Slashdot Mirror

Canuckanuck writes: "The Space Telescope Institute which operates the Hubble Telecope has this story about the discovery of an unexpected hereto unknown population of wandering, planet-sized objects in the outer Milky Way that could be 80 times less massive than our beloved Earth. The viewing took place in M22 (a globular cluster) by way of microlensing. These things could be the smallest bodies ever seen beyond our solar system, which don't orbit a star. More information can be seen at JPL's website."

The-Pheon writes: "Now you can take a trip to the red planet, if in name only. NASA is giving space enthusiasts a chance to send their personal appellation on a spacecraft slated to blast off for Mars in 2003. Think of it, millions of /.ers names on the Martian surface." Of course, you can also send your name to random postcard recipients, which would get you about the same up-close view of Mars, but at least this way you can imply to your grandchildren that you were part of a Mars mission.

EccentricAnomaly writes: "JPL has a press release about an aerorover blimp for exploring Saturn's moon Titan. There's also a group that has been working on inflatable rovers for Mars and Titan. And there's a group working on flying robots, or aerobots for space exploration. With a 2.5 to 3 hour round-trip light time between Earth and Saturn, flying anything on Titan has got to be a little dicey."

EccentricAnomaly writes: "JPL has a press release about an aerorover blimp for exploring Saturn's moon Titan. There's also a group that has been working on inflatable rovers for Mars and Titan. And there's a group working on flying robots, or aerobots for space exploration. With a 2.5 to 3 hour round-trip light time between Earth and Saturn, flying anything on Titan has got to be a little dicey."

EccentricAnomaly writes: "JPL has a press release about an aerorover blimp for exploring Saturn's moon Titan. There's also a group that has been working on inflatable rovers for Mars and Titan. And there's a group working on flying robots, or aerobots for space exploration. With a 2.5 to 3 hour round-trip light time between Earth and Saturn, flying anything on Titan has got to be a little dicey."

Scoria writes: "CNN dot com reports that the Houston based company Encounter 2001 will ship a part of your DNA to space in 2003 for $50. They're apparently hoping that aliens will find the "message" that they send. The ship will use solar sails the size of a football field as its primary accelerator and will take fifteen years to pass Pluto, at which point it will be travelling at 7.8 miles a second. Pioneer 10, alternately, is currently moving at 7.605936 miles (12.24 km)/sec. There are 4.5 million total slots, go make sure that there are in fact geeks in space!"

Crixus writes "It seems that a mathematical pattern has been found in the X-Ray light emitted by star systems." This is a really intriguing scientific detective story, too -- it took several years of analyzing numerous sources of X-ray flicker to find this pattern.

geigertube writes: "This isnt very new, but after doing a search for 'science' on Shoutcast, I found a streaming feed for a VLF receiver in Huntsville, AL.. Its pretty neat. For some reason its very engrossing listening to the pops and whistles. Via the web page one can order their own kit reciever, (although it wouldnt be that difficult to homebrew one) and listen to the streaming feed. Thanks!"

Sunthorn writes: "After much hype NASA was forced to destroy the X-43 prototype seconds into the flight after the launch rocket went out of control." The BBC has another story with some pre-flight pictures. Anybody have actual flight photos? Update: 06/02 8:28 PM by michael : Emperor writes "The official NASA take on the X-43 destruction." Update: 06/03 10:18 AM by michael : And someone else sent in this photo gallery, with some really nice close-ups.

Sunthorn writes: "After much hype NASA was forced to destroy the X-43 prototype seconds into the flight after the launch rocket went out of control." The BBC has another story with some pre-flight pictures. Anybody have actual flight photos? Update: 06/02 8:28 PM by michael : Emperor writes "The official NASA take on the X-43 destruction." Update: 06/03 10:18 AM by michael : And someone else sent in this photo gallery, with some really nice close-ups.

namespan writes: "NASA and university researchers are looking into creating plants that emit a jellyfish-like glow as a signal of trouble, say, not enough water or oxygen or nutrients in the soil, say. The idea: send them to Mars and have them glow feedback at us about how they're faring on the red planet. They will, of course, have to compete with the radio-controlled plants mentined in an earlier slashdot story. And the Triffids." We've done several stories on glowing plants and animals in the past, but this seems to be a bit more useful and detailed.

EccentricAnomaly writes: "NASA's Three Corner Sat mission will use artificial intelligence to command three formation-flying spacecraft. JPL has a press release here. And there's more information about the A.I. software here. The software is apparently the next generation of the software used for Deep Space One."

EccentricAnomaly writes: "NASA's Three Corner Sat mission will use artificial intelligence to command three formation-flying spacecraft. JPL has a press release here. And there's more information about the A.I. software here. The software is apparently the next generation of the software used for Deep Space One."

EccentricAnomaly writes: "NASA's Three Corner Sat mission will use artificial intelligence to command three formation-flying spacecraft. JPL has a press release here. And there's more information about the A.I. software here. The software is apparently the next generation of the software used for Deep Space One."

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

SEWilco writes: "As NASA points out, Friday May 25 2001 is the 40th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech which set the goal to place men on the Moon within 10 years. Of course, we did land on the Moon in a few places. Although the small spacecraft could only carry two people to the surface, there is a group picture (from this silly page). Few people considered that we might abandon it once we got there." mikeraz points out that the picture of the day is a Saturn V rocket, with plenty of other links too.

jmichaelg writes "Taking a page from Hollywood, NASA approved a Deep Impact mission to poke a seven story hole into Comet Tempel 1. It's a little tough to get past the grandstanding on NASA's part - the collision is scheduled for July 4, 2005. OTOH, hitting an asteroid something NASA has to demonstrate they can do. They missed on their first attempt at an asteroid rendezvous and spent a year chasing Eros. Clearly, they need a bit of practice. Last year, Los Alamos Labs detected two meteors impacting the earth. The bigger of the two explosions was estimated at between 6000-8000 tons of TNT which is 1/2 to 2/3'rds of the bomb's yield that was dropped on Hiroshima. The Tunguska comet/asteroid explosion in 1908 was the equivalent of a 15-40 megaton bomb. The Near Earth Asteroid Tracking observatory keeps turning up previously unknown near earth asteroids all the time so it's just a matter of time before NASA will have to deflect or destroy an incoming asteroid lest it destroy some part of us." We ran another story about this earlier this year.

jmichaelg writes "Taking a page from Hollywood, NASA approved a Deep Impact mission to poke a seven story hole into Comet Tempel 1. It's a little tough to get past the grandstanding on NASA's part - the collision is scheduled for July 4, 2005. OTOH, hitting an asteroid something NASA has to demonstrate they can do. They missed on their first attempt at an asteroid rendezvous and spent a year chasing Eros. Clearly, they need a bit of practice. Last year, Los Alamos Labs detected two meteors impacting the earth. The bigger of the two explosions was estimated at between 6000-8000 tons of TNT which is 1/2 to 2/3'rds of the bomb's yield that was dropped on Hiroshima. The Tunguska comet/asteroid explosion in 1908 was the equivalent of a 15-40 megaton bomb. The Near Earth Asteroid Tracking observatory keeps turning up previously unknown near earth asteroids all the time so it's just a matter of time before NASA will have to deflect or destroy an incoming asteroid lest it destroy some part of us." We ran another story about this earlier this year.

Thorgal writes: "NASA does it again! Thanks to fine people at Malin Space Science Systems we have best yet image of Cydonia Face, with pixel resolution of 1.56m per pixel and excellent angle, again leaving no doubt about what the "face" really is (hint: a mesa). There is also a perspective image generated from laser altimetry data and even a hiking trail designed for future Mars explorers. Definitely a must see!"

Spaceboy writes: "NASA scientists said Sunday they have contacted the Pioneer 10 spacecraft, ending fears that the robotic probe had gone silent 29 years into a mission that has carried it more than 7 billion miles from Earth. Here's the story at excite.com." NASA still maintains a Pioneer webpage, which has been updated with recent information.

Lostman writes: "CNN has an article that details a computer glitch that has occured at the international space station. The problem disrupted all communication from the command computers on the station. Although NASA knows that this was because an onboard server had crashed, the cause of this was not immediately known." See also space.com, the BBC, or NASA's status update. NASA is using Windows for most of their computing functions, as mentioned here.

Lostman writes: "CNN has an article that details a computer glitch that has occured at the international space station. The problem disrupted all communication from the command computers on the station. Although NASA knows that this was because an onboard server had crashed, the cause of this was not immediately known." See also space.com, the BBC, or NASA's status update. NASA is using Windows for most of their computing functions, as mentioned here.

StarEmperor writes: "The folks at Goddard Space Flight Center have created virtual zoom-ins from space to various cities using composites of satellite images."

Greylark writes "The Solar System Simulator lets you see a number of different planets and moons from a number of different positions in the solar system, at any day and time in a 800 year period." This is very cool, and even though it's been around for a while, we don't seem to have run it before.

Guppy06 writes: "NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center (Mississippi, near the gulf coast) will be opening its doors to the public for the first time this Saturday. As part of its celebrations of the 20th anniversary of the first space shuttle launch (as well as flight-certifying a Pratt & Whitney fuel turbo pump), there'll be a 520-second static test of an SSME around 2000 CDT. Translating that into English for the non space geeks, that means they'll be lighting up a space shuttle main engine (attatched to a large steel frame, grounded in a big chunk of concrete so it doesn't go anywhere) for about 9 minutes around 8:00. The press release is available here. Now if only they did stuff like this more often, there might be more interest in NASA ..."

Guppy06 writes: "NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center (Mississippi, near the gulf coast) will be opening its doors to the public for the first time this Saturday. As part of its celebrations of the 20th anniversary of the first space shuttle launch (as well as flight-certifying a Pratt & Whitney fuel turbo pump), there'll be a 520-second static test of an SSME around 2000 CDT. Translating that into English for the non space geeks, that means they'll be lighting up a space shuttle main engine (attatched to a large steel frame, grounded in a big chunk of concrete so it doesn't go anywhere) for about 9 minutes around 8:00. The press release is available here. Now if only they did stuff like this more often, there might be more interest in NASA ..."

PenguinRadio writes: "The Washington Post is reporting that NASA is readying the X-43 space plane for a 10 second test flight, after which is will plunge into the ocean and not be recovered. The X-43 is an unmanned aircraft (there are three of them) that is used as a testing bed for hypersonic aircraft and may lead to a commercial version in about 20 years or so. Anybody got an extra wet suit?" See also the Reuters article on the same subject, and our previous story about an Australian version.

lord skippy writes: "The STS-100 mission is going to launch at 1:41PM CDT (18:41 GMT) on Thursday the 19th. This time the crew is delivering a "new-generation" robotic arm to the IIS, something much alike the one the shuttle has. As usual, always a great thing to watch. You can watch the live NASA TV feed here at the official NASA Human Spaceflight site or there's a nice mirror broadcast here which has 28k, 56k, 100k and 300k versions of the feed. Coverage should start at 9AM EDT but there's still a lot of launch related conferences, etc. that are shown before then."

Robots have been around in concept for longer than the word itself has been used to describe them, and for most of this century they've had a fair hold on the public imagination as either Utopian saviors or inexorable villains. Reader mtDNA sent in the evaluation below of a book called Robo sapiens: Evolution of a new species which may be the basis for a more realistic and neutral understanding about Robots, especially well suited to non-experts in that field. (I also found the other books in the series excellent.)

Robo Sapiens author Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio pages 240 publisher MIT Press rating 8.5 reviewer mtDNA ISBN 0-262-13382-2 summary A coffee-table survey course in words and pictures on the state of robots at the turn of the century.

Robo sapiens is the latest offering in the "Material World" series produced by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio, which includes Material World: A Global Family Portrait (1995) and Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects (1998). On the outside, Robo sapiens is an ordinary coffee table book. On the inside, however, is something different. Robo sapiens sets out to document the state of the art in robotics and artificial intelligence by talking to over fifty active researchers and photographing them with the tools of their trade. The book succeeds brilliantly. With sharp, beautifully reproduced photographs and engaging, well composed text, Robo sapiens provides an overview of robotics research that is simultaneously surreal, comically entertaining and dead serious.

The book is motivated by two main questions: What are robotics researchers working on? and Where are robots headed?

The book attempts to answer these questions through a sequence of profiles. Each profile is roughly two to three pages long and includes an interview, a description of a specific robot of interest and one or more relevant photographs.

The interview with Cynthia Breazeal, the creator of Kizmet (a robot that specializes in communication through facial expression), is typical. It includes Kizmet's basic specifications, photos of Kismet partly disassembled, a photo of Breazeal working on Kismet and several photos of Kismet in action. An interview with Breazeal discusses the general motivations for making a robot use facial expressions and her general approach to artificial intelligence.

Menzel is a terrific photographer, and every shot reflects attention to detail. Menzel tried to capture each robot with its designer (preferably while they were interacting) but there are plenty of photos of bots on their own. Some of my favorites were of BIT (a baby-doll-bot), Kismet (a face-bot with expressions) and Robopike (a fish-bot that swims). Several of the pictures, like the face robot on the cover, the surgery robot in the front pages and the baby (BIT) robot on the back cover are nightmarish or psychadelic, but these are the minority. All of the photos are at least slightly staged, but for the most part they are documentary and stylized only for added interest. Several photos from the book can be found on the Robo sapiens web page.

Research-based approaches to robotics vary widely, and the range of interviews in Robo sapiens varies accordingly. Many of the major players in robotics and artificial intelligence are represented: Ronald Arkin, Rodney Brooks, Raymond Kurzweil, Hans Moravec and Marc Raibert are there, to name just a few. A number of people not usually considered to be roboticists, like Robert Full and Paul McCready, are positive additions to the book's broad scope.

The interviews are surprisingly candid and telling. At one point, Rodney Brooks concedes that he could be wrong about behavior-based subsumption being fundamental, and that he might just be "a grumpy old asshole." (his words, not mine). At another point, two researchers (Eric Baumgartner and Terry Huntsberger) scramble to explain why their Mars rover is tethered, which would seem to be a problem on an interplanetary mission (it's to allow emergency shutdowns during testing). An inspiring feature of every interview is the enthusiasm that shines through. These people are having a darn good time and they make you want to join in the fun.

The answer to the first question posed by the book, "What are robotics researchers working on?", is well answered. In a series of six chapters (Electric dreams, Robo sapiens, Bio logical, Remote possibilities, Work mates and Serious fun), Menzel and D'Aluisio document a diversity of approaches that is truly remarkable in both behavior and mechanism. They range from Mark Tilden's primitivley elegant analog BEAM-bots to Honda's computationally brutish P-series. Robots that swim, walk, crawl, roll, swing and fly are all described. The conclusion is that research in robotics and artificial intelligence is far more diverse than most people would expect: applications range from human-bot social interactions to dynamic prosthetics to meteorite hunting.

The answer to the second question posed by the book, "Where are robots headed?", is less clear. This question is asked in many of the interviews explicitly and answers vary across a spectrum. Some interviewees, like Hans Moravec and Kevin Warwick, seem convinced that robots will eventually supplant or subsume the human species. Others, like Rodney Brooks and Mark Tilden, are more skeptical. One of the funniest interviews is with Tilden, who describes how he built a robot butler that ran into trouble with cleaning. The butler-bot couldn't tell the difference between dirt and cat food, so it vacuumed up the food and the cat went hungry. Tilden's point isn't that nobody can build a bot that can distinguish dirt and cat food, but that endowing bots with the kind of abstract intelligence that comes naturally to humans is a serious problem. It is clear that future directions include the development of new forms of intelligence, but it is unclear what forms these intelligences will take.

My main critism of Robo sapiens is its treatment of points of disagreement in the field. The question of whether robots will take over the world is presented as central, but in reality that question is only of marginal (if any) real interest to professionals. More important controversies, such as about the best way to implement artificial intelligence, are easy to find. One question that could have been asked is, "How is intelligence constructed?". Hearing the perspectives of people who actually design and build serious bots would be interesting. For example, some discussion of the differences between traditional sense-model-plan-act models of intelligence and newer behavior-based subsumption models by the people that actually use them would give a good idea of the practical constraints of each approach, as well as possible compromises. It would easily have been possible to discuss some of these issues without going over the heads of ordinary readers. One simple, illustrative observation would be that increases in the performance of artifical intelligence have not been described by Moore's Law. Why not? Speculation on the answer could only be informative.

Other minor shortcomings of the book are its lack of attention to the roles of history and non-professional researchers in the field. For the ordinary person, the mention of robots and artificial intelligence evokes images of HAL, Rosie, C3PO or even Frankenstein's monster. These images are an important consideration in the development of the robots we see today and in their general role in public life. Why isn't an airplane autopilot called a robot pilot? These issues are mentioned, but only briefly. Discussions with academicians and industry specialists dominate the book but sophisticated hobbyists are a significant presence in the real world. It's a shame not to give them some space.

Most of the deficiencies of the book are resolved by a quick look on the internet. Many of the researchers profiled in Robo sapiens have homepages that provide online versions of their technical articles and further information. Information about the work of amateurs and hobbyists is abundant online as well. Fred Martin's Handyboard, for example, has been integrated into all kinds of interesting projects. While Robo sapiens is directed at the educated layman and thus not a good source of technical information by itself, the book could be a useful starting point in finding robots and researchers in specific categories.

If you're propeller-head to the point of pathology, be warned: Robo sapiens isn't a technical document and may be disappointing. For the rest of us Robo sapiens is outstanding and at $29.95 (USD) it's a bargain. I heartily recommend Robo sapiens to anyone who even has a passing interest in who robotics researchers are, what they are doing, or where robots are headed.

You can purchase this book at ThinkGeek.

Robots have been around in concept for longer than the word itself has been used to describe them, and for most of this century they've had a fair hold on the public imagination as either Utopian saviors or inexorable villains. Reader mtDNA sent in the evaluation below of a book called Robo sapiens: Evolution of a new species which may be the basis for a more realistic and neutral understanding about Robots, especially well suited to non-experts in that field. (I also found the other books in the series excellent.)

Robo Sapiens author Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio pages 240 publisher MIT Press rating 8.5 reviewer mtDNA ISBN 0-262-13382-2 summary A coffee-table survey course in words and pictures on the state of robots at the turn of the century.

Robo sapiens is the latest offering in the "Material World" series produced by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio, which includes Material World: A Global Family Portrait (1995) and Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects (1998). On the outside, Robo sapiens is an ordinary coffee table book. On the inside, however, is something different. Robo sapiens sets out to document the state of the art in robotics and artificial intelligence by talking to over fifty active researchers and photographing them with the tools of their trade. The book succeeds brilliantly. With sharp, beautifully reproduced photographs and engaging, well composed text, Robo sapiens provides an overview of robotics research that is simultaneously surreal, comically entertaining and dead serious.

The book is motivated by two main questions: What are robotics researchers working on? and Where are robots headed?

The book attempts to answer these questions through a sequence of profiles. Each profile is roughly two to three pages long and includes an interview, a description of a specific robot of interest and one or more relevant photographs.

The interview with Cynthia Breazeal, the creator of Kizmet (a robot that specializes in communication through facial expression), is typical. It includes Kizmet's basic specifications, photos of Kismet partly disassembled, a photo of Breazeal working on Kismet and several photos of Kismet in action. An interview with Breazeal discusses the general motivations for making a robot use facial expressions and her general approach to artificial intelligence.

Menzel is a terrific photographer, and every shot reflects attention to detail. Menzel tried to capture each robot with its designer (preferably while they were interacting) but there are plenty of photos of bots on their own. Some of my favorites were of BIT (a baby-doll-bot), Kismet (a face-bot with expressions) and Robopike (a fish-bot that swims). Several of the pictures, like the face robot on the cover, the surgery robot in the front pages and the baby (BIT) robot on the back cover are nightmarish or psychadelic, but these are the minority. All of the photos are at least slightly staged, but for the most part they are documentary and stylized only for added interest. Several photos from the book can be found on the Robo sapiens web page.

Research-based approaches to robotics vary widely, and the range of interviews in Robo sapiens varies accordingly. Many of the major players in robotics and artificial intelligence are represented: Ronald Arkin, Rodney Brooks, Raymond Kurzweil, Hans Moravec and Marc Raibert are there, to name just a few. A number of people not usually considered to be roboticists, like Robert Full and Paul McCready, are positive additions to the book's broad scope.

The interviews are surprisingly candid and telling. At one point, Rodney Brooks concedes that he could be wrong about behavior-based subsumption being fundamental, and that he might just be "a grumpy old asshole." (his words, not mine). At another point, two researchers (Eric Baumgartner and Terry Huntsberger) scramble to explain why their Mars rover is tethered, which would seem to be a problem on an interplanetary mission (it's to allow emergency shutdowns during testing). An inspiring feature of every interview is the enthusiasm that shines through. These people are having a darn good time and they make you want to join in the fun.

The answer to the first question posed by the book, "What are robotics researchers working on?", is well answered. In a series of six chapters (Electric dreams, Robo sapiens, Bio logical, Remote possibilities, Work mates and Serious fun), Menzel and D'Aluisio document a diversity of approaches that is truly remarkable in both behavior and mechanism. They range from Mark Tilden's primitivley elegant analog BEAM-bots to Honda's computationally brutish P-series. Robots that swim, walk, crawl, roll, swing and fly are all described. The conclusion is that research in robotics and artificial intelligence is far more diverse than most people would expect: applications range from human-bot social interactions to dynamic prosthetics to meteorite hunting.

The answer to the second question posed by the book, "Where are robots headed?", is less clear. This question is asked in many of the interviews explicitly and answers vary across a spectrum. Some interviewees, like Hans Moravec and Kevin Warwick, seem convinced that robots will eventually supplant or subsume the human species. Others, like Rodney Brooks and Mark Tilden, are more skeptical. One of the funniest interviews is with Tilden, who describes how he built a robot butler that ran into trouble with cleaning. The butler-bot couldn't tell the difference between dirt and cat food, so it vacuumed up the food and the cat went hungry. Tilden's point isn't that nobody can build a bot that can distinguish dirt and cat food, but that endowing bots with the kind of abstract intelligence that comes naturally to humans is a serious problem. It is clear that future directions include the development of new forms of intelligence, but it is unclear what forms these intelligences will take.

My main critism of Robo sapiens is its treatment of points of disagreement in the field. The question of whether robots will take over the world is presented as central, but in reality that question is only of marginal (if any) real interest to professionals. More important controversies, such as about the best way to implement artificial intelligence, are easy to find. One question that could have been asked is, "How is intelligence constructed?". Hearing the perspectives of people who actually design and build serious bots would be interesting. For example, some discussion of the differences between traditional sense-model-plan-act models of intelligence and newer behavior-based subsumption models by the people that actually use them would give a good idea of the practical constraints of each approach, as well as possible compromises. It would easily have been possible to discuss some of these issues without going over the heads of ordinary readers. One simple, illustrative observation would be that increases in the performance of artifical intelligence have not been described by Moore's Law. Why not? Speculation on the answer could only be informative.

Other minor shortcomings of the book are its lack of attention to the roles of history and non-professional researchers in the field. For the ordinary person, the mention of robots and artificial intelligence evokes images of HAL, Rosie, C3PO or even Frankenstein's monster. These images are an important consideration in the development of the robots we see today and in their general role in public life. Why isn't an airplane autopilot called a robot pilot? These issues are mentioned, but only briefly. Discussions with academicians and industry specialists dominate the book but sophisticated hobbyists are a significant presence in the real world. It's a shame not to give them some space.

Most of the deficiencies of the book are resolved by a quick look on the internet. Many of the researchers profiled in Robo sapiens have homepages that provide online versions of their technical articles and further information. Information about the work of amateurs and hobbyists is abundant online as well. Fred Martin's Handyboard, for example, has been integrated into all kinds of interesting projects. While Robo sapiens is directed at the educated layman and thus not a good source of technical information by itself, the book could be a useful starting point in finding robots and researchers in specific categories.

If you're propeller-head to the point of pathology, be warned: Robo sapiens isn't a technical document and may be disappointing. For the rest of us Robo sapiens is outstanding and at $29.95 (USD) it's a bargain. I heartily recommend Robo sapiens to anyone who even has a passing interest in who robotics researchers are, what they are doing, or where robots are headed.

You can purchase this book at ThinkGeek.

mitd writes: "ISS Mission STS-100-6A will leave be leaving Thursday carrying the new Canadarm2 and Chris Hadfield who will become the first Canadian to walk in space. Chris gave an interview on CBC radio (MP3) . He talks about the new features of the Canadarm2 including its ability to walk around the ISS and do very delicate work that previously only astronauts could do." And MP3 interviews are a nice idea, too, versus streaming.

mzac writes: "The amateur radio abord the ISS is now activated and is digipeating packet radio. With a simple 5W handheld and a 3/4 wave 2 meter antenna, the signal can be received quite easily. Anyone who doesn't have a amateur radio license but does have a scanner can probably also receive the signals with a handheld scanner and the stock antenna. Using satellite tracking software and NTP software to sync your computer's clock is a good way of knowing when the ISS will pass over." (Read more.)

"Transmitting to the station is a bit more difficult as everyone is trying to transmit to the station on each pass, but many people have made it through.

Frequencies for the ISS are:

• Worldwide downlink for voice and packet: 145.80MHz
• Worldwide packet uplink: 145.99MHz
• Region 1 voice uplink: 145.20MHz
• Region 2 & 3 voice uplink: 144.49MHz

More info can be found at: Amsat or the ARISS Home Page."

ehintz writes "40 years ago today, 4-12-61, Lt. Yuri Gagarin slipped the surly bonds of Earth to become the first man in orbit. His 108 minute flight aboard Vostok 1 from Baikonur Cosmodrome was the stimulus causing Kennedy to make his famous Man on the Moon speech of 5-25-61, resulting in the moon landing of 7-20-69. We owe our comrades thanks for providing the competition that made it happen." ( michael : More links! The APOD notes that this is also the 20th anniversary of the first Shuttle launch. And NASA provides this image of a newspaper front page, which ought to convey the momentous nature of the event to those of us who weren't born at the time.)

ehintz writes "40 years ago today, 4-12-61, Lt. Yuri Gagarin slipped the surly bonds of Earth to become the first man in orbit. His 108 minute flight aboard Vostok 1 from Baikonur Cosmodrome was the stimulus causing Kennedy to make his famous Man on the Moon speech of 5-25-61, resulting in the moon landing of 7-20-69. We owe our comrades thanks for providing the competition that made it happen." ( michael : More links! The APOD notes that this is also the 20th anniversary of the first Shuttle launch. And NASA provides this image of a newspaper front page, which ought to convey the momentous nature of the event to those of us who weren't born at the time.)

We've gotten several submissions of this Wired story about life on space station Alpha. The story was written from these logs (which we linked to a few days ago) kept by the commander of the most recent ISS mission. So, let me recommend the logs once again - like the Wired reporter, I found them fascinating reading. For instance, the commander describes losing a washer because everyone's hands were full and they couldn't grab it - obviously letting go of dozens of washers to grab one, in zero-gravity, would not be a good idea - and they can't just "put them down" somewhere.

Shturmovik[KGB] writes: "As per NASA/JPL: "Tune in today and Saturday and see hundreds of robots and their creators -- high school students -- compete in a national robotics competition sponsored by NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Seven teams sponsored by JPL are taking part in the contest at Walt Disney World's EPCOT Center in Orlando, Fla. Watch the students and their robots compete on NASA Television or on the Web during a live broadcast and Webcast of the FIRST Robotics National Competition on Friday, April 6 from noon to 2 p.m., PDT (3 to 5 p.m, EDT) and on Saturday, April 7 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., PDT (1 to 5 p.m., EDT)." The Webcast can be accessed here. The NASA TV schedule is also available."

Shturmovik[KGB] writes: "As per NASA/JPL: "Tune in today and Saturday and see hundreds of robots and their creators -- high school students -- compete in a national robotics competition sponsored by NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Seven teams sponsored by JPL are taking part in the contest at Walt Disney World's EPCOT Center in Orlando, Fla. Watch the students and their robots compete on NASA Television or on the Web during a live broadcast and Webcast of the FIRST Robotics National Competition on Friday, April 6 from noon to 2 p.m., PDT (3 to 5 p.m, EDT) and on Saturday, April 7 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., PDT (1 to 5 p.m., EDT)." The Webcast can be accessed here. The NASA TV schedule is also available."

automandc writes "NASA has posted the Mission Logs kept by Commander William Shepard (slightly redacted). Among other interesting things is an insider's view of the computing infrastructure of the station. (For instance, he complains of running out of 'laptop desks' because they have 9 laptops running and want to add two more). He asks for a Windows boot CD, and gripes about a russian Cosmonaut's familiarity with "that other" OS. All in all, a very interesting read for ISS buffs. (Note, they are in reverse chronological order)."

ParticleGirl asks: "Dennis Tito's flight to the ISS is scheduled for the same time that the Canadian Space Agency (CSA)'s robotic arm is supposed to be installed. Speaking for the CSA, Marc Garneau did an interview with Space.com. Now that Canada has come out against Tito going into space, it'll be interesting to see what kind of a compromise will be reached. Until now, this has been a sort-of standoff between Russia and the United States, but now other countries are entering the fray. Should this dude have access to the space station just because he's got the cash? He did work for NASA, and he seems to be intelligent and capable. On the other hand, he's not a trained astronaut and could plausibly be a liability if there is some sort of emergency. Will this be our first extra-orbital international incident?" While the article at Space.Com downplays any possibility of such an occurence, I can see reasons for both sides, here: Russia should be able to run their own space program, without any interference from the US, however Tito's presence on the ISS affects more than Russian interests. If the issue is a matter of training, however, I'm sure that Tito will need to pass some form of certification for space travel. Another thing to remember: the Russians have been at this space-travel thing longer than the US has. As always, feel free to share your thoughts on this issue.

olafva writes: "You may be interested in this new breakthrough! See NASA Press Release and a couple of today's local stories for a remarkable paradigm shift in "Computing Faster without CPUs"." CmdrTaco said he'd believe it when he saw it. Well, they've got pictures. (Update: 03/29 5:02 PM by michael : At NASA's request, we've modified the links in the above story to reduce the load on their Public Affairs website. The same content is at the new links.)

olafva writes: "You may be interested in this new breakthrough! See NASA Press Release and a couple of today's local stories for a remarkable paradigm shift in "Computing Faster without CPUs"." CmdrTaco said he'd believe it when he saw it. Well, they've got pictures. (Update: 03/29 5:02 PM by michael : At NASA's request, we've modified the links in the above story to reduce the load on their Public Affairs website. The same content is at the new links.)

olafva writes: "You may be interested in this new breakthrough! See NASA Press Release and a couple of today's local stories for a remarkable paradigm shift in "Computing Faster without CPUs"." CmdrTaco said he'd believe it when he saw it. Well, they've got pictures. (Update: 03/29 5:02 PM by michael : At NASA's request, we've modified the links in the above story to reduce the load on their Public Affairs website. The same content is at the new links.)

UserID 3.14 writes "This article from science daily talks about a communications module that will be strapped to the rockets of a shuttle or other payload delivery vehicle. It can be used to provide constant telemetry by making a cell phone call using the Globalstar Network. Does this mean that if you use a cell phone in space, even there people will ask you to step outside?" See NASA's web page about the Flight Modem, which seems to be very much a work in progress

Porfiry writes "An international team of astronomers has detected what could be a significant portion of the galactic dark matter that has eluded astronomers for nearly 70 years. Scanning digitized images of the southern sky, the team found 38 previously unseen cool white dwarfs within about 450 light years of Earth. If the density of these newly discovered white dwarfs is indicative of the rest of the galaxy's halo, these dead stars would comprise at least three percent of the dark matter of the halo, and perhaps as much as 35 percent."

Shturmovik[KGB] writes ""Let's get ready to rumblllllllllllllle!" On Saturday night NASA is webcasting the big robot fight. A total of 49 machines, constructed by 2,000 high school students, will battle it out at the LA Arena. Should be good. Be there! You can watch it on the JPL website"

Deglr6328 writes "The Galileo space probe, which has been orbiting Jupiter since 1995, has received it's third and final mission extension from NASA. Galileo will remain in the Jovian system for 2 more years and 5 orbits studying Callisto, Io and Amalthea, then the spacecraft will take an elongated loop away from Jupiter and head back for a direct impact and burn in Jupiter's atmosphere. The extension will cost $9 million and was approved by the National Academy of Sciences which originally had concerns about it potentially contaminating Europa."