A robot is a virtual or mechanical artificial agent. In practice, it is usually an electro-mechanical system which, by its appearance or movements, conveys a sense that it has intent or agency of its own. The word robot can refer to both physical robots and virtual software agents, but the latter are usually referred to as bots. There is no consensus on which machines qualify as robots, but there is general agreement among experts and the public that robots tend to do some or all of the following: move around, operate a mechanical limb, sense and manipulate their environment, and exhibit intelligent behavior, especially behavior which mimics humans or other animals.
Stories of artificial helpers and companions and attempts to create them have a long history but fully autonomous machines only appeared in the 20th century. The first digitally operated and programmable robot, the Unimate, was installed in 1961 to lift hot pieces of metal from a die casting machine and stack them. Today, commercial and industrial robots are in widespread use performing jobs more cheaply or with greater accuracy and reliability than humans. They are also employed for jobs which are too dirty, dangerous or dull to be suitable for humans. Robots are widely used in manufacturing, assembly and packing, transport, earth and space exploration, surgery, weaponry, laboratory research, and mass production of consumer and industrial goods.
People have a generally positive perception of the robots they actually encounter. Domestic robots for cleaning and maintenance are increasingly common in and around homes. There is anxiety, however, over the economic impact of automation and the threat of robotic weaponry, anxiety which is not helped by the depiction of many villainous, intelligent, acrobatic robots in popular entertainment. Compared with their fictional counterparts, real robots are still benign, dim-witted and clumsy.
Defining characteristics
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| KITT is mentally anthropomorphic, while ASIMO is physically anthropomorphic | ||
While there is no single correct definition of "robot",[3] a typical robot will have several or possibly all of the following properties.
- It is composed entirely, or almost entirely, from artificial substances.
- It can sense its environment, and manipulate or interact with things in it.
- It has some ability to make choices based on the environment, often using automatic control or a preprogrammed sequence.
- It is programmable.
- It moves with one or more axes of rotation or translation.
- It makes dexterous coordinated movements.
- It moves without direct human intervention.
- It appears to have intent or agency.
The last property, the appearance of agency, is important when people are considering whether to call a machine a robot, or just a machine. (See anthropomorphism for examples of ascribing intent to inanimate objects.)
Mental agency
For robotic engineers, the physical appearance of a machine is less important than the way its actions are controlled. The more the control system seems to have agency of its own, the more likely the machine is to be called a robot. An important feature of agency is the ability to make choices.
- A clockwork car is never considered a robot.
- A remotely operated vehicle is sometimes considered a robot (or telerobot).[4]
- A car with an onboard computer, like Bigtrak, which could drive in a programmable sequence, might be called a robot.
- A self-controlled car which could sense its environment and make driving decisions based on this information, such as the 1990s driverless cars of Ernst Dickmanns or the entries in the DARPA Grand Challenge, would quite likely be called a robot.
- A sentient car, like the fictional KITT, which can make decisions, navigate freely and converse fluently with a human, is usually considered a robot.
Physical agency
However, for many laymen, if a machine appears to be able to control its arms or limbs, and especially if it appears anthropomorphic or zoomorphic (e.g. ASIMO or Aibo), it would be called a robot.
- A player piano is rarely characterized as a robot.[5]
- A CNC milling machine is very occasionally characterized as a robot.
- A factory automation arm is almost always characterized as an industrial robot.
- An autonomous wheeled or tracked device, such as a self-guided rover or self-guided vehicle, is almost always characterized as a mobile robot or service robot.
- A zoomorphic mechanical toy, like Roboraptor, is usually characterized as a robot.[6]
- A mechanical humanoid, like ASIMO, is almost always characterized as a robot, usually as a service robot.
Even for a 3-axis CNC milling machine using the same control system as a robot arm, it is the arm which is almost always called a robot, while the CNC machine is usually just a machine. Having eyes can also make a difference in whether a machine is called a robot, since humans instinctively connect eyes with sentience. However, simply being anthropomorphic is not a sufficient criterion for something to be called a robot. A robot must do something; an inanimate object shaped like ASIMO would not be considered a robot.
Source: wikipedia
