Designing A Robot You Want To Have A Beer With

I recently had a conversation with a colleague that works with me in the MIT AgeLab. He specializes in AI and machine learning. As we walked and discussed his current work on autonomous vehicles, I asked him "where would you like to take your research?" Without missing a beat he responded – "I would like to build a robot that you would want to have a conversation with." Robots may be rapidly losing their novelty.