# Can You Really Teach a Robot Empathy? This Roboticist Says Yes.

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/machines-like-us-97796/can-you-really-teach-a-robot-empathy-this-roboticist-says-yes
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/machines-like-us-97796/can-you-really-teach-a-robot-empathy-this-roboticist-says-yes.md
Podcast: [Machines Like Us](https://stenobird.com/podcast/machines-like-us-97796)
Published: 2026-08-04T10:00:00+00:00
Episode link: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/podcasts/machines-like-us/?token=s3d
Audio file: https://pscrb.fm/rss/p/afp-119681-injected.calisto.simplecastaudio.com/7862a9c5-dc9a-4d42-9fcd-d04ed44df073/episodes/e93f82c2-43e9-46dc-a2b6-eb1771b01282/audio/128/default.mp3?aid=rss_feed&awCollectionId=7862a9c5-dc9a-4d42-9fcd-d04ed44df073&awEpisodeId=e93f82c2-43e9-46dc-a2b6-eb1771b01282&feed=FJSi7gLl
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Duration seconds: 1927

## Resource

You've probably seen one by now: a human-sized robot doing very human feats – landing a perfect backflip, racing through the streets of Beijing, or dancing in a crowd at a Knicks game. But behind these viral moments, there is serious money. Analysts predict the market for humanoid robots could be worth trillions in a matter of decades. Everyone from trillionaire Elon Musk to Chinese President Xi Jinping is betting humanoids are the future – that one day, they will live alongside us – in our homes, and even our military. The question is: can we trust them? Angelica Lim has spent her entire career trying to build trustworthy robots. A roboticist based at Simon Fraser University, Lim joins Machine’s Like Us to share lessons from building the world’s first mass-produced humanoid named Pepper, and why empathy in robotics is more important than ever.

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## Transcript

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