A Quadruped That Doesn’t Just Look Like Your Dog. It Acts Like It, Too.

Former Xbox engineer's ‘Super Intelligent Dog’ modelled on a canine behaves like a ‘really good boy’. 
 
Consider a robot pet dog that does more than wag its tail. One that can give you the cold shoulder or cock its head. Former Xbox engineer Tyrell Asimov is putting forward such a prospect with his “Super Intelligent Dog”, which he has based on the Shiba Inu his sister had. With the aid of phone videos he has made over the years, Asimov intends to put the animal’s idiosyncrasies back into play.  

Not Just a Dog. That Dog.  

Asimov has done a similar project with Ollie, a robotic cat. His work with Ollie will form the blueprint for his quadruped, called the Shiba Inu project, and will focus on the way the dog walks, how it moves its ears and head, its response to a voice it knows and basic commands. One does not want a machine that is merely dog-like, but a replica of a specific dog, quirks, and all.  

Teaching a Robot to Ignore You  

Then there is the hardware. The quadruped is fitted with a frame and joint geometry, and a system of movement, while sensors help it maintain balance and modulate its gait. Cameras and microphones, along with memory, allow for an interpretation of what is going on around it. A reasoning system makes the call on behavior, and the software takes care of safety and motion. 

Can You Really Clone a Personality? 

But then you have the curious fact that perfection is not what the robot is being trained for. It may well sit still or disregard a stimulus altogether or let an ear twitch just before turning its head. Such imperfections are taken straight from the original. Obedience is not so much the measure of success as familiarity. 

The public has yet to see the completed work in all its glory, so we will have to wait and judge how true it is to the Shiba Inu. Yet the notion to have a companion built from one’s own recollections and video instead of some run of the mill model is an intriguing one. A robot can, of course, put on the patterns of the animal without being the animal, and the machine is new if the memories are not. But should a robotic pet come to ignore us with any degree of authenticity, perhaps we will have, at last, a machine that comprehends the most difficult instruction of all: “Come here.”