New BigDog Robot Video

John860 writes "The US company Boston Dynamics has released an amazing new video of its quadruped robot BigDog. The highlight of the video (at 1:24) shows how the robot starts slipping on ice, almost falls several times, but finally regains its balance and continues walking. The video also shows the robot's ability to cope with different types of terrains, climb and descend steep slopes, and jump. Two years ago, the older version of BigDog was already able to climb slopes, keep its balance after a strong kick, and walk on rough terrain like stones, mud, and snow. The new version weighs 235 lbs and can carry a payload of up to 340 lbs, a factor of 4 better than its predecessor."

Comments

Creepy

[GodfatherofSoul]

Is anyone else creeped out by how natural the movements of this robot are? Maybe it's the lack of a head and the ominous buzz-of-death, I don't know. As I recall, there's some theoretical curve for robots where the human acceptance of a robot dramatically drops at a sweet spot as reality is approached and doesn't rise until reality is achieved. This robot definitely falls in that zone for me.

Re:Creepy

[lendude]

I found the anthropomorphic factor of this robot thru' the roof, mostly I think because of its movement characteristics. It immediately reminded me of an old German Shepard once in our family, particularly the sequence on ice when it badly slipped: it looked exactly like our poor old shep when his back legs went on him. Man, I almost shed a tear at that point of the vid!

They may have to think about toning this aspect down for war time scenarios - I can well imagine soldiers going to 'old yella's' assistance when he comes under fire!

Simply Amazing.

[Sterrance]

It reacting to a kick was so lifelike I wanted to call Peta. I frankly don't see the actual use in war, besides transporting things, I can't wait till they make toy versions.