The dawn of the robot

dr_manhattan

Listen, screw asimo, this is Qrio, the cutest damn thing I have ever seen - be sure and watch the clip to the end and see Qrio do a geisha dance.

windows media:
http://www.asahi.com/video/031218run.wvx

realplayer:
http://www.asahi.com/video/031218run.ram

However, I have to say the most impressive moment by far is when he throws the ball - the *incredible* management of movement here is just awe inspiring.

I'm not religious but when I see technological achievements like this I do get quite a spiritual twang - and I believe this thread belongs in humanities as opposed to a tech thread.

What I'm wondering is, do people fear technology like this? Does it inspire respect for the creative drive of humankind, or fear that we are creating our very own shiny nemesis?

Personally speaking, I'd rather be killed by one of these chappies than some smelly human, even if they do "turn evil", hahahahaha

ixoy

Hey, I'm with you on this. As, at best, an atheist, I take my main belief from the firm foundations of science - the laws that govern us and help express our current limitations. That clip shows us creating something with actual grace and some sort of beauty, pushing back our own boundaries just a tiny bit more. It's nice to see we can create something like that, not just a cascading spread of radioactive death. It's just another glimpse at our creative potential, as a species, and not just the destructive side of our nature and an idea of where we might be able to go.

Personally, I think technology is liberating. It's made our lives better, richer, despite our grievances at times. I will not ever subscribe to Luddite notions, unfounded fears of technology. I think science, in its many guises, has eventually the ability to liberate us ever more from the confines of our planet and stations in life - whether that be increased life spans or inter-planetary colonisation remains to be seen. It puts a smile on my face, and I think that's a good thing.

dr_manhattan

(actually, in a somewhat jokey aside, I was saying earlier that, given wheat I've seen of japanese anime, and the fact that japan is currently trying to change its constitution in order to keep an army once again, and the secrecy surrounding honda's project (I mean, if this is what they're showing us, how far has the R&D gotten?) - perhaps this is the dawn of the japanese robot army? LOL)

On the subject of luddite notions, I dropped round a mate-with-sattelite's house last night to check out battlestar galactica the remake -

(GEEK DISCLAIMER - I reserve the right to discuss the implications of trashy SF as if it were more important than it actually is. There is no need to remind me that Battlestar Galactica (I refuse to abbreviate it to BS ;-)) is "just a TV show")

Either way, the mix of hilariously gratuitous sex (yes, the cylons have sex now) and notions of absolute fear of artificial intelligence (Adama will not have new computer systems on his ship, damn it!) makes for a strange, slightly primal form of entertainment.

Everyone is hunky chunky, sexy and full-of-life, fighting (ahem, and ****ing) against the terrible cyclons while odd speeches are made about the terrible responsibility of artificial life. Myself and my friends reckon it's like a really low brow version of the type of things covered in "crash" by JG Ballard, about primitive simian libidos being confronted by their hi-tech creations...

...Or maybe we just went through too many packs of large rizla, haha. I'll shut up now...

Oh and PS - lorne greene is replaced by the old captain from miami vice as commander adama: good to see the old dog getting work ;-)

Commissar

Anybody got links to related sites which are in English?

The balance of those rpbots is amazing. Far and away the most impressive robots I've ever seen in real life.

dr_manhattan

here's the commercial SONY site:

http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/QRIO/

I'll have ten of them please: I want them to follow me around playing the theme from "shaft", and then join together to form a huge big robot when I get hassled, haha... "go mighty anti mugging robot!"

Strange though, I thought the original link *was* in english...?

bizmark

Theirs notting to be afaird of from technology....them that do are takeing stupid sci-fi movies with evil computers to much to heart

Sparks

I'm afraid Qrio, like Asimo, is in effect meaningless. The research that produced it is a trade secret, which means it won't be published in the public domain and thus as far as overall progress is concerned, it's meaningless because we can't see how it was done and it can't be improved upon.

It's a systemic problem with the Japanese research system.

dr_manhattan

"meaningless"? Worthless to you, perhaps, as a robotics person: but surely this means that any product is "meaningless" if it's patented or protected by copyright, including any non-open source software?

I get what you mean, and agree to a degree, but ****, it's a robot! And it does cool ****! Lighten up, you're looking a bit sour grapes-y, hmm?

It's a robot, dude! Don't be rude!

Exit

That is unreal!

Specky

"meaningless"? Worthless to you, perhaps, as a robotics person: but surely this means that any product is "meaningless" if it's patented or protected by copyright, including any non-open source software?

Big difference between something that is patented and something that is secret.

In fact, if you can guarantee that something can remain a secret then you've protected it far more thoroughly than you ever could by patenting it.

A difference in attitude, perhaps, between Japanese and western researchers. Everywhere else research is funded by grants etc which are awarded to researchers who produce patents and publish papers. The publishing puts the information out there so that others can learn from it (not necessarily copy it).

But anyway, that's all beside the point.

The speed and precision of control systems that can produce reasonably graceful motion is really only a part of the game here. It's a bit like how we, as people, sort of take being able to move about pretty much for granted and we think the smart stuff we do in our head is what makes us so clever. Pretty decent AI (functionally specific stuff anyway) has been developing nicely for a long time but we just haven't been able to build a nice box to carry it around in.

Sparks

Originally posted by dr_manhattan
"meaningless"? Worthless to you, perhaps, as a robotics person: but surely this means that any product is "meaningless" if it's patented or protected by copyright, including any non-open source software?

Yes and no. Any robotics research that I do is public domain, as is the case for the majority of researchers in the Western world, and a minority in Japan. That research can be used by private companies to develop products. And any offshoots of it can be pursued fully, even if they cross over to another discipline - which happens a great deal in robotics, where techniques from computer vision, biology, some rather esoteric mathematics, mettalurgy, and a dozen other disciplines are used either directly or as inspiration. But the research that lead to qrio is private research, which does not publish the "how this works" side of things, and so we have to go and learn it all for ourselves and it takes longer because we don't have the same amount of money to throw at the process (the amount of cash pumped into private research in Japan is spectacular - hell, if half the money they got was put into research here, we'd probably have a cure for cancer by now).

So basicly, it sucks up wads of cash and produces no papers, disseminates no information and basicly contributes nothing to the rest of mankind. Which, technically speaking, sucks.

I get what you mean, and agree to a degree, but ****, it's a robot! And it does cool ****! Lighten up, you're looking a bit sour grapes-y, hmm?

Yes, it does cool stuff and looks pretty, but it represents millions of euro's and hundreds of man-years, and all it does is look pretty. Meanwhile, there's precious little funding available to develop surgical robotics, or mine rescue robotics, or landmine defusing robots, or a hundred other productive technologies which may not look cool, but which are of far more value.

And no, it's not sour grapes, it's being annoyed that a demo is taken as such a great thing when I know how demos are done (they're all smoke and mirrors, alas).

It's a robot, dude! Don't be rude!

I work in a robotics research lab, it's not being rude, it's a professional opinion!

Specky

However, I have to say the most impressive moment by far is when he throws the ball - the *incredible* management of movement here is just awe inspiring.

Interesting that you should assume a male gender for this machine. You refer to it as a "he" rather than an "it".

dr_manhattan

Hahaha, easy knowing who's the sci fi fan and who's the robotics people here ;-)

I acknowledge all your points fully, especially those about lack of published papers or surgical robots: and I agree fully. As regards the demo being smoke and mirrors, well hey, I do corporate presentations all the time, of course it's hardly going to walk home from the demo itself: i realise this is a demo, and like all demos, nailed together.

However, I was being lighthearted in the *entire* post - when it comes to robots, I am 12 years old (hence the "he" thing, which I laughed out loud at the very serious reply back - come on, lighten up!) - I'm saying it's a "he" because I'm not considering what i'm saying - but either way, i'm never going to refer to a robot as "it" - do you guys have any idea who Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein are? Or Mek-Quake? Or Call-me-Kenneth? Or ever Walter?

Dammit, I was *raised* by robots - optimus prime was my mate at school!

but above all, please realise that i know bugger all about robotics, I'm just a SF fan who's delighted at seeing some robots get on down ;-) - tbh, I started this thread cos the racism thread was getting me down.

In my mind, the fact that i've always sworn to call my firstborn "megatron" beats any involvement with real robots (and yes, I'm joking with this one, too - no need for those retorts of "how can you say that???" - my GF is a biochemist and has the same straightfaced approach to her work as you guys, which gives me a lot of giggles when I start asking her when the first GM monkeypig is being produced)

cheers folks

Rabies

That is really cool, but I bet it still can't make me a cup of tea.

Specky

However, I was being lighthearted in the *entire* post - when it comes to robots, I am 12 years old (hence the "he" thing, which I laughed out loud at the very serious reply back - come on, lighten up!)

:rolleyes:

Just because my comment didn't have a ;-) in it didn't mean it wasn't meant lightheartedly...jeez....

I would almost go so far as to :rolleyes: again as it seems smilies are obligatory in order to express the subtleties of irony in these forum.

In this particular thread I would guess the word "irony" would be more useful in describing the flavour of a robot.....

dr_manhattan

heh, cool s'pose I should have known better... at the same time, I *do* find that smilies are essential at all times, otherwise everyone takes ya seriously...

The "irony" joke, however, is unforgivable, haha.

cheers

Specky

Serious?

Moi???











oops nearly forgot