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Zora, the Robot Caregiver
- croon 8y agoWhen robots are advanced enough to have rights, this might be a good idea. What's next? We're spread to thin to take care of our kids so we put them in the Raiselator 3000?
- skybrian 8y agoIt seems like an expensive toy, but good entertainment. If the cost can be brought down, it could bring joy to a lot of people's lives when they can't have pets. (But why call it a caregiver?)
- Quarrelsome 8y agoI worry that if this succeeds and we lose the human connection to the patient there exists a slew of problems as the infirm and those with dementia aren't the best at asking for help beyond the immediate surroundings or questioning the status quo. I'm thinking wrong pills, general error handling and worst case: malicious compromise. While its nice to see mild benefits I feel bittersweet about any successes given that I feel a better solution to this problem is more human in nature.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- howard941 8y agoThe piece points out one positive interaction: A patient revealed to the device/remote operator that her bruising was caused by falling out of bed. On the other hand, the dementia patient is a less reliable witness than a nannycam. Having been in Zora's shoes for my mom I think Zora's got a long way to go, and I fear that we'll get her anyway.
- JasonFruit 8y agoUpcoming models include Zora the Explorer and Zora, Warrior Princess. Flippant answer aside, what this shows us is that confused, desperately lonely people will grasp at even the most unsatisfying interactions. I don't think it points to a useful direction in robotics or emotional care. (The article was fairly clear on that at the outset, but seemed to ignore its own warning as it progressed.)
- zeeed 8y agoThe robot itself is actually NAO from Aldebaran (now Softbank Robotics): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nao_(robot) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nao_(robot) Zora appears to be the platform/service provider that runs on Softbank's robots.
- pacaro 8y agoIf the “Zora” robot looks familiar, it’s because it is a rebadged SoftBank (was Aldebaran) Nao[1] which have been around for a long time (I stopped working in robotics in 2012 and they had been around for a while then) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nao_(robot) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nao_(robot)
- tlb 8y agoIt's easy to think, as long as there are an even number of lonely people in an area you can just pair them up and everybody can have companionship. And yet, the world is full of buildings full of people, most of them lonely. Or all watching TV instead of talking to each other. Walking into a room full of lonely people and trying to make them all feel less lonely is incredibly hard! There seems to be a shortage of people who are good at it. It therefore seems like a reasonable thing to try automating.
- magic_beans 8y agoWouldn't it be easier and cheaper to simply teach people how to have conversations with other people? Social skills are just expected to develop naturally. But social grace and the ability to have a good conversation with someone are SKILLS -- they need to be learned and honed. Before we start automating companionship, why don't we start teaching people how to communicate with other people?
- tlb 8y agoParents, schools, churches, and society have been trying for 1000s of years. So "why don't we start?" isn't the most useful question. Ask "why has this perpetually failed?" I think in this case, skills aren't the limiting factor. Most people have them, but not sufficient motivation to overcome shyness and fear of rejection. Education can teach skills, but not give people motivation.
- rubidium 8y agoAnd have succeeded until relatively recently... technology isn’t the solution to this.
- jayd16 8y agoYou act like these people were alone their entire lives. If we're talking about a retirement home, I'm sure it has more to do with all your friends passing in front of you.
- nopinsight 8y ago
- have_faith 8y ago> Families can visit only so much Nothing against the robot but how do we fix the root cause of the problem? that modern lifestyles dictate leaving very little time for close family members.
- msla 8y agoChanging that won't fix the fact some families just drift apart because they're composed of individuals. So I still see a role for those robots even in a hypothetical perfect world where nobody's ever "forced" apart.
- burnThemAll 8y agoSo, ultimately, we're all inclined to hate each other for selfish reasons, isolate ourselves, and lob smug animated GIF potshots and 140 character zingers from self aggrandizing user profiles on social media websites, in an effort to puff up our egos, and seem superior through the lens of a user avatar? (see also: karma whoring) And... all in a blind, rabid quest for materialistic status symbols that still leave us bereft of hope amid a listless emptiness, leading to a fate where we can only die alone, in a hospital, unfulfilled? Gee, I guess that's the way the cookie crumbles, huh? Hands are tied. Software eats the world. Birds, bees, and the existential dread of social media. Incontrovertible facts of life. And the fix? Maddeningly asinine robot companions to pat us on the back, and say there, there. Got it!
- harigov 8y agoWhat kind of a social/economic system makes us invest in this when there are billions of malnourished people willing to do something like this for close to free? Why is it that we focus so much on engineering when a lot of problems can potentially be solved using better social and political policies.
- ph0rque 8y agoWell, here's one factor: > The challenge is particularly acute in France, where hospitals have been facing a national crisis, with health care professionals striking and protesting budget cuts and staff shortages.
- true_religion 8y agoMinimum wage laws mean you'd have to pay them more than a one time cost of $18,000 which is the robot's price tag.
- watwut 8y agoMajority of people are not engineers. Engineers focus on engineering by definition. Altrough this is primary entrepreneurs forum, many here are still engineers who kow a lot about that and did not studied sociology. Nothing stops you from learning about other issues and becoming activist. Plenty of forums about that.
- crimsonalucard 8y agoThis isn't healthy. The robot will never provide an adequate amount of companionship required by humans. Even children don't bond with these robotic toys. The fact that elderly people are bonding with the machine is a sign of severe loneliness and not a sign of successfully creating an android companion. I get the problem they're trying to solve though. Currently there's already a solution in modern society that solves this issue though albeit comes with it's own inconveniences... Dogs. Get these people dogs. If dogs can lead blind people than they can take care of the elderly.
- wild_preference 8y agoNot everyone can take care of a dog or wants to. You even admit it ("inconveniences") yet immediately dismiss it.
- crimsonalucard 8y agoYour point? Obviously not everyone can take care of a dog. Also I admit to inconveniences, but when did I dismiss it? If I admit to inconveniences it means I am trying to present a view that covers both the downsides and the upsides. I'll say one thing though. I'd rather have a human develop a friendship with a dog then develop a friendship with a robot toy. One relationship is healthy and humane the other is not...
- sbilstein 8y agoA few startups (including mine) are trying to help with human interaction in this space: Papa (joinpapa.com): bring college students to seniors as short term caregivers Ayuda (ayudacare.com / I am the co-founder of this one): We connect seniors in assisted living facilities with freelancers such as musicians, fitness teachers, and more. A VC with General Catalyst wrote a useful summary on eldercare startups: https://medium.com/@alerner_93836/disrupting-eldercare-974546f85a2e https://medium.com/@alerner_93836/disrupting-eldercare-97454...
- artur_makly 8y agoDogs from shelters are 100000% better IMHO.
- daveguy 8y agoWell, not directly from shelters, but those trained to be therapy dogs (temperament requirements), definitely.
- HappyAlbatross 8y agoYeah but they have a large maintenance requirement. These dementia sufferers are not the kind of folks that should own animals.
- linsomniac 8y agoI see two problems with this: old people are fragile and training dogs is expensive. I got a dog while my mother was in a nursing home. Additionally, my wife used to work in an assisted living facility. We would bring the dog to visit both of these, and everyone loved the visit... Except for me. It was nerve wracking. I had to keep her on a very short leash, and pay attention every second she was with an elder. In a heartbeat she can jump up or lean into someone and take them to the ground. Seniors falling is a big deal, broken bones or worse often happens. And training a dog to be a service dog costs well into the 5 figures. I've heard $40k for a fully trained service dog, it takes around a year to do. An elder can probably be safe with something less, but I'd guess we're probably still talking $10k. My in-laws got a dog 18 months ago and they are taking her through some of the service dog training and other training. My father in law has been out in the hospital once by the dog, and has fallen numerous times while walking her (sudden pulls or just getting mixed up in his feet).
- funkaster 8y ago> "Nothing will ever replace the human touch, the human warmth our patients need" I remember having discussions lasting several hours with my med-school (and nursing) friends when I was at the Uni. They had the same feeling. I'm still convinced that we can and prob should replace doctors (for some of their tasks) with computers as soon as possible. For instance: given a set of symptoms and some biological metrics, a computer (an expert system) could provide a much accurate and un-biased diagnosis. I always had the idea that in the future, "doctors" would be scientists that would be researching and helping improve AI in the medical field, but the front line would be robots/computers. At least, that's the future I would like to live in ;)
- 0x8BADF00D 8y agoThat’s the root issue, isn’t it. Is a simulation of something somehow inferior to the real thing? I’m not quite so sure. In my experience, it has been machines that have provided me with a certain kind of kindness and warmth that no human could ever provide for me. A machine’s love would be unconditional.
- tanzbaer 8y agoIt would only be unconditional if you could program it without if/then statements.
- gumby 8y agoAn undermentioned issue is that a robot can provide privacy (or perhaps only the semblance of it but still). My mother has talked about in-home care and she would prefer a machine because she doesn't want someone in her home: really she doesn't want to feel dependent. It isn't demeaning to her to have a machine take care of things for her but to have a person do so would feel bad. Machines can't do everything but people can't either.