H.G. Wells was the first one to paint this picture in fiction, with a dramatic departure from the standard picture of a mechanical monstrosity; readers recall the steel tentacles from his 1898 novel War of the Worlds:
Seen nearer, the Thing was incredibly strange, for it was no mere insensate machine driving on its way. Machine it was, with a ringing metallic pace, and long, flexible, glittering tentacles (one of which gripped a young pine tree) swinging and rattling about its strange body.
Festoon your monitor with these remarkable biomimetic robots from Festo:
Festo Aqua Ray Robot
Aqua_ray is a remote-controlled fish driven by water hydraulics, the shape and movements of which have been based on the model of a manta ray.
Robot Arm With Fluidic Muscles
The company describes it as a "combination of mechatronics and the biological model of a human being."
Humanoid Robots Building Humanoid Robots
''Pardon me, Struthers,' he broke in suddenly... 'haven't you a section of the factory where only robot labor is employed?'' - Isaac Asimov (1940)
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