Robotic Space Workers of the Future 135
Roland Piquepaille writes "In an article named "Puckish robots pull together," Nature describes the work done at the Polymorphic Robotics Laboratory (PRL) of the University of Southern California on self-reconfigurable teams of robots. There, Wei-Min Shen and his colleagues simulate the absence of gravity by creating a 2D representation of space by using an 'air-hockey table.' With jets of air flow blowing on the surface, the 30 cm-wide robots, working in pairs, evolve in a frictionless environment, pick elements such as girders to assemble structures like if they were in space. NASA will use these teams of autonomous robots to build space systems like 10 km-long arrays of solar panels and other huge spatial structures. You'll find more details, illustrations and references in this overview."
Little buddy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Low-Cost Way of Experimenting with Zero-G (Score:2, Interesting)
what I don't get is this (Score:0, Interesting)
Same problem applies to getting places real fast, lets just say you can approach the speed of light, and that you can go into a cryogenic sleep or whatever. What happens when you plough through the ever-so-faint tail of a comet that consists of metalic rocks and the like.
Sure, you replace people with robots, and most systems with redundant and backup systems.
But for all those people blowing their load over commercial and civilian/tourist space flight. There isn't much you are going to do, or see. It will be just as viable as commercial and civilian/tourist submarines. Some, yes, but not that many. And not many things that aren't based around science and/or money making commercial ventures.
I wish people would realise that we are hundreds of years away from being a viable space faring race (should we so desire) and that there are some problems at home that we have to think through first.
Global warming - I don't care whether we caused it or if it's a natural cycle.... it's real we have to deal with it.
The carrying capacity (longterm sustainable population to resource ratio) of the earth is being exceeded and we aren't doing squat. There is no rationale to have more people, there is no reason why 500 million people in europe or america is better than 300 million... these numbers are meaningless. We need to halt population growth, big time. Population to resource ratio inequality usually leads to death, either by starvation or by war. Not a good future
Other climate effects we don't understand like currents in the sea that affect the whole global climate, errosion, salinity etc.
We have a million and one problems down here, and floating we monkeys into space doesn't solve ANY of them. I hate this romantic notion that it will be all like star-trek when we forge out into space. It WONT, it will be exactly like it is down here. The only way things are going to change is if they change down here first.
I don't want to troll to badly here. But tons of people are starving, our global political order is on the brink (brought there by a "peace loving" democracy no less), at home in liberal democracies we cover up the fact our education systems suck, our environment is polluted, we don't look after our sick and ill properly and we don't care about the homeless.
We need fewer great minds to be looking into the sky and more great minds to bent their will towards these problems. I'm sorry, but until that time... people looking through telescopes will always be immature little boys who are in a fantasy world and ignoring the problems at hand.
I suppose the same could be said for any technology enthusiast. Think about that. THAT, my freinds, is stuff that matters.
Capitalism and Robots do not mix. (Score:5, Interesting)
First I never said capitalism is good. What I'm saying is capitalism and robots can not co-exist. Humans become absolutely useless once robots become efficient. Yes at first robots increase jobs and productivity, but soon the knowledge and intelligence level required to continue to program/repair/ or stay above the robots will become too much for the average human to handle.
Can we all have A PHD from MIT/Harvard/Yale/etc? Competition with humans in the third world is enough, and the population keeps increasing every year meaning competition keeps increasing. How the hell are we supposed to compete with each other as 6 billion humans along with the machines?
Re:Low-Cost Way of Experimenting with Zero-G (Score:2, Interesting)
You don't have to have robots and nano-tech to make humans seem pretty useless. It's something humans have struggled with for a long time.
Take it to the micro level - just one person, and in this case, I'll use myself as an example. In almost every case, I can find a way to replace myself and justify self-termination:
I work tech services... someone else could do my job
I have lots of friends... someone could fill my place for each of them
I pay rent... someone else could live here
I have 2 cats... someone else could feed and care for them
In fact, the only place I can't be easily replaced is in my family relationships. While my parents and brother can't replace me, they could get by without me, and you have to ask what value those relationships have.
Most of us could probably be eliminated by the above criteria. So, either we find our value through some other measure, or we have no value at all, and the inroduction of robots and nano-tech doesn't really impact the equation.
Re:Low-Cost Way of Experimenting with Zero-G (Score:2, Interesting)
Do you hunt your own food? Did you build your own computer? When you go to malls or resturants do you make your own meals or do everything yourself? Humans are still useful however human labor is a lot less useful than it were only 20 years ago. Robots/Machines decrease the value of HUMAN LABOR. Humans decrease the value of labor as well but at least the job is going to the better human.
I work tech services... someone else could do my job
I have lots of friends... someone could fill my place for each of them
I pay rent... someone else could live here
I have 2 cats... someone else could feed and care for them
Better to be replaced by superior humans than to be replaced by a superior machine. When replaced by humans then at least a human benefits.
Re:Potential issue (Score:4, Interesting)
Indeed, humans make their own mistakes. Darwin had a theory (mostly accepted) about how humans have develop the "instincts" that help them improve their performance and in some cases keep them alive. Some experiments in AI based on similar principles seem to have held promise (e.g. see When Robots Play Games [slashdot.org]). Perhaps the key is to have multiple teams of robots with slightly different designs such that an error by one team is less likely to be replicated by all.
Re:what I don't get is this (Score:2, Interesting)
Has it ever occured to you that astronomy is vital to human life? These boys playing with their toys have done far more to advance human knowledge. I for one find much practical value in knowing the state of the actual universe, instead of the fantasy universe you live in.
Take, for example, the advances in sensor technology made as a result of astronomy. Thanks to the new CCD's and optics invented, advances in medical and other fields are possible. Lives have been saved due to these "immature boys". What have you done that was remotely equivalent in impact?
http://www.lbl.gov/supernova/supernova-spinoffs
http://www.ihateglasses.com/html/vision_wavem
Thanks to adaptive optics, many people have gained superb vision, being liberated from glasses and contact lenses. Have you improved anyone's sight?
I am personally very grateful to these "boys" who happen to live in the real universe and are discovering its secrets.
Swarm? (Score:2, Interesting)
And can they get a divorce if one of the robots is cheating?
The air-table robot thing is not new (Score:3, Interesting)
new species alert! (Score:3, Interesting)
How long before the AI is advanced enough for the computer/robots are able to identify flaws in their design and reprogram themselves accordingly. This kind of intelligence will allow 'robots' to evolve, superceding humans as the dominate species on earth. The will have all the assets that belong to humans, ie technology, brainpower, but none of the weaknesses, such as the neccesity of oxygen to exist.
Probably not in our lifetimes, but then the pace of technological development seems to be increasing exponentially...put it this way: take all the scientists that lived from year x to 1900: there are more scientists on earth today than in this total period.
Re:Why send jobs to robots? (Score:4, Interesting)
"what the hell is the average human useful for"? Who said we had to be useful anyway? We have to survive (well, not really, but let's pretend); whether we do that working our asses off or having fun while our technology does our work for us doesn't make a whole lot of difference.