MIT AI Acts Childish on Purpose

garibald gave us the link to an article in the electronic Telegraph about researchers at MIT who have built an interactive AI robot called "Kismet" that is as cute as any George Lucas character, and is supposed to function on the emotional level of a human two-year-old. The cuteness is not gratuitous. As the article makes clear, there is a sound, scientific reason for it. (For pictures, and more technical depth than the Telegraph story, you may want to go directly to Kismet's Web Page.)