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VR Tech Lets People Interact With Rats

Posted by Soulskill on from the why?-who-knows dept.

cylonlover writes "The EU Commission's Community Research and Development Information Service (CORDIS) is working on a 'beaming' telepresence system that is designed to allow users to virtually experience being in a remote location by seeing, hearing and even feeling that location through the sensory inputs of a robot located there. That robot, in turn, would relay the user's speech and movements to the people at that location. Now, two of the CORDIS partners have put an interesting slant on the technology – they've used it to let people interact with rats."

25 of 33 comments (clear)

  1. I have a different term for it by MyLongNickName · · Score: 2, Funny

    I have a different term for it. I call it consulting my lawyer.

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    1. Re:I have a different term for it by dkleinsc · · Score: 1

      So do I: I call it "reading Youtube comments".

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    2. Re:I have a different term for it by NettiWelho · · Score: 1

      I though that was called "snake handling".

    3. Re:I have a different term for it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      not be confused with "playing with your junk"

    4. Re:I have a different term for it by YodasEvilTwin · · Score: 1

      Reading isn't interactive. You have to contribute to the problem for it to be interactive :P

    5. Re:I have a different term for it by Obfuscant · · Score: 1

      Well, having just been haranged by a Google web specialist at work about my company's "web presence" (because they scraped the Network Solutions database for a domain long ago expired), I'd say that it's called "talking to a telemarketer".

    6. Re:I have a different term for it by MyLongNickName · · Score: 1

      Well, you won't get your mod point back but thanks for the explanation.

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    7. Re:I have a different term for it by reboot246 · · Score: 1

      Okay, then how about reading and interacting on slashdot?

    8. Re:I have a different term for it by antdude · · Score: 1

      Aren't lawyers, sharks?

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  2. they took all the fun out of it by shadowrat · · Score: 1

    They made this tech that would let you pilot a small robot around and then hid everything behind some lame AR game? wtf? I dream of a day when i can pilot a mini drone down into an ant colony, or into a pond or something. That seems awesome. That dream doesn't include pretending the ants look like people though. I either want to just play a game where what's represented to me as ants are actually people (pretty much the way multiplayer games work now), or just have a real time feed from my little robot interacting with some animal on it's scale.

    1. Re:they took all the fun out of it by Hatta · · Score: 1

      Why are they using a rat sized robot? Why not an actual robo-rat?

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  3. The possibilities are endless! by Rhacman · · Score: 1

    I'm imagining a reality show where contestants are 'piloting' robotic telepresence pack animals like wolves. Your objective is to gain control of a pack of real wild animals and to lead them in battle against the packs lead by the other contestants. The winner recieves a lifetime supply of raw meat, den building materials, and psycological counseling.

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  4. want fun? try a haiku by marcello_dl · · Score: 2

    the voice of the telepresence bot
    like rustling autumn leaves
    it's your mother in law

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    1. Re:want fun? try a haiku by BotnetZombie · · Score: 1

      counting is your friend
      when constructing a haiku
      5-7-5 it is

  5. Apparently these people by Black+Parrot · · Score: 1

    have never had a regular job.

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    Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
  6. Re:So you can now pet rats.. by Black+Parrot · · Score: 1

    Cue the Farside comic w/ Prof. Metzbaum and his dog-translation helmet.

    (Sorry, I can't find it on the innerweb.)

    --
    Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
  7. Welcome to the REAL Rat race.... by rts008 · · Score: 1

    Please tell me there will be mazes, electric shocks, and cheese involved ! ;-)

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  8. What is this, Farm Science Week? by bradorsomething · · Score: 1

    Interacting with rats... hugging chickens... I think scientists are misunderstanding the needs of our society.

  9. CORDIS, jeez! by janoc · · Score: 1

    Guys, you do realize that CORDIS is the name of the web portal for EU-funded research projects and not a research team nor institution? It is a portal website for the grant-related bureaucracy - like publishing calls for proposals and aggregating information on projects being funded. Saying that "CORDIS is working on something" is like saying that Google Scholar is working on a research project.
    The project above is actually being done by University College London, it is even in that damn article!
    This is second time in two days I see this sort of idiocy - the first article was on Gizmodo on another project. I didn't know that stupidity is contagious.

  10. Kinect ? by NinjaTekNeeks · · Score: 1

    Kinect motion tracking is actually very good, using Kinect motions to control an avatar (robot) would be a good way to leverage existing research and technology. I'm actually surprised we don't have Kinect Battle bots yet....

  11. You need VR tech for that? by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

    And there was me thinking you could just go the pet shop.

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  12. Socrates, is that you? by milbournosphere · · Score: 1

    Other than the possibility of naming the rat Ben and using it to take out their boss, I don't see what could possibly go wrong.

  13. Finally! by emudoug42 · · Score: 1

    This is it. The culmination of the human experience. Countless generations led us here, to this point in time -- this glorious point in time, in which man has finally done it! We can now interact with rats via robots. We're done here, humans. We've won. Anything else form here on out is just frosting on the cake.

  14. Paging Dr Dolittle. by Ostracus · · Score: 1

    The rat was remotely represented by a computer-generated human avatar, which the person in Mundet saw via a head-mounted virtual reality display – whatever the rat did in Bellvitge, its animated human representative appeared to do in Mundet.

    So one could watch a human lick it's balls?

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  15. In IMAX 3D, yet! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    > VR Tech Lets People Interact With Rats

    Apparently, so does Hurricane Sandy.

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