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"I" Robot
Robots have made the shift from sci-fi movies to reality in many aspects. Industrial robots are already replacing humans in repetitive or dangerous tasks, and they are also invading cyber-space, which could lead to intense relationships with personalities who exist only in a computer.
Human beings spend a large part of their day interacting with machines, whether we are driving to work, cooking lunch, relaxing at home, or preparing a report - machines save us time and effort, functioning virtually as an extension of ourselves. And herein lies the rationale for the robot - a machine that performs functions normally ascribed to humans. By replacing humans at tasks that are boring, dangerous or require heavy labour, robots are designed make our lives easier. The word robot comes from the Czech word "robota", which means "forced labour" or "serf". The prospect of a marginalised underclass of intelligent machines has been extensively explored in literature and film, as has the fear that they might one day usurp human authority. As with so many so-called "modern" innovations, the first robots were produced in ancient Greece - primitive mechanical statues that mimicked the activities of the gods.
The industrial revolution resulted in the first assembly lines, which improved productivity by replacing human labour with machines. The desire to automate factory operations, particularly in the textile industry, spurred the development of modern robotics. The invention of the computer in the 1940's was the clincher - it ushered in the era of the true robot: the "thinking machine." And where the job at hand is highly dangerous, such as exploring the surface of Mars, robots allow humans to extend their vision and dexterity without risk to life and limb. If robots are extensions of ourselves, then the ultimate goal of robotics must be to recreate the human being. It is a prospect that make many people uneasy, yet it may be closer we think.
Voice recognition systems are at the forefront of this new technology, enabling the PC to respond intuitively to each user's voice commands.
In the future, personal computers will be a lot more personal. Without the need for a keyboard, PCs will be a lot smaller, and that could herald a revolution in robotics - greater interactivity with humans and the environment, greater processing power, and greater autonomy for the robot. But if building a machine that thinks like a human is possible, will we ever build one that actually looks human? The construction of an android would represent the fulfilment of the scientific dream. Presently, synthetic sex dolls offer the closest alternative to the real thing. Unfortunately, they still leave a great deal to the imagination, not least in terms of their responsiveness.
Ironically, the first android may be the result of advances in bio-science and prosthetics, rather than machine technology - humans becoming more robot-like rather than robots becoming more like us. The human body and the machine are converging at a startling pace. The first sentient robot may not be a replacement for a human being: it may be a combination of human and machine - a cyborg. If that is so, then the fear that we will sacrifice our human autonomy to build the perfect robot may come to pass. Robots were supposed to make our lives easier, freeing our bodies from the necessity of work and our minds from the preoccupations that work entails.
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Leonardo da Vinci took the science a step further by documenting the anatomy of the human body - essential for the construction of mechanical joints.
Industrial and exploratory robots do not come close to human intelligence - they simply perform a sequence of actions according to a fixed set of instructions. But that may change with new programming methods that allow computers to learn from their environment and make their own decisions. Neural network programming utilises "fuzzy logic", a technique that allows a computer to process data according to several criteria rather than a single category.
"We already have the technology that allows you to interact and receive e-mails and voice mails in your car and get that stuff read back to you," says Kevin Ackhurst of Microsoft Consulting Services in Johannesburg, South Africa, "but you should be able to say to your car radio or to your cell phone "phone Mary" and it should be able to interpret it and phone that particular person, and you should be able to do all of that while you are concentrating on the road. It obviously has further implications as you are not just looking at the disabled advantages - you are also looking at safety implications. For the user, there are other benefits as well. If I could phone home and say, "switch the kettle on, turn the microwave on, and I'll be arriving in twenty minutes time, so have my meal prepared when I get there."
The latest humanoid robots can negotiate stairs and manipulate an impressive range of objects, but they still look like machines. Although highly realistic expressions have already been achieved by special effects experts in animating this gorilla head, the same technology could be applied to a robotic human head, with such realism that it may take awhile before one realises one is conversing with a robot.
But building cyborgs or robots in our own image will necessitate constant surveillance. Technology is after all, just a reflection of ourselves...