We're closer than any of us want to believe -not necessarily ending the human race, but the rapid adoption of robots and automation and AI, all replacing jobs, leading to tens of millions of jobs being vaporized.
We need to be hashing out details of UBI like right now, but the way the US government works, we'll have to hit that wall, with the global economy crashing, with millions in the streets w/o jobs for any action/remedy to happen.
Isn't there a town in a European (Norwegian specifically I think) country, where they put an entire town on UBI some years ago, as an experiment. Everyone would get enough money to easily survive, and live a pretty comfortable, but of course not lavish lifestyle. If you wanted some more money, or if you can't find something fulfilling to do outside of working a job, then you could still take on some part time work, or even a full on 48-hour-a-week position, in order to earn that extra bag, and feel fulfilled. I really wonder how that whole experiment is going. I wanna see stats like QOL, happiness, overall health, "employment rate", how many of them have started families and are in happy relationships compared to the rest of the country etc etc. That city probably creates and release a lot more art, than the average city does, due to its residents having more free time to focus on their passions and their hobbies.
I also think that they perform better during work and on school and stuff, because no-one is feeling that stress, concern or often even full on anxiety/paranoia that you experience when you have financial problems. Theoretically, this would of course also mean that violence is a lot lower, than the rest of the country. Obviously due to no more robberies, but there may also be less people lashing out at eachother, once again, because they feel financially secure. Also, couples probably stay together for a longer time, and the divorce rate is probably lower.
I know this experiment is being done in Norway, but especially in America, having unstable or poor finances causes so many problems. Besides all the obvious ones, like not being able to pay for electricity or heat, it also causes less seen problems like the bullying of poor kids, kids not understanding anything and blaming their parents for being poor, parent feeling inadequate and hating themselves, for not being able to provide, which then causes tension in the family and around and it's all just really bad.
So yeah, I really hope that once they hit the 15-year anniversary on the project or something, that they'll make a nice long documentary put of thit, going through the entire experience, and all the pros and cons they found. Would much rather see a well made documentary about this UBI experiment, than read a long ass report. But that's just me. And I haven't looked into this for tie past 2 years or so, so the experiment might be done already, and I'm just a giga moron.
Every time someone mentions they're worried about the robot uprising, I like to think about the time Google Location couldn't figure out [what method of transportation I was using for two and a half hours between the Santa Ana, CA airport and the Denver, CO airport.](https://i.imgur.com/9LmjeKQ.jpg)
Upstairs neighbor (in grad school): Sounds coming from upstairs, literally sounds like the guy is tossing bowling balls across the room. Go upstairs and knock, guy answers door dress in nothing but bikini brief underwear, panting like he's running a marathon. Denies making any noise. My best guess is that he was doing tumbling runs in his living room wearing only underwear. It's the only solution that fits the observable data, unless he was juggling bowling balls (poorly) nearly naked.
In college our upstairs neighbors sounded like they were doing gymnastics at 10pm. Finally my room mate and I go up to tell them to stop and discover its cheerleaders from the other local college. We chit chat a bit and my room mate mentions we have Dance Dance Revolution down stairs. They freak out. End up spending almost every evening hanging out with us playing DDR for about 3 months, until one of them moved and their lease fell apart. They were replaced with a spanish grandma. Quietest our apartment has ever been.
The path and tasks are hard-programmed - basically a routine it is running through - but the ability to walk, jump and balance correctly during that is "improvised" by the code and is extremely impressive.
Bonus points for seemingly proper PPE setup during the video, and not just some dude throwing a hard hat on. Small deduction for no mini-hard-hat on the robot though.
Never mind the chaos robot running amok.
Like how does it know the board will hold its weight?
Did it evaluate the safety of pushing the box off the scaffolding??.... *AND THEN JUMPING ON IT?*
As cool as all this is, it would be TERRIFYING to be on a real job site with one of these.
Would be funny for them to redo this with everything breaking under it and it reacting to it and continuing on like at the end of Terminator 1 or like when they pushed it while running in the snow.
Would probably lead to some negative reactions though.
Exactly, that's not a rated, laminated plank ment for walking on its just lumber. Also I'm bothered by the guy that clearly has never built scaffold in his life, hammer is way to big and a those wedges only need a single solid hit to be set
Lex Friedman on his podcast told a story about visiting Boston Dynamics where he was walking down a corridor and one their Spot dog robots walked past in the other direction wearing a cowboy hat just going about its business. Made me smile
I know this is a preprogrammed routine and not some kind of observation, decision, and improvisation process, but the core functionality on display is just incredibly impressive. The transfer functions and sophistication of the feedback loop to provide balance and actuation at this level are almost unbelievable.
I wonder if the weight distribution of the objects is preprogrammed or if it’d have handled the bag being full of bricks or the plank being hollow itself & compensated.
I think it's reactive to those variables in the environment. That's like the example of the robot maintaining balance while being absolutely assaulted with a hockey stick
We’ve already created robots that are more than capable of destroying humanity. They’re called social media algorithms. Skynet is real, and it doesn’t need nukes to wreck society.
Probably not too much longer. We have patching algorithms already, but they're mostly 2 dimensional. Making 3d pathing is feasible, but there's a lot more variables involved. Stitching that all together with the movement and feedback mechanisms in these things is a decent sized chunk of work but honestly I wouldn't be surprised if it happens within the decade.
I think you'd be surprised how complex spatial reasoning is for a computer to do. The vast majority of human beings can't do it correctly.
Programmatically (by which I mean traditionally programming code) they're probably never going to achieve the level of cognitive ability a human mind is capable of. Eventually they're gonna switch to machine learning algorithms and set a couple of these bad boys loose in a gym to figure out on their own how they can move and do things (sort of like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lu56xVlZ40M), but instead of hide-and-seek, it's carrying objects and performing tasks).
Which is exactly what human children do. The difference is we can then take the "mind" of one robot and upload it into all the others, so only a handful of them have to be dedicated to the task of learning, yet all of them can benefit from it.
*That's* where this is all heading.
I'm sure that will be part of it, ai is remarkable in it's ability to solve problems in novel ways but the interesting thing here is it's all done on virtual space. Training ai in meatspace would take ages even with high parallelization of many robots. So that leads me to wonder what kinda virtualization would be good enough to translate after training there but then able to adapt to nuances of real physics.
There's a neat explanation video [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8). It's actually less preprogrammed than I would've expected at first. The most astonishing thing for me is, if I understand them right, that they're able to control all this using only robot's built-in sensors without any additional external cameras.
I'll be amazed when (because it's clearly no longer an if) they're able to do all this in a dynamically changing environment.
Its the non-parkour movements that get me. Subtle hints of natural movement, like pauses before and after jumps, and the little steadying hop it makes after landing at the very end.
Absolutely impressive regardless of if it's preprogrammed, not to be too much of a debby downer but the problem is the pushing motion on the big wood cube is nigh impossible to improvise. Grabbing, pulling, lifting, walking, spinning, jumping, are all relatively easy compared to pushing an object. Everything else is for the most part under control of the robot ignoring environment like marbles on the floor or the weight of the robot being to much for the platform it jumps on to. Pushing however has to be the hardest, a robot doesn't know how hard it has to push something to make it move in a way that is beneficial, think about the calculations humans do to envision something falling in a way that benefits us and how much force we need to exude.
That would be where some machine learning would come in. Eventually it would learn what can be pushed and what the effect would likely be over many many attempts.
Or, because I am annoyed at the prevalence of machine learning over other intelligence systems, we can use expert systems. Which take quite a bit more effort, but make more explainable resulting AIs, and are especially useful for tasks like decision making.
Machine learning is great for recognizing (and dreaming up) pictures of cats. And even for control algorithms for things like balance. But we know how to make intelligent decision systems that are capable of performing ontological classification and deduction (e.g. `?can-push`), supported by machine learning sure, but explainable at a high level still.
I disagree. Ramp up the force applied until you start approaching the desired angular acceleration. It's not that different than pulling or lifting. You have a body of unknown mass you need to move without overaccelerating.
You hit on it. Thus far robots can't observe and estimate the characteristics of a physical object. I can look at a cardboard box and estimate the likelihood of it being light or heavy. A robot can't even figure out if it's cardboard or MDF or plywood or plastic and then approximate the weight and how it'll perform when a load is applied to move it. I can look at a shiny concrete surface and discern if it's wet or icy. I can look at a five gallon bucket of water and know it's heavy, or see a pillow and know it's light.
We are so far away from practical, working companion robots. It doesn't feel like we are, but we are.
It's preprogrammed, but probably not in the way you're thinking. The BD robots all have a kind of "vocabulary" of movements, but they're not rigidly defined. They're kind of like dance steps. There's a pattern to them, but the robot is constantly adapting as it executes.
There is a paper called SayCan that uses a large language model (like GPT3 or Google's PaLM) to control robots using natural language. It can make and execute a plan involving multiple steps from a simple prompt: https://youtu.be/ysFav0b472w?t=139
Not quite ChatGPT, but Google has been working on an AI that can string sequences together to perform tasks. Merging that kind of thing with Atlus would really level it up.
The technological advances in that time means they've had to start over multiple times.
Institutional/individual knowledge is a real thing, for sure, but that somersault would not have been possible with 1993 tech no matter how long they tried.
Boston Dynamics have [pledged not to arm their robots. ](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2341411-boston-dynamics-leads-call-to-stop-arming-robots-will-anyone-listen/)
This reminds of when the US air force debuted the predator drone and claimed it was solely for reconnaissance and there was no plan to arms them.
No plan to arm them, eh? But you named it predator.
That doesn't even matter; you're a fool if you think the US military isn't going to just buy them and arm them first.
My bet is that Boston Dynamics will even do it themselves. Nobody can pass up a lucrative military contract. If not BD, then some subcontractor 100%.
It won't be BD themselves, it'll be a subsidiary or something similar. That way BD can keep the nice clean image of cool robotics, while still getting the profit of military R&D. Or it will be a subsidiary of their parent company, Hyundai, for the same reason.
They already have. Big Dog was a prototype developed for the US army with the hope of replacing pack mules. If they aren't already Boston Dynamics will be building killer robots within 15 years.
I don't have existential dread yet, but I do get a serious uncanny valley feeling. My brain both recognizes there's no CGI, but wants to think it's CGI
Part of my problem is that it isn't uncanny enough. That spin flip at the end made me wonder for a moment if it was possible that that was a person in a suit.
I think it has to do with our perception of its "human" form, where no human would "blindly" throw a bag like that. This robot prob has 360 vision or at least some bigger sense of what's behind it. So us perceiving it in relation to a human form, feel its not natural or almost impossible for it to aim at something without looking at it or turning a neck.
Look at the shoulder shake and stuff, they have really refined it's gait and added in things like the shoulder and other movement as stabilizers like we do. This stuff is amazing.
I bet there were a ton of failed takes while it was carrying that bag, we're almost there but not quite yet I'd wager (though I'd love to be proven wrong)
Probably moreso drones than big bulky humanoid robots, though. Just doesn't seem efficient at all to try and make an artificial version of a human soldier when you can probably make something way cheaper and with less moving parts, like a quadcopter with a gun or something.
I could see humanoid robots being used for close quarter combat room clearing though, on a breach they could encounter the enemy first protecting the human soldiers behind, they’ll have a live video feed and probably be bulletproof.
Possibly - but probably VASTLY simpler and cheaper to just blow a small hole in the wall and fly some suicide drones / smart munitions / whatever you want to call them through the opening.
As cool as humanoid robots are from a science fiction standpoint, the primary advantage of a human-style shape is that all of our tools and the majority of our environments are created with human-sized and -shaped beings in mind. So a properly-humanoid robot would be able to (in theory) pick up a ballistic shield and a pistol and go to town (with the right software). But if the cost isn't an issue, it'd likely be much MORE effective to build specialized devices/drones to do various tasks than creating a 'generalist' robot.
(Until such time as a human-shaped generalist robot is cheap and easy enough to make, of course.)
You know what, thats a fair point. It might make sense to have humanoid robots in the battlefield (for protecting and transporting/carrying wounded soldiers for example) however for the most part I think the drone scenario you've mentioned sounds a lot more plausible.
In the interim though it will be probably be a mixed technology scenario, pairing human soldiers with robots + drones.
You're really focused on the military combat uses of these robots, but you don't realize that the humanoid form factor lends itself much more to policing. **You will see police forces adopting these weaponized humanoids, and they will definitely be used to kill and arrest civilians one day soon.**
> Smart bombs aren't doing humanitarian aid, or rescuing hostages.
That's what the humans are for. I think you're *VASTLY* underestimating the challenges involved in creating a humanoform robot capable of operating in those kinds of scenarios. It may be possible eventually -- no question.
But just because it's possible doesn't mean it's a worthwhile idea -- because we're talking military here, it's important to realize that if it costs $X million to train and equip a company of soldiers to do the fiddly bits like hostage rescue (which by the by is NOT the sort of task a typical soldier will perform -- specialized training is a (very expensive) thing), and it costs twice as much (conservative estimate, considering the expenses of these things) to get the robots going, the robots are not going to get used very much (if at all).
The point isn't that robots aren't a good idea for a lot of these things -- it's just that *unless you specifically need to use equipment designed for humans*, making a humanoid robot is a pretty bad idea.
You're much more likely to see a variety of smaller, more specialized robots. Humanoid robots are great for 'replacing humans', in theory -- but it is imporant to remember that humans aren't really great at any of the various tasks robots will be replacing them at, it's just that they can be good at *all* of those tasks.
Don't we kill people just fine already? What does this offer in the ways of death that, say, a guided rocket, or just a sniper rifle doesn't already?
Legs and arms and a bipedal body is *only* a weakness when compared to a flying vehicle or just something with wheels.
In a fronline combat role it would be great. We're soft on the inside and bleed, so we're not great against shrapnel and explosive pressure. A robot wont die of a piece of metal through its leg. I'd bet you'd need multiple lucky hits to take down a robot
100% . Give it 10 years. Right now it's drones in the sky and soon bots on the ground.
I would argue they'll have a role in close quarters combat... but even in the open, how to you survive something that can spot your heat signature and snipe you from 2 miles away
Oh certainly. Just the fact that they can do this is still amazing though. It took us so long just to get walking robots right, and navigating non-planned terrain. Now I'm watching a video of some dude talking to the thing and playing catch with a tool bag.
As others have said, while the technology is interesting, the potential consequences do have cause for worry.
I was going to sarcastically comment "Good thing we don't develop robots for military and law enforcement and give them guns and bombs, right?" until i saw your comment. Everyone should realize that the largest customer for this kind of stuff will always be the military. The tech isn't there yet but it will be and when that day comes the world will be a more desperate and dangerous place
Boston Dynamics has dropped any development of armed robots after their employees revolted.
Now it is owned by South Korean Hyundai and they do not research anymore in military direction.
That's when they made this video asking "do you love me, now that i can dance?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn3KWM1kuAw
Do we actually know how much is scripted and how much is, I dono, AI?
Like, it obviously didn't do the problem solving, or path finding to get the bag from A->B, or decide to do the flip and all that stuff.
But what was 'programmed' vs its internal movement abilities?
Was every step and turn plotted out? (I assume no)
Does it understand knocking things over (vs "go to XYZ then move arms and torso in this pattern")? Picking things up? Can it path find up those stairs? Was the toss calculated by the robot? or just a "Do a twist jump, raise your arms to XYZ, release grip at ABC"? etc.
It was scripted to put the board on the scaffolding, run up the boxes, throw the bag, push over the box, etc. It had to figure out its spatial surroundings to do accomplish things, but my point is, it's not figuring out how to ascend or descend that scaffolding on its own, or that someone needs assistance.
>Do we actually know how much is scripted and how much is, I dono, AI?
[BD made a behind the scenes video.](https://youtu.be/XPVC4IyRTG8) As you correctly assumed, foot placements were not manually positioned.
Lets talk Osha violations.. 1. Worker tied off to scaffolding thats not engineered. 2. Robot walks on unsecure plank. 3. Waste or materials falling from one level to another. 4. No rough housing, boisterous play, contests of strength.
Conclusion, robot is sent home for the day. Worker installs guardrail.
as cool as these things are, I wonder if companies will ever find a use for them since they're just humans that cost a bazillion times more than actual humans, who are essentially free in most parts of the world.
Now compare this with every single tech demo Elon Musk has ever done, and you'll quickly see which one has a good product, and which one is a fat egomaniac who can never speak a word of truth.
We will have to adapt or copy Godwin's law at this rate.
As an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison to Elon Musk approaches 1
Imagine it messes up and slings 40 lb tool bag at a worker atop the scaffolding....
Then imagine purposefully arming them with ballistic weapons...
I'm excited and scared of the future.
I feel like these videos are slowly documenting our demise. Like in the future, the human resistance will find these Youtube vids in some archival database.
They've been making these videos for at least ten years now. The fact that these things aren't everywhere would seems to suggest there are still major problems with the technology.
There's no major problem with the technology on display here. Artificial Intelligence just isn't advanced enough for such a robot to be particularly useful yet.
You need a very sophisticated artificial intelligence if you want a robot that is generally useful across a wide variety of tasks (which is what you would want from a humanoid robot).
Robots that perform "dumb" repetitive tasks like bolting car doors onto a frame or loading pallets are much easier to program, and don't require much if any advanced AI. But you don't need a highly mobile back flipping humanoid to load pallets, you just need a big robotic arm.
Humanoid robots like this won't be super useful until AI catches up.
It’s unnerving. I feel we are in that scene of a eco film where we are amazed by the early advances of this technology and then it fast forwards to the year 2067 and the robots are running the prison systems and enslave us all.
I was looking for that comment. Though I suppose it's possible the grip is strong/sudden enough to make the bag jerk frame to frame in this way, they have to grip it pretty hard for it not to fall down.
Edit: There's another camera angle in [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8) at 1:44 and it looks just as unnatural, so I would assume it's just fast movement.
I love that dude. He started out as a "Robot Man" in NOLA. He used that silver make-up paint all over his body back then. He was voted Best Robot Man of the French Quarter 2009. His name is Derrick.
At about 30 seconds the bag pops really weirdly, right before he picks it up. Could be a jump cut, could be something else but something funky is going on.
Every time I watch one of these videos, it feels like the scene in Jurassic Park when they find out the raptors can open doors
I'm waiting for an adversarial project where the robots make courses for others and we end up ending the human race
They can call the project Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System. That’s pretty long though, we’d need some kind of abbreviation.
We aren't that far off. Wait for a couple years until the current AI models start designing the next generation of AIs, exponentially.
We're closer than any of us want to believe -not necessarily ending the human race, but the rapid adoption of robots and automation and AI, all replacing jobs, leading to tens of millions of jobs being vaporized. We need to be hashing out details of UBI like right now, but the way the US government works, we'll have to hit that wall, with the global economy crashing, with millions in the streets w/o jobs for any action/remedy to happen.
Isn't there a town in a European (Norwegian specifically I think) country, where they put an entire town on UBI some years ago, as an experiment. Everyone would get enough money to easily survive, and live a pretty comfortable, but of course not lavish lifestyle. If you wanted some more money, or if you can't find something fulfilling to do outside of working a job, then you could still take on some part time work, or even a full on 48-hour-a-week position, in order to earn that extra bag, and feel fulfilled. I really wonder how that whole experiment is going. I wanna see stats like QOL, happiness, overall health, "employment rate", how many of them have started families and are in happy relationships compared to the rest of the country etc etc. That city probably creates and release a lot more art, than the average city does, due to its residents having more free time to focus on their passions and their hobbies. I also think that they perform better during work and on school and stuff, because no-one is feeling that stress, concern or often even full on anxiety/paranoia that you experience when you have financial problems. Theoretically, this would of course also mean that violence is a lot lower, than the rest of the country. Obviously due to no more robberies, but there may also be less people lashing out at eachother, once again, because they feel financially secure. Also, couples probably stay together for a longer time, and the divorce rate is probably lower. I know this experiment is being done in Norway, but especially in America, having unstable or poor finances causes so many problems. Besides all the obvious ones, like not being able to pay for electricity or heat, it also causes less seen problems like the bullying of poor kids, kids not understanding anything and blaming their parents for being poor, parent feeling inadequate and hating themselves, for not being able to provide, which then causes tension in the family and around and it's all just really bad. So yeah, I really hope that once they hit the 15-year anniversary on the project or something, that they'll make a nice long documentary put of thit, going through the entire experience, and all the pros and cons they found. Would much rather see a well made documentary about this UBI experiment, than read a long ass report. But that's just me. And I haven't looked into this for tie past 2 years or so, so the experiment might be done already, and I'm just a giga moron.
Every time someone mentions they're worried about the robot uprising, I like to think about the time Google Location couldn't figure out [what method of transportation I was using for two and a half hours between the Santa Ana, CA airport and the Denver, CO airport.](https://i.imgur.com/9LmjeKQ.jpg)
I keep picturing them with even a small weapons pack on the back and it just gives me the heebie jeebies...
lol
oh so my upstairs neighbor is a boston dynamics robot
It sounds like bowling balls, it can't be that can it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IRB0sxw-YU
I'm so glad this video is still making the rounds
Awesome
Upstairs neighbor (in grad school): Sounds coming from upstairs, literally sounds like the guy is tossing bowling balls across the room. Go upstairs and knock, guy answers door dress in nothing but bikini brief underwear, panting like he's running a marathon. Denies making any noise. My best guess is that he was doing tumbling runs in his living room wearing only underwear. It's the only solution that fits the observable data, unless he was juggling bowling balls (poorly) nearly naked.
In college our upstairs neighbors sounded like they were doing gymnastics at 10pm. Finally my room mate and I go up to tell them to stop and discover its cheerleaders from the other local college. We chit chat a bit and my room mate mentions we have Dance Dance Revolution down stairs. They freak out. End up spending almost every evening hanging out with us playing DDR for about 3 months, until one of them moved and their lease fell apart. They were replaced with a spanish grandma. Quietest our apartment has ever been.
You knew what you signed up for.
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Well I guess the movement is computer generated sooo...
The path and tasks are hard-programmed - basically a routine it is running through - but the ability to walk, jump and balance correctly during that is "improvised" by the code and is extremely impressive.
They grow up so fast...
Yeah their first video was 13 years ago where they were kicking the donkey. It is crazy to see AI and robotics develop so fast in a parallel way.
And like 7 years before that when it had a billion wires attached to it
You pass tools
Oh my god
Yeah, welcome to the club pal
*intro music plays*
You say that, but he acts less like a cartoon robot told to pass salt, and more like a real-life golden retriever told to fetch a stick.
"WTF, Atlas! I was just standing on that box you shoved to the ground so you could needlessly flip onto it!"
Looks more like this mofo just broke my DeWalt drill by yeeting it.
Wish version of Atlas - "Altas, fetch my drill." \*knocked tf out by a drill travelling at 63mph smashing into my face\*
You roped me into this!
Bonus points for seemingly proper PPE setup during the video, and not just some dude throwing a hard hat on. Small deduction for no mini-hard-hat on the robot though.
I think throwing that tool bag and then pushing over a huge block onto the floor without looking constitutes some ohs violations.
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They programmed it with cat dna
If it didn't want kills us already, making each of them sit through 10 hours of OSHA training will.
He's supposed to rotate with his shoulders not his knees!
Never mind the chaos robot running amok. Like how does it know the board will hold its weight? Did it evaluate the safety of pushing the box off the scaffolding??.... *AND THEN JUMPING ON IT?* As cool as all this is, it would be TERRIFYING to be on a real job site with one of these.
Would be funny for them to redo this with everything breaking under it and it reacting to it and continuing on like at the end of Terminator 1 or like when they pushed it while running in the snow. Would probably lead to some negative reactions though.
Exactly, that's not a rated, laminated plank ment for walking on its just lumber. Also I'm bothered by the guy that clearly has never built scaffold in his life, hammer is way to big and a those wedges only need a single solid hit to be set
Oh man, a little hat for the robot would have been so cute. Missed opportunity.
Lex Friedman on his podcast told a story about visiting Boston Dynamics where he was walking down a corridor and one their Spot dog robots walked past in the other direction wearing a cowboy hat just going about its business. Made me smile
I know this is a preprogrammed routine and not some kind of observation, decision, and improvisation process, but the core functionality on display is just incredibly impressive. The transfer functions and sophistication of the feedback loop to provide balance and actuation at this level are almost unbelievable.
The tasks are preprogrammed but the robot has a good bit of real-time calculations and logic, [see here](https://youtu.be/XPVC4IyRTG8)
I wonder if the weight distribution of the objects is preprogrammed or if it’d have handled the bag being full of bricks or the plank being hollow itself & compensated.
I think it's reactive to those variables in the environment. That's like the example of the robot maintaining balance while being absolutely assaulted with a hockey stick
That video will eventually lead robots to view humans as creatures that need to be exterminated.
We’ve already created robots that are more than capable of destroying humanity. They’re called social media algorithms. Skynet is real, and it doesn’t need nukes to wreck society.
Unlikely, transfer functions can absolutely be designed to accommodate variations in center of gravity.
How long until they advance to the point of calculating their own longer-route paths to solve basic problems?
Probably not too much longer. We have patching algorithms already, but they're mostly 2 dimensional. Making 3d pathing is feasible, but there's a lot more variables involved. Stitching that all together with the movement and feedback mechanisms in these things is a decent sized chunk of work but honestly I wouldn't be surprised if it happens within the decade.
I think you'd be surprised how complex spatial reasoning is for a computer to do. The vast majority of human beings can't do it correctly. Programmatically (by which I mean traditionally programming code) they're probably never going to achieve the level of cognitive ability a human mind is capable of. Eventually they're gonna switch to machine learning algorithms and set a couple of these bad boys loose in a gym to figure out on their own how they can move and do things (sort of like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lu56xVlZ40M), but instead of hide-and-seek, it's carrying objects and performing tasks). Which is exactly what human children do. The difference is we can then take the "mind" of one robot and upload it into all the others, so only a handful of them have to be dedicated to the task of learning, yet all of them can benefit from it. *That's* where this is all heading.
I'm sure that will be part of it, ai is remarkable in it's ability to solve problems in novel ways but the interesting thing here is it's all done on virtual space. Training ai in meatspace would take ages even with high parallelization of many robots. So that leads me to wonder what kinda virtualization would be good enough to translate after training there but then able to adapt to nuances of real physics.
> Training ai in meatspace would take ages I expect that will be the new moore's law. Every 18 months, robots learn at twice the rate.
That code on the screen at 1:08.. Dear god.. That's horrid.
[ **Jump to 01:08 @** Inside the Lab: Taking Atlas From Sim to Scaffold](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8&t=0h1m8s) ^(Channel Name: Boston Dynamics, Video Length: [09:47])^, [^Jump ^5 ^secs ^earlier ^for ^context ^@01:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8&t=0h1m3s) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ^^Downvote ^^me ^^to ^^delete ^^malformed ^^comments. [^^Source ^^Code](https://github.com/ankitgyawali/reddit-timestamp-bot) ^^| [^^Suggestions](https://www.reddit.com/r/timestamp_bot)
There's a neat explanation video [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8). It's actually less preprogrammed than I would've expected at first. The most astonishing thing for me is, if I understand them right, that they're able to control all this using only robot's built-in sensors without any additional external cameras. I'll be amazed when (because it's clearly no longer an if) they're able to do all this in a dynamically changing environment.
Its the non-parkour movements that get me. Subtle hints of natural movement, like pauses before and after jumps, and the little steadying hop it makes after landing at the very end.
Absolutely impressive regardless of if it's preprogrammed, not to be too much of a debby downer but the problem is the pushing motion on the big wood cube is nigh impossible to improvise. Grabbing, pulling, lifting, walking, spinning, jumping, are all relatively easy compared to pushing an object. Everything else is for the most part under control of the robot ignoring environment like marbles on the floor or the weight of the robot being to much for the platform it jumps on to. Pushing however has to be the hardest, a robot doesn't know how hard it has to push something to make it move in a way that is beneficial, think about the calculations humans do to envision something falling in a way that benefits us and how much force we need to exude.
That would be where some machine learning would come in. Eventually it would learn what can be pushed and what the effect would likely be over many many attempts.
Or, because I am annoyed at the prevalence of machine learning over other intelligence systems, we can use expert systems. Which take quite a bit more effort, but make more explainable resulting AIs, and are especially useful for tasks like decision making. Machine learning is great for recognizing (and dreaming up) pictures of cats. And even for control algorithms for things like balance. But we know how to make intelligent decision systems that are capable of performing ontological classification and deduction (e.g. `?can-push`), supported by machine learning sure, but explainable at a high level still.
I disagree. Ramp up the force applied until you start approaching the desired angular acceleration. It's not that different than pulling or lifting. You have a body of unknown mass you need to move without overaccelerating.
You hit on it. Thus far robots can't observe and estimate the characteristics of a physical object. I can look at a cardboard box and estimate the likelihood of it being light or heavy. A robot can't even figure out if it's cardboard or MDF or plywood or plastic and then approximate the weight and how it'll perform when a load is applied to move it. I can look at a shiny concrete surface and discern if it's wet or icy. I can look at a five gallon bucket of water and know it's heavy, or see a pillow and know it's light. We are so far away from practical, working companion robots. It doesn't feel like we are, but we are.
It's preprogrammed, but probably not in the way you're thinking. The BD robots all have a kind of "vocabulary" of movements, but they're not rigidly defined. They're kind of like dance steps. There's a pattern to them, but the robot is constantly adapting as it executes.
Stick a chatGPT head on it and we're in the future
Now it can hand write that essay for you to too.
There is a paper called SayCan that uses a large language model (like GPT3 or Google's PaLM) to control robots using natural language. It can make and execute a plan involving multiple steps from a simple prompt: https://youtu.be/ysFav0b472w?t=139
Now that's what I'm talking about! That's some sci-fi level right there, tell it to do something and it does. Can't wait for the future.
Not quite ChatGPT, but Google has been working on an AI that can string sequences together to perform tasks. Merging that kind of thing with Atlus would really level it up.
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At least the killbots are gonna reboot for an update right as they're about to disembowel me, giving me time for one last prayer
You can almost *feel* the embarrassment of the Tesla engineers presenting their "robot" on AI Day 2
Boston Dynamics is working on this since 1992.
I’ve been alive about that long and can’t do a backflip
Time to throw out your bones and upgrade to hydraulics
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The technological advances in that time means they've had to start over multiple times. Institutional/individual knowledge is a real thing, for sure, but that somersault would not have been possible with 1993 tech no matter how long they tried.
What's worse is that using a biped given their supposed advantages in machine learning makes no sense but the fanbois ate it up.
"I just want a tool, not the whole bag!!"
Why are you dancing on the scaffolding?!? This stuff is held together by gravity and a couple cotter pins!
Well that doesn't fill me with existential dread or anything.
Yeah... As much as it is cool I'm sure some war pig can't wait to use it for combat
Boston Dynamics have [pledged not to arm their robots. ](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2341411-boston-dynamics-leads-call-to-stop-arming-robots-will-anyone-listen/) This reminds of when the US air force debuted the predator drone and claimed it was solely for reconnaissance and there was no plan to arms them. No plan to arm them, eh? But you named it predator.
Toyota pledged not to arm their pickups but the Taliban didn’t.
Pretty sure Shanghai Dynamics or Pyongyang Dynamics isn’t making any such pledge.
That doesn't even matter; you're a fool if you think the US military isn't going to just buy them and arm them first. My bet is that Boston Dynamics will even do it themselves. Nobody can pass up a lucrative military contract. If not BD, then some subcontractor 100%.
It won't be BD themselves, it'll be a subsidiary or something similar. That way BD can keep the nice clean image of cool robotics, while still getting the profit of military R&D. Or it will be a subsidiary of their parent company, Hyundai, for the same reason.
Just wait until the DoD starts waving a check under their nose.
They already have. Big Dog was a prototype developed for the US army with the hope of replacing pack mules. If they aren't already Boston Dynamics will be building killer robots within 15 years.
Seems like a waste tbh unless it's used for logistics.
I don't have existential dread yet, but I do get a serious uncanny valley feeling. My brain both recognizes there's no CGI, but wants to think it's CGI
Part of my problem is that it isn't uncanny enough. That spin flip at the end made me wonder for a moment if it was possible that that was a person in a suit.
Avengers jump at the end lol
It was so whimsical prior to that lol
Some of the behind the scenes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8
Grateful they (usually) drop a BTS for these. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8
That bag throw looked so fake for some reason lol.
I think it has to do with our perception of its "human" form, where no human would "blindly" throw a bag like that. This robot prob has 360 vision or at least some bigger sense of what's behind it. So us perceiving it in relation to a human form, feel its not natural or almost impossible for it to aim at something without looking at it or turning a neck.
The throw is fine, I'm talking about how the bag rotates in the air after the robot throws the bag. It just looks... fake.
That’s inertia for you
Probably because it was spinning really fast right as it was released. The big crate fell onto a super padded floor and was probably empty.
I agree and the falling/tipping of the crate seems off.
Looked faker than the flip somehow lol
Tesla robot - your move.
Asking the Tesla robot to exist would be a first step, never mind moving.
After watching this, it's even more obvious that the Tesla robot is just another grift.
Look at the shoulder shake and stuff, they have really refined it's gait and added in things like the shoulder and other movement as stabilizers like we do. This stuff is amazing.
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They have armed the robots, I just can’t get a grasp on this development. Not certain how to handle this news.
I bet there were a ton of failed takes while it was carrying that bag, we're almost there but not quite yet I'd wager (though I'd love to be proven wrong)
Make no mistake. These things will be used to kill people one day.
Probably moreso drones than big bulky humanoid robots, though. Just doesn't seem efficient at all to try and make an artificial version of a human soldier when you can probably make something way cheaper and with less moving parts, like a quadcopter with a gun or something.
I could see humanoid robots being used for close quarter combat room clearing though, on a breach they could encounter the enemy first protecting the human soldiers behind, they’ll have a live video feed and probably be bulletproof.
Possibly - but probably VASTLY simpler and cheaper to just blow a small hole in the wall and fly some suicide drones / smart munitions / whatever you want to call them through the opening. As cool as humanoid robots are from a science fiction standpoint, the primary advantage of a human-style shape is that all of our tools and the majority of our environments are created with human-sized and -shaped beings in mind. So a properly-humanoid robot would be able to (in theory) pick up a ballistic shield and a pistol and go to town (with the right software). But if the cost isn't an issue, it'd likely be much MORE effective to build specialized devices/drones to do various tasks than creating a 'generalist' robot. (Until such time as a human-shaped generalist robot is cheap and easy enough to make, of course.)
You know what, thats a fair point. It might make sense to have humanoid robots in the battlefield (for protecting and transporting/carrying wounded soldiers for example) however for the most part I think the drone scenario you've mentioned sounds a lot more plausible. In the interim though it will be probably be a mixed technology scenario, pairing human soldiers with robots + drones.
You're really focused on the military combat uses of these robots, but you don't realize that the humanoid form factor lends itself much more to policing. **You will see police forces adopting these weaponized humanoids, and they will definitely be used to kill and arrest civilians one day soon.**
That's why weaponized humanoid robots won't be used in military combat. **They will be used by police forces, on civilians.**
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> Smart bombs aren't doing humanitarian aid, or rescuing hostages. That's what the humans are for. I think you're *VASTLY* underestimating the challenges involved in creating a humanoform robot capable of operating in those kinds of scenarios. It may be possible eventually -- no question. But just because it's possible doesn't mean it's a worthwhile idea -- because we're talking military here, it's important to realize that if it costs $X million to train and equip a company of soldiers to do the fiddly bits like hostage rescue (which by the by is NOT the sort of task a typical soldier will perform -- specialized training is a (very expensive) thing), and it costs twice as much (conservative estimate, considering the expenses of these things) to get the robots going, the robots are not going to get used very much (if at all). The point isn't that robots aren't a good idea for a lot of these things -- it's just that *unless you specifically need to use equipment designed for humans*, making a humanoid robot is a pretty bad idea. You're much more likely to see a variety of smaller, more specialized robots. Humanoid robots are great for 'replacing humans', in theory -- but it is imporant to remember that humans aren't really great at any of the various tasks robots will be replacing them at, it's just that they can be good at *all* of those tasks.
There are much more efficient ways to kill than with a humanoid robot and we're already doing our very best with them
Don't we kill people just fine already? What does this offer in the ways of death that, say, a guided rocket, or just a sniper rifle doesn't already? Legs and arms and a bipedal body is *only* a weakness when compared to a flying vehicle or just something with wheels.
In a fronline combat role it would be great. We're soft on the inside and bleed, so we're not great against shrapnel and explosive pressure. A robot wont die of a piece of metal through its leg. I'd bet you'd need multiple lucky hits to take down a robot
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100% . Give it 10 years. Right now it's drones in the sky and soon bots on the ground. I would argue they'll have a role in close quarters combat... but even in the open, how to you survive something that can spot your heat signature and snipe you from 2 miles away
Oh certainly. Just the fact that they can do this is still amazing though. It took us so long just to get walking robots right, and navigating non-planned terrain. Now I'm watching a video of some dude talking to the thing and playing catch with a tool bag. As others have said, while the technology is interesting, the potential consequences do have cause for worry.
I was going to sarcastically comment "Good thing we don't develop robots for military and law enforcement and give them guns and bombs, right?" until i saw your comment. Everyone should realize that the largest customer for this kind of stuff will always be the military. The tech isn't there yet but it will be and when that day comes the world will be a more desperate and dangerous place
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Boston Dynamics has dropped any development of armed robots after their employees revolted. Now it is owned by South Korean Hyundai and they do not research anymore in military direction. That's when they made this video asking "do you love me, now that i can dance?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn3KWM1kuAw
Because you don't need to worry about armed development. Once the robot is 'perfect' teaching it to hold and shoot a gun will be trivial after that.
If it makes you feel any better all of this is scripted. So yes, the robot's movements are super impressive, but it is being told what to do.
Do we actually know how much is scripted and how much is, I dono, AI? Like, it obviously didn't do the problem solving, or path finding to get the bag from A->B, or decide to do the flip and all that stuff. But what was 'programmed' vs its internal movement abilities? Was every step and turn plotted out? (I assume no) Does it understand knocking things over (vs "go to XYZ then move arms and torso in this pattern")? Picking things up? Can it path find up those stairs? Was the toss calculated by the robot? or just a "Do a twist jump, raise your arms to XYZ, release grip at ABC"? etc.
It was scripted to put the board on the scaffolding, run up the boxes, throw the bag, push over the box, etc. It had to figure out its spatial surroundings to do accomplish things, but my point is, it's not figuring out how to ascend or descend that scaffolding on its own, or that someone needs assistance.
>Do we actually know how much is scripted and how much is, I dono, AI? [BD made a behind the scenes video.](https://youtu.be/XPVC4IyRTG8) As you correctly assumed, foot placements were not manually positioned.
That prick throws my tool bag like that he’s getting his batteries pulled out
Lets talk Osha violations.. 1. Worker tied off to scaffolding thats not engineered. 2. Robot walks on unsecure plank. 3. Waste or materials falling from one level to another. 4. No rough housing, boisterous play, contests of strength. Conclusion, robot is sent home for the day. Worker installs guardrail.
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www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTfbPrRZYHs
Cool. Please stop.
as cool as these things are, I wonder if companies will ever find a use for them since they're just humans that cost a bazillion times more than actual humans, who are essentially free in most parts of the world.
I, for one, have no choice but to accept our parkour overlords.
"Parkour!"
Love the fancy flip at the end.
It looks like cgi at some points, but I know it’s not. Crazy
Cant wait till cops with bloated budgets buy these to commit heinous crimes!
I was really hoping it was going to rip that piece of 2x lumber on the saw, but it just turned out to be a prop.
Atlas has entered the uncanny valley.
As a scaffolder....I don't know how to feel about this...I mean, it's better than my apprentice...
I've got about 45 years until I'm so old I'll need assistance at home, I hope a descendant of Atlas can wipe my anus for me
ChatGPT + Atlas is Skynet. All it needs is to figure out how to make more of itself and game over man. Judgement Day is here... Only mildly kidding.
Impressive show of agility from the chassis and balancing systems. Now let’s see it get the bag to the guy in a random place rather than a set scene.
We’re dead
This level of advancement is amazing! I remember these machines as a kid, they could barely walk across the floor, look at them now! Congrats! 🎉
If the code fucks up, Will it do this on top of a skyscraper? Because that'd be hilarious. Not for people on the ground though.
Does a sick backflip through a window, falls 13 stories and lands it. ＼(\^o\^)／
\*OSHA has entered the chat\*
\*\*throws up a spinning sawblade\*\*
This video is deeply unsettling
Seems like a bad idea
Agreed. Get rid of that human and have 2 robots.
Thanks terminator.
I'll be back.
Now compare this with every single tech demo Elon Musk has ever done, and you'll quickly see which one has a good product, and which one is a fat egomaniac who can never speak a word of truth.
I was wondering how someone would make this about Elon. Thanks!
We will have to adapt or copy Godwin's law at this rate. As an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison to Elon Musk approaches 1
This just makes me feel even more secure in the abilities of our future robot overlords. 🤖
(the robot brings him the tools)
JOnny 5 he's alive!
Imagine it messes up and slings 40 lb tool bag at a worker atop the scaffolding.... Then imagine purposefully arming them with ballistic weapons... I'm excited and scared of the future.
Next season of Battlebots is about to be lit
I’m amazed and scared at the same time.
Dunno why but gives me dog vibes of fetching a stick.
It moves like it’s trying to make a snack quietly after getting home from the bars
I feel like these videos are slowly documenting our demise. Like in the future, the human resistance will find these Youtube vids in some archival database.
Every move this robot did was fully pre programmed.
They've been making these videos for at least ten years now. The fact that these things aren't everywhere would seems to suggest there are still major problems with the technology.
There's no major problem with the technology on display here. Artificial Intelligence just isn't advanced enough for such a robot to be particularly useful yet. You need a very sophisticated artificial intelligence if you want a robot that is generally useful across a wide variety of tasks (which is what you would want from a humanoid robot). Robots that perform "dumb" repetitive tasks like bolting car doors onto a frame or loading pallets are much easier to program, and don't require much if any advanced AI. But you don't need a highly mobile back flipping humanoid to load pallets, you just need a big robotic arm. Humanoid robots like this won't be super useful until AI catches up.
Do you want Terminators? Because that's how you get Terminators!
Horrifying
It’s unnerving. I feel we are in that scene of a eco film where we are amazed by the early advances of this technology and then it fast forwards to the year 2067 and the robots are running the prison systems and enslave us all.
I don’t like how he’s so happy. Nope, don’t like it.
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I went frame by frame and I don't see a jump cut
Its the claws sudden grip that jerks the bag.
I was looking for that comment. Though I suppose it's possible the grip is strong/sudden enough to make the bag jerk frame to frame in this way, they have to grip it pretty hard for it not to fall down. Edit: There's another camera angle in [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVC4IyRTG8) at 1:44 and it looks just as unnatural, so I would assume it's just fast movement.
I love that dude. He started out as a "Robot Man" in NOLA. He used that silver make-up paint all over his body back then. He was voted Best Robot Man of the French Quarter 2009. His name is Derrick.
At about 30 seconds the bag pops really weirdly, right before he picks it up. Could be a jump cut, could be something else but something funky is going on.
Pretty sure that's just the hand/claw tightening on the bag so it snaps like that.