Jul 08, 2006
Emotionally aware computer
According to The Herald, Cambridge professor Peter Robinson has developed a prototype of an “emotionally aware computer” that uses a camera to capture images of the user’s face, then determines facial expressions, and infers the user’s mood.
From the report:
‘Imagine a computer that could pick the right emotional moment to sell you something,” says Peter Robinson, of Cambridge University. “Imagine a future where websites and mobile phones could read our mind and react to our moods.”
It sounds like Orwellian fiction but this week, Robinson, a professor of computer technology, unveiled a prototype for just such a “mind-reading” machine. The first emotionally aware computer is on trial at the Royal Society Festival of Science in London…Once the software is perfected, Robinson believes it will revolutionise marketing. Cameras will be on computer monitors in internet cafes and behind telescreens in bars and waiting rooms. Computers will process our image and respond with adverts that connect to how we’re feeling.
20:43 Posted in Emotional computing | Permalink | Comments (0) | Tags: emotional computing
Cognitive Computing symposium at IBM
Via Neurodudes
Recently, the Almaden Research center, part of IBM research, invited some provocative speakers for a dicussion on the topic of “Cognitive Computing”.
Powerpoint presentations and videos of the event are available online.
From the synopsis:
The 2006 Almaden Institute will focus on the theme of “Cognitive Computing” and will examine scientific and technological issues around the quest to understand how the human brain works. We will examine approaches to understanding cognition that unify neurological, biological, psychological, mathematical, computational, and information-theoretic insights. We focus on the search for global, top-down theories of cognition that are consistent with known bottom-up, neurobiological facts and serve to explain a broad range of observed cognitive phenomena. The ultimate goal is to understand how and when can we mechanize cognition.
Confirmed speakers include Toby Berger (Cornell), Gerald Edelman (The Neurosciences Institute), Joaquin Fuster (UCLA), Jeff Hawkins (Palm/Numenta), Robert Hecht-Nielsen (UCSD), Christof Koch (CalTech), Henry Markram (EPFL/BlueBrain), V. S. Ramachandran (UCSD), John Searle (UC Berkeley) and Leslie Valiant (Harvard). Confirmed panelists include: James Albus (NIST), Theodore Berger (USC), Kwabena Boahen (Stanford), Ralph Linsker (IBM), and Jerry Swartz (The Swartz Foundation).
20:38 Posted in Brain training & cognitive enhancement | Permalink | Comments (0) | Tags: cognitive computing