“You are a crumb bum. A thick-headed palooka.”

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via

So, I have become aware of a hypothesis called the uncanny valley.

From the Wiki article:
Mori’s hypothesis states that as a robot is made more humanlike in its appearance and motion, the emotional response from a human being to the robot will become increasingly positive and empathic, until a point is reached beyond which the response quickly becomes that of strong repulsion. However, as the appearance and motion continue to become less distinguishable from a human being, the emotional response becomes positive once more and approaches human-to-human empathy levels.

This area of repulsive response aroused by a robot with appearance and motion between a “barely-human” and “fully human” entity is called the uncanny valley. The name captures the idea that a robot which is “almost human” will seem overly “strange” to a human being and thus will fail to evoke the empathetic response required for productive human-robot interaction.

I call bullcrap. I think this uncanny valley nonsense is really tied to people’s perceptions of a thing, and the uneasiness experienced when those perceptions turn out to be false.

I was at a party once and dipped a piece of bread into a plate of raspberry sauce and took a big bite. It wasn’t raspberry sauce at all, but salty shrimp cocktail sauce. Yuck!

You spot a woman walking in front of you. She has beautiful, long-flowing hair, and tight jeans fitting a nice, curvy figure. She turns around. Wait a minute, that lady has a beard and a handlebar mustache! Yuck!

The uncanny valley is really just an extension of one making the commitment of believing something based on one’s perceptions, only to have that commitment undermined by a realization that the perception was flawed.

Also, perhaps there is a conflict in one’s perception which is foregrounded when presented with a vaguely human-like robot, or a guy with a lady’s butt. Part of your perception is asserting one thing, but another part of it is challenging that assertion, creating conflict, uneasiness, even disgust.

DUDE LOOKS LIKE A LADY.

But why listen to what I have to say? Here’s Aerosmith, hypothesizing with the power of rock.

(not pictured: MizSplotchy)

MizSplotchy has been training many weeks for the Chicago Half Marathon, which starts out in beautiful Jackson Park early Sunday morning (September 14th). Yes, MizSplotchy will be running on Lake Shore Drive during this race. Yes, she is hot-doggity cool.

There was a brief moment during her training when she was worried about a leg injury that might affect her ability to run, but that injury is now a thing of the past.

THUNDERBIRDS ARE GO!

Please join the Splotchy family in wishing MizSplotchy a safe, happy and healthy race!