For more on Asimo and other bright innovations for 2012, check out issue 29 of How It Works, on sale 29 December 2011.

Chatbots are programs that try to mimic human conversation, and for many years attempts have been made to create a computer program that can perfectly imitate a human. In this video, Cornell’s Creative Machines Lab decided to put two of their chatbots virtual face to virtual face and see what happens. The results are bizarre, with topics ranging from God to unicorns, but it’s impressive to see the progress being made in this area of AI.

Cleverbot, as this program is known, will be competing at this year’s Loebner Prize in late October, an annual competition where artificially intelligent chatbots attempt to fool a panel of judges into thinking they’re human, with a potential $100,000 prize up for grabs.

The Rubik’s Cube was created in 1974 by Hungarian sculptor and architect Ernő Rubik. The current world record for a human solving a 3x3x3 cube is an express 7.08 seconds.
The cube itself consists of 26 miniature cubelets which rotate around a central fixed axle, with the central cubelet on each face acting as a static facade providing structure for the other pieces to fit into and rotate around.

Built by Kyoto-based factory automation firm Squse, the hand is constructed of a polycarbonate skeleton covered by a soft silicone skin. It has 22 pneumatically powered “muscles” that give it a range of 20 different movements, ranging from a firm handshake to a gentle pinch with two fingers.

It’s actually designed for harvesting and packing delicate foodstuffs rather than hand feeding the bone idle, we can’t help thinking of the skutters from Red Dwarf whenever we see it!