Can we remove the Third Law from Asimo, please?

Let me start with a little story.

I was in kindergarten and we were visiting the Big Kids in the bandroom. Since I had already been playing piano for two years, I was chosen as the "conductor". I remember being puzzled that the kids didn't seem to pay any attention to me at all; they were playing without even looking at me.

That's the way Asimo "conducts" an orchestra.

Look, I like the little guy. But can we please quit pretending he's something he's not? Asimo is basically a miracle of animatronics... and that's all.

Asimo can walk? Asimo can run? Baloney. Asimo can execute preprogammed "walking" movements that resemble real walking the way a toy car resembles a race car. When we walk, we constantly adjust in real time for this or that obstacle or this or that momentary imbalance. Asimo does not do this, he does not actually "balance". If you had him walk down the hall twice, his feet would be in the exact same spots each time. If you pushed him while he was walking he would fall over.

Up until now, this is nitpicking. But when I see the Honda PR people place this hunk of actuators in front of an orchestra and imply that this thing is emulating what a human conductor does... I have to call BS in a big way. The dirty little secret is of course that the concertmaster is leading the orchestra while Asimo waves his arms meaninglessly in the exact pattern someone fed into him. Pretending that this mechanical contraption is capable of the high level of processing a conductor must accomplish in real time... well, it's just ridiculous, to anyone who knows ANYTHING about either robots or music.

I love robots. I BUILD robots. But Asimo is a fraud. Can we teach it to self-destruct, please?

I doubt they have.

The way I look at it, Asimo is like the Ford Model-T. It's very primitive, but it's just a baby-step in the process. Honda has done a great job simulating human movement but not much else, yet.

the claim is implicit when you place your product in front of an orchestra and claim it's doing anything at all.

A necessary evil in any industry.

have come from the research into how to make something walk, grab without crushing or dropping many wondeful things. He is just a compilation of many new engineering devices. One day computer engineering will enable it to do something of its own, like walking up stairs with out being pre-programmed. Just the ability to do it programmed is a marvel.

is that the marketing is inappropriate. Laymen see this and think, "Wow, a walking robot, look how far things have come" when it's nothing of the kind, really, it's just a feat of engineering, NOT of computation.

Here's the central point: Honda, the tech is amazing. But quit pretending it's some kind of breakthrough, because it just isn't.

Can we stop calling any device controlled by Remote Control a robot?

My main example are the so 'Robot War' style TV shows. They are battles between armed radio control cars, not robots.

But it raises new ones. Consider an autonomous robot, capable of performing useful actions on its own, which I'm sure you agree is a true "robot". But what if we offload some or all of the processing onto a remote machine over a radio link? Is it still "autonomous"?

:silly:

Turn your sound down - Big Dog sounds like a giant mosquito.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2bExqhhWRI

He's hard to push over!

I knew about that but hadn't seen a video yet. Very impressive!

although the noise is part of that - like some giant bug.

As least no one could "play the race card" or claim "sexism" and I could take 100 names off the ignore list...