Tag: Robots
Imagine a future city where all pets are replaced by robots. The city is too crowded and too expensive for anyone but the wealthiest to have pets, so robots like Sony’s AIBO robotic dog have replaced them. Dogs don’t have to be walked. Litter boxes don’t have to be cleaned. The shelters are empty. Ferrets […]
They took our jerbs!! In an unnerving development that crosses scary uses of A.I. and the elimination of humans ability to make a living, a tech company called Knightscope has debuted their new robot security guard, the K5. The egg-shaped bots stand about 5 feet tall and weigh 300 pounds. They are unarmed (for now) and are […]
In terrifying, dystopian news that was once the stuff of fiction, scientists have taught an artificial intelligence program how to create a magic trick. After researchers uploaded the outline of how a magic jig-saw puzzle and a mind-reading card trick work, the computer program was able to create original versions of the trick that were so good […]
The video above demonstrates a nifty educational resource developed at the Harvard Biodesign Lab for the developers of the soft robotics field. Watch pressurized “fingers” bend around objects, a soft rubbery thing crawl across the table on its own and some stretchy stuff stretching, while being live-configured through computer interface. We’re sure it has a lot of very technical, very […]
Scientists at Harvard University have created a colony of robots that mimic self-organized systems in nature. Their 1,000 robots — dubbed collectively as the “kilobot” — is the largest self-organizing group of robots ever created. Previously, researchers had only used up to 100. This was accomplished by simplifying the designs of the robots to include only their essential qualities. Navigating […]
Cloud Piano by artist David Bowen is an instrument played by the sky. A live feed of clouds and its patches of light and dark are interpreted into “hand” movements. As the sky changes, so do the notes played. Creative Applications explains, “MaxMSP patch uses the video of the clouds in real-time to drive a robotic device that presses the […]
ANIMAL’s Radicals Of Retrofuturism uncovers stories by the technological rebels of the past in vintage media and looks at their predictions in the context of today’s digital world. This week, we take a look at Charles Csuri’s “Random War” illustration inside a 1970 Sam Shepard playbill. Operation Sidewinder, the 1970 play by luminary Sam Shepard, […]
The UK Ministry of Defense has released their annual report on the future. Entitled Global Strategic Trends — Out Till 2045 [PDF], it sets out predictions until 2045, when the world will allegedly be engulfed by chaos and despair. Wired UK broke it down to a list of nine of the very worst things that will happen in the future, […]
MIT researcher Daniella Rus has been developing heat-activated self-building robots. In the video posted to MIT’s blog earlier today, you can watch these parts fold themselves into a mini robot, Transformers-like. It’s more dramatic than you think. The technology can also build individual robot parts like “muscles” and circuits. The final goal is to 3D-print […]
The brightest innovators of our time continue to solve the world’s most pressing issues. For instance: getting wasted. Barobot is a portable, open source cocktail making machine, created by British “robot enthusiasts,” and controlled by a simple iPad-like boozer-interface (get it?) that has 1,000 cocktail recipes stored. Flanked by sound-responsive LED lights, Barobot will be the […]
