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Tiny Little Robots!

spud_meister

spud_meister

Veni, vidi, dormivi!
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MIT’s M-Blocks: A New Class Of Robot Cubes That Self Assemble | Singularity Hub

What if robots could reassemble themselves at will? The liquid metal cyborg in Terminator was terrifyingly useful. It could look like anyone, repair shotgun blasts, even turn its hand into a murderous icepick. And then of course, you’ve got Transformers, wherein alien robots morph from cars and trucks into giant humanoid fighting machines.
It isn’t liquid metal nor is it extraterrestrial, but MIT’s John Romanishin, Daniela Rus, and Kyle Gilpin think they’ve found a promising precursor to a similar technology.
By building simple, independent modules that can separate and recombine at will, you can design a robot of flexible functionality. Such modular robots have been around for a long time. Indeed, we’ve covered plenty in the past. But none are as simple as MIT’s M-Blocks, and it’s that simplicity that’s got folks excited.
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How awesome is that? The possibilities that come with miniaturisation are potentially limitless, but even on the current scale, with a bit of computering advancement, you could get a robot that rolls along beside you, and then assembles into a chair if you need to sit down, or a table, or a 12 foot long robotic halberd.

The possibilities are amazing.
 
spud_meister said:
MIT’s M-Blocks: A New Class Of Robot Cubes That Self Assemble | Singularity Hub






How awesome is that? The possibilities that come with miniaturisation are potentially limitless, but even on the current scale, with a bit of computering advancement, you could get a robot that rolls along beside you, and then assembles into a chair if you need to sit down, or a table, or a 12 foot long robotic halberd.

The possibilities are amazing.
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I would say, as you mention it quite prominently, the idea of a terminator trajectory on this stuff is kinda frightening... we are probably assured of good and bad uses, how will we manage the two?
 
Mushu Kako states in "The Future of Physics" that we will see in the future, for example that we can program to be a coffee table then and end table then a radio or anything imaginable. This will be possible because it will be made of millions of micro machines that are programmable to form any object we choose.
 
spud_meister said:
... The possibilities are amazing.
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IMO, I don't think we should mess around with this type of technology. Even though there seems to be a ton of benefits from having machines do everything for us, there will come a point where we won't have any control over it.
 
Green Balls said:
IMO, I don't think we should mess around with this type of technology. Even though there seems to be a ton of benefits from having machines do everything for us, there will come a point where we won't have any control over it.
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I do NOT mean to come off snarky or disrespectful but your position is similar to the refusal of stem cell research. Progress is progress. Look how clean the world would be if we never industrialized or invented cars. But we did and the world changed - and will continue to change.

There has been a lot of robot development lately. Mostly for killing people but some for helping. Robots are the next big thing.
 
Scientists have planted human hair on robots that grows. Recall the line from the 1932 film Frankenstein" with Boris Karloff as the monster. When Dr. Frankenstein realizes his creation is alive he screams, "It's alive! Now I know what it's like to be God"! Androids are here today and in the not to distant future we will see them every day as they integrate in to our society. I saw a PBS show this past Monday of the stunning leaps in technology for robotics. Ironically, the scientists are mimicking animal and plant movement and incorporating it in to robots. Also, don't forget they are building micro size robots as well.
 
specklebang said:
I do NOT mean to come off snarky or disrespectful but your position is similar to the refusal of stem cell research. Progress is progress. Look how clean the world would be if we never industrialized or invented cars. But we did and the world changed - and will continue to change.

There has been a lot of robot development lately. Mostly for killing people but some for helping. Robots are the next big thing.
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I don't have an issue with robots. I have an issue with inventing something that can replicate itself.
 
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