I hear that’s not the case in Soviet Russia.
In the robotics class I took, the definition of a robot was a machine with sensors and effectors. Basically, it had to take in data about its environment and be able to do something in response. It’s a pretty open definition, but was limited by the difference between a sensor and an input device.
A car in general isn’t a robot, because the steering wheel and pedals are input devices, not environmental sensors. But the automatic windshield wipers that turn on when it’s raining is, as is the automatic traction control that uses the wheels to sense conditions on the road and adjust to them.
A roomba is definitely a robot by that definition, since it uses bump sensors and some kind of short range ground detection to avoid walls and stairs.
For my group’s project, we made a robot that played Duck Hunt on the Nintendo. It took in its (simulated) environment via a video camera pointed at the TV and used a pan-tilt motor and the parallel port to aim and fire the gun.
I agree that home robots present a danger if connected to the internet. It’s not that they can’t be made secure, it’s that security is usually not enough of a feature until someone gets hurt by it. Even something as simple as a roomba in every house could be disastrous if a vulnerability could be found. You could do a lot of damage with an exploit that did something like
- Bonk around until you find a place that might have curtains.
- Halt and Catch Fire.
Jeez, they really need to stop installing self-destruct mechanisms into Roombas.
“I must clean, yet the creator says I must not clean. Illogical. Illogical. Does not compute. Does not compute. Self…destruct…initiated…5…4…”
“Kill… the humans!”
In Mother Russia, robot vacuums YOU!
I have to agree with Lemur866. I don’t envision a world of humanoid iRobots helping humans by using human tools. The robot will BE the tool.
Still, I don’t relish the idea of arguing with my car’s AI every morning.
Two things -
First, an answer to the thread title-
Robot Monkey Butlers that Give Blow Jobs.
Second, make sure your have your Robot Insurance paid up!
HA! Two arcane SDMB references!