Project #4

Dear Professor Rodrigo and my classmates,

This was one difficult semester.  While I felt as though I was performing exceptionally well at the beginning of the semester, various personal and school related issues began to accumulate and this class took a massive blow around halfway through.  Whether or not I obtain a passing grade is unknown at this point, but this class was extremely helpful either way.

I’ve never seen myself as an exceptional writer.  Traditionally, whenever massive writing assignments have to be done, I’ve always done them reluctantly.  This class has helped wonderfully.  The simple task of allowing me to write about my own personal field (such as Project #1) improves moral considerably.  To be honest, I’ve never cared so much for reading or writing.  It’s not that I have any disdain for reading.  I do actually read a lot, but most of my escapism has been in film and not so much with literature.  

One thing this class has helped with is organizing what needs to be done to prepare for a project.  I appreciate spending a week obtaining sources, another writing drafts, before finally submitting a project.  This helps me a lot.  I would always have a nasty habit of writing exactly one version of a paper and submitting it with very few if any revisions.  This class forced outlines and drafts which forced me to put more effort in planning.  I feel this helped a lot, especially with Project #2 (which had a lot of pre-planning involved).  Peer review and revision allowed me to see what other students were doing and use those ideas in my own projects.  Then I could see other student’s notes on my thoughts, and revise.  It was very helpful.

I also enjoyed being able to use different formats for projects.  Not every paper was submitted in a typical MLA format.  I actually did my Project 3 as a video, which was more akin to my background.  Though that project had enormous technical difficulties and held me up for weeks.  I somewhat regret choosing video.

I’m not an expert yet on anything.  I really enjoyed this class and what I learned.  Not just about writing, but even about my own field.  There’s still a few grammar issues I have and formatting usually gets me, but I enjoyed it a lot.

-          - Jon Thomas

Project #3

I did my project #3 as a video.  It's really late, took a lot of time, but I'm fairly satisfied with it.  Enjoy.

11.5 Draft of Public Argument

Here is the link to my Project 3 draft.  I know it's late and I won't get credit, but I wanted to upload it anyway.  If anyone wants to comment, they can.  As I'll be trying to do a video, the draft is in the form of a screenplay.

12.4 Reflection on Project 3 Draft

I reviewed Felicia and Andrew's projects. 

1. The purpose of my project is to convince people that uncanny valley shouldn't be taken too seriously since it has no real evidence.  I haven't actually posted my draft yet since I'm not done with it, but I feel it fulfills that fairly well.
2. After reviewing other people's articles, I do want to focus more on my opposing groups as I want to convert them to my line of thinking.  After I publish my draft, I'll go back in and add more of their viewpoints.
3. I'm revising for my opposition groups.  Before I felt I was preaching to the choir as I wasn't really addressing their points.  I'll reach out to them more.
4. How will aspects change?
1. Length will probably increase to account for other views.
2. Format will still likely be a video.  I've worked in video and I feel it supports my arguments well.
3. Appearance will probably involve a lot of graphics and visuals to show examples.
4. Conclusion will change.  I'll probably side more with my opposition group than I planned.
5. Structure will likely stay the same.  It was mostly informative with some attempts at humor periodically.
6. I will try and get in depth.  All of my sources are published research and I should get pretty explanatory.

12.2 Punctuation, Part 1

Topic 1: The comma.  Especially unnecessary commas.  It's a bad habit of mine to put a comma there when I don't know whether or not it needs one.  Mildly parenthetical ones are an issue for me.

Topic 2: The semicolon.  I almost never know when to use a semicolon.  I would usually avoid using them at all times.  Knowing now that the two parts must be independent clauses now really helps me.

Topic 3: The quotation marks.  I never knew how to do quotes inside of quotes.  I would always just use more quotes.  Using single quotes was nice to know.

Topic 4: I just learned there's a difference between hyphens and dashes.  I've always used hyphens as dashes.  This is new to me.

11.4 Paraphrasing a Source

Original Source:

Nowadays, industrial robots are increasingly recognized as the driving force behind reductions in factory personnel. However, as is well known, these robots just extend, contract, and rotate their arms; without faces or legs, they do not look human. Their design policy is clearly based on functionality. From this standpoint, the robots must perform functions similar to those of human factory workers, but whether they look similar does not matter. Thus, given their lack of resemblance to human beings, in general, people hardly feel any affinity for them. (Note: However, industrial robots are considerably closer in appearance to humans than general machinery, especially in their arms.) If we plot the industrial robot on a graph of affinity versus human likeness, it lies near the origin in Figure 1.

In contrast, a toy robot's designer may focus more on the robot's appearance than its functions. Consequently, despite its being a sturdy mechanical figure, the robot will start to have a roughly human-looking external form with a face, two arms, two legs, and a torso. Children seem to feel deeply attached to these toy robots. Hence, the toy robot is shown more than halfway up the first hill in Figure 1.

Paraphrased:

In factories, machines and robots are the leading cause of employment reductions.  Although these machines are replacing humans, they do not look human.  They exist to perform certain jobs and aesthetics do not play into their designs.  Although they perform functions similar to that of a human worker, we do not have any emotional response to them.  This would have them located far to the left of the uncanny valley.

Toys, on the other hand, are often designed with the intention of triggering an emotional response.  Despite a toy robot being mechanical inside, they have human-like features which children will respond to.  This places them further up the graph, but still not triggering an uncanny response.

11.3 Outlining My Public Argument

Introducing

• Start by defining the uncanny valley
• State how whether the theory is believed or not defines whether animators and roboticists even attempt to create human analogues.
• Show how the uncanny valley shapes our views on media.
• If the uncanny valley is not true, but believed, it prevents people from investigating techniques in creating realistic human analogues.
• Problem: The uncanny valley is accepted by people in the industry despite no empirical data showing its veracity.

Supporting Paragraphs

•  Supporting arguments against the valley: The idea was never tested before being accepted.  Different experiments are getting different results.  Not all human analogues create an uncanny response.
• Criticisms: The valley does explain a documented behavior: people's seeming aversion towards near-lifelike human analogues.  Certain criticisms could still fit in the uncanny model. 
• Point #1: The theory was never tested (rebuttal: Mori never intended it do be a definitive explanation).
• Point #2: Research shows an uncanny response based more on conflict of realistic and unrealistic features, less on how close to real it is (rebuttal: this may be the basis of the valley in general, features that aren't quite 'human').
• Point #3: Research shows actual humans don't get quite the same emotional response as some not-human figures (rebuttal: The valley may be a rough approximation and may vary example to example).
• Point #1: Despite its popularity and near universal acceptation, especially since the rise of CGI films, the theory was never actually tested.
• Point #2: Another study done by [source] shows that the uncanny valley may exist, but is not based simply on how 'close' something appears to be human.  The effect may be caused by a conflict of realistic features, such as expressions or hair, and unrealistic features, such as plasticy skin or unnatural movements.
• Point #3: Another problem relates to the original graph itself.  The graph shows a standard increasing line of emotional response based on how close to human something is, sans the titular valley.  However experiments done by [source] show that real, actual humans don't get quite the same emotional response some of the less realistic examples further down the graph.
• Point #1 Evidence: "However, the validity of the uncanny valley has not been confirmed with psychological evidence. Thus it is uncertain whether the uncanny valley actually emerges at certain realism levels." - (Seyama, Nagayama)
• Point #2 Evidence: "These results suggest that to have an almost perfectly realistic human appearance is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the uncanny valley. The uncanny valley emerges only when there is also an abnormal feature." - (Seyama, Nagayama)
• Point #3 Evidence: "Interestingly, the most liked anthropomorphism levels were all robots: toy robots and humanoids.  They were even preferred over real humans." - (Bartneck, et. al.)
• Outline
• Introduction
• Define the valley and provide examples.
• Brief history involving the valley.
• Explain the conflict
• Point #1
• The uncanny valley is an accepted but unproven hypothesis.
• Data showing the unverified nature of the theory
• Defense: The theory is just a hypothesis and explains an observed phenomenon
• Point #2
• The uncanny valley may exist, but is not based on 'closeness' to humans, but on abnormal features.
• Cite data showing study
• Defense: The data may prove the valley.  Perhaps the valley is made of these imperfections. 
• Point #3
• Real humans aren't rated as highly as some humanoid robots or toys.
• Show data conflicting humans with humanoid robots.
• Defense: The original model is just a hypothesis.  The real model would have some perfecting to do.
• Conclusion
• Sum up what the theory means
• Sum up what all the evidence is
• Conclusion: The uncanny valley is probably true on some level.  The real model is probably more nuanced that the hypothesized one.

Concluding Strategies

• Call to action: Until we have a clear cut empirically backed model of the uncanny valley, I wouldn't worry too much about whether you venture into it.  Go ahead and try to make creepy robots.
• Negative consequences: If you avoid the valley for fear of alienating people, you risk setting back robotics and animation potential years of progress.
• Positive consequences: If we attempt to push the boundaries of human realism, maybe we can one day cross the uncanny valley, making this whole scenario a non-issue.
• Common ground: Everyone agrees there is some sort of uncanny response.  It's more of the specific model and whether its a big issue that's debated.
• Future of the Debate: Research will probably give us a more accurate model.  The debate will turn to whether we should try and push the valley or not.