Does This Terrifying Robot Really Have to Look Like a Mermaid?

Mermaids, and their less famous comrades the mermen, are beautiful beings that have mastered the underwater world. They also have a more sinister rep as vicious bastards that drag sailors to their watery doom. So perhaps it's no wonder that a new mermaid-like robot from Stanford, the OceanOne--with its graceful, streamlined body but oh, also, claws and dead eyes--elicits mixed emotions. Sure, it looks like you and me, but it's just rather more, well, electronic. Grab a pitchfork and vow to hunt it down. But OceanOne is in fact an emblem of a battle over the future of robotics: Humanoid bots are getting roboticists riled up, and not just because they're creepy.