IBM Wants to Build AI That Isn’t Socially Awkward

Big Blue says its latest Watson tech enables chatbots, robots, and even smart cars and houses that can understand and relate to humans.
Though artificial intelligence experts may cringe at the portrayals of humanlike AI in science fiction, some researchers are nudging us closer to those visions.
In this piece for Fast Company, ICT’s virtual humans research and Jonathan Gratch are featured in driving home the point that some service people are more comfortable opening up to a virtual human than to a real one who may be judgmental. Given the cost and ever shakier status of mental health care coverage, AI may fill a gap that human professionals can’t.
Read the full article on Fast Company.