Elon Musk Reveals 'Tesla Bot', a Humanoid Robot Utilizing Tesla AI (cnet.com) 128
At Tesla's AI Day event, Elon Musk revealed a humanoid robot called Tesla Bot that utilizes the same artificial intelligence that powers the company's autonomous vehicles. CNET reports: Musk revealed few details about the Slenderman-looking Tesla Bot outside of a few PowerPoint slides but reiterated some of his beliefs about human labor. "They can use all of the same tools that we use in the car," Musk noted, suggesting the robot could be told to "go to the store and get ... the following groceries." A prototype would likely be ready next year, Musk said. "It's intended to be friendly," Musk joked, "and navigate through a world built for humans."
synergies (Score:3)
Makes you wonder if they should team up with Boston Robotics. Or if they do not, it will be interesting to see if Tesla can replicate the same degree of limbed mechanized coordination as Boston Robotics within that one-year timeframe.
Re: synergies (Score:1)
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I'm sure that Hyundai is now regretting the timing of their purchase of Boston Dynamics (not Robotics)
Given Elon's ability to create and take over entire industries (Tesla is now the most valuable automobile company in the world, Space X is completely dominating the launch market), having them enter their market must be (or should be!) frightening.
Not only is Elon an engineering genius (unlike most CEOs he actually understands the physics, engineering and production behind his products) but they use an extr
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Given Elon's ability to create and take over entire industries (Tesla is now the most valuable automobile company in the world, Space X is completely dominating the launch market), having them enter their market must be (or should be!) frightening.
What Elon did was to buy an already created electronic car company which was founded from two other guys and sell their cars, which is not very remarkable in itself. Space X reusing rockets has really not shown us that it's in any way more safe and cheaper in the long run than simply creating new rockets.
What Elon is really good at however is market manipulation, stock pumping and PR.
Not only is Elon an engineering genius
Elon has no clue about anything it seems. His stupid ramblings about the Hyperloop, which shows that he has no clue about the
Re:synergies (Score:5, Insightful)
Tesla was founded in 2003. Musk got involved as a major investor one year later, before the company had done much of anything.
SpaceX is remarkable in that they're the cheapest launch provider on the market, with a reliability record that's close to that of ArianeSpace. The launch insurance companies have him under a magnifying glass, and they're willing to insure payloads on Falcon 9 (including reused vehicles) at competitive rates. IOW, the people with an inside track don't see reuse as an additional risk.
And that's before factoring in reuse. He's upended 'normal business practice' for the space industry - an industry that had been stagnant since the 1970s.
I've seen him talk about SpaceX a few times, and "no clue" couldn't be farther from the truth. His depth of knowledge is impressive. He's also able to question underlying assumptions to a degree I've rarely seen, witness the way the Falcon 9 was engineered for minimum cost rather than maximum performance.
I'm skeptical about Hyperloop too. And his other companies make baffling decisions on occasion (I'm not a fan of the Tesla 'everything via touchscreen' UI). But in general, he's shown he knows what he's doing.
Is Tesla overvalued? Yes. There are too many uncritical fanboys around. But I also see overcritical detractors who blithely overlook his accomplishments and declare them "nothing".
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Everything via touchscreen makes sense when you have level 5 automation, and perhaps a level 4. Not yet. I suspect a "truly autonomous car" was more difficult than he expected.
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Everything via toucscreen makes sense for an Over The Air (OTA) updates perspective, first and foremost.
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"There are too many uncritical fanboys around. But I also see overcritical detractors who blithely overlook his accomplishments and declare them "nothing"."
The only evidence of "his accomplishments" you have provided are your impressions of his "depth of knowledge". He is a money man and a con artist. There are plenty of people sufficiently skilled in being able to talk a good technical game, particularly when addressing layman and those not specifically informed on topics. Musk is one of those, and you
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He's good enough to have upended two major sectors of industry: car manufacturing and space launch. His company got from 0 to taking 50% of the total launch market in 10 years. His other company singlehandedly moved electric cars from experimental curiosities to desirable, usable-by-the-general-public vehicles that are cheaper to run than equivalent ICE vehicles.
The only evidence you have provided of his being a 'con artist' is a reference to Hyperloop. If all of his ventures were like Hyperloop, NASA woul
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A SpaceX Falcon 9 launch costs $50 million in 2021$ each.
A space shuttle launch cost $1.95 billion in 2021$ each.
SpaceX had a 60% market share in 2020. So, it's a tiny fraction of the cost for the space shuttle, and everybody uses them for launches now.
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NASA spends more on each SpaceX launch because they have to self-insure, and additional mission requirements can add additional cost. For that matter, NASA is also paying for the Dragon spacecraft, which isn't included in the basic cost to launch. Crewed flights add all sorts of additional requirements and costs. Even then, under the Commercial Resupply Services program's first phase, NASA paid SpaceX $1.6 billion for 12 cargo flights, for a total of $133 million per launch. Still a tiny fraction of the cos
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NASA accounting shows that SpaceX total mission cost is around half the cost of a space shuttle launch even if you ignore the Space shuttle program cost, which you can't do, because that money was spent to launch the space shuttle.
SpaceX is launching four astronauts at a time, while the space shuttle launched seven, but that's what NASA wanted, as they're only launching four crew on Dragon and Starliner despite both being designed for seven crew. As such, they're accomplishing what they want with a single l
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NASA accounting’s shows Space ex total mission cost more than the space shuttle.
NASA's accounting shows no such thing. [nasa.gov]
Are you high? (Score:2)
Yeah, because Tesla before Musk was exactly the same as after.
And you clearly have no idea what you're talking about when it comes to SpaceX:
SpaceX Falcon 9 launch cost: $50 million for 22 metric tons to LEO on a reused booster, landing for refurbishment
ULA Atlas 5 launch cost: $153 million for 18 metric tons to LEO
Yeah, reusing rockets hasn't shown to be any cheaper at all, right? Like less than a third of the cost for more payload weight?
You don't have a fucking clue.
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The shuttle cost almost 40x per launch as what SpaceX charges. So, no.
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SpaceX charges NASA a small fraction of what a space shuttle launch costs. SpaceX has a 60% market share. Everybody launches on SpaceX because they're so much cheaper than everybody else.
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SpaceX was only paid $2.6 billion for the entire CCtCap program (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Development_of_the_Commercial_Crew_Program#CCtCap_-_crew_flights_awarded), less than the cost of two space shuttle launches (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle). SpaceX represented 26 out of 42 global launches in 2020 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_launch_market_competition#2010s:_Competition_and_pricing_pressure).
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What Elon did was to buy an already created electronic car company which was founded from two other guys and sell their cars, which is not very remarkable in itself. Space X reusing rockets has really not shown us that it's in any way more safe and cheaper in the long run than simply creating new rockets.
What Elon is really good at however is market manipulation, stock pumping and PR.
If all it takes is money and a team, and Elon can't take credit for anything, why hasn't Blue Origin absolutely demolished SpaceX by now. Jeff has had billions while SpaceX repeatedly almost went under during its early phase.
What I find more curious is how so many are parroting attacks like this using almost the exact same points. Is there a youtube video out there that's compiled all of these? Or is there a talking points memo?
It really feels like an organized psychological operation designed to
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Elon isn't an unstoppable force. His main success is in getting into markets that others may fear to tread into. Electric Cars, Private Space Flight, Digging Tunnels for transportation. He normally takes the first mover advantage, and then keep R&D at full force to make sure he says ahead of the competition that will follow him.
However Boston Dynamics and some other companies may not have too much to fear from Tesla. As they can probably still compete, as they have first mover advantage, just as long
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Boston Dynamics doesn't have a first-mover advantage because, well, they don't really sell anything. Over the past 29 years, their total cumulative commercial sales amounts to around 400 Spot robots.
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I'm sure that Hyundai is now regretting the timing of their purchase of Boston Dynamics (not Robotics)
Yes, I'm sure they're quaking in their boots. [youtube.com]
I will never understand the Elon fanboy: comapny A shows actual robots doing a free running task. Elon has a model in a suit dance to dub step music. "zOMG Elon is going to destroy those guys!"
Re: synergies (Score:1)
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Re: synergies (Score:2)
Re:synergies (Score:4, Insightful)
Boston Robotics would probably laugh in their faces. What they have is just a render, with extremely vague and unrealistic claims like "human level hands" on the labels.
Plus it looks like a murderbot from a bad sci-fi flick and I'm sure they don't want to be associated with that.
This is just another Musk fantasy, like his tunnels or self driving cars. He has some good ideas but is prone to announcing things before it's even known if they are possible, and massively over-promising on features and on timelines.
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Pretty such those fantasies, tunnels and self-driving cars, have produced some pretty valid and useful tech.
If those fantasies now include a robot that seamlessly fits into the background of my life, then I wouldn't bet against him being able to deliver more than vaporware. I'm not saying his ultimate goal will definitely succeed, but even a marginal failure would be some crazy cool tech.
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Musk seems to consistently under-estimate how difficult it is to make AI work reliably in the real world. I would say that self driving cars have been a real learning experience for him, but he doesn't seem to have learned anything.
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Musk seems to consistently under-estimate how difficult it is to make AI work reliably in the real world
In other words he's no different from all the other AI people throughout history. :)
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Tesla should just buy Boston Robotics off of Hyundai if this is what they want to build.
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They're probably not worth it. Hyundai spent $1.1 billion, but Boston Dynamics has only produced a few tens of millions of dollars in commercial sales over the last three decades. Their schtick is basically paid research, and Tesla can do a lot of R&D with their existing AI and robotics teams for that kind of cash.
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16 August 2021,
"The U.S. government has opened a formal investigation into Tesla’s Autopilot partially automated driving system, saying it has trouble spotting parked emergency vehicles ..."
"The U.S. government has opened a formal investigation into Tesla’s Autopilot partially automated driving system, saying it has trouble spotting parked emergency vehicles ..."
"The agency has sent investigative teams to 31 crashes involving partially automated driver assist systems since June of 2016. Such sys
I'd thought (Score:2)
The general design rule for humanoid robots has been either to make them not look human at all, or to make them look small and soft. Either way, to make them obviously machine-like or to appear friendly and non-threatening.
I guarantee you that 'Teslabot' if ever built would scare enough people that you wouldn't dare send it shopping because it would be attacked and rendered into an expensive pile of recyclables long before it brought groceries home.
Re:I'd thought (Score:4, Funny)
it would be attacked and rendered into an expensive pile of recyclables long before it brought groceries home.
Be sure to send a team comprising an Earth detective and an alien robot to investigate the case.
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you wouldn't dare send it shopping because it would be attacked and rendered into an expensive pile of recyclables
What makes you think it wouldn't be programmed to fight back? Or, over time, learn by itself to fight back?
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What makes you think it wouldn't be programmed to fight back?
Mr. Musk indicated that the robot will be intentionally designed to be easily overpowered by humans.
Or, over time, learn by itself to fight back?
Assuming they are planning to use the same methodology as their cars, all the learning happens remotely in the "dojo" supercomputer, not in the robot itself. The robot simply executes pre-trained neural networks verbatim, so that it can be implemented on a (relatively) modest size/weight/cost budget.
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And where does that supercomputer get the data that it uses for training? From the deployed robots. Just the same as with the cars. So though the learning might be in a batch workflow, it's conceivable that "over time" it could "learn to fight back" with some data uploads, some software engineering, and a downloaded software update.
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I guarantee you that 'Teslabot' if ever built would scare enough people that you wouldn't dare send it shopping because it would be attacked and rendered into an expensive pile of recyclables long before it brought groceries home.
Much like Elon Musk.
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Why do you think someone would immediately go to violence when confronted with something they don't understand in a public place? What kind of society do you live in where the first reaction is to smash something that you've not seen before? If you see someone in your town that you've not seen before, do you reach for the baseball bat?
The vast majority of people will wait to destroy something until it's actually done something that merits destruction, or at least threatens to.
What a fucking idiotic post.
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Because 'Murica!
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
"HitchBOT then attempted to cross the United States from Boston to San Francisco starting on July 17, 2015. After 2 weeks, on August 1, 2015 however, a photo was tweeted,[12] showing that the robot had been stripped and decapitated in Philadelphia. The head was never found.[5] On August 3, 2015 Adam Gabbatt reported on the Guardian website about hitchBOT's destruction. Frauke Zeller, co-creator of hitchBOT, was quoted saying: "We can see on all our data
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>What a fucking idiotic post.
Well, mine was based in reality. Yours is just the bitching of a moron who doesn't realize their own ignorance and stupidity, and wants to get into personal arguments with strangers on the Internet.
Just because your mom tells you you're special, doesn't mean you should believe her.
You can both outrun the Tesla Bot and overpower it (Score:2)
This should be exciting (Score:1)
Let's see it do the Human Torch
Wait a minute (Score:3)
“It’s intended to be friendly” is a joke?!
So it’s really intended to scare or hurt people?
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He probably gets a thrill tipping his hand that he's trying to build a robot army to take over the world. The only thing stopping him is trying to figure out if he can beat Bezos or will have to split the Earth with him.
Re: Wait a minute (Score:2)
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I think that's his point.
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Re: Wait a minute (Score:2)
I for one welcome our intentionally friendly overlords...
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* intentionally friendly ACTING overlords.
Key difference.
Why care about employees? (Score:2)
Robot AI workers will run Tesla plants in the future, and never unionize or go on strike.
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You say that like it's a bad thing, but I say if it can be automated it should be automated. The only real problem here is how artificial scarcity and this "You MUST earn your continued existence" attitude that is prevalent in modern society.
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Though its a children's movie, I think WALL-E did a pretty good job showing what human's would be like in a post-scarcity society where no one has to work. People are bored, miserable, and little more than animate vegetables.
Tons of research has shown that earning a dollar is far more satisfying than being given a dollar. If people never face adversity or challenges in their lives, they can never appreciate all the positive things in their lives.
As the great Bob Ross said, "If you have light on light, you h
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Though its a children's movie, I think WALL-E did a pretty good job showing what human's would be like in a post-scarcity society where no one has to work. People are bored, miserable, and little more than animate vegetables.
There are many MANY other ways to occupy people's time.
A swath of humanity is already taken care of. Anyone who can occupy themselves in an open world computer game doesn't need to work to avoid boredom or misery. Such people have the creativity to invent ways to entertain themselves.
Personally I believe that pretty much all humans can be taught to think that way. It's just that most people aren't. Children who are exposed to too much external media (specifically too much video) grow up to be testably l
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Hate to tell ya, but your phone's chips likely came from a "lights out" fab.
It's called that, because they don't even turn the lights on anymore, because usually there's no human there that needs them.
Automation is not the problem. Profit is. Aka getting money that somebody didn't actually work for.
If it meant super-cheap products, like a new Tesla for $1000-2000 bucks, or a top-end smartphone for $150, you'd be all for it, because you had to work less too, and could refuse to work bullshit jobs.
If the mach
We have not seen this before. Ever. (Score:2)
It is absolutely certain that those jobs will specifically be automated sooner rather than later. Modular design will reduce maintenance task complexity to swapping parts/units, and the maintenance automatons will have a very easy time dealing with the various tasks they face. Manufacturing will also be automated. Likewise, every easy job will be automated. We're already seeing that. Order a soda prepared at McDonalds today, most like
High-speed limbo competition anyone? (Score:2)
I want to see them do a high-speed limbo competition. Preferably many 'bots of different generations.
Pedantic (Score:2)
Mars. Yeah programmable workforce. No spacesuit needed.
NASA hand claps.
BEZOS hands NASA lawsuits
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Do you really think Elon wants to goto Mars ?
Yes.
Of course not, no sane person
I just have to stop you there.
Robotism (Score:1)
I do admire the efforts, but I canâ(TM)t help (Score:1)
sex (Score:1)
Musk just wants a robot to have sex with, and he wants it to be good enough to sell to you too. Tesla has more competition coming, time to switch to sex robots. You can have sex with your Tesla robot in the back seat while your Tesla drives itself. The AI will make sure you blow your load when the car is accelerating hard and the music is banging. Good girl Cherry AI, its going to be great day at work.
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Self-directing robot. (Score:2)
At Tesla's AI Day event, Elon Musk revealed a humanoid robot called Tesla Bot that utilizes the same artificial intelligence that powers the company's autonomous vehicles.
Will it always need an owner nearby to take over in emergencies?
Uh huh, sure (Score:1)
Is it going to crash into emergency vehicles, too?
Tesla ai (Score:3, Interesting)
And it only kills a few of the surrounding humans, just like the cars.
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And it only kills a few of the surrounding humans, just like the cars.
And very much unlike the cars driven by slightly evolved monkeys, which kill way more than just "a few".
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* in America (where there's no real drivers education or test standards for a license to speak of)
(I think your point still stands anyway, as yes, I don't think ANN-driven cars will be that much worse, but merely get that much more attention, which is unfair. But you reached your point with a bad argument.)
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Re: Tesla ai (Score:1)
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Yor argument is based on the (erroneous) assumption that humans never kill humans. Like so many before you ...
I know what it's going to look like... (Score:1)
Tesla AI ? (Score:1)
So bad (Score:2)
Re: So bad (Score:2)
The funny part (Score:2)
The funny part isn't the robot, but how many people aren't going to realize that the whole thing is a joke.
I don't believe for a moment that Tesla is actually pursuing this beyond maybe a "Friday hobby project" that some engineers are working on. If you consider how many years Boston Dynamics has spent just to get to their current Atlas design; there is no reason for Tesla to seriously pursue them. Plus, the software/models that Tesla has built for their cars is great and could probably be applied to land r
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Boston Dynamics' compulsive ideology has walked them into a dead end though.
They completely refused to use neural networks. I support not jumping onto the "AI" train, but lighting it on fire and dancing on its grave, yes. But they refused, even where artificial neural networks are actually sensible. That's why Google (an "AI" nut) left them.
But anyone with a clue in anatomy could also tell you the "feet" of their machines are a joke. As in: They don't have any. And even if they do, they missed half the poin
Elon ideas are a dime a dozen (Score:1)
Great! Another stupid Elon idea that will never be a reality. Can't wait too see this fizzle out just like everything else this man has announced. Hyperloop anyone?
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As a Tesla shareholder, I really want Elon to focus on things that improve profitably like getting the Cybertruck released on time.
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Your view of what Tesla is differs from Musk's view. You think Tesla is a car company, Musk does not.
Ford's EV pickup (Score:2)
Speaking as a pickup truck owner/driver, I'm afraid Ford's electric pickup has brutally stabbed Musk's cybertruck in the heart before it ever had a heartbeat. That's not even considering the esthetic issues of Musk's proposed design as shown thus far; that truck is definitely not going to be to everyone's tastes, even if he did get it out the door at a reasonable price, something there is no sign of ha
No worries (Score:2)
If it works as well as their cars, it’ll keep walking into fire trucks
The real question (Score:2)
How good is this "AI"? Will this robot run into emergency vehicles [cnn.com] with their lights on?
Quality Issues though? (Score:1)
Problems long in the tooth (Score:2)
That's an easy fix: hire a dental hygienist. Bingo, no more plaque.
Or how he calls it: (Score:1)
"Son"
Emergency vehicles (Score:2)
Another Robot Mugged! (Score:1)
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Needless Distraction (Score:2)
This is just a needless distraction from the plan. Likely the result of scope creep from self-driving development.
Next year? (Score:2)
And here I thought that's what Zuck was.
utilizes the same artificial intelligence ... (Score:1)
Guess we'll see... (Score:1)
As for the Tesla Bot, I'll believe it when I see it. They've figured out a lot of image recognition and prediction that I wouldn't have thought was possible, but it's still a long way from a robot that can be given tasks to complete using everyday objects. Not to mention the entirely different and much more complex hardware that is
Tesla Bot (Score:2)
... IS A JOKE!. Get a grip people.
Musk was introducing a bit of levity after a very information dense presentation and trolling the haters in the process.
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Pre terminators (Score:2)
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CEO (of company who doesn't advertise with us) over optimistic about their product. News at 11. And now for all those great new innovations from company (who gives us a lot of advertising revenue)