Annoyed Robots

I love my dog. I like to think my dog loves me as well. That is, she always looks happy when I am around (ears relaxed, tail wagging, grabbing my hand with her paw in order to be pet) and she tries to be near me (whenever I sit down, she always lays tight against me). She is the sweetest dog in the world, but nonetheless sometimes I am annoyed by her. For example when she scratches my hand to get more cuddles after I cuddled her endlessly or when she won't come to be leashed after a very long walk. I am never annoyed for long, but I am annoyed. She never looks annoyed with me.

A face that says to me she would like more attention, but is not annoyed about not getting enough attention.

How I imagine an annoyed plant would look like.

I thought about it for some time and I have found no other examples of the ability of annoyance other than in humans. Animals just take life as it comes. I don't think plants or any other living things have opinions about their circumstances. No need to worry about how things could have been differently. (Please get in touch if you thought of something!)

So, every human now and then (some more than others) is annoyed with / by / at / about / of. The amount of possible prepositions shows that thee are many possible situation to be annoyed. In my opinion, the ability of being annoyed is one of the qualities that make us human.

Can annoyance be translated into bots?

Google is never annoyed by one of the more than five billion questions it gets every day. Every time a whole booklet of new information is helpfully presented to the user. Humans can be annoyed if they didn't get the page they were looking for.

Illustration I made of how Google could look annoyed when for the millionth time this hour someone searches for Google inside the Google search bar.

The most simple form of the Useless Box (there are also creations that differ in speed, have sounds, etc), looks annoyed by the human who flipping the switch, in my opinion.

I did not find many examples of annoyed robots. Some robots can appear angry, but this is a step further than annoyed. I came across many examples of robots that annoyed people, but we already knew humans are very good at being annoyed.

This learned me that annoyance is a complex quality. It is not the same as angry, but maybe not even a synonym of irritated. People can be annoyed in many occasions, but mostly when they care about it. For example, when they really want to see a movie and people keep talking through the cinema, when they just missed the train while they have an important interview later, when the person(s) they love keeps doing that very annoying thing, and many more examples you can surely think of out of your own life.

I wonder if maybe robots first need to really care before they can be annoyed?

I imagine my annoyed creature as follows.

Visitors will enter a room with gentle piano music playing softly in the background. In the room, a black box can be found. This appearance of this box is nothing special. The visitors might start wondering what this creature is supposed to do, since it doesn't do anything but be there. They ask each other 'Hmm, what happens here...?'

At this point, the creature hisses 'SSTH!!'.

The creature wants to enjoy the music in quiet! If people distract the bot from the music, it will be annoyed and order them to shut up! It cares about listening to the music and therefore can be annoyed if this is hindered.

Every time visitors talk, whisper or walk too loudly in the room, the creature will hiss at them to be quiet. Not in a polite way, but in an annoyed way like people do at each other in cinema's. 'SSSSSTHHHH!!'

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