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Robotic Assistive Devices For Independent Living

Posted by samzenpus on from the lending-a-robotic-hand dept.

Hallie Siegel writes: Kavita Krishnaswamy has extreme physical disabilities that severely limit her mobility. She also has drive and a keen mind. I met her last month at the International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), where she attended via BEAM. In this article, Kavita shares her Phd research to develop robotic assistive devices that give independence to people with severe disabilities. Interesting work on the need for 'multi-modal' interfaces — ie. interfaces that allow the users to interact with the assistive device in different ways, including speech recognition and brain-computer interface.

4 of 17 comments (clear)

  1. It will be diverted by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

    Unfortunately, whatever robotic technology that's used to help disabled people will end up just being co-opted to let fat people get fatter. The disabled are not a big enough market. Morbidly obese people are already a major market for the medical equipment industry.

    And the cost will be borne by all of us.

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    You are welcome on my lawn.
    1. Re:It will be diverted by PopeRatzo · · Score: 2

      There's no doubt it would be abused by the marginally disabled or even the merely lazy, but at least this might actually help some disabled people achieve independence.

      That's true. I suppose if a large market of fat people eventually makes the technology more cheaply available to the disabled, then that's a win.

      Far too often measures allegedly for the disabled are implemented to make a political statement - and the effective statement is the one that spends enormous amounts of money to underline, rather than overcome, disabilities.

      Part of that comes from the fact that as a society, we just don't know how to talk about people who have physical challenges. And for the most part we don't know how to talk TO people with physical challenges, so we get solutions that are meant to make the able-bodied feel good about themselves rather than actually making life better for the disabled.

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      You are welcome on my lawn.
  2. Needs only 3 buttons by Tablizer · · Score: 2

    1. Get me pizza
    2. Get me a beer
    3. Suck my dick

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    Table-ized A.I.
  3. Why wait for robots... by jasno · · Score: 2

    Why not just create a telepresence robot that, say, let's grandma wash dishes and fold laundry for the kids who live 2,000 miles away? You don't have to wait for fancy AI - just low-latency video and control channels. Maybe it sounds like a way to enslave the elderly, but my mom would go nuts at the chance to help out her kids.

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    http://www.masturbateforpeace.com/