RobotEscape

Meet Saya, a robot “teacher” in Japan. She can express the six emotions most commonly displayed by human teachers: surprise, fear, disgust, anger, happiness, and sadness. She can call out the students’ names, offer a polite “Thank you”, and admonish the pupils to be quiet.

Saya’s developer, Hiroshi Kobayashi, a Tokyo University of Science professor, reports “Children even start crying when they are scolded.” I’d probably cry if a creepy robot teacher scolded me, too.

MSNBC calls Saya’s face “eerily lifelike”. I call it just plain eerie.