Not only the Japanese find a way to get proper funding for non profitable projects in areas such as robotics, at last Europeans have now commenced to give funding for such "non-serious" projects.
Here is one that might help some Italian researchers put some light on learning if this is really feasible: the iCub robot
http://www.physorg.com/news171703166.html
Will we be able to run from our iPod Touch ?
Luc