens in a state that is "similar in a sense to dreaming", he says. "Not really conscious, but not unconscious." Chella wants to replicate these states in a machine. "Consciousness could be linked to these moments of combination," he says.