So nothing particularly substantial stood out to me this
week, but a couple shorter articles caught my attention, both pertaining to my
interests in robotics and automation.
The first is a follow up to my previous journal post about automated
vehicles. In a recently conducted survey, it seems up to 90% of drivers would
be interested in an automated vehicle (or would at least consider purchasing
one) if it meant an 80% discount on insurance. 20% said they would be
interested even without the discount. Indeed, in an automated system, the
responsibility of driving is taken mostly off of the driver, the cause of 95%
of traffic accidents. Though, who would instead take responsibility is still a
question.
Curiously, more people said they would trust automakers over
software companies such as google (even despite their impressive track record
to date) to develop the vehicles. This, then would call into question the
neutrality of the cars. Would Tesla cars interact well with Fords for instance?
Likely it would be better for all involved if the software going into the
automated were a neutral party, to allow for the best cooperation between vehicles.
It may be hard to trust consumer opinion on this particular matter anyway; a
decent amount said they would trust apple or Samsung to develop the vehicles.
When asked what users would do with the free time while
riding in a vehicle they don’t have to drive, “26 percent of respondents said
text or talk with friends, 21 percent said read and 10 percent said sleep.”
Certainly safety and standards will be an issue as well, as
was discussed briefly in my last post. Undoubtedly the engineers working on
this project are putting as much consideration into safety as possible,
especially given that the reduction in accidents and deaths is one of the
biggest incentives for this endeavor. At our current level of technology, we
already have car manufacturers implementing sensors and automation into their
vehicles. Though the exact company slipped my mind, I remember seeing ads for a
new car with a sensor to detect when you’re about to crash into something, and
auto-brakes to prevent the accident. If that level of technology exists now,
and is reliable, then it bodes well for the automated cars future.
The other article I came upon shows a video of what’s been
named a “Janken Robot.” This bot, developed by the University of Tokyo lab, has
a 100% win rate in the game rock paper scissors (janken being the name of the
game in Japan). Truth be told, it’s actually cheating at the game. It
recognizes the symbol its opponent is going to make and reacts with the winning
symbol before humans can perceive that it’s moving just slightly slower- in
about 20 milliseconds.
So what exactly is this importance of a machine playing a
kid’s game? What it is is a great demonstration of the speed and precision that
current robotics technology is capable of. To be able to recognize a human’s
hand signal, process what to do, and form its own symbol in only 20
milliseconds is no easy feat.
This video as well, demonstrates a very impressive level of
mechanical movement for robotics. The QRIO bots demonstrate a very high level
of both dexterity, speed, and precision in their movements, actually almost
making them look somewhat human in their movements.
I’m also a big fan of the robotics company Boston Dynamics, who’ve
shown off some very interesting projects. Their Alpha Dog/Big Dog projects
demonstrate an advanced ability to process the environment and traverse nearly
any terrain, making great use of balancing technology to the extent where you
can give it a big shove, and it will figure out how to balance itself without
falling over. A more recent project, WildCat, has demonstrated the capability
of record-breaking running speed, and many versatile movement capabilities.
Before I ramble on about robots for too long, the point of
all this is the advancement of robotics technology these examples show. With
the levels of speed and precision these robots can achieve, perceptive and reliable
enough to perform such impressive feats, who knows what robotics will be
capable of in the near future?
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