Understanding the sense of self through robotics.

Summary

Robots can help scientists understand the sense of self by serving as embodied models or experimental probes. This review covers robotics research on the minimal self, the extended self, and disorders of the self. Key self-phenomena can be generated in robots with appropriate sensor and actuator systems and a layered cognitive architecture of predictive models. The work highlights future directions and challenges in understanding the self through artificial systems.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Robotics can play a useful role in the scientific understanding of the sense of self, both through the construction of embodied models of the self and through the use of robots as experimental probes to explore the human self. In both cases, the embodiment of the robot allows us to devise and test hypotheses about the nature of the self, with regard to its development, its manifestation in behavior, and the diversity of selves in humans, animals, and, potentially, machines. This paper reviews robotics research that addresses the topic of the self-the minimal self, the extended self, and disorders of the self-and highlights future directions and open challenges in understanding the self through constructing its components in artificial systems. An emerging view is that key phenomena of the self can be generated in robots with suitably configured sensor and actuator systems and a layered cognitive architecture involving networks of predictive models.