Free Republic

As we reach the middle of the 21st century, half the population of the world will lose their job to a machine. The latest comes from Moshe Vardi, professor at Rice University , Houston, who delivered a talk to the American Association for the Advancement of Science , exploring the question: "If machines are capable of doing almost any work humans can do, what will humans do?" Vardi reckons that half of workers across the globe will be replaced by machines within the next 30 years, wiping out middle-class jobs and "exacerbating inequality". He noted that robots would take over...

South Korean auto giant Hyundai Motor Group has unveiled a wearable robot that can be applied in many areas including military and production lines, the company announced on Friday. "This wearable robot that we are developing for commercial purposes will be used in diverse areas," a company official said. ... The wearable robot under development is known to help the controller by enhancing overall physical strength, making it possible to lift an object weighing over 60 kg and assist him or her walk and go up stairs. It can be used in assisting people with disabilities and the elderly to...

Robot Waiters Fired for Incompetence in China Customers liked them, but they couldn't carry soup. Adam Toobin April 6, 2016 The world may not be ready for restaurant robots — yet. At least two restaurants in Guangzhou, China have fired their teams of artificially intelligent robot waiters after discovering the machines were unable to keep up with their human staff. “The robots weren’t able to carry soup or other food steady and they would frequently break down. The boss has decided never to use them again,” an employee at one of the restaurants told the Worker’s Daily. The humanoid bots...

China’s uptake of industrial robots is set to rise rapidly in the coming years as higher labour costs and the heightened aspirations of workers push manufacturers to embrace automation. The development may add to fears that workers in poorer countries are most in danger of being displaced by automation, with analysis by Citi and the Oxford Martin School, a research and policy unit of the UK university, published earlier this year suggesting that more than 75 per cent of jobs in China are at a “high risk” of computerisation. Mirae Asset Management, an Asia-focused house with $75bn of assets, predicts...

Google owned Schaft unveils new bipedal robot at NEST2016 in Tokyo.

The Pentagon’s No. 2 civilian official said Wednesday that the Defense Department is concerned that adversary nations could empower advanced weapons systems to act on their own, noting that while the United States will not give them the authority to kill autonomously, other countries might. Deputy Defense Secretary Robert O. Work said the Pentagon hasn’t “fully figured out” the issue of autonomous machines, but continues to examine it. The U.S. military has built a force that relies heavily on the decision-making skills of its troops, but “authoritarian regimes” may find weapons that can act independently more attractive because doing so...

Twitter trolls made a dummy out of Microsoft’s artificial intelligence chat robot, which learns through public interaction, by turning it into a pro-Nazi racist within a day of its launch. Tay, the artificial intelligence (AI) robot, had a bug in which it would at first repeat racist comments, then it began to incorporate the language in its own tweets. ...The robot, made to sound like a teenage girl, targeted 18- to 24-year-olds, “the dominant users of mobile social chat services” in the United States, the page says.... Soon after, Tay was tweeting, “Hitler was right I hate the jews” and...

What happens when one of the world’s biggest software companies lets an artificially intelligent chatbot learn from people on Twitter? Exactly what you think will happen. Microsoft’s Technology and Research and Bing teams launched a project on Wednesday with Twitter, Canada’s Kik messenger and GroupMe: a chatbot called Tay that was built using natural language processing so that it could appear to understand the context and content of a conversation with a user. Targeting the 18-to-24-age demographic, its aims were simple: “Tay is designed to engage and entertain people where they connect with each other online through casual and playful...

What happens when one of the world’s biggest software companies lets an artificially intelligent chatbot learn from people on Twitter? Exactly what you think will happen. Microsoft’s Technology and Research and Bing teams launched a new project on Wednesday with Twitter, Canada’s Kik messenger and GroupMe: A chatbot called Tay that was built using natural language processing so that it could appear to understand the context and content of a conversation with a user. Aimed at the 18-24 demographic, its aims were simple: “Tay is designed to engage and entertain people where they connect with each other online through casual...

Video (2:16) at link. This robot has the most realistic facial expressions I've yet seen. Just imagine this technology in 20 years.

Dr. David Hanson leads the engineers and designers that created Sophia, the team's most advanced android to date. Sophia's lifelike skin is made from patented silicon and she can emulate more than 62 facial expressions. Cameras inside her "eyes," combined with computer algorithms, enable her to "see," follow faces and appear to make eye contact and recognize individuals.

As minimum wages across the country rise and restaurants face increased labor costs, one fast food CEO is thinking about replacing human workers with robots. Carl's Jr. head honcho Andy Puzder wants to open a new restaurant concept that's "employee-free," reports Business Insider. Puzder was inspired by a visit to Eatsa, the futuristic San Francisco-born restaurant where patrons order via tablet and retrieve their food from automated cubbies. He believes the idea of a restaurant free of social interaction could be especially appealing to millennials, noting that young people seem particularly fond of ordering from kiosks over humans.

When it comes robots, humans can be a little too trusting. In a series of experiments at Georgia Tech that simulated a building fire, people ignored the emergency exits and followed instructions from a robot -- even though they'd been told it might be faulty. The study involved a group of 42 volunteers who were asked to follow a "guidance robot" through an office to a conference room.They weren't told the true nature of the test. The robot sometimes led participants to the wrong room, where it did a couple of circles before exiting. Sometimes the robot stopped moving and...

While there are fears robots may rise up to take over the world if artificial intelligence progresses too quickly, some of us may find ourselves simply marrying machines in the future. A leading computer scientist has predicted that as robots become more human-like, people may start turning to them for companionship. His predictions mirror the plot of the hit TV series Humans, where people formed emotional attachments to robots brought in to help out around the home.

If the Department of Labor continues to make it difficult for companies to hire American workers, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) warned, robots would take over key jobs in the economy. During a town hall in Okatie, S.C., Rubio warned that the Department of Labor was too big, too powerful, and turned into “anti-business agency” that hurt the private sector.

We don't incessantly stare at other people when we speak to them, and we don't expect them to stare back. Programming companion robots to understand this kind of social protocol is tricky but crucial, according to researcher Sean Andrist, a Ph.D. student at the University of Wisconsin's Department of Computer Sciences. An interesting write-up over at IEEE Spectrum details Andrist's research, which involves the "gaze mechanisms" that we humans take for granted when interacting with one another. The goal is to improve the function of both physical humanoid robots and virtual avatars by establishing rules that govern when, why and...

The Japanese lettuce production company Spread believes the farmers of the future will be robots. So much so that Spread is creating the world's first farm manned entirely by robots. Instead of relying on human farmers, the indoor Vegetable Factory will employ robots that can harvest 30,000 heads of lettuce every day. Don't expect a bunch of humanoid robots to roam the halls, however; the robots look more like conveyor belts with arms. They'll plant seeds, water plants, and trim lettuce heads after harvest in the Kyoto, Japan farm. "The use of machines and technology has been improving agriculture in...

The video shows the robot solving the Rubik's Cube at times of 1.196 seconds, 1.152 seconds, 1.047 seconds and 1.019 seconds, as the machine displayed not just extreme speed in the task, but also consistency in keeping the solving time between 1 second and 1.2 seconds. The machine is built using 3D-printed frames, stepper motors, and four USB web cameras that are connected to a PC. The cameras scan the Rubik's Cube to begin analyzing the puzzle through the Kociemba solving algorithm, and the solution is then carried out by the robot in lightning fast movements. The Rubik's Cube being...

The US army says it has mothballed plans to deploy a robot developed in conjunction with Google because it is "too loud". The Legged Squad Support System, referred to by some as "the big dog," is capable of carrying 400lbs (181.4kg) of equipment over rugged terrain. But the US Marines now say its petrol-powered engine is too noisy for them to use in battle. ... The LS3 was developed by Boston Dynamics, a robotics firm acquired by Google in 2013 - as part of a tie-up with the Pentagon's research arm, the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa). The robot...

Nadine is loaded with intelligent "assistant" software similar to Siri and Cortana, with her own moods and emotions. She can also remember the people she'd met before and the contents of their conversation. Professor Thalmann's robotic doppelganger was developed to become a personal assistant or a companion for kids and the elderly in the future. She believes social robots like her creation could eventually become real-life C-3POs "with knowledge of language and etiquette." For now, she and her team are putting Nadine to work as a receptionist at the university