Assistant Professor
Title: Bad Robot, Good Robot - Rethinking the Agency of Our Artificial Teammates
Abstract: A prevalent assumption in human-robot and human-AI teaming is that artificial teammates should be compliant and obedient. In this talk, I will question this assumption by presenting the Guide Robot Grand Challenge and discussing the components required to design and build a service robot that can replace or surpass the functionalities of a guide dog. This challenge encompasses a variety of research problems, for each of which I will present a novel contribution: reasoning about other agents, initiating an interaction, teaching teammates, and more. Finally, I will discuss the many remaining challenges towards achieving a guide robot and how I plan to tackle these challenges.