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"Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is."
- Isaac Asimov
 |
| Flexible Frank | ||
| An all-purpose household robot. |
| Housekeeping is repetitious and unnecessary drudgery; as an engineer, it offended me.
For the problem to be within the scope of one engineer, almost all of Flexible Frank had to be standard parts and must not involve any new principles...
 ('Door into Summer' by Robert Heinlein) Just what did I want Flexible Frank to do? Answer: any work a human being does around a house. He didn't have to play cards, make love, eat or sleep, but he did have to clean up after the card game, cook, make beds, and tend babies - at least he had to keep track of a baby's breathing and call someone if it changes. |
| From The Door Into Summer,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Fantasy & Science Fiction in 1956 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the household robot from Ely's Automatic Housemaid, by Elizabeth Bellamy published in 1899.
Thanks to @SMOF_ for the great cover graphic.
Thanks to Pete for suggesting this item.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Door Into Summer
More Ideas
and Technology by Robert Heinlein
Tech news articles related to The Door Into Summer
Tech news articles related to works by Robert Heinlein
Flexible Frank-related
news articles:
- Twendy-One Robot Is Your Humanoid Helper
- REEM-B Robot Autonomous Helper Video
- Care-O-Bot Robot Does Chores One-Handed
- Basil Reification Robot
- ATLAS Robot Now Does Housework!
- Elon Musk et. al. OpenAI Household Robot
- Housekeeping Robots Easy To Imagine, Tough To Make
- VirtualHome: Teaching Robots To Do Chores Around The House
- Dyson's Secret Household Robots
| ESTHER Tennis Robot V. Fact (1934) And Fiction (1952) |
| EELS Exobiology Extant Life Surveyor For Enceladus |
| Helpful Robots In Science Fiction |
| SayCan with PaLM - Google's Robot Helper |
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'THE red tennis robot scooted desperately across the court...'
'The Consul remembered his first glimpse of the kilometer-long treeship...'
'Do you know what window washing used to cost by the hour?'
'Once the target is confirmed, it uses an IR laser to send a coded signal back to the parent, clearing it to attack.'
'I filled your bullet hole with flesh putty and the lattice.'
'... it will be easy to form an alphabet which shall enable us to converse with the inhabitants of the moon.'
'From the tower's huge octagonal base radiate wide silvery strips...'
'It was about five feet long... a black bullet head and red camera eyes.'
'The Law Society has strict rules on the use of pseudo-intelligent software...'
