time travel, parallel universes, and other useful illusions
The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) will attempt another lunar landing this year, and they’re sending a humanoid robot torso named Vyommitra along for the ride. Providing everything goes as planned, India’s Gaganyaan crewed orbital spacecraft, with Vyommitra on board, will set off for the Moon in December, as part of the Chandrayaan-3 lunar exploration …
Continue reading “India Prepares to Send Half-Humanoid Robot On Mission to the Moon”
“A book is made of wood. But it is not a tree. The dead cells have been repurposed to serve another need.” That’s quite the way to begin a press release. The University of Vermont recently shared details on what their scientists have been up to lately. That is, using a supercomputer AI to construct …
Continue reading “University Reveals Living ‘Xenobots’ Designed By Supercomputer”
Hey, there’s this weird band I want to tell you about. Kind of a garage surf sort of thing. The lead singer has a giant horn for a head. The drummer uses a busted-up pie plate as a snare. The keyboardist? Five fingers, and nothing else.
In the ongoing adventures of everyone’s favorite spherical ISS robot, IBM has revealed that CIMON has been upgraded to CIMON-2, complete with improvements to its artificial intelligence.
If we’re going to get Skynet up and running, we’ll need more than just breakthroughs in artificial intelligence – we’ll need passable robot clones covered in living tissue, so they’ll be able to travel back in time and mingle without being noticed. That’s just how things have to be.
On February 23, 2019, the Kodaiji temple in Kyoto, Japan unveiled Mindar, the Android Kannon. The robot, its head and hands covered in something resembling human skin but otherwise machine-like, was fashioned after Kannon, the Buddhist deity of mercy.
The above video from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology highlights a “particle robotics system,” which consists of many smaller robots working together to accomplish goals.
Robots might not be self aware yet, but given some recent headlines, I have a feeling that once they do wake up, they’re going to be a bit agitated. Consider the following…
In 1984, The Terminator promised me a robot apocalypse circa 2029. And yet, we haven’t quite reached our inevitable obliteration via some Skynet-esque artificial intelligence.
“What are your commands?” asks the spherical robot as it floats through space. Inch by little inch, we’re getting closer to the futures dreamt up in science fiction. In this video, ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst introduces us to Cimon, a robot created to assist astronauts aboard the International Space Station.
China’s Xinhua News Agency, alongside the Chinese search engine Sogou.com, have revealed what they call the “world’s first artificial intelligence news anchor.” Its appearance, facial expressions, and voice were modeled after the real news anchor Zhang Zhao, using machine learning algorithms that essentially “taught” it to recreate his likeness. The final product, what you see …
Continue reading “Virtual News Anchors Hit Airwaves In China”
There was a time when you may have looked at Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robot and thought, hey, I could outrun that. It was a lumbering hunk of metal, after all. Sure, it could open doors and go for quiet walks in the freshly fallen snow, even lift 10-pound boxes. But in a robot apocalypse scenario? …
Continue reading “Boston Dynamics Shows Off “Parkour Atlas” Robot”
There’s a hotel in Japan staffed by robots. But not just any kind of robots. As you walk up to the front desk, you might feel a bit confused when you see the two gesticulating robot dinosaurs greeting you in a handful of languages. Don’t worry; they’re wearing bellboy hats, so you’ll know they’re employees …
Continue reading “Robot Dinosaurs Manage Front Desk At Japanese Hotel”
