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Robot Hall of Fame

Posted by michael on from the Tom-Servo-and-Crow dept.

Smaz writes "Apparently Carnegie Mellon has set up a Hall of Fame for robots and their inventors. Wonder if it'll have the pull of a RnR Hall of Fame or Baseball Hall of Fame? I'd visit." Any nominees?

4 of 161 comments (clear)

  1. 1 vote for Hero 2000 by OwnerOfWhinyCat · · Score: 5, Insightful

    For the appropriate era, the Hero 2000 deserves a place of honor.

    Robots have many useful purposes like manufacturing and deep sea exploration, but this non-trivial, non-toy robot was designed to inspire. It was an enormously complicated kit that our high school electronics class put together, that made all those stupid-seeming lessons on how to bias a transistor, and the million obscure uses of op-amps worthwhile. It illustrated for us, why you took the time to make good solder joints, and what these funny logic gates could actually be made to do. Go Heathkit!

  2. Issac Asimov by John_Sauter · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Since inventors are included, I nominate Issac Asimov for his Three Laws of Robotics. Dr. Asimov is as responsible for robots as Jules Verne is for the nuclear submarine and Robert Heinlein is for the waldo.
    John Sauter (J_Sauter@Empire.Net)

    1. Re:Issac Asimov by borroff · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I agree with your nomination of Asimov, but for a slightly different reason. While he didn't actual "invent" anything, his statement of robot behavioral ethics contained in the "Three Laws" is first successful rebuttal to the Frankenstein Complex. If applied successfully, it removes the chance of any intentional harm to humans from robots, and makes the idea of Robots palatable. The dramatic tension in Asimov's Robot stories comes from failures and/or unforeseen consequences of the Three Laws of Robotics. Unfortunately, there are two problems: to avoid these unforeseen consequences, the robots require a phenomenal level of judgement, and, of course, how do you program ethics and judgement?

  3. a robot museum MUST include... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Karel Capek (1890-1938), a Czech playwright, novelist, and essayist. He was the author of the play RUR (1921) which contains the first known public usage of the word 'robot' in the modern context.
    --
    Eric R. Bassey
    Technology Wrangler, Detroit
    Discovery Communications, Inc.