REEM-A is designed to play well with humans; it can play chess, hold objects, stroll around with people and answer questions and follow commands. REEM-A can also do face recognition.
REEM-A is a prototype built by PAL Technology Robotics. The friendly robot is about four feet ten inches tall and weighs about ninety pounds. It can carry five pounds in each arm; both arms are equipped with gripper claws (which are also used when REEM-A plays chess.
(REEM-A plays chess to win)
REEM-A is in the tradition of science fictional robots that are easily able to walk with and converse with human beings. And play chess with them.
Moxon sat facing me at the farther side of a small table upon which a single candle made all the light that was in the room. Opposite him, his back toward me, sat another person. On the table between the two was a chessboard; the men were playing...
The response of his antagonist, while equally prompt in the inception, was made with a slow, uniform, mechanical and, I thought, somewhat theatrical movement of the arm, that was a sore trial to my patience. There was something unearthly about it all, and I caught myself shuddering...
Then I remembered that Moxon had once spoken to me of having invented such a piece of mechanism, though I did not understand that it had actually been constructed.
(Read more about Ambrose Bierce's 1910 automaton chessplayer)
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'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!' - Ray Cummings, 1931.
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