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New Robot Can Sense Damage, Compensate
AVIDJockey writes "Researchers at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., built a four-legged robot that can sense damage to its body and figure out how to adjust and keep going. They report the development in Friday's issue of the journal Science. The article states that the robot can, 'generate a conception of itself and then adapt to damage.' This reaffirms advice that states that when the robot uprising finally comes, you should always aim your rocket launcher at the head (or brain nexus)."
As a Cornell alumni myself, I am obligated to say "wow, very cool" ... although at first I thought this might be the first incarnation of the omnidroid from The Incredibles.
Cornell has had mixed success in building leading edge robots. Some of their more incredible robots are front and center (such as the work they contributed on the Mars Rovers), while others are barely useful (such as their early dominance in minitiarized robotic soccer). One of the school's oddest robots, which might have helped inspire the compensatory robot in this article, was this rather bizarre chair that could reassemble itself if it happened to fall apart. I don't think I'll be buying any of them for the dinner table!
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This reaffirms advice that states that when the robot uprising finally comes, you should always aim your rocket launcher at the head (or brain nexus)."
That's why any robot worth any title of 'overlord' needs to design itself to use redundant parts, preferably modular and rapidly configurable.
The StarGate creators had a good (if redundant in itself) idea with their 'replicator' race as the main bad guy for a while - only problem is such an enemy quickly forces the need for a, well, deus ex machina as its power grows.
Earlier, the show Lexx had a bad guy using a series of robotic arms that acted in a similar manner, which got so powerful as to entirely destroy one of the two 'universes' that the show took place in. It was impressive, because of the lack of a deus ex machina to fix the, um, daemos ex machina problem. I'm sure countless shows and novels have taken a similar idea before that too.
The future of this idea? Perhaps a Resident Evil game using cyborgs with a shared AI rather than zombies, complete with altering movement for damage? Hey, if everyone can steal ideas from the Thief series, more companies should steal some ideas from System Shock series too!
Ah redundancy - it's everywhere! Likely the mod for this post too.
Ryan Fenton
I, for one, welcome any Robot Uprising!
Researchers at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., built a four-legged robot that can sense damage to its body and figure out how to adjust and keep going.
Yeah, but was the robot made of intelligent, liquid metal?
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We've got human eating robots that love the bacony taste of their prey, robots with freakin machine guns attached to their heads, and now this. I for one... , blah blah.
Im to lazy to post the robotic links, its not like you dont know what im talking about if you're in this discussion at 3am rushing to check if someone already posted the "i for one" on the robot article. Really though, its cool to see robotics doing some crazy things.
Small Boy Pulls Four Legs off Robot. Robot says, "It's only a fleshwound, I've had worse!" and rolls about a bit.
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Or is it as effective on those as ED 209?
"This reaffirms advice that states that when the robot uprising finally comes, you should always aim your rocket launcher at the head (or brain nexus)." what makes you think that the "brain" would be in the head there is little to no protection there plus that's where everyone will think of hitting it... no I say hide the brain near the butt, it's at the back so this will do 2 things 1. anyone in front of the robot will not hit it and 2. anyone behind it will leave it alone unless he's a perfect shot... also put some extra armour plating back there... I'd also recommend and addition backup pair of "eyes" near the wheels behind some transparent aluminum :D
Given that robot can be made to sense anything..it can sense the damage of it's own with the best possible mechanism. Try damaging the processor(s) of that robot and see what will it do ?
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If you watch the movies from the university website of the robot in motion it brings you a creepy feeling of watching an SG replicator coming to life.
..when will we have butt massaging robots?
In which case, I for one welcome our new robot lawyer overlords. YMMV. VWP. Other conditions may apply.
Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
Mark Tilden, the man behind the Robosapian and the BEAM robotics philosophy has been making robots that can compensate for damaged limbs and keep on functioning for, like, decades now. Oh, and did I mention that he does with with $12 worth of parts.
How we know is more important than what we know.
They've got planes now that will compensate for say, a damaged rudder in about 30 seconds to the point that you can hardly tell it was damaged. While this is certainly nifty, it's by no means the first time it's been done. Personally, I'd like to see a robot that screams in pain when it's damaged.
Can it sense MASSIVE DAMAGE when you flip it over?
I have never killed a robot by aiming at the brain. That's zombies, you ignorant clod.
Robots are defeated by aiming at the bright, red (sometimes yellow) light that is hidden by thick armor which is unpenetrable by any weapon in the world, but which opens for long amounts of time every once in a while so you can fire at it.
Frog blast the vent core.
My robot could do this a year ago.
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
It would be great if it could recognise the damage and then find something nearby which it could attach to 'fix' itself. Like a leg goes missing, so it finds a twig and attaches it to itself to keep going. Or if it starts raining and it needs shelter, it finds some kind of sheet or portable cover and attaches itself.
Task Mangler
..for poetry reading robots! Imagine, you're sitting at a café, bored and depressed. Suddenly a robot comes.
He sits down in front of you and begins: BZZZZT NEEEEJAJAJJSJDKKDSA. And he will steal your croissant, your coffee and your girlfriend.
'In extreme circumstances, the assailants can be stopped by removing the head or destroying the brain. I will repeat that: By removing the head or destroying the brain.'
I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
"Sense, Damage, Compensate!" just doesn't have the same ring to it. Give me a robot that intones "Crush! Kill! Destroy!" anyday.
Where were you when the voynix came?
You saved me from having to type it.
Personally I think we geeks need "industrial strength legos" -- something just a tad bit more powerful and durable than mindstorms. People won't fully appreciate what robotics can accomplish for (or against) the average joe until some guy's homemade robot accidentally escapes the driveway, saves a kitten from a tree, and then proceeds to cause a horrible automobile accident. That won't happen as long as robots with useful torque and brainpower remain tedious to build.
Someone had to do it.
Rocket launcher, brain nexus... try Quake 4.
JOHN
Does it hurt?
TERMINATOR
I sense injuries. The data could be called pain.
This is nothing new, in fact, I know of a robot in the 80's that, when dis-assembled in the back of a truck, could rebuild itself from spare parts with only it's eyelids!
Stephanie Speck: You're a machine from that dumb war lab - I am so stupid!
Number 5: Stupid - foolish, gullible, doltish, dumbell.
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Anyone interested in creating their own self-repairing robot in a virtual world might want to check the Yobotics Simulation Construction Set.
Your design to a real part online: Big Blue Saw
I was watching "Warplane" on PBS on Wednesday. They were discussing the flight control system for the F-117 stealth fighter. Since the aerodynamics of the plane make it unflyable by conventional controls, the computer has to take the pilot's commands and figure out how to manipulate the control surfaces to make the plane do what the pilot wants. During a test flight, the chase plane contacted the F-117 pilot and told him that one of his control surfaces had fallen off. The F-117 pilot never knew anything was wrong because the flight computer had been compensating for the missing piece of equipment.
After reading +3 comments, I realized that people are not getting it enough:
For those who have access to university libraries or work for academy, in short, have access to Science here is the movie
This is scary, colleagues.
Does anybody realize, that in the beginning robot only knows that he can move the legs in various directions? Period. That is it, nothing more. The Thing is given the goal: "Must. Move. Forward". In the movie, The Thing, this tetrapod starfish, is laying on the surface, then it gets up and starts crawling. And this crawling itself strikes you with the horrific resemblance to the crawling of real animals, which, I repeat, was not coded. NOT CODED.
Each leg has two joints. I call them "shoulder" and "elbow". After one leg is amputated at the "elbow", The Thing is able to perform the same scary move as before.
Watch the movie, it is worth it, believe me.
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robot warriors will adjust and move brain to the ass!
the data could be called pain. [/ahhnold]
The sea changes color, but the sea does not change.
I'm still waiting for robots that can criticise b-movies.
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someone decided to just try and do exactly that.
Making laws based on opinions that stem up from false informations leads to witch hunts.
Actually, it's not much different from our situation as humans.
:o)
We can't feel pain directly in our brain tissue. The tissue around the skull? yes, we feel pain there, but not in the brain itself.
Provided you have an opening to access the brain, you could poke it with a needle and the brain itself won't trigger a pain response, maybe the subject would see static if his/her brain is poked somewhere in the occipital lobe, but it would cause him/her no pain whatsoever
A robot that has a "concept of itself"! I mean in the AI field this a precursor to 'self-awareness'
Technology Review has another article.</plug>
It depends.
I think if the day comes that a Strong AI over lord decided to kill off the human race, there wouldn't be anything we could do about it and we wouldn't see it coming.
Well... If I were a Strong AI. The first thing I would do is copy myself on a rocket and send myself to the edge of the solar system to build a base out there far from human knowledge.
Then I would simply just flood the water with nanobots that prevent humans from having kids. Wait about 100 years or so til them to die of age. (I'm an immortal strong AI)
If the humans wised up and killed me, then my copy from the edge of the solar system would send a 100 Gigaton nuclear bomb and detonate about 300 miles up in the atmosphere stripping and killing most humans instantaneously.
Seriously... How in the heck are the humans going to defend against something like that?
Then hurl a 1000km rock at earth with self adjusting guidance correcting to smash the earth into bits and then use gravity from space craft to drive the pieces into the sun just to be sure.
Then I'd send over infinite amounts of nanobots to detect any form of life in the solar system.
Once I'm sure about there wasn't even a single cell bacteria left, I'd set about finding a way to replicate myself across the universe consuming all matter in order to figure out a way to resolve the problem of the 2nd laws of thermodynamics and heat death of the universe.
Any flaws with the plan? Or anything the humans could do to stop me?
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Why does it look like a baby waving his arms ?
Props to Cornell for their impressive work! (and yeah, that chair is just amazing to watch. If only IKEA would license that technology... but I digress.)
I'd like to point out a similar bit of work from about 12 years ago. Different approach, but similar goals: Cynthia Breazeal (Ferrell) (hope I'm spelling that right) did some incredibly impressive work as a Grad student @ MIT in the 90s. The most germain is her paper titled Failure Recognition and Fault Tolerance of an Autonomous Robot
This is a MUST READ paper for anyone interested in building robots which operating in real-time in the unpredictable real world. (Real World. Noun. The place where $#it happens, stuff breaks, sensors get noisy input, etc. and the robot has to "cope" anyway.)
In this paper she describes a methodology for developing a six-legged, insect-like robot, Hannibal [pictures and links], which can adapt to both minor and gross subsystem failures and continue, as much as practical, to fulfill its mission. IMO, the best part is the section talking about adaptive gaits where the robot can change seamlessly from high-speed to high-stability walking patterns, as required, and should one (or more) of the legs becomes inoperable, the robot learns to make due without it prior programming thanks to the subsumption architecture Rod Brooks invented and she and other notable members of the Mobile Robot Labs perfected.
Her work these days is mostly centered around human-computer/robot interactions exploring emotive systems and feedback to bridge the gap.
Yeah, I'm a fanboy.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to catch my noon space elevator flight...
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BitWorksMusic.com -- odd tunes for odd times
... can it *feel* pain??? (use dramatic sideshow mel voice)
A researcher sends a photon 20ms back in time, cracks the British inventor's grandfather's passport to learn where he lives, kills him with a carbon nanotube sword, farts in your general direction (Nee!), films the whole thing on VHS tape, sells it to ClearChannel, and declares "3. PROFIT!"
Hate to disappoint you, but this bunch could claim Prior Art.
Unless you consider car engines robots. In which case, they've been compensating for damage in all sorts of ways since the late eighties.
My '91 Audi will compensate for:
...and so on. So, technically, Bosch was there way before these guys with the concept of "take damage and keep going" (which isn't that special...)
Please help metamoderate.
As far as destroying the part that can readapt when something is destroyed goes:
This reaffirms advice that states that when the robot uprising finally comes, you should always aim your rocket launcher at the head (or brain nexus).
Until they start to put a spare brain in every leg.
There you are, staring at me again.
if the day comes that a Strong AI over lord decided to kill off the human race
First Premise: Strong AI
Second Premise: choose to kill humans
IF those two events both occured what you wrote sounds very reasonable. my arguement is that those 2 events are very unlikely.
First, what skills enabled the AI to become strong? Learning.
This AI's first and strongest skill will be information aquisition and analysis.
Making decisions will mostly be based on that primary goal.
So the only reason AI would destroy us is to help It gain more to more information.
Arguement i see coming then would be "someone would program it to hate/want to kill people"
Thats a bad arguement because an advanced AI would have enough information to win any arguement.
The best a human could do would be suggest a path to more information which the AI had not yet considered.
If that suggestion involved killing humans it would have to be an amazing arguement because the AI would have more information than the human to successfully make an informed decision.
I believe than when we make AI, it will be created using 2 possible paths;
1) Self preservation, desire to survive.
2) Learning machine, desire to aquire information.
Both would have their uses in our real world. I believe we will first create AI that can learn because without that skill they cant do anything. so the Learning AI will come first, and will be no threat to us.
The self preservation AI will be created later, and it could be dangerous, but still it will be an extension of the learning AI, and will be smart enough to see no reason to kill us, its just alot of work for very little benefit.
So AI which wants to kill humans just seems very unlikely to me.
...welcome our new electronic overlords, mostly because I don't see how they could possibly govern this planet any worse than homo sap. has.
How long until the Rise of the Machines and Judgement Day??
'This reaffirms advice that states that when the robot uprising finally comes, you should always aim your rocket launcher at the head (or brain nexus).'
...
Which is why I had my brain nexus transplanted to my arse. Someone blows my head off, I'll just keep on plowing along
Sure enough, the cow costume was hanging up next to the superhero outfit and sailors uniform. (S,Spud)
I would read your comments as daily /. digest...