Japan’s ifBot Understands Language and Emotional Tone, Gets Rejected

Japan's Business Design Laboratory developed a robot that can understand language and emotional tone from human voices.

"Why are you mad at me?"

"I'M NOT MAD!" 

ifBot is a resident at a Japanese nursing home.

It can converse, sing, express emotions and quiz seniors to help keep them mentally agile.

It's kind of like a wife -

"Can you guess what I am feeling now?" 

The old folks lost interest with the robot after about a month.

Once again…kind of like a wife….

The geezers preferred stuffed animals – nothing but stuffing up top and no noise coming out.

"'Most (elderly) people are not interested in robots. They see robots as overly-complicated and unpractical. They want to be able to get around their house, take a bath, get to the toilet and that's about it,' said a geriatric social worker at the University of Tokyo."

It's not surprising that once a person figures out what his spouse wants and begins to understand her…she rejects him.

Why should robots be any different?