Can a robot make me happy?
Ellie, she's here to listen Today is officially Blue Monday, though nobody needs a pseudo-scientific formula to identify the past few weeks as the most stressful time of the year. Many of us are still smarting from protracted holiday arguments over politics, religion, blighted childhoods or the correct constituents of the festive feast. Others kept shtum, but have returned to work fuming at loved ones’ failure to exercise similar self-control. Everyone feels overfed, cold, out of shape and oppressed by the need for New Year reformation. ‘Tis the season for festering resentments to surface, and new betrayals to erupt: January is peak time for divorce lawyers as well as gym signups , and every authority from the highly-reputable Mayo Clinic to the highly-sensational New York Post recognises year-turn stress as a real, and distressing, phenomenon. Can robots help? Don’t get me wrong: I’m not suggesting you spend next Christmas locked away in a dark room with no...