Artificial Intelligence Is Misreading Human Emotion

When Ekman arrived in the tropics of Okapa, he ran experiments to assess how the Fore recognized emotions. Because the Fore had minimal contact with Westerners and mass media, Ekman had theorized that their recognition and display of core expressions would prove that such expressions were universal. He would show them flash cards of facial expressions and see if they described the emotion as he did. In Ekman's own words, "All I was doing was showing funny pictures." But Ekman had no training in Fore history, language, culture, or politics.