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Building Amazon a Better Warehouse Robot
Nerval's Lobster writes: Amazon relies quite a bit on human labor, most notably in its warehouses. The company wants to change that via machine learning and robotics, which is why earlier this year it invited 30 teams to a "Picking Contest." In order to win the contest, a team needed to build a robot that can outpace other robots in detecting and identifying an object on a shelf, gripping said object without breaking it, and delivering it into a waiting receptacle. Team RBO, composed of researchers from the Technical University of Berlin, won last month's competition by a healthy margin. Their winning design combined a WAM arm (complete with a suction cup for lifting objects) and an XR4000 mobile base into a single unit capable of picking up 12 objects in 20 minutes—not exactly blinding speed, but enough to demonstrate significant promise. If Amazon's contest demonstrated anything, it's that it could be quite a long time before robots are capable of identifying and sorting through objects at speeds even remotely approaching human (and thus taking over those jobs). Chances seem good that Amazon will ask future teams to build machines that are even smarter and faster.
Amazon's contest demonstrated anything, it's that it could be quite a long time before robots are capable of identifying and sorting through objects at speeds even remotely approaching human (and thus taking over those jobs).
This is from the summary, and it is wrong.
It implies that it will be awhile before the robots are as fast as humans and thus replacing their jobs.
This is not it at all. The robot doesn't have to be faster than humans, just cheaper. If the robot can only handle 12 items in 20 min, but it costs 50 cents an hour to run, then you can simply order up more robots.
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I was watching a show on The Discovery Channel recently that was profiling new robots, and one of them is a new learning robot that you teach to do things by just showing it. It isn't fast, it takes maybe 5 minutes to fold a shirt for example, but you can teach it to fold a shirt by just showing it, the same way you'd show another human. Make some adjustments and corrections as it tries to do it and then it has "learned" how to do it. That robot costs just $30,000 to purchase and is expected to last for years. It can also be taught how to do other things.
It doesn't have to be fast if the job is one that you can scale up and just buy more robots, that robot will work 24/7/365, it never calls in sick, it never asks for a raise, and it doesn't complain about working conditions.
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Amazon ships stuff from warehouses, it can simply order up 500,000 such robots if needed.
In some circles this is also being referred to as the "Put mommy out of a job contest"
Prosperity comes from the efficient creation of goods and services, not by "keeping people busy". We need to figure out a solution to inequality, but make work jobs are not the answer. If a job can be done by a robot, then a robot should do that job.
The effect of 'contests' and 'rewards' is often a bunch of people coming up with an expensive one-off stunt that does exactly what is required for the prize money and nothing more, and does not really advance the state of the art. The various turing test contests are an example, as well as the Ansari X prize.
I agree with you, but not completely. For contrast, the Darpa grand challenge led to Google's self-driving car, which is poised to put 3 million truck drivers out of work.
The original grand challenge might actually be the problem - people looked at the success and tried to emulate it.
The differences might stem from problem specifications, or proper choice of problem. I remember the Darpa prize for building a machine to ascend the space elevator powered by a big searchlight at the bottom. The contest rules specifically required solar cells and electric motors, completely cutting out thermodynamic engines of various type (steam engines, stirling-cycle, other mechanical types). With so little room for innovation, it became a simple cutting-edge engineering chore.
Another prize involved a machine that can ride (and pilot) a tractor, dismount and walk into a building, find and turn a valve, and return. That doesn't quite fire the imagination as much as building a self-driving car, and the requirements are quite specific.
The Turing Test has no fundamental basis in theory, but it's led to some interesting algorithms like ELIZA, insights into human interaction (ie - that you don't actually have to be intelligent to keep up a conversation), and clarified the definition of AI a little.
So there's definitely value in having prizes, but I agree with you that it's not a 1-to-1 ratio of prize money to return.
(complete with a suction cup for lifting objects)
What I'm getting from this is, these robots suck. But they might replace some jobs due to a vacuum in the market for free workers.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
I think the future of massive warehouses will involve RFIDs and standardised packaging. Products are packed far too randomly ... if standard packages were deployed, robots dexterity could perhaps be reduced?
Sometimes being able to work is more important to people than having cheap trinkets in the shops.
Many people find meaning, purpose, and fulfillment through their work. But few of those people are pickers in a warehouse.