My favorite passage: The idea is to create “a deeper and deeper emotional connection,” Sofman said. “And if you neglect [the toy robot], you feel the pain of t

My favorite passage: The idea is to create “a deeper and deeper emotional connection,” Sofman said. “And if you neglect [the toy robot], you feel the pain of that.” When he told me this, I felt a flash of not-quite-anger. It seemed almost cruel to design a robot that could play on a young kid’s emotions. And I had never considered that, in the coming human–robot conflagration, robots might take over simply by expertly manipulating us into letting them win.