Machines have feelings?

Emotion is an internal part of communication. But the machine does not have, does not understand and does not react. This makes us - those who operate them - upset. However, thanks to projects developed by European researchers, machines with emotions may no longer be fiction.

Nearly everyone has to communicate with machines to some extent, such as cell phones, personal computers or annoying customer care services. But the communication part is on the machine, not the person. Although scientists all over the world have tried to create a more user-friendly machine-human interface, much of the improvement is merely technical.

The Humaine project approached the problem from a relatively different perspective than the previously unsuccessful attempt. Participating in this project are multidisciplinary experts and scholars to create the different parts or tools needed to make machines 'soft' skills .

The process of setting up emotions

Emotional diary? (Photo: Humaine)

Professor Roddy Cowie, coordinator of this European-funded project, said: "This problem has confused people who try to solve everything immediately while not having the tools implemented." that. In general, systems are often developed by talented programmers and engineers. These people know how to write and create great computer programs but know little about identifying and acquiring human emotions.

Cowie explained, 'When they build data, the records are not the same way the emotions appear in action and daily interaction at all, and the codes they use to describe the sample will not match. what happens in everyday life. ' So the Humaine project started from the first step of creating multi-disciplinary expert groups such as philosophy, psychology and computer animation.

Psychologists study and interpret human signals that emit, expressing different emotional states from boredom to anger. A part is simply what is said, but also has more intonation, facial expressions, and even smaller signals such as eye gaze, hand movement and posture. Link all of these together and psychologists and IT professionals can work together on a database that allows interpretation and even response to emotions.

'People who understand communication provide information to computer operators that produce complex images.' This is a simple explanation for both an extremely complex project that may not be completely successful in 20 or 30 years, although there are positive results and there are partial applications the technology of the project.

'We have developed multi-modal emotional recognition systems and this brings us to the forefront of identification technology. And we have identified different types of signals emitted by a representative - usually an image of a person - if he wants it to be emotionally convincing. '

Some of these technologies are close to commercial applications.

Latest achievements

Museum instructors tested in Scotland and Israel in the form of handheld PDAs with frames and microphones observing other levels of excitement in different display formats and responding accordingly.'While this is only at the basic level, it is a long step from a simple pre-recorded message type.'

At another museum in Germany, a large representative named Max makes the presentation more appealing by communicating with children. According to Cowie 'Max is not only knowledgeable but also entertaining and it attracts children.'

Designers have also used techniques to control video game enthusiasts and improve the corresponding design. Future applications include a learner-focused teaching method in which you can observe learners' attitudes and responses. In addition, there are instructions for installing user-friendly computer programs.

'People often assume that this work is aimed at the complete communication between mankind and machines, like the HAL character in the 2001 film: A Space Odyssey. This may have never happened, the Humaine philosophers thought very carefully about whether we should allow it to happen. Even if everything goes in that direction, now is definitely not the right time. '

But the path to the emotional machines is under construction. Cowie and colleagues set up a new project that brings together technologies and offers an agent that can communicate really through voice. Advances in voice recognition technology from other projects will be needed for full interaction.

In the present time, countless other applications will come out.'As the interaction of people with computers becomes more and more widespread, it is more difficult to ignore emotional factors. Concerned about this issue will become an integral part of other computer science and computer development studies. '