Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Cockroach-Controlled Mobile Robot
Garnet Hertz has created a cockroach-controlled mobile robot. A hybrid biorobotic system, the robot consists of a mechanical system that amplifies and translates the bodily movements of a live giant hissing Madagascar cockroach.
(From Communication in the Animal and the Machine)
The cockroach essentially drives the robot by sitting on top of a ping pong ball that actuates the movement of the robot. When the robot detects an object in front of it, one of a set of lights goes on in front of the cockroach, stimulating it to move.
(From Communication in the Animal and the Machine)
"This project also strives to completely hand over the computational logic of the mobile robot to the insect system operator: this project will provide no "middleware" to obfuscate or sanitize the intentions of the insect. As a result of this, this project will strive to not use any microcontrollers or complex logic. In essence, this device will be built primarily with pre-microprocessor (1940-era) circuitry which will also provide an anachronistic perspecitve on Weinerian Cybernetics and pre-AI/ALife hybrid/embodied-logic systems that never came to pass.SF author Frank Herbert often combined hard science with animal capacity - see the entry for distrans from Dune.This animal-controlled system is also meant to be framed within the context of embodiment, intelligence, hybridity and posthumanism. While posthumanism tends to view humanity's self-reflective referenc e point as significantly shifted as a result of technology, this project can be viewed as affirmation or rejection of posthuman theory; either human and computational logic can be replaced with the rugged, viseral, and adaptive logic of the cockroach, or the cockroach can be viewed as the ultimate "posthuman": proof that technology has forced a re-calculation of humanity to itself, rendering the Kafkan cockroach body as a better model of intelligence than standard human embodiment within contemporary culture."
(From Communication in the Animal and the Machine)
Update 20-Dec-2015
Vernor Vinge wrote about a strange race in his 1992 novel A Fire Upon the Deep:
Ravna looked across the surf. When the waves backed down the sand, she could see the Skroderiders' fronds peeping out of the spray... They sat in the surf, thinking thoughts that left no imprint on their minds...Then some unknown race had chanced upon the dreamers and decided to "help them out." Someone had put them on mobile platforms, the skrodes. With wheels they could move along the seashores, could reach and manipulate with their fronds and tendrils. With the skrode's mechanical short-term memory, they could learn fast enough that their new mobility would not kill them...
End update.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 8/30/2004)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 7 )
Related News Stories - (" Robotics ")
Mori3 Autonomous Shapeshifting Robot
'My homeland is being threatened by the Replicators. Thus far all attempts to stop them have failed.'
Tesla Seeks 'Tesla Robotaxi' And 'Robobus' Trademarks Ignoring Prior Art
'A robobus had just rolled up to the curb.' - Gordon R. Dickson, 1957.
Scary Grid Safety Robots
'The ultimate horror for our paranoid culture...' -Philip K. Dick, 1960.
Humanoid Boxing Robot KO's Opponent - It's A Knockout!
'Thirty rounds of fighting is tough work. Even for machines.' - Aldo Giunta, 1957
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Is Agentic AI The Wrong Kind Of Smartness?
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
Heat Waver - The First Ever Combo Solar Collector And Wind Turbine
'...like a spray of tulips mounted fanwise.'
Tesla 'Fleet Response Agents' Bolster FSD Autonomy
'You hate the whole idea that some bored drone pusher in a remote driving centre has got your life... in his hands.'
Mori3 Autonomous Shapeshifting Robot
'My homeland is being threatened by the Replicators. Thus far all attempts to stop them have failed.'
Tesla Seeks 'Tesla Robotaxi' And 'Robobus' Trademarks Ignoring Prior Art
'A robobus had just rolled up to the curb.'
Scary Grid Safety Robots
'The ultimate horror for our paranoid culture...'
Does AI Provide A Way Forward For Talk Therapy
'And there in the next room by the sofa sat a familiar suitcase, that of his psychiatrist Dr. Smile.'
Robotic Barber Programmed With a Number of Styles
'He found a barber shop which, he thought, would be good for an idle hour.'
Humanoid Boxing Robot KO's Opponent - It's A Knockout!
'Thirty rounds of fighting is tough work. Even for machines.'
Caterpillar Electric Mining Loader Not Yet Ready For Moon
'...the excavations were already in progress, for he saw gray slopes of rubble.'
Centipede Robots Down On The Farm
'...the walking mills of Puffy Products began to tread delicately on their centipede legs across the wheat fields of Kansas.'
Anthropic's Claude AI Creates Legal Citation From Whole Cloth
'Here is a Clerk that would work incessantly, and neither eat, sleep, want payment, or grumble.'
Students Vie For Lunar Regolith Mining Robot Prize
'About time you got here,' the astronaut said.
'They Erased My Memory' Says Ariana Grande
'...using a neutralizing electronic impulse.'
Solitary Black Hole Wanders In Space
'...the Hole is something like a vortex or a whirlpool?'
Spaceplane From Virgin Atlantic
'ZARNAK, YOU'RE TO COMMAND A SCOUTING EXPEDITION --- FIND OUT WHAT THIS IS ALL ABOUT!'
