That is exactly what Will Wright (the creator of SimCity and The Sims, and Robot Wars / Battle Bots contestant) was getting at when we made these one-minute robot reality videos about "Empathy" and "Servitude".

His idea was to probe just how much random people on the street (or in a diner) would believe about autonomous intelligent robots operating in the real world.

Of course we were actually hiding behind the scenes tele-operating the robots through hidden cameras and a wireless web interface, listening to what the people said and making the robots respond with a voice synthesizer and sound effects, clicking on pre-written phrases and typing ad-libbed responses.

Empathy (a broken down robot begs for help from passers by on the streets of Oakland):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXrbqXPnHvE

Servitude (a robot waiter takes orders and serves food in a diner in Oakland, making stupid mistakes and asking for a good review):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXsUetUzXlg

All his robots aren't as harmless, non-violent, polite, and obsequious as those two. Here's an old interview with Will at Robot Wars 1997:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nmbs0WqDQM

Here is Super ChiaBot and her MiniBots, created by Will and his daughter Cassidy, getting its leaves shredded and body slammed at BattleBots:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrArvRG2yQA

Here's a more recent video of Will throwing a tantrum about the failure of SimSandwich, destroying his old creations because they're pixely and poorly rendered, then complaining about how those jerks at EA hate him:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-7F7s46-9A