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Hum110 wake tech week 8b robots3
- 3. The Robots of Generation Y
- 4. “Humanoids”
Editor's Notes
- Robotics: Robota is the Czech word for “ f orced labor.” Only 25% of Americans surveyed by the Angus Reid Group believed that robots had applications in the home. Only 14% of Americans think that robots could do their work. When asked if robots would be able to perform typically human functions within 5 and 10 year spans... 2000 survey 5 yr 10 yr Drive car 13% 33% Cook food 19% 38% Shop 13% 32% I n 2000, Japanese factories employed 400,000 robots; American industry used only 100,000.
- Why? The new industrialized Japan with the aid of the post WWII Marshall Plan takes in the age of the manufacturing infrastructure (1945-1960) Fifty years later there is a new optimism toward robotics in the new century: Lower cost components Improvements in vision systems More adaptable systems from object oriented development (This means that common computer functions don’t need to be programmed for each application. Every system once had to write software to calculate dates. Now every system has access to a previously developed date calculator.) “ S mart Chips” (Computer chips now perform some functions that once required software to perform the operations.) I n 1999, 13,368 robots were produced valued at $1.1B, a 40% increase in one year. A robot controller used to be the same size as the robot. Now it’ s the size of a PC monitor. 1 495- Leonardo da Vinci designed the first humanoid robot. 1961- DuVol and Engelberger develop the first practical robot for GM in NJ (Bruno, Lee. “Robotic Century: Has the long-promised future started to become the present?” Red Herring. August, 2000.Robot Snobbery.) Wm. Whittaker:” Here at Carnegie Mellon, we don’ t concern ourselves with dumb welding machines.” This academic view was a part of the problem. Universities wanted to build sophisticated robots rather than useful robots. H enry Thorne of General Motors:” Get industrial robotics wrong and you can cost your company billions of dollars.” General Motors needed a different perspective in the development of robots. Those who would build robots should have different b ackgrounds to help GM: Computer Science v Engineering.Tools: Software and AI v mechanical solutions In the 1980s, there were only 400 robotics mfgrs in the US By 1986 only twelve were left. In 1999, Japanese robotics were valued at $2.2B; At the same time US had decreased to $1.0B. Meanwhile MIT builds robo-pike, the fish, and Aibo, Sony’ s dog “ t ests” the technology of the future as does Honda’ s humanoid. (McKay, Niall. “ C lique Here: A rivalry between academia and industry stymies development in the United States.” Red Herring, August, 2000, 208-212.)
- Robotics evolve with the capability to surpass human performance due to developments in sensors and optics. Thus a welding robot can spot-weld thousands of connections without a break or without an error. iRobot invents Roomba. Roomba vacuums your room. Learns its dimensions. Avoids falling down stairs. It doesn’t do any of these things like a human. WowWee of Hong Kong invents the Rovio, a Wi-Fi operated roving security camera. But not like a human. Husqvarna invents the automower that leaves un-mowed patches where kids have left toys, unlike a human. Honda’s Asimo and Toyota’s Partner Robot greet guests, serve guests and play instruments like humans. But not any human you would want to know. “ With a Little Help” The Economist Technology Quarterly, June 6, 2009, 14. The $1m to 2.25m daVinci surgical robotic system “changes the skill set that is required to perform a successful surgery. “ Some small hospitals, however, are unable to support the new technical skills required to support da Vinci. (Carreyrou, John. “Surgical Robots Examined in Injuries,” The New York Times . 04 May 2010. 05 May 2010, Online.) Robots are also assuming more human traits and behaviors.Mimic-bots like those developed at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), as the name suggests copy, repeat and remember the behaviors it sees humans perform. Humans may learn by using “mirror neurons.” These are the cells that demand that we pay attention to the cell conversations of others even though we can only hear half of the exchange. Unlike earlier robots, mimics learn steps like humans and even “ask” for more information by displaying a question-mark on its humanoid face. (Knight, Helen. “The Rise of the Mimic-bots That Act Like We Do,” NewScientist. 8 Jan 2011 17 Print.)
- Mental Commitment Robots In Feb, 2009 the Full Frame Film Festival featured a documentary called Mechanical Love about a mechanical seal pup used in therapy For geriatric and Alzheimer's patients. This robot is designed to be rather than to do. It responds and encourages feeling. In doing so, it cures. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhqCpekT6DA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KitQjT8g_d4&feature=related Lars and the Real Girl is a fictional treatment of the same subject. Funny but still therapeutic. Nearly Human Hands The Shadow Robot Company has designed a device that is very much like the human hand. It was designed this way so that The skill of particularly skilled experts can be translated from human to machine “hands-on” operations. Shadow Robot is designed to act as a bomb disposal robot. The device is shaped very much like a human hand even having polycarbonate fingernails. The joints have a range of 24 degrees. It is operated by 40 pneumatic “air-muscles.” The hand can pick-up breakable items including eggs. The manufacturers has resisted the temptation to make it stronger because “it might be dangerous.” “ Very Handy,” The Economist Technology Quarterly, June 6, 2009, 4-5. Perhaps the greatest advancement in robotics yet this decade is the work being done at Georgia Tech. There Alan Wagner and Ronald Arkin are collaborating "to build robots that can not only interact with humans but are also capable of representing, reasoning, and developing relationships with others." Perhaps most significantly , these humanoids are capable of understanding and even committing deception. ("The Office Robot," Bloomberg Businessweek, 17-23 Jan 2011,70-71. Print.)