i've taken to twittering. and then gareth kay pointed out that don draper, the lead character of the AMC show "Mad Men" is also twittering. so i followed his tweets, and now he's following mine, and so is peggy olsen, and so is betty and so is salvatore and it's just so much to follow! i'm not even sure if it's linked to the show, and there seems to be office intrigue that's going on in the twitterverse but not on the screen and it's just really so much big geek fun. i heart it the heartiest.
and then i put up a simple tweet about trying to combine don draper and robots. a simple dream, from a simple girl.
the other day, on the plane to dallas, i caught up on mad men - a show i find so resplendent, so detestable, so delicious in its period accuracy that i can't turn away. i noticed two important things.
i'm a better tv viewer on a plane with my iPhone then i am at home. i actually watch the show instead of also checking email or also reading my googlereader feeds or also playing mah-jongg.
don draper destroyed a robot. little bobby was playing with the robot at the dinner table and he knocked over sally's glass with the robot and betty went apeshit and don, fed up with the day and probably most of his life, picked up the robot and dashed it against the kitchen wall. i have one word for this: hot.
i did some searching for the robot. i didn't get a good look at it before it met its unfortunate end, but i think this might be it... you see, robots are for everyone. i bet i could work some serious symbolism out of that robot - robot as symbol of labor, lack of free will, oppression, slavery. a mere plaything to a child, but a tyrant to a man. who keeps don draper down? only himself. when his wife tries to submit him to her will, force upon him decisiveness and authority to overwhelm her own parental defects (and what's with her total resentment of the kid?), he rebels, grasps the idol of his own slavery and demolishes it like some golden calf. i think this means that don draper is moses.
I grew up in the 80s. In the 80s we were concerned about the following:
The eruption of Mt. St. Helens - this was the first time we turned to powdered milk and face masks
The Chernobyl disaster - that was the second time... Mmmm... Tang
The Spaceshuttle Challenger disaster - no powdered milk, just a classroom full of shocked 4th graders
The Iran/Contra Hearing - interrupting summer programming and tearing us away from whatever Bo & Hope were doing on Days
AIDS
The hole in the ozone layer - this seemed to be caused by Aquanet, the refrigerator and the air conditioner
Just saying "No" to drugs
Not talking to strangers - this means you, latch-key kids!
Whether there would be a booth in the non-smoking section, and whether you'd have to walk through the smoking section to get to it
When your cable provider would finally carry MTV so you could actually watch videos
Drunks driving oil tankers
And one of the more disgusting worries: baby seals being clubbed to death for their skins
I grew up in Oregon. For those who don't know where it is on the map, you can find it on the Pacific Ocean, between Washington and California. You'd be surprised how many people I meet that aren't quite sure where Oregon is, though they seem to at least correctly assume it's "West". Oregon is regarded as being both a place for redneck, fishermen and lumberjacks who don't like gays, the watershed or the spotted owl; and as a place full of damn dirty hippies who voted for Mondale.
But Oregon is also the home of the Oregon Coast, the Oregon Coast Aquarium, the Seaside Aquarium, the Washington Park Zoo (now called the Oregon Zoo), the Oregon Wildlife Safari, and a town called Seal Beach. What I mean to say is, I saw a fair number of seals in my time. They seemed like slightly pushy, aquatic dogs. Barking at you and clapping water in your direction if you didn't toss that sardine. Swimming right up to the glass to eyeball you and then show off a bit. So to think that someone could club and then skin a baby seal was truly appalling. And, for some reason, oft-discussed in elementary school circles. I don't really remember why.
But, we set to work protecting baby seals, whales, and all the rest of our beloved ocean mammals. They even made a Star Trek movie about it.
(Alright, enough of that!)
So now, baby seals are available to you, in robotic form, to fill the empty void in your soul where love, affection and loyalty ought to be.
It's been available in Japan for several years, but now the company has created a Florida-based unit, Paro Robots U.S. Inc., to sell the fuzzy creature to places like nursing homes and hospitals. The robot, named Paro, is marketed as a therapeutic device that can help comfort people who have dementia, autism or other problems that can lead to social isolation.
Apparently, the robot seal can 'feel' pleasure - when you pet him, he makes the pleased, squealing sound of a real baby seal. It also shivers when you first hold it, until you begin to soothe it - which no doubt contributes to the bond people feel to the 'pet.'
But the article also makes this fascinating observation - because most people don't ever interact with or see a seal in real life, they have low expectations for the look and feel of, and interaction with a robotic seal. We do know what cats and dogs are like, so it's harder to bond with a robotic one of those.
Case in point:
Which seems like an apt observation of humanity in general - while we might fear the unknown, we can also very easily adore the unfamiliar, the untouchable, the out of reach. We yearn from afar. We fall in love at first sight. We link eyes across a crowded room. We covet thy neighbor's wife, or husband. We take snippets of information about complete strangers to us and begin to feel that we have a relationship with them (it's called being a 'fan'). Only when we discover that the object of our arm's-length affections is not quite as we imagined, do we begin to sour on it or him or her. Real relationships are hard - they take care, feeding, shelter, warmth, safety, nurturing, acceptance, struggle, compromise, disagreement, and even punishment in order to be successful. They are long-term propositions. It's no different for owning a 'real' pet - a living, breathing dog or cat requires our affection, and gives back positive reinforcement (well, dogs do, anyway). But it also requires boundaries, training, a sense of belonging, and someone to take on the responsibilities of the administrative aspects of the relationship.
What I'm saying is this: batteries and soft fake fur, long eyelashes and pre-recorded sounds of baby harp seals mewling at their mothers make for a nice 'fake' pet. Still, Paro the baby seal robot is 'real' enough to be loved. And for some, enough really is enough.
Let's bring it back to the robotic, shall we? I find myself fascinated and repulsed by the notion that we're going to give a shivering, squealing animatronic seal to people who are already a few sandwiches short of a picnic. But why would that be? Why am I being a hater of robot pets? Turns out, there is a theory about robotics and animation that is referred to as the Uncanny Valley.
The uncanny valley is a hypothesis that when robots and other facsimiles of humans look and act almost, but not entirely, like actual humans, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers.
For the best explanation of this phenomenon, watch this clip:
"The great mystery is why robots come off so well in science-fiction films when the human characters are often so astoundingly wooden." John Podhoretz
I realized one day that I had a deep and abiding fondness for the robotic. Not real robots, necessarily, but things that are reminiscent, evocative, or referential (reverential?) to robots.
Perhaps it was my childhood of Buck Rogers reruns, Star Trek reruns, Jetsons reruns, Lost in Space reruns, and of course, Star Wars.
There were so many lovable robots running around. Rosie, C3PO, R2D2, B.O.B. and Vincent from The Black Hole, KITT, Twiki - they were all so idiosyncratic, so loyal, so smart.
The day it struck me was the day I started listening to the Flaming Lips' "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots". I was on the platform of the 2nd Avenue station, waiting for the entirely unreliable F train, edging farther from the distinct smell of urine that permeates the 1st Avenue end of the station, and these lyrics suddenly woke me up from the 2am, Brooklyn-bound stupor...
Oh Yoshimi, they don't believe me but you won't let those robots eat me Yoshimi, they don't believe me but you won't let those robots defeat me
Those evil-natured robots they're programmed to destroy us she's gotta be strong to fight them so she's taking lots of vitamins
'Cause she knows that it'd be tragic if those evil robots win I know she can beat them
Oh Yoshimi, they don't believe me but you won't let those robots defeat me Yoshimi, they don't believe me but you won't let those robots eat me
Right then and there I knew that I should start this blog. And that is the answer. Why robots? Why the hell not!
i did some searching for the robot. i didn't get a good look at it before it met its unfortunate end, but i think this might be it... you see, robots are for everyone. i bet i could work some serious symbolism out of that robot - robot as symbol of labor, lack of free will, oppression, slavery. a mere plaything to a child, but a tyrant to a man. who keeps don draper down? only himself. when his wife tries to submit him to her will, force upon him decisiveness and authority to overwhelm her own parental defects (and what's with her total resentment of the kid?), he rebels, grasps the idol of his own slavery and demolishes it like some golden calf. i think this means that don draper is moses.
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