It's a Bird, It's a Plane ... No, It's Super Robot

May 24 2008 / by juldrich
Category: Business & Work Year: 2017 Rating: 3 Hot

By Jack Uldrich

Cross-posted from www.jumpthecurve.net

There’s that old saying that if walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it’s a duck. Well, in the future, things are going to get a little more confusing. Soon, devices will walk like humans; feel like humans and see like humans, but that won’t mean it is a human.

To this point, I simply refer you to a handful of articles that were published only this morning. The first explains how researchers at Delft University in the Netherlands have developed a robot that walks like a human. The next article documents how researchers have constructed a new pet robot that communicates with humans only by touch. Lastly, there was this report outlining how advances in image recognition technology is improving to the point where computers and robots will soon be as good (and eventually even better) than humans at recognizing the images around them.

If you consider how all of these advances are likely to converge with one another, it is easy to understand how robots might soon be seeing, feeling, walking and even jumping their way around us.

To this last point about jumping, check out this short video which demonstrates how a tiny robot can already leap – kind of like Superman – “taller than the tallest building” :