Ask the Robotic Psychiatrist

No, not Dr. Susan Calvin. She's a fictional character who appears in a number of Isaac Asimov's works. Dr. Joanne Pransky is real, although she happily admits that she's modeled her career on the fictional Dr. Calvin. There is plenty of show biz razzle-dazzle (and humor) in Dr. Pransky's shtick -- she's been a judge on BattleBots and an engaging guest on many talk shows -- but there are hard academic underpinnings to it all, and she is as qualified as any living human being to answer your questions (one per post, please) about robot behavior and human-robot relationships. We'll send her 10 - 12 of the highest-moderated questions and have her answers back to you in about a week. (No hard-tech question, please. Those would go to a robotic internist or robotic orthopedist.)

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Pushing or Shoving?

[hoggoth]

In your experience with robots, which is the real danger, pushing or shoving?

Re:Eliza

[muzthe42nd]

Here's the best eliza program out there. It really is

Re:Aren't you just another shameless tech self-pub

[jdray]

'Dr. Joanne Pransky Credentials' Comes up with 0 hits on google. Wow.

I just googled for a guy whom I know to have a doctorate in experimental nuclear physics from Berkeley using the same method with the same results. A check of another doctorate holder with a much more common name turned up a bunch of medical doctors, but nothing on his specialty (mathematics). I'm not sure your method is a sound one, though I suspect that your conclusions aren't far off the mark.