Not nearly as cute as Aibo

I defy you to watch this video of a, sort of, robot dog and not be creeped out:

I have only heard of the uncanny valley being applied to people, but this has that same feel of being just natural enough as to be disturbing. In the first shot of the thing walking up the hill I wasn’t entirely convinced it wasn’t some poor real dog with a few artificial legs. It’s an impressive feat of engineering though – watch through to where it gets kicked while trying to walk on ice. The recovery it goes through to avoid falling is amazing.