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Why Can't Robots Be More Like a Man?
by Mad Dog


And what do you get for all that money? A machine that measures the room, vacuums the floor, doesn’t bump into walls or fall down the stairs, and cleans 92 percent of the room. 
It’s the 21st century, shouldn’t we be lolling around living a life of leisure while the day-to-day drudgery is taken care of by robots? I, for one, wish it would hurry up. My mother recently stopped accepting the weekly C.O.D. FedEx packages filled with my laundry and someone needs to take care of it. Soon.

For years we were fed an image of the future—and if today isn’t yesterday’s future then what is?—in which automatons cook, clean, wash the dog, do the gardening, and either take out the trash or eat it depending on which version you bought into. Of course this would make our lives pure paradise. But it just hasn’t happened, and it saddens me to think that all those years of reading Popular Science and watching The Jetsons may have done nothing more than given me false hopes. I sure hope Playboy doesn’t let me down the same way.

Actually robots are being used, just not around the house. They’re working hard in industry where they do things like assemble cars, move product around warehouses, and count Bill Gates’ money. Meanwhile the mindless, super-efficient automatons we’re supposed to have around the house are nowhere to be found. Unless, of course, you count husbands when they agree to make love with only four minutes left until the ball game starts on TV.

But don’t despair. Matsushita, the parent company of Panasonic, recently demonstrated a vacuum-cleaning robot. It’s the size of a basketball, runs for 55 minutes before needing a recharge, and is expected to sell for a bargain basement $4,000. That’s when it’s available, which they expect will be in two or three years.


What good would all that new found leisure time be if we spent it feeling bad because a hunk of metal and wires can wash windows better than we can? Trading leisure time for therapy time is a lousy reason to create a robot.
And what do you get for all that money? A machine that measures the room, vacuums the floor, doesn’t bump into walls or fall down the stairs, and cleans 92 percent of the room. That’s right, since it can’t vacuum around the edges it’s only slightly better than a man doing the job. Not to mention that it doesn’t contribute a penny towards the rent, can’t turn a leaking faucet into a full blown plumber-driven bathroom renovation job, and won’t get around to vacuuming for at least the next two years. And you thought men have an inability to make a firm commitment! On the other hand, vacuuming robots don’t burp, they somehow manage to find their way around a room without using a map or arguing about whether to stop and ask for directions, and they don’t require three days of nagging to get around to doing their job. Plus they have an “Off” switch. Come to think of it, men might not make it to see the second half of the century.

Matushita is so confident about their new Almost Does The Job™ technology that they’re planning to use it to create a home security guard robot (“Stop or I’ll bump into your leg!”), a babysitter robot (“Guaranteed not to drop the baby 92 percent of the time”), and a robot that can take care of your elderly parents (“Don’t feel bad, I don’t remember your model number either”). It’s a beautiful new world ahead.

While at first glance it may seem that these less than perfect robots are a sign that the technology is still in its infancy, they’re actually created that way by design. Remember, scientists have always patterned robots after living creatures, most often humans, and face it, we’re far from the perfect organism. If we were we wouldn’t get sick, we wouldn’t waste half our waking hours doing the stupidest things imaginable in order to try to have sex, and Survivor: Marquesas wouldn’t be a top-rated TV show. So why would you think anything modeled after us would do a better-than-human job? Besides, why would you want it to?


These would definitely make better pets than the Robofly, which researchers at the University of California at Berkeley are creating thanks to a $2.5 million government grant.
Having lawn-mowing robots which leave little patches of grass and vacuuming robots which forget to clean under the couch makes us much more comfortable with them and less liable to feel inferior. What good would all that new found leisure time be if we spent it feeling bad because a hunk of metal and wires can wash windows better than we can? Trading leisure time for therapy time is a lousy reason to create a robot. Wanting a maintenance-free pet, on the other hand, is a good reason.

Robot scientists quickly figured out that pets are popular. Or perhaps it was the accountants. People get so attached to them that when they die they freeze-dry them, try to clone them, and publish newspaper obituaries for them. The pets, not the scientists or accountants. It’s true. Once a month the Philadelphia Daily News (motto: “Fewer calories than a cheese steak”) runs pet obituaries. For $52.08 they’ll print a photograph and a few lines in memoriam. This may have a healing effect, but you’d probably be better off saving your money and putting it towards a robot pet.

Sony is already on their second-generation robot dog. Named Aibo, it has four legs, a head, a retractable headlight, 21 colored lights which “express feelings,” a built-in digital camera, and the ability to obey 75 voice commands. It costs $1,500 and doesn’t have a clue what a vacuum cleaner is. There’s also a robo-cat named Tama, another bionic dog named Poochi, and Necoro, a fur-covered Aibo wannabe that responds to human emotions, learns its owner’s voice, recognizes its name, and makes 48 different cat sounds when you step on its tail. It’s a steal at $1,482. And no, it doesn’t do anything useful.

These would definitely make better pets than the Robofly, which researchers at the University of California at Berkeley are creating thanks to a $2.5 million government grant. This 43-milligram sun-powered robot actually has no reason for being created, though the scientists feel certain that if they actually get it to work they’ll figure out a use for it. And in case you prefer your pets to live in a fish tank, the Navy is bankrolling the development of a Robolobster at Northeastern University and a Robopike at MIT.

Although we still have a few years to go until robots are at our beck and call, it’s good to know scientists are working on it. And that what they create won’t be too perfect. Personally I’ll be happy just as long as the robo-maid can find all the little piles of robo-poop the robo-pets leave on the floor. After all, it may be a while before they create the robo-shoeshine boy, and there’s nothing like dirty shoes to take the luster off paradise.

©2002 Mad Dog Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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