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Will robots needs therapists? A funny film from TED and Mother imagines if they did

#artificialintelligence

Will the robots of the future be so sophisticated they get depressed? It's an idea Douglas Adams explored in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" with Marvin the Paranoid Android -- and now a funny original film from TED imagines if they needed therapy. Created by Mother London, the film, which premiered last week at TED's conference in Vancouver, stars well-known U.K. comedy actors Rebecca Front, as a therapist, and Hugh Skinner as a depressed AI bot called Archie. Front's character explains that robots have evolved from doing menial tasks to taking on human bodies and doing amazing stuff ("They cured cancer. They re-froze the Arctic") but now the third generation have grown up privileged and miserable, "gravitating to fields such as art and DJing."