Helen Hastie

So there has been a shift since with people thinking that robots aren't these scary entities, but could actually be useful and help us in our daily lives.

Technology is advancing very, very quickly, and we do need to think about regulation and guardrails, but we need to do so in a way that doesn't stifle the innovation.

So what's really important is that we embed responsible research from the very start, and this is what we are teaching our students, to think about what the system is going to be doing down the road when it is actually deployed and how we can make it safe from the very start.

But there are risks.

And what is important, I believe, is that we build in these systems a level of transparency and an audit trail so that we can understand the decisions that are being made and the consequences.

Well, with robotics, we have to think about things like robots being hacked, used for surveillance, all sorts of dark, unintended purposes.

So these are all issues that we really, really need to think about and safeguard against for the future.

My mother's now in her 90s.

She lives alone.

And whenever I visit, I try and instill a bit of tech, whether it's a smart speaker or a video conferencing device.

But unfortunately, it usually ends up in the drawer.

So I would like to see technology, in particular robots, being accepted by her generation so that she can maintain a good quality of life and live independent for longer.

If it works, yes.

So performance is still very important and how we interact with the robot and what it looks like and then hopefully they will be accepted and used for good purpose.

Thank you, Jim.