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The ''Neediness to Survive'' has taken inspiration from Petra's Spare Some Change blog. I like the idea of something ''nonhuman'' asking people for help. It's an intriguing and inspiring subject. Petra's idea uses people's judgement as a medium to convey a story through the robot. The robot beggar is a cool idea, but what if you give it multiple designs and see what people react positively to? Make a cute version, a broken version, a rich-looking version. What will people do with these variants? This idea is based on a social experiment with children looking for their parents. 2 situations happened at different times. One child looked ''rich'' while the other child looked poor. The public's reactions differed with each child, and people tended to help the rich-looking child much sooner than the other child. (I am rambling a bit my bad)
I can't find the specific research atm, but I'll try to add it later!
The idea of begging robots is not something new.
An example could be the robot called Hitchbot! This robot was made to travel the world—in small steps first. It was put on the streets in Canada and had an end destination it wanted to reach by hitchhiking and travelling with strangers. The trial run in Canada was a success. But the second run in America was a bit of a disaster; Hitchbot got "killed."
I liked the idea of including the drug aspect in the project. Giving the project a more profound meaning! It also offers a glimpse into reality; in a lot of cases, people who are addicted are happier with the substance they use than with food.
A twist I would give this idea is what would evoke other people's pity. What would people help earlier, a homeless robot or, for example, an animal-shaped robot? Do people have different reactions when the robot looks more human than Hitchbot? Or would a deformed robot get more pity from people?
It's also a question of whether people are willing to help someone or something who isn't like them. People don't always help the homeless, so what would motivate them to support a "robot"?
''Imagine a robot on the ground with its hand raised as if asking for something. One version of this experiment is only a single robot begging for something. The second version has a few companions that look like dogs. What version would people help the most? Do the so-called dogs give sympathy just like with real people?''
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