Furby inventor Caleb Chung wants to create “an artificial life-form” — something that looks eerily alive and is affected by its environment.

Pleo, a tiny dinosaur, begins as a baby, and its personality is forged by how you treat it. If it uses a high-pitched squeak and you feed it, it will learn to repeat that noise to get fed. Be nice to it and it will become mellow and friendly; mistreat it and you will evolve a bitter, annoyed robot.

He’s also designing an experimental interactive chair that “tries to understand you,” he says. Chung is writing software that will enable the chair to analyze your body language as you approach it and configure itself to suit your mood.