News Update Robotic Technology : Self-Aware AI Developed By New York Researchers

Machines have come a long way in the past few years. Engineers have developed robots that can navigate their environment based on the surrounding context, robots that can heal / repair themselves in just a few short minutes, and robots that can learn from their mistakes and improve future results.

And while Hollywood level artificial intelligence (AI) is still a long way from becoming a reality, little steps are being takes in that direction every day. The most recent achievement comes courtesy of professor Selmer Bringsjord from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, who recorded video footage of a robot that waves and recognizes itself as an individual.

His self-aware experiment was conducted on three (3) commercially-available Nao robots. He programmed the machines to believe the two (2) of them were previously given a “dumbing pill” which would prevent them from speaking (of course, in reality, the professor only pressed a button that muted them).

All three (3) robots were then tasked with finding out which of them were unable to talk and which of them was able to talk. All of them tried to wanted to answer “I don’t know”, but since only one (1) of them was actually able to make any sounds, his voice was the only one he heard. He then waved his hand and said: “I know now. I was able to prove that I was not given a dumbing pill”.

Professor Bringsjord gave a statement informing the robot first needed to recognize the sound of his own voice in order to then use logic, prove that it understood the question, reach the above mentioned conclusion and pass the test.

The test itself was based on a classic philosophical problem known as “The King’s Wise Men” and addressed a very small but specific side of self-awareness. The philosophical scenario describes a king who has to decide who should be his next advisor. To do this he invites three (3) of the wisest men in his kingdom to compete in a contest, with the promise that it will be a fair one.

He informs them that he will be putting either a blue or a white hat on each of their hats, and that the color of each individual hat can be seen only by the men who are not wearing it. He then says that a least one of the three (3) is wearing a blue colored hat. The promise is that the first person to guess the color of the hat he’s wearing will become the king’s next adviser. The real answer is that they’re all wearing blue harts.

Professor Bringsjord is currently collaborating with the US Navy on a project that has the goal of teaching robots what’s considered right, what’s considered wrong, and what the difference between the two is.

Posted by Unknown Sunday, July 19, 2015

News Update On Robotics : Battle Of The Bots: American MegaBot To Face Off Against Japanese Kuratas Next Year

The U.S. may have just won a decisive victory against Japan on the soccer field, but whether that will hold in a larger-than-life battle between two mega robots has yet to be determined. In the real life version of a Transformers fight, the Japanese robot Kuratas has My reaction? Come on guys, make it cooler. Just building something huge and sticking guns on it is… super American.”

Kurata continued, “We can’t let another country win this. Giant robots are Japanese culture. But you know, we really need… Melee combat.” And it’ll be quite the combat. Kuratas specs are impressive a single pilot will control a mammoth of a robot (which is reallput-giant-fighting-robots-into-battle.html" target="_blank">My reaction? Come on guys, make it cooler. Just building something huge and sticking guns on it is… super American.”

Kurata continued, “We can’t let another country win this. Giant robots are Japanese culture. But you know, we really need… Melee combat.” And it’ll be quite the combat. Kuratas specs are impressive — a single pilot will control a mammoth of a robot (which is really more of a suit) weighing in at 9,000 pounds and standing 12 feet tall. It also boasts an enormous BB gun and moves on wheels. On the other hand, MegaBot, the less sleek and elegant of the two machines, stands at 15 feet and weighs a whopping 12,000 pounds (or 6 tons). It comes complete with a tank-like set-up, rolling on tracks, a giant cannon that fires paintballs at 100 mph, and space for two pilots.

The details of the match are yet to be ironed out, and of course, there will need to be significant safety measures in place to protect the human operators of the machines. But prepare yourselves, robot lovers. The showdown of all showdowns approacheth.

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Posted by Unknown Tuesday, July 07, 2015

News Robotic Technology Update : Inside The Robot House: Is This Your Future? Lets Check Out These Photos

Summary: Service robots that are empathetic and that can learn from you - these are just some of the technologies tested out in robot houses across Europe as part of the Accompany project.

 

Autonomous robots :

With more of us expecting to survive into old age, it's probably inevitable that one day robots would be enlisted to shoulder the burden of care and companionship for the elderly.

The potential for robots in this area hasn't been lost on the European Commission, which put almost €5m ($5.6m) into funding the three-year Accompany project, which produced technology used by the robot pictured above.

The robot itself is a commercial Care-O-Bot 3 made by the Fraunhofer research institute in Germany. But the technology it uses and the intelligent environment in which it operates have been developed by Accompany project researchers from nine institutions across five countries, led by Dr Farshid Amirabdollahian, associate professor in adaptive systems at the UK University of Hertfordshire's School of Computer Science.

Among goals set for the Accompany project was the idea that the robot should be able to learn and show empathy in dealings with people. Devising ethical guidelines for service robots for the elderly was also a significant focus of the research.

Liveried in an abstract representation of a butler's morning suit, the robot seen here is using its right arm to serve a drink in a sensor-equipped beaker, which allows the machine to monitor how much fluid its human companion has consumed.

Its shorter left arm holds what serves as a tray in one orientation but which can flip over to reveal a detachable customised Samsung tablet that acts as the principal communications interface between the automaton and the human. Integrated proximity sensors tell the robot when the tray is empty.

"Part of what we've done is software, of course. But a big part of it is hardware and integrating the different technologies together, which is a very difficult task because they're not really meant to work together. When you integrate them and then put them to work in a certain scenario, you find out all sorts of surprises," Amirabdollahian said.

As part of the project, four robot houses were created in France, Germany, the Netherlands and in a residential area near the Hertfordshire University campus in England.

The robotic environments share common features, such as overhead 360-degree cameras providing fish-eye views of the rooms below to track and record the movements and relative positions of robots and humans.

The houses also employ sensors on doors and cabinets to show what has been opened, together with bot plugs, which can relay data on how much electricity is being consumed by individual devices. So if a fridge door is left open, triggering a rise in power consumption, that information is sent to the central computer and potentially to the robot as well.

Social skills for robots :
As seen here, these autonomous robots are taught certain social behaviours, such as where to position themselves. They also learn about possible activities that the individual they are working with might want to undertake, depending on the time of day and the presence of other people.

"Technology is normally very cold. We try to change this by teaching this technology, the robot itself, some social mannerisms, like not coming too close to you or not approaching from angles that you don't prefer," Amirabdollahian said.

"From the studies we've done, we know that each individual will have their personal distance. They will have an intimate space that they don't want to be intruded into by anyone. An elderly person could be walking - whether the robot is going ahead or following is something that will need to be taught to the machine."

The robot is also equipped with object- and facial-recognition software. These systems enable it to recognise that its companion has, for example, just been given flowers. It can also send the identity of the person giving the bouquet back to the central tracking system, provided he or she is a regular visitor to the room.

A skeletal-tracking algorithm enables the robot to detect that the human has received flowers.

The robot's twin cameras, which can roll over backwards to provide a rear view, are for its own use and for the human, who can view on the tablet what the robot is seeing. So, for example, the robot could be alerted to the entry bell ringing and go to the transparent front door. Its human companion could then see who is visiting through the robot's cameras.

Language-free robot comms :

Here are two screenshots from the tablet that the human uses to communicate with the robot. They show the robot's view of the kitchen and the objects it has recognised and labelled using its stereo cameras and data from the ceiling tracker. The white cross in a red circle shows an item that the human has selected for the robot to, for example, pick up.

The tablet has a flexible frame. If the elderly person squeezes it hard, that communicates urgency to the robot. The mouth-like mask overlaying the images conveys emotion and in this case narrows with the urgency of the task. The robot can also use the mask to convey information back to the individual.

"If the mask is a happy mask, the robot is happy. If the mask is sad, the robot is sad. A sad mask would imply, for example, 'Hey, you haven't taken your medicine and it's time you did or you haven't had a glass of water for over an hour," Amirabdollahian said.

"It's not necessarily an approval or disapproval. But [it changes] as what you're doing is growing more serious - for example, you haven't had your medicine and you really should have. In one scenario the robot brings a glass of water and puts it in front of the person and the person doesn't drink it.

"Then the robot will come back again and point by looking at the glass, and you can see on your tablet that the robot is looking at the glass of water. At that point the face turns a little sadder."

The aim of the mouth-like mask, developed at the University of Siena in Italy, is to establish that a number of robot-human interactions can take place effectively and with emotional content but without any language whatsoever.

Skeletal-tracking algorithms and sensors :

The robot, working with the robot house computer, has a number of algorithms at its disposal to work out what the individual is doing at any given moment and to check on his or her wellbeing.

As well as the skeletal-tracking software, sensors in furniture, such as chairs, sofas and beds also provide vital information about an elderly person's posture and activity levels.

"We use the overhead camera and the robot's cameras to detect the pose of the individual, because we're interested in knowing when someone has had a fall. It's one of things we can get technology to tell us: 'Look, someone has had a fall and maybe we should do something about it," Amirabdollahian said.

"The first thing we need to know is what posture you have. So when, for example, I'm going to serve myself a cup of tea, I will have a certain set of postures that will that will support serving a cup of tea. The upper part of my body will have a certain pose.

"So one of the things that the upper camera will see and the robot camera will contribute to is how we can be very accurate and how we can still get to a certain level of detection with an acceptable level of accuracy."

Voice commands and robot alerts :

The project also looked at the pitch of voice commands to convey urgency to the robot.

"The robot can also use its onboard speakers to tell you things. It can tell you things in audio - for example, there's someone at the door. One of the things we tried not to replicate was the act of talking with natural language to the robot. There are many projects doing that," he said.

Now that many of the Accompany technologies have passed their proof-of-concept stage, the researchers are looking at ways to put them into the market.

"If these types of machines are going to be made into products, we need to make them much more modular so that then I can combine different modules to fit into certain requirements," Amirabdollahian said.

"For example, not everybody needs my robot to have an arm because not everybody has a problem with physical manipulation. Sometimes people just have a problem in mobility. So maybe the robot can become just a mobility aid."

Posted by Unknown Monday, February 23, 2015

Robotic Technology Update : Let A Robot Valet Park Your Car, Yeah Now Robot Can Park You Car

Throwing your keys at the parking valet as you sashay onto a flight may seem like the stuff of James Bond films, but already a robotic valet is taking the sweat out of getting on a plane at Germany's Dusseldorf airport.

Rather than getting behind the wheel, however, this robotic valet physically lifts your three tons of road machinery and slots it into pre-designated robot parking bays.

Nicknamed RAY by its creators, the automated forklift truck is the brainchild of Germany's Serva Transport.

Aimed at business travelers in a hurry, the automated parking system can be controlled and booked via an app. All travelers have to do is drop the car off in a designated area, go to a nearby touch screen to confirm the car is empty, and RAY does the rest.

RAY uses sensors to measure and photograph the car, it then gently lifts it and takes it to one of 249 parking spots reserved for the robot forklifts.

The company claims that its space-saving system -- which uses lasers and sensors to measure not just the height and width of the cars but accessories such as wing mirrors and fenders -- can park 60% more cars than a human driver.

The system is also connected to the airport's flight data system: RAY will retrieve the car based on flight itineraries. The app also lets car owners communicate with RAY if there are any flight delays.

The airport charges €29 a day ($40) or €4 ($5.50) an hour for the service, which the airport's management said was likely to appeal to time-strapped corporates.

"Our product is especially appealing to business travelers, who arrive at the airport shortly before the flight, seek efficient parking, and return within a few days," Thomas Schnalke, the airport's managing director, said in a statement.

A new tie-up with Volkswagen announced this month aims to increase the efficiency of RAY by getting the car and the parking robot to communicate with each other.

"Our jointly developed technology exchanges data automatically between RAY and Volkswagen cars via Bluetooth and thus facilitates the parking progress," said Rupert Kock, the managing director at Serva Transport Systems.

But RAY is not the only robot valet on the block.

A New Jersey startup called Boomerang also aims to take parking to the next level by using an automated parking system that can park hundreds of cars without human intervention.

Shuffling them like the squares in a giant Rubik's Cube in garages that need no light and little ventilation, the company says the system not only saves on energy but can fit more cars into a smaller space, freeing up valuable land for other real estate.

According to Boomerang CEO Mark Patterson the advantage of his system is that it is designed with multiple entry bays, multiple robots and multiple lifts so there is no single point of failure.

"If any one thing goes down, we can still operate the system," he told CNN.

Drivers put their car into a parking bay that places the car on a large steel tray. Robotic wheeled platforms slide under the vehicle and then transport it to the bays following buried wires in the floor of the carpark.

Patterson says its increased throughput means the bays can be filled and emptied more quickly than conventional carparks.

"Our system is installed in a garage with level concrete floors so there's total fire separation between floors like in a conventional garage - most legacy systems are steel rack structures with no separation between floors," he said.

"Developers like it because you can park 100% more cars in the same space and that's a big value proposition."

The other advantage is that the carpark is a 'sterile' environment that has no need for human intervention.

"The cars are not running in these garages so there's a big savings on air handling equipment," Patterson said. "You need seven or eight air changes an hour with traditional carparks versus just one or two with this system."

Similarly, there's also no need to illuminate the building to the sort of levels that would deter muggers or other attackers that lurk in the gloom of multi-story carparks.

"Robots don't care if it's dark," Patterson said.

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Posted by Unknown Tuesday, February 03, 2015

New Gadget Achivement Update : As Chinese Retiree Designs A Robotic Horse

You just can't keep an inventive mind down. Su Daocheng -- a 60-year-old retiree from Shiyan in the eastern Hubei province of Central China -- spends his spare time inventing things. You know, just normal things, like you'd find in any garage -- like a helicopter designed for the road or a mechanical elephant.

His latest invention is a petrol-powered rideable robotic horse, inspired by Three Kingdoms-era chancellor Zhuge Liang. Zhuge Liang is said to have invented some 1,800 years ago a steamed bread called mantou, the land mine and a mysterious transportation device called "wooden ox and flowing horse" (sometimes thought to be the wheelbarrow, although archaeological evidence dates the wheelbarrow at least a century earlier). 

At any rate, Su's "horse" -- which took two months to build -- is a little more complex. It stands 1.5 metres high and two metres long, weighing in at 250 kilograms. It uses a recycled go-kart engine, which runs on petrol, powering the spring-loaded legs to move back and forth. Only the back legs propel the horse, though; the front is supported by wheels, and the front legs appear to move only for show.

While it looks like a bit of a bumpy ride, the aim of the horse isn't transportation. Rather, it seems to be designed to help farmers. The robotic horse would, Su claimed, cost less than a real horse, since it does not require the time spent on human care, or the money spent on feed -- which would be higher than the cost of the horse's fuel.

Posted by Unknown Sunday, February 01, 2015