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Passage 4

Scientists are racing to build the world‘s first thinking robot. This is not science fiction: some say they will have made it by the year 2020. Carol Packer reports.

Machines that walk, speak and feel are no longer science fiction. Kismet is the name of an android（机器人） which scientists have built at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Kismet is different from the traditional robot because it can show human emotions. Its eyes, ears and lips move to show when it feels happy, sad or bored. Kismet is one of the first of a new generation of androids—robots that look like human beings—which can imitate human feelings. Cog, another android invented by the MIT, imitates the action of a mother. However, scientists admit that so far Cog has the mental ability of a two-year-old.

The optimists say that by the year 2020 we will have created humanoids with brains similar to those of all adult human being. These robots will be designed to look like people to make them more attractive and easier to sell to the public. What kind of jobs will they do? In the future, robots like Robonaut, a humanoid invented by NASA, will be doing dangerous jobs, like repairing space stations. They will also be doing more and more of the household work for us. In Japan, scientists are designing androids that will entertain us by dancing and playing the piano.

Some people worry about what the future holds: will robots become monsters?Will people themselves become increasingly like robots? Experts predict that more and more people will be wearing micro-computers, connected to the Internet, in the future. People will have micro-chips in various parts of their body, which will connect them to a wide variety of gadgets. Perhaps we should not exaggerate the importance of technology, but one wonders whether, in years to come, we will still be falling in love, and whether we will still feel pain. Who knows?