Mechanical Talking Heads
There is a long history of attempts to build mechanical "talking heads." Speech synthesis#Mechanical devices. Gerbert (d. 1003), Albertus Magnus (1198–1280) and Roger Bacon (1214–1294) are all said to have built speaking heads (Wheatstone 1837). However, historically confirmed speech synthesis begins with Wolfgang von Kempelen (1734–1804), who published an account of his research in 1791 (see also Dudley and Tarnoczy 1950).
Read more about this topic: Articulatory Synthesis
Famous quotes containing the words mechanical, talking and/or heads:
“No sociologist ... should think himself too good, even in his old age, to make tens of thousands of quite trivial computations in his head and perhaps for months at a time. One cannot with impunity try to transfer this task entirely to mechanical assistants if one wishes to figure something, even though the final result is often small indeed.”
—Max Weber (1864–1920)
“A man may appear learned, without talking Sentences; as in his ordinary Gesture he discovers he can Dance, tho’ he does not cut Capers.”
—Richard Steele (1672–1729)
“My travel’s history,
Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,
Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven,
It was my hint to speak—such was my process—
And of the cannibals that each other eat,
The anthropophagi, and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)