tag > Robot
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People in Japan are wearing exoskeletons to keep working as they age (newscientist)
Elderly Japanese workers wearing exoskeletons Japan has one of the largest populations over the age of 65 out of any country, comprising about 26% of the total population (2015). Japan has both the world’s highest life expectancy and the lowest birthrate. As Japan’s workforce continues to decline, the right-wing government of Shinzo Abe has sought to grapple with labor shortages and increased public spending on the senior citizen population by raising the retirement age from 60 to anywhere between 65 and 71.
But now, Japanese tech companies hope to use these exoskeleton suits to allow them to continue their labor well into their advanced age, with some suits costing only $1,300 and allowing people to lift up to 55 pounds. The suit can be charged through a hand pump that fills the “muscles” with pressurized air.
Automotive giant Toyota has also poured funds into its motorized exoskeleton research division, in part out of hopes to support the aging workforce. Panasonic, too, has created the popular Atoun Model Y, a $5,500 suit that adds 22 pounds of lifting force to wearers.
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Robotic Self-Replication - by Matthew S. Moses & Gregory S. Chirikjian (unpaywalled)
Abstract: The concept of an artificial corporeal machine that can reproduce has attracted the attention of researchers from various fields over the past century.Some have approached the topic with a desire to understand biological life and develop artificial versions; others have examined it as a potentially practical way to use material resources from the moon and Mars to bootstrap the exploration and colonization of the solar system. This review considers both bodies of literature, with an emphasis on the underlying principles required to make self-replicating robotic systems from raw materials a reality.We then illustrate these principles with machines from our laboratory and others and discuss how advances in new manufacturing processes such as3-D printing can have a synergistic effect in advancing the development of such systems.
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"People out of Stone" - a brief backstory of modern-day robotics and AI:
In India, it is a tradition amongst certain Tantric sects to anoint their phallic lingam images with oil, milk, and sometimes semen. A similar tradition involving living statues and plaster busts exists in Western culture - at least on a literary level. E.T.A. Hoffman, Edgar Allen Poe, Ambrose Bierce, and Jules Verne amongst others, have reinterpreted the original myth of Pygmalion from Ovid; it can even be seen in the musical 'My Fair Lady'. This tradition fulfills an ancient human dream, that of bringing the dead back to life, either artificially or with the help of the gods of magic. Even today there are hints of it in cybernetics and genetic engineering. Inspired by the attempts of Charles Darwin's grandfather Erasmus Darwin to re-animate dead worms, the nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley wrote the novel 'Frankenstein: or the new Prometheus' which was published in 1818. More on the theme has been written more recently by authors such as Philip K. Dick (as in 'Blade Runner'), Alfred Bester, Stanislaw Lem and Pierre Klossowsky. In Switzerland in 1972, a drama based on the classical myth of Galatea appeared, expressing the eternal dream of a man for a woman who is wholly dedicated to him. In the play, which was a reworking of an 'Alpensaga' (Swiss mountain fairy tale), some farmers create a 'Sennentuntschi', an artificial woman grown in a bottle from a mixture of dung and cheese. Needless to say, Sennentuntschi soon frees herself from their attentions.
In Jewish mysticism, there is the legend of the Golem, which is ultimately based on Psalm 139 verse 16; the story is best known from the mediæval golem created by Rabbi Löw of Prague, as described in Gustav Meyrink's impressive novel The Golem (1915). Golems are reproductions of Adam, formed from the dust of the earth, and they go even further back in Jewish culture, as may be discovered in a commentary on the ancient Cabalistic text the Sefer Yetzirah, as expounded by the eminent scholar Gershom Scholem. The German author of occult and erotic potboilers H.H. Ewers added a sexual twist to the legend with his novel Alraune in 1911. Also in Germany, Paul Wegener directed a film of The Golem in 1915, the first in a series of German films such as Nosferatu, Das Kabinett des Doktor Caligari and Dr. Mabuse which evoked a fascination for evil. Neo-Gnostics and secret societies in Germany and elsewhere got a lot of inspiration from fictional sources such as these - enough for them to devise their own 'Order Secrets'. The concept of the Homunculus, an alchemical mannikin produced in a bottle, was not foreign to Theodor Reuss, the O.T.O.'s founder. The prescribed reading-list for O.T.O. members included G. Herman's work called Genesis - das Gesetz der Zeugung (Genesis - the Law of Procreation) which describes the production of a being "who is realized through the odic power of materialization, and which as odic mist streams from the vulvae, and under the traditional uterine influence easily forms child-souls." The alchemist Paracelsus described his formula for creating a Homunculus using blood and semen, and this has been compared to the consecrated hosts of the Spermo-Gnostics. In 1914 Aleister Crowley wrote his Xth degree instruction De Homunculo Epistola in which he described the homunculus, even though he was less than enthusiastic about it. It is quite possible that he had been inspired by Somerset Maugham, who had published a novel called The Magician in 1907, whose villain Oliver Haddo is based on Crowley; in the novel Haddo manufactures a mad homunculus by devilish arts. Similarly, Crowley himself wrote a novel in 1917 (not published until 1929) called Moonchild, in which sex-magicians create a speaking homunculus with astrological enchantments.
"You are my Creator, but I am your Master — Obey!" - Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
Text is an excerpt from: "Nosferatu's Baby (Much Too Much) Too hot To Handle" - by Peter-R. Koenig
#Comment: It is rather comedic, that generations of highly educated elite men tried to make inanimate matter come alive through ever-evolving complex means. It seem obvious, that the driving psychological force behind such efforts, is a pathological jealousy of men towards women, resulting from the biological inability of males to give birth.
Consider the somewhat related insights, by Robert Anton Wilson: "Elohim," the name for the creative power in Genesis, is a female plural, a fact that generations of learned rabbis and Christian theologians have all explained as merely grammatical convention. The King James and most other Bibles translate it as "God," but if you take the grammar literally, it seems to mean "goddesses." Al Shaddai, god of battles, appears later, and YHWH, mispronounced Jehovah, later still. - Genesis, p. 197
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Advances in neuromorphic computing technology - talk by Steve Furber
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"Technological Masturbation" - by Robert Anton Wilson (1993)
The vibrator — first as shady joke, then a growing fad — has already prepared us for the technologization of sex, so introduction of the artificial sex partner will come as little surprise.
Rudimentary doll-like models are already for sale, one [called the Deep Throat model — naturally] is even capable of performing fairly realistic fellatio. Hedy Lamarr’s autobiography, Ecstasy and Me, reveals that a former lover of hers had a very elaborate imitation Hedy manufactured to give him solace when their affair went on the rocks. Such developments indicate that in sex, as elsewhere, desire plus money equals results — or, as George S. Kaufman once said of a friends‘ new estate, “This is what God could have done, if He’d had the money.”
Are we talking about substitute sex for the crippled, the malformed, the hopelessly ugly or neurotic? Only in the first generation of such technology. Brain-wave and other bio-feedback studies lead inevitably into the concept of cybernetic sex robots programmed to scan neural signals from the human partner and provide exactly, precisely, exquisitely what is desire in every second of sexual union. In fact, reports from Masters and Johnson indicate that their crude and pre-cybernetic [brainless] ACE model [artificial coital equipment] produced no frustration in the women who tried it. Eventually such mechanized substitutes can be programmed for an effect “better than the real thing,” as William S. Burroughs fantasised in his sixties science fiction novel “The Soft Machine.”
In recent years, John Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Baltimore possessed a 100-pound robot affectionately dubbed The Beast, that knows how to “feed” itself, i.e., to seek electric outlets and recharge its circuits when its power runs low. Sim one, an experimental robot at University of Southern California, has the external features of a man, stands over six feet tall and has a normal pulse rate, blood pressure and heartbeat; is white-skin coloured, moves its diaphragm and chest in simulation of breathing, and even possesses a tongue, teeth, and vocal cords. Sim’s keepers plan improved models that will sweat, bleed, cry out in pain, and eventually replace cadavers in training medical students. The Sim One of today combined with the Masters and Johnson ACE of today would already constitute a crude artificial playmate for women. A more complex Hedy Lamarr doll [or Linda Lovelace, or Raquel Welch or..] cannot be far away. [Recall the movie Blade Runner (Philip K. Dick) where NASA coerced Earth’s inhabitants to leave the planet by providing them with a humanoid playmate.]
Yes; why not a totally programmed sexual environment? Saul Kent, who has described this concept as “multi-media masturbation”, envisions sex tapes for the household computer, programmed for the all- around sexual trip — with or without partner. Already, X-rated motels in California provide water beds and closed circuit TV featuring porn films, so that a shy couple can have a simulated orgy and share their real selves with each other and the images of Georgina Spelvin, Harry Reems, and Marilyn Chambers. The next step, easily obtainable for the rich even now, is to program the whole inner environment of the bedroom for a fantasy that goes well with the sex act. ESB control of brain centres via this computer-programmed artificial environment would give, in Burrough’s perfect phrase, “precise control over thought, feeling, and apparent sensory impression” [his italics]. Reality in that room would be whatever you wanted it to be.
Of course, in a sense we already live inside that room, as the Buddhists know. That is, the human nervous system, properly programmed, can edit and orchestrate all experience into any gestalt it wishes. We encounter the same dismal and depressing experience over and over because they are repeating tape loops in the central programmer of our brains. We can encounter ecstasy over and over by learning the neurosciences that orchestrate all incoming signals into ecstatic tape loops. The contact has already happened right where you are sitting now. Whether it is tuned-in or not tuned-in depends on your skill as metaprogrammer.
Multi-media pornography will enthral millions when it first appears; porn light shows, porn 3-D, and porn holograms are the dawning intimations of a revolution that will climax — certainly by the early years of the next century — when the difference between porn and the artificial sex mate will no longer be visible. Multimedia solipsism and all-channel masturbation will be the pleasure norms.
- Technological Masturbation - by Robert Anton Wilson appeared in TOTAL, Volume 2 (1993).
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#Comment: Fun to discover Wilson discussing the idea of cybernetic/augmented total hedonism. A concept people like Robert Nozick explored in "Experience Machine" (1974) or David Pearce in "The Hedonistic Imperative" (1995) or even Daniel Kahneman "Hedonic psychology". Wilson's post includes a reference to the JHAPL's classic robot "The Beast", that knew how to “feed” itself, i.e., to seek electric outlets and recharge its circuits when its power runs low - an idea somewhat related to Shannon's Ultimate Machine, alas far less genius and fun. In my playbook, "augmented" or "optimized" hedonism is an extremely naive and boring concept, which quickly leads to experience mono-cultures and nonsensical discussions around "artificial love" - deep down in a hyper-commercial total-surveillance simulacra of meaningless bullshit. Growing calls to "end suffering through tech" are a clear sign of a crass misunderstanding of the most basic lessons of Buddhism, which such people love to frequently quote (meanings easily lost in translation and history to the gullible seeker). Somewhat related: Samim’s Law of Diminished Experience.
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Recology adds robotics to produce cleaner plastics
"A West Coast operator installed four artificial intelligence units at its high-tech San Francisco MRF. A company manager explained how the machinery is working in conjunction with optical sorters to boost recovery and reduce contamination."
"I don’t get sick. I don’t need breaks, lunches or days off. I work harder, longer and better than anyone else. I’m more accurate and more efficient than anyone could be. Thanks to my intelligent neural network, I’m capable of learning on the job so I can adapt to changing conditions and variables. Lowering costs & improving productivity"
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Long Beach Container Terminal is using $1.5B to build a fully-automated system by 2021. It will handle 2x the freight volumes than before and cut pollution to help reach zero emissions by 2030: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-05-20/in-middle-of-trade-war-america-s-busiest-port-gets-ready-for-robots
PROWLER.io released a whitepaper that shows how probabilistic modeling can be used to solve the supply chain trade problem posed by the logistics of pooled palettes: https://drive.google.com/file/d/182ulJ9LA580wS3btnzTKzSywzbQdoslH/view
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You Can Now Buy Pretend Food for Your $2,900 Sony Robot Dog:
https://us.aibo.com/feature/food.html
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"A paper in Nature demonstrates a 10-gram insect-inspired robot capable of crawling, walking, jumping, somersaulting and performing collective tasks that is built from low-cost, assembly-free components": https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1388-8.epdf?shared_access_token=UtFJe-JelGb0gTinzKDSaNRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0NF4yBunNJWoz8yJqO9lXQeboDqYQij3NdSgRSYZ88M46Sk0WaypinyattrDJ7z9TUdrmYQZOnzNDSyUQFhWqWf4F1NUva_Cm1ZUqTNJAIL2w%3D%3D #Biology #Robot #ALife
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"Light-seeking mobile houseplants raise big questions about the future of technology": https://www.pnas.org/content/116/31/15313
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André Rocha - Farmlabs - What is or can be Open Agriculture? (2017)
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Say Hello to FarmBot Express and Express XL: https://farm.bot/
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FarmBot Can Automate Your Garden with Robotic Farming: https://blog.hackster.io/farmbot-can-automate-your-garden-with-robotic-farming-f62fc174a50e #Robot #Garden #FFHCI
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"MELTANT-α - an avatar robot with the world’s most powerful and flexible robotic hand": https://www.meltin.jp/en/news/202/ #Robot
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"Digital farm business coaching: Small Robot Company offers its robots through a Farming as a Service (FaaS) model, which is both a hardware and a software service for farmers": https://www.smallrobotcompany.com/press-releases/2019/6/26/small-robots-launch-farm-ambition-blueprint-and-100-club-groundswellaguk-gw19 #ML #Robot #Garden
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PEAK CreativeAI, its all downhill from here: Ai Da: I am the world's first robot artist:
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IoT based hydroponics system using Deep Neural Networks:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168169918311839Cyberponics: A fully automated aeroponic greenhouse system: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321874554_Cyberponics_A_fully_automated_aeroponic_greenhouse_system
Deep learning, hydroponics, and medical marijuana: https://www.pyimagesearch.com/2018/10/15/deep-learning-hydroponics-and-medical-marijuana/
Dynamic optimization of water temperature for maximizing leaf water content of tomatoes in hydroponics using an intelligent control technique: http://ijcea.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/20.pdf
Teens create automated aeroponics garden kit with NASA tech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2EzPN3rIn4
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Boston Dynamics: New Robots Now Fight Back:
