We are in 2021 and so far there has been one crisis after another. What really gives me hope is the time I spend with my dog. It is a time away from chaos and I often wonder if my dog knows what is going on around us. Do our pets have a sixth sense for both disasters and our emotions? Dogs are one of the smartest domestic companions to have and our furry friends really form an inexplicable bond with us. Which brings me to this – what is the future of robot dogs?
Devoid of real feelings, but with the advancement of AI, they will certainly be more intelligent and efficient. Dog bots are likely to be a hybrid of a smart pet and a domestic assistant, I imagine features like eye security cameras, although they are still cute enough to bring your newspaper and wake you up in the morning. Bot dogs can have the benefit of being low maintenance, they do not require mandatory walking on days when you are sick or make you panic if you forget to leave food out during emergencies. And as you can imagine, they will definitely not be a problem during bath time.
So in the future, it seems like a practical option because AI will be able to mimic a dog’s behavior, but what about our conditioned behavior towards dogs? This Samsung conceptual dog bot replaces the dog’s features with a screen, so instead of a confused head tilt, the robot’s face or screen will show a question mark. If tech giants want to make a robot dog, using a screen as an interactive interface will save a lot more material than using plastic-like materials to replicate your pet’s actual construction. With the rapidity with which AI is growing and conceptual renderings appear, the robot dog will be able to chase balls and welcome you when it senses your arrival. It’s interesting how the design is so futuristic, and yet when you look at it, you can tell it was made to look like a dog. You may not even have noticed that the ‘tail’ is missing, and yet our brains have evolved to associate emotion with robots.
For most of us, our dogs are considered family. The strong bond teaches us a lot about our own emotions, caring for each other all the time, communicating without real language and the invincible power of a dog’s eyes! While technology can make robots so realistic that we begin to question what is real, something like a dog placing its head on its lap can never be replicated by a bot, right? Let’s take a paw (see what I did there?) And think about what life would be like if Samsung made a robot dog like that.
Designer: Gaetano De Cicco
