Can’t find anyone to hang out with? Maybe you should invite a robot into your home. In this segment, Ira and guests talk about developing robots with personalities — moving on beyond the mechanical arms found in today’s factories, to devices that could interact with people on a social level. Some of us already anthropomorphize our robotic assistants — who hasn’t called the Roomba robotic vacuum cleaner ‘cute?’ Inventors are working to develop devices that can interact with people on a deeper level, however: communicating, responding to emotion, and operating under specific rules of social behavior. How soon will it be before social, lovable robots enter our homes?

We’ll also hear from inventor Dean Kamen about the results of FIRST, a worldwide robotics competition for young inventors. An alliance of three teams from St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, Greenville, Texas, and Sterling Heights, Michigan won this year’s championships, held last weekend.