You can’t have an indestructible robot army bent on overthrowing the human race without indestructible robot arms, and the engineers at DLR have brought us one step further on that road. The latest profoundly unnerving piece of tech from the German robotics lab is a fully articulated robot arm that can manipulate objects, flip the bird, withstand glancing blows from a hammer, and get creamed with a metal baseball bat, all without missing a beat. Granted, this is pretty neat in principle, and a sturdier robot arm means a sturdier robot butler/more capable indentured robot assassin down the road.
But it’s a bit troubling for anyone who is planning on having to battle legions of robots for their very lives in the next 20 years or so. Which is to say, people who are prepared for the inevitable future.
(via Robots.net)
Published: Feb 1, 2011 03:08 pm