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100,000 BCE
Knapping
Knapping, the knowledge of making stone tools, existed three million years ago and allowed technology to be shared among people who could not verbally communicate; it was emotion that shared the information. and we see this as the start of technology and humanity working in tandem. -
The Polygraph Instrument
John Larson developed this device which is able to measure a person's breathing rate, blood pressure, pulse, and perspiration. Through these measurements, one would likely be able to tell whether someone is lying or not. This is important for affective computing because devices can now measure the same things as the Polygraph to determine the mood of someone.
History
HowItWorks -
Facial Action Coding System (FACS)
FACS was developed by Paul Ekman and is a system for describing the movement of facial muscles on one's face. Through studying the change in facial movement, you would be able to tell the emotion one is feeling. This is vital for affective computing because this launched the practice of giving technology facial tracking systems that can use FACS to equate certain facial expressions to certain emotions.
https://youtu.be/ZMlN2sJAThA -
"Affective Computing" Published
Rosalind Picard published this book which pioneered this new field of technology. The book deals with the topic of giving computers the ability to interact with emotions. This book, which contains lots of Picard's research, inspired many to start advancing the field of affective computing.
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/affective-computing -
Affectiva Launched
Rosalind Picard and Rana el Kaliouby launched their very own company that who's sole purpose is to build artificial intelligence that understands emotion. Through this company, many products that advance the field of affective computing have been made such as Affdex and the Q Sensor.
Affectiva -
Pepper: The World's First Social Machine
Softbank's robot is the first one created that can recognize faces and basic human emotions. Created for human interaction, this robot begins to ever so slightly blur the line between humans and robots. This robot marks the start of emotionally capable robots being released to the public.
website
video -
The Near Future
I foresee that on the track we're going, we will be creating humanoid robots for companionship that can simulate basic emotion in response to another emotion of the buyer. These would be basic emotions that the robot would be emulating, but it wouldn't be capable of having independent emotions. -
The Far Future
In the far future, it is likely that affective computing will advance to the point of where human consciousness can be implanted into robots. This way the robots will have fully functioning emotions and independent thought.
