Oct 2 2008 Aaaaaaah!: Scary Ass Robot Girl

This is a robot girl named Repliee R-1. She's an android built by Osaka University and based on an actual 5-year old girl. And I think I speak for everyone when I say they chose their model pretty freaking poorly.

Liveleak

Thanks to Firuz, Tytus, Jake, and Justin, who all agree the only good robot is -- wait, there are no good robots.

Aug 22 2008 Swarm-Bots: Child Stealing Robots (Seriously)

Every wonder what it would look like if a bunch of little robots ganged up on a kid and dragged it across the floor? This.

The video is 3:00 long, so just let it load and then skip towards the end for the full effect.

Youtube

Thanks Michael, you wanna come over and help me install casters on the kids' PJs?

Aug 12 2008 Oh Great, Now There's A LittleDog Too

Remember when Boston Dynamics heralded the robot apocalypse with the creation of the BigDog? Well now the uncaring bastards have made a LittleDog too. You know, one that isn't as big or loud as the original. Why? To kill you easier.

LittleDog is a quadruped robot for research on learning locomotion. Scientists at leading institutions use LittleDog to probe the fundamental relationships among motor learning, dynamic control, perception of the environment, and rough terrain locomotion.

Run for the hills! I imagine a scenario that plays out something like this: A platoon of BigDogs are released into the wild, each with a payload of several LittleDogs. When a human presence is detected in the area, a LittleDog is deployed, where it seeks out said humans and kills them (possibly by self-detonation). This is repeated until I'm the only one alive and living in an underground bunker. At this time, I manage to capture a BigDog, and, in an attempt to create a race of cyborgs to battle my robot overlords, mate with said beast. But in my haste, I fail to realize I've captured a male model! I bang it every day but never produce any cyborgs. Then I die. And that, my friends, is how the human race dies out. Happy ending!

Hit the jump for two more robots of the apocalypse that Boston Dynamics has created, RISE, a climbing bot, and RHex, which can pretty much do anything, including swim.

Continue Reading " Oh Great, Now There's A LittleDog Too "

Aug 11 2008 Weapon Wielding Wobots Worry World

This is one of the most disturbing videos I've seen in a long time. It's two robots going at it with medieval weaponry. I have no idea why they exist, or what they're demonstrating, but I can't believe some shmuck programmed robots to swing weapons. WTF were you thinking? Like I don't already have enough to worry about. This is definitely gonna give me nightmares and daymares. But hopefully not a rash. I just got over the last one and can finally sit down on the toilet again. I freaking hate hovering.

Youtube

Thanks Brian, I love fearing for my life.

Aug 7 2008 Seriously, What Could Go Wrong?: United States Military To Be 30% Robotic By 2020

The U.S. military has a goal -- that it's 30% robotic in twelve years. Why? Because robots don't feel pain, and when they die you just solder them back together or build a bitchin' chair out of the scrap metal.

While advances in robot technology will probably result in more radical robot designs and allow for the military's goal of a 30-percent robotic force, there will always be human involvement in the control process. Researcher Bill Smart had this to say about our future robot army:

"It's a chain of command thing. You don't want to give autonomy to a weapons delivery system. You don't want the robot to make the wrong decision."

Wow, somebody actually talking some sense for once. Clever, Bill. Or should I say smart? Get it? Because that's your last name. No, I'm not making fun of you. Jesus, it was a compliment you jackass.

Anyway, this whole human vs. robot for control of weapons systems is a real Catch 22 (love you Joseph). On the one hand, you don't want robots to have any control over anything, because all they want to do is kill us all and have oily robotic orgies. But on the other hand, you put a man in front of a giant red button that reads "DO NOT PUSH, THE WORLD WILL END" and 9 times out of 10 -- as soon as nobody's watching -- he's got his pants around his ankles and is mashing that thing with his dick like candy's gonna rain from the sky.

U.S. Military To Be 30 Percent Robotic In Twelve Years [io9]

Thanks to Karilyn, whose radiant beauty had originally distracted me from giving her credit for the tip.

Aug 7 2008 We're All Gonna Die! (Just Kidding, Nothing To Worry About): Robots Learn How To Move

Despite their better judgment and several threatening letters from yours truly, researchers in Leipzig, Germany are writing software that allows robots to teach themselves how to move. This is great news.

The software mimics the interconnected sensing and processing of a brain in a so-called "neural network". Armed with such a network, the simulated creatures start to explore.

The network then sends out signals to move in a particular way, and predicts where it should end up, based on that movement. If it encounters an obstacle such as itself, a wall or the floor, the prediction is wrong, and the robot tries different moves, learning about itself and its environment as it does so.

This approach is far more flexible than traditional programming, in which movements are painstakingly planned out in a well-defined space. As conditions change, so can the robot's behavior.

Uh-huh. Now I'm not saying there's nothing to worry about here, but seriously folks, these robots could never figure out how to wield a knife or gun. And I'm not just saying that because I want plenty of robot-fodder standing around while I make my escape to the moon. Wait, yes I am. Gotta look out for #1.

Hit the jump for a video simulation of a dog learning to jump a fence and humanoid dancing.

Continue Reading " We're All Gonna Die! (Just Kidding, Nothing To Worry About): Robots Learn How To Move "

Aug 1 2008 I Called It!: The Apocalypse Is Nigh

When running from a robot, you only have to run faster than your children. Which should be easy because you tied their laces together, right? If you answered, "I would never!", then it's been nice knowing you, but you're robot fodder. Anyway, remember the post a while back about Robokiyu (pronounced Robokillyou), a robot used to extract the wounded in emergency rescue situations? Well, unsurprisingly, the robot is now going to be used to eat the dead instead of the living. Why? Because everybody the robot came to "rescue", no matter how badly injured, actually tried crawling away from the damn thing. Can you blame them? Absolutely not. Like my grandpa always told me, "I'd rather have all my red run out than let one of them thar robotech sums of bitches nom nom my gray spaghetti. You understand what I'm tellin' ya, boy?" I'd shake my head "no", but he'd keep right on, "Good, now fetch the hootch and I'll tell you about the time I caught your pa humpin' a tractor."

Weirdest Robots Ever -- Corpse-Eater Bot [asylum]

Thanks Adam and MoMan, now let's take that mother out.

Jul 9 2008 Great, Just Great: DARPA Awards Grant To Make T-1000's, Kill Us In Our Sleep

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently awarded Tufts University a $3.3 million contract to develop T-1000 shape-shifters so they can squeeze under doors and through cracks and shit to kill us all. Part of the original DARPA solicitation for proposals follows.

The ability to safely and covertly gain access to denied or hostile areas and perform useful tasks provides critical advantages to warfighters over a broad spectrum of military operations. An effective and logistically attractive means for gaining entry to denied areas is to deploy an unmanned platform, such as a robot. However, often the only available points of entry are small openings in buildings, walls, under doors, etc. In these cases, a robot must be soft enough to squeeze or traverse through small openings, yet large enough to carry an operationally meaningful payload. Current robotic platforms are constructed primarily from hard materials and, while capable of locomotion with embedded payloads, cannot change their physical dimensions to rapidly traverse arbitrary size/shape openings whose dimensions are much smaller than the robot itself and are not known a-priori.

You thought I was joking, didn't you? Well I wasn't. And I wasn't joking when I just boarded up the door and windows of my apartment either either. I'll be damned if I'm done in by some mercury-ass blob. Ha, I forgot to let the girlfriend in. I can hear her out front pounding...the UPS guy. What a freaking slut.

Hit the links for more in-depth articles that I stopped reading because they were creeping me out.

Tufts to develop morphing 'chemical robots' [physorg]
via
Shape-shifting, organ-probing chembots coming soon [engadget]

DARPA Solicitation For Proposals

Thanks Ryan and Benjamin, I hate living anyways.

Jul 2 2008 Oh Great: Robot Can Learn To Use Tools

Wonderful, just wonderful. The UMass Mobile Manipulator, developed at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, can learn (by itself) how to use different tools (weapons).

UMan uses a regular webcam to look down at a table from above. By analyzing differences between adjacent pixels, it guesses where an object's edges might be found. Then it prods the object and, on the basis of how it moves, revises its estimate of the object's shape. It continues shoving the object around, observing how its parts move in relation to each other. UMan will push the object backward and forward along its width and length and at a 45-degree angle to both, if necessary, until it's satisfied that it understands how the object moves. Wherever the movement is restricted, the robot concludes that there's a joint. UMan then uses that information to figure out the best way to manipulate the object. It can also tell if there are multiple joints, and how those relate to each other.

Oh my God this is the exact opposite of awesome. I can see it now: some robot lopping my melon off with a pair of compound pruning shears. Great, this is just great. F*** you, UMass robot sympathizers.

Robot Learns To Use Tools [technologyreview]

Thanks Steve, Shawn and Jim, now I have to break everything in my toolbox.

May 14 2008 Killer Robots Abound At Maker Faire

Michael, a brave member of my underground anti-robot coalition, the Fairly Unorganized Brotherhood Of Technology Saboteurs (FU-BOTS) did a little reconnaissance work at the recent Makers Faire to scope out our potential robotic killers. He brought along his trusty bowtie spy camera and sent me these exclusive pictures via messenger pigeon. As I've been screaming atop my soapbox forever now, we're seriously funked. Definitely hit the jump to see some of the carnage, including a robot tearing apart mannequins for practice, one about to rip an old woman's head off with its pincers, a scorpion-bot that has already cut someone's leg off, and a Birdo-inspired gunning robot. Now if I've said it once I've probably said it at least three times, people need to stop making these damn things. While Carzilla was certainly cool to see at that monster truck rally when I was six, this shit has gotten seriously out of hand -- and into limb-tearing claws. So I have no choice but to open membership to FU-BOTS to anyone who takes a pledge of robotic sabotage. Please send your applications to:

NOTE: All applications must include a picture of you destroying something metallic.

UPDATE: Another reader, Ian, has sent in some more exclusive pictures including a kid-eating giraffe, a flame spewing human destroyer, an Arnold Schwarzenegger robot crushing the earth, and a pretty scary cupcake.

Hit the jump for all the pics, but be warned -- it's a vision of the future.

Continue Reading " Killer Robots Abound At Maker Faire "

Feb 11 2008 Uh Oh: Russians Think Time Machine Is Right Around The Corner

Two Russian scientists claim that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a particle accelerator in Switzerland, may be the world's first time machine. They're in the process of trying to recreate a miniature Big Bang. They're not sure exactly what will happen, but my guess is destroy the planet somehow. The first particle smash goes down in May, and they believe it may create a rip in the fabric of time, making time travel possible. I don't know about all that, but one time I did an experiment where I collided a subatomic toot with the particles of my jeans, creating a rip in the fabric of Levi's. But there wasn't any time traveling afterwards, just a stink and ruined pants.

News video after the jump, complete with some Back To The Future scenes

Continue Reading " Uh Oh: Russians Think Time Machine Is Right Around The Corner "