MAS 962 Special Topics in Media Technology Techniques for Interactive Characters

Spring 2002
This course reviews the leading research into building interactive animated and robotic characters. In particular, we focus on understanding how to build characters that "do what they ought to do", "learn what they ought to learn", and "express what they ought to express" in dynamic and unpredictable domains. Students will be exposed to the key design challenges and state of the art systems through a critical review of current research. Students will also gain a hands-on appreciation and first-hand insight into these issues by building autonomous interactive characters using the toolkit development systems of the Synthetic Characters Group.

Professors Bruce Blumberg and Cynthia Breazeal

H-Level Credit (0-12-0)

MAS 961 Special Topics in Media Technology Human Robot Interaction

Fall 2002
This course reviews the leading research in the emerging field of Human Robot Interaction (HRI). Students shall explore work in each of the major themes that characterize the human-robot relationship---from robots as intelligent tools, to cyborg extensions of one’s body, to social partners. Through weekly readings, assignments, critical review, and a final project, students will be exposed to the ideas, technologies & techniques, applications, and implications related to the creation of machines that blur the human-robot boundary, both interactively and physically.

Professor Cynthia Breazeal

H-Level Credit (0-9-0)

MAS 963 Special Topics in Media Technology Curious Machines

Spring 2003
It is ironic that we are witness today to an abundance of machines that learn, yet we would not consider any of them to be curious. Curiosity is a trait of those natural learning systems, such as people and animals, that learn what they ought to learn when they ought to learn it. It implies a pro-active system that is motivated to learn. It also implies a reflective aspect to the learning process: when to learn, what to learn, from whom, how, and why? How can we build machines that are as curious learners as natural systems? How can we build systems that have a deeper understanding of the learning process beyond turning the statistical crank of a learning algorithm? How can synthetic systems interact with and leverage rich environments that include other agents?

This course examines the issues, principles, and challenges toward building curious machines through lecture, lively discussion, critique of course readings, and student projects. Both natural and synthetic systems are explored to investigate how to build machines that are:

· Curious, self-motivated and pro-active learners.

· Reflect upon their learning process in order to initiate learning what they ought to learn when they ought to learn it.

· Have learning behaviors that are transparent and understandable to a human instructor. They must be easy to train and teach based on their observable behavior.

Professors: Bruce Blumberg, Cynthia Breazeal, Deb Roy

H-Level Credit (0-12-0)

MAS 965 Special Topics in Media Technology Cooperative Machines

Fall 2003
This course examines the issues, principles, and challenges toward building machines that cooperate with humans and with other machines. Philosophical, scientific, and theoretical insights into this subject will be covered, as well as how these ideas are manifest in both natural and artificial systems (e.g. software agents and robots). Course grade will be based on weekly student assignments and presentations, participation in lively class discussion, and a final term project.

Professor: Cynthia Breazeal

H-Level Credit (0-12-0)

Link to MIT OpenCourseWare

MAS 751 Relational Machines

Spring 2005, 2006
Introduction to the issues, principles, and challenges toward building relational machines: technological artifacts that are designed to inspire a sense of relationship in their users. Sample applications include learning companions for children, assistive robots for the elderly, software agents that act as trainers or assistants, interactive game characters that engage in social relationships, or machines that cooperate with humans as members of human-robot teams. Readings cover a broad range of topics from psychology, sociology, and human-computer/robot interaction as well as how these ideas manifest in a wide range of applications for technological systems. Requires presentations and critiques of class readings and a final project that includes writing a scholarly paper.

Professors: Cynthia Breazeal & Sherry Turkle (STS)

H-Level Credit (2-0-7)

Link to Stellar