note 56

Steels shows in his experiment of the Talking Heads that machines also develop a language in this way (Steels 1999). The AIBO experiment taught the Paris researchers that attribution is a crucial phenomenon in interaction and in developing a language between two actors (human or not). Pushing this idea, further experiments were set up in which two robots developed ‘grammar’ between them by anticipating and evaluating the expected feedback. Anticipating and evaluating feedback appears to be a crucial factor in adaptation, learning and the development of social structures. Trust research, which I do not discuss in this study, also points to the crucial factor of evaluating anticipated feedback in the establishment of trust in relationships.