time travel, parallel universes, and other useful illusions
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”
Boston Dynamics are behind some of the most interesting robot videos we’ve seen on the Internet, from Big Dog tossing cinder blocks around to, more recently, the reveal of their sharp yellow SpotMini.
If you’ve ever dreamed of having a slender, cat-shaped robot that could spy on your friends from the comfort of your own home, believe it or not South Korean roboticists are happy to oblige.
During last week’s Game Developers Conference in San Fransisco, Epic Games revealed one of their latest projects: Siren, a “digital human.” It’s actually some fairly realistic CGI, streamed directly into Epic Games’ Unreal Engine. They worked alongside Tencent, Cubic Motion, and 3Lateral to bring Siren to life, as well as Vicon, who provided her “lifelike …
Continue reading “Meet Siren, The Digital Human Of Your (Uncanny) Dreams”
If there’s one thing I really think the world could use more of right now, it’s robot fish. Thankfully, MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory has delivered. According to IEEE Spectrum, their roboticists have developed an intriguing new “soft robotic spy fish,” which scientists are now using to explore the ocean without disrupting its …
A Swedish funeral agency called Fenix intends to experiment with creating “digital copies” of the deceased, and they’re looking for volunteers. Don’t get too excited. Yet. The agency’s first order of business is to focus strictly on text, which would mimic the personality of the deceased and answer simple questions, maybe talk about the weather, …
Continue reading “Digital Immortality Phase One – Resurrecting the Dead With Chat Bots?”
“This is not sci-fi imagination or an extreme sport for the fearless.” So reads the opening of the above video, in which we see the Ehang 184 Autonomous Aerial Vehicle in action. It’s essentially a big drone designed to carry human passengers, reportedly the first in the world.