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Stanford Students Build "JediBot"
An anonymous reader writes "By combining a dexterous robotic arm, a foam-padded lightsaber, the movement tracking capabilities of Microsoft's Kinect sensor, and some clever software, students at Stanford University have created what can only be called a JediBot. Using a series of pre-programmed 'attack moves', and Kinect to detect the location of the enemy's light saber, JediBot can attack and defend with surprising grace. For now its attack moves are fairly slow — it can only attack once every 2 or 3 seconds — but presumably you could tweak a knob (and remove the foam padding) to turn JediBot into a real killing machine." I look forward to model that can also "force choke" an opponent.
till the bot spazzes out and whops some one ... then its just fun
This seems to me to be a grievous mistake.
the video was much less cool than the summary made it sounds
As a long time swordfight student and instructor, I have to say that putting a stick in the grip of an industrial robot does not make it a sword fighter.
For example, the obvious mistake seen in the video is that the robot strikes at the *weapon*, not the *person*. As any 1st year fencing student knows, you can't win the fight that way. I love fighting nubies who make that mistake.
We have a term for this - it's called "Erroll Flynn" fighting, and it refers to those cheap movie swordfight scenes where the actors aren't skilled enough to actually fight without putting out their opponent's eye. Stay far enough away so that you can't hit the opponent, and cross swords in mid air. Clack... Clack... Clack... now low: Clack... Clack... Clack... now high...
Let's have a robot that holds a broom and say it's a sweeping robot! Or a robot that holds a hose and say it's a car washing robot! Or a robot that holds a trimmer and say it's a hedge-trimming robot.
Wake me when it can detect an opening in the opponent's defense and strike at it.
If a robot is not sophisticated enough to obey orders that aren't hardcoded, is it in violation of the second law?
I do not have a sig. You are hallucinating.
Obviously fake there were women in the class.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
However If I was a general in the empire I would just use explosives, like a grenades.
Considering how often the troops shoot half a mile in the wrong direction you should also have them have some shooting lessons. I mean, a grenade is powerful, but the troops would be most likely to drop them behind their backs when trying to throw.
Force lightning can be directed. You'd need something that would ionise a path through the air to act as a conduit. This has been done before with lasers. It was originally intended as a stun weapon - like a taser but without the need for wires - but the laser burns tended to do more damage than the electrical arc.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
In 'attack mode', it's following a set of pre-determined attack moved. Not even randomly determined. Boring.
But in 'defence mode', it's impressive, tracking the opponents sword and moving to block it. Very nice. Would be cool if it could move faster... but that's just a factor of time - next year's version will be twice as fast, and the year after twice as fast again...
Why not? Pretty much every robot produced can violate the first law, because no one has created a control system capable of defining what 'harm' means. Even toy robots can move just outside of a baby's reach and make them cry. Most factory robots could probably disassemble a human if one got in the way.
Most of Asimov's robot stories dealt with the fact that 'harm' is difficult to quantify even for highly intelligent beings. For something with a simple control program, it's basically impossible.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
ABOMINATION
Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed.
Maybe if they had a video camera watching the student's stick and striking motion and then moved the robot to counter attack in real time - then you've got something worth sharing.
They did do this.