Marvelmind Robotics

Robotics, Evolution and Web 2.0

2006-07-30T12:28:00.000+03:00

I like people talking about Web 2.0! They divert the public's interest from robotics! :-)

Crowded markets... - It is too difficult and messy! Fighting for peanuts when huge prospects are nearby unexplored ::--))

It is much easier quietly developing something and then take the market by surprise revealing nothing particularly new. Revealing something that just works as everyone hoped and wanted... Remember MS Netmeeting?!... And a 5-letter Hsype word used for IP calling nowadays! ::--))

Robotics - mmm, wonderful area! :-)

Some people are still about to realize that everything what civilization has created up to now pushes us towards robotics...

Humans have small weak teeth. They invented long sharp knives.

Humans tire too easily and the are lazy to run. They invented wheels, petrol and cars.

Humans live too far from each other and can't shout loudly enough... They invented radio.

Humans do not cope with math very well. They invented computers.

This is just great!!! Avoiding much pomp humans intentionally or unintentionally step by step develop all needed technology for robotics! I like it so much!!! :-) And I appreciate that people talk about Web 2.0! It is like dreaming about Terminator 2 (BTW, I like it even more than the Terminator), when some people are already shooting The Matrix! ::--))

We are not there yet! I am lacking my tiny, cheap tactile sensors! I don't have small cheap facet eyes among components for my robots. I am not even dreaming of useful taste or olfactory sensors! It may delay my MarvelTime :-) by some years. But it will come! One pulls another. Need of robotics will produce a strong demand for such sensors that currently can't find a market of their own. Chicken-egg thing once again!

Good luck to Web 2.0 that allows me communicating so easily with the whole world! But it's the past! No offense! ::--))

Robotics is Cool! :-)

Robotics <> Mechanics!!!

2006-07-26T16:44:00.000+03:00

A-a-a-a-aaaaa!!!! Robotics is not mechanics!!!! Aa-a-a-a-aaa!!! ::--))

(... after seeing that an Autonomous System Lab belongs to Mechanics Engineering and Mechanics in the University NN ... )

Additionally, taken from http://www.answers.com/robot:

A mechanical device that sometimes resembles a human and is capable of performing a variety of often complex human tasks on command or by being programmed in advance.
A machine or device that operates automatically or by remote control.
A person who works mechanically without original thought, especially one who responds automatically to the commands of others.

How wrong!!!

I will fade down the most significant delusions:

A mechanical device that sometimes resembles a human and is capable of performing a variety of often complex human tasks on command or by being programmed in advance.
A machine or device that operates automatically or by remote control.
A person who works mechanically without original thought, especially one who responds automatically to the commands of others.

Marvelmind Grumbler robot: main interfaces

2006-07-25T13:18:00.000+03:00

The Marvelmind Grumbler robot has several I/O: for robot-PC communication, for debugging and for expansion:

Obviously, In-System Programming (ISP) for flashing
JTAG interface for step-by-step debugging - very powerful tool. One can freeze the processor and read the real inputs from the processor's pins
RS232-1 and RS232-2 - these two are present, They do not have a standard connector due to lack of space, but the circuitry is there and the USART can be used. Adaptor to a standard DB9 RS232 connector is an option.
Two-wire Serial Interface to connect to expansion processor boards, ADCs, DACs, etc
Pins for external control (motor, relay, etc), ADC, expansion of IR emitters and receivers, external interrupts

In fact, the robot has a good number of different interfaces. Probably, I just need to highlight them better :-)

For more information see the picture attached.

Don't believe in remote-controlled robots!

2006-07-24T16:44:00.001+03:00

Folks!

If some people are telling you that robots can be remotely controlled - don't believe them! ::--))

Real robots cannot be controlled and they cannot be commanded. I mean real robots. Truly real ones. Things that are controlled should be called "remotely controlled rovers", "remotely controlled devices", R/C walking plastic human-like looking R/C toys - whatever. They simply should not be called robots even for simplicity, because anything that is controlled externally is not a robot.

We should be honest and clear here. The task to create something intelligent enough to appropriately react to the external world, move around or even do something useful, from our - human's - perspective, is very-very challenging. Not many people can design and manufacture such things, but too many want to pretend they do :-) We still must be courteous to those people, but we must not let them fool us telling that a thing that one commands with a remote control device is a robot. No, that thing is not a robot indeed! :-)

As we agreed, real robots cannot be controlled! ::--))

Now a bit grounds for my logic:

Intelligent machines/organisms/people act in their own interests. Only!
Highly intelligent organisms, like humans for example, forecast the impact of their deeds for many steps ahead or follow complicated rules developed in the society they live. It may confuse in the beginning and lead to a conclusion that people do not always act in their self-interest. I will agree to some extent adding that people's self-interest was replaced in these cases with the interest of these societies that are eventually in the interests of the organisms comprising these societies. In short, nothing is drastically different here, but one or two more layers added in the reasoning chain, i.e. people pursue not blatant direct self-interests, but more sophisticate indirect ones, because the evolution showed that it is a more winning strategy.
Intelligent machines (and humans) act based on their own sensory inputs, previous experience and the forecasted model of the environment in their heads/processors.
There is no place for external inputs like "R/C commands". Bypassing the whole chain of intelligent reasoning from sensing, analyzing, recognizing, thinking, making decision and acting and jumping directly to acting completely ruins the whole notion of intelligent behavior.
I imagine what would experience an intelligent robot receiving an R/C command: (1) a sudden loss of consciousness; (2) limbs cannot be controlled, they move unexpectedly and unpredictably for the robot; (3) robot tries to fix the situation by shaking limbs, straining muscles or increasing torque on motors, but in vain; (4) after the remote command completed, the robot finds himself in a strange place and hardly can understand what has happened to him and why.
If the robot were truly intelligent, he probably would not do what he just did - acted against his own interest. Why would such a device be called intelligent robot or robot at all?! :-)

And finishing for now, I would point out again - robots cannot be controlled!

Robotics and Marvelmind

2006-07-24T11:53:00.000+03:00

My fascination in mind and its capabilities reflected in the name of the company Marvelmind Robotics. It is all about mind, it is far less about body, mechanics or electronics.

The body is needed to a mind as far as means to provide the mind with the ways to survive - nothing more. Interestingly, the mind has evolved as a means for the body to survive.

Body always implies environment. Taking into account that minds can potentially exist in various habitats, mind's body variants may be extremely diverse.

For example, if we are talking about natural biological world, cell-based organic structures survive pretty well, as we see :-)

However, the sphere created by humans can theoretically support artificial creatures rather well too. Imagine a car that have got intellect. The car would have a comfortable environment, because humans prepared it: gas stations, mechanics shops, roads, even automatic washing! A car with intellect can survive in this environment. It will be fully dependent and vulnerable to changes in the environment (because this car won't have evolution built in it), but its generation can live reasonably well. It won't be an independent life. It will be a symbiotic life.

Symbiont can be found in nature too, but they are for some reasons not so common.

Jumping further, a truly artificial mind hidden somewhere in Google's servers and living in a corresponding artificial world of internet can exist as well. It misses, though, one requirements. It does not need to worry about its body or has very indirect way to do so. Surely, it is possible that it does not need that boring problem to worry about the body, but the link between the thought of a mind living in Google to upgrade its body (server) and a mechanics changing a processing block in the server is longer and not so straightforward. Meaning that the driving factor of all known living organisms - to survive by all means - won't govern the Google's creature. This is "a ding" in a fact-supported reasoning :-)

What is my point here?! Robots and artificial intelligence is first of all about minds!

P.S. with all respects to mechanics engineering! ::--))

Copy-paste robotics

2006-07-24T10:51:00.000+03:00

I love news, especially when they are new :-) Recently I read just another article that was decently interesting. It was about robotics. My second note about the article is that a minute before that I read the same article in a totally different web source.

I know that it is very easy to copy-paste or use more sophisticated methods to fill in a web page not producing a word of your own... I checked google and learnt that the article - a rather specific article about robotics, not a general news about a celebrity - was found by google in more than 14 thousand places!

So, what are my comments and conclusions?! I will think about :-)

What is robotics?!

2006-07-22T02:12:00.000+03:00

I am smiling full-swing when I see that the world can't find a place for robots! :-)

Check eBay, for example. Most robots are placed in toys group along with monsters and aliens! Others - to industrial robots that look more like a crane. Luckiest are placed to microcontrollers and test equipment...

Many people believe that robots are humanoid-type walking machines. Well, not correct assumptions at all! ::--))

Is robotics about mechanics? - No, it is not. Is it SW? - Not only. Is it computer HW? - No. What is it then? There is no clear cut answer. The field is wide and not well defined currently.

I wrote all this just to introduce another robot - Marvelmind Grumbler (see the picture above). Those who believe that it is a car are partly mistaken. Its mechanics is wheeled-based and yes, the robot looks like a car, though it moves like a tank and can turn 360 degrees on a spot.

But most importantly, this robot is autonomous! It does not require a remote control. It does what it wants. It senses the environment and acts accordingly.

When I use word robot, I usually refer to an embodied artificial intelligence. Thus, these terms are quite synonymous for me.

2006-03-15T15:55:00.000+02:00

Hello World!