How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: The Approach
It is usually believed that robots will take over much of the work that humans were doing to make a livelihood and then what will happen? In fact in recent times, the indulgence of smart robots within the industrial sectors across the domains has taken the productionism to another level with more variety of goods being produced and the quality of procedures and end products have also improved on an unprecedented level and the main credit goes to the robotics. A few decades ago when the automation was introduced within the industrial sectors, especially the automobile industry 1.
It was considered a giant leap in industrialization as a lot more could be achieved now yet those automated robots were very limited in their practice. If any of the robots are programmed to do the body paint for a chassis of the car, it will stay limited to it. But now, since the fourth industrial revolution has taken the reigns and Artificial Intelligence has become its main poster-child. The robotics has also been upgraded from Automation to Autonomy 2. Generally, the laymen consider both automation and autonomy the same but there is a big difference that will be explored further in the blog.
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: History of Industrial Robots
The very first of the industrial robots were invented back in 1950 and it was called “Unimate” 3. In that era, the robots were programmed to complete a certain function and they had no clue around their dedicated task. In short, they never had the “sense” of going away from their primary task at all. These robots were introduced in industrial settings with a primary goal to substitute the repetitive tasks which were usually being performed by human beings. However, in the past couple of decades, the robots have been enthused with something very unique and that is the “intelligence”, in short, they have now started making “sense” around their specific tasks. All this happened because of Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, the Big-Data, and a barrage of Algorithms 4.
This is how the robots have been transitioned from simply being automated to now being autonomous to a certain level. This means that the robots now have a certain space to make a choice on their own. That’s what modern-day robotics are capable of and this is also posing a further threat to more jobs that usually humans performed.
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: What’s so Special About the New Robots
Sot the big question is, how the modern-day robots are so different than the robots of ancient era (yah hardly a few decades a go but in technological terms a year is much like a millennium in time frame). The robots now do some unique tasks which their ancestor could never imagine. We will be discussing various use-cases but to get the main idea, it is important to know that the smart robots now days are found in various industries like, Education, Security, Infrastructures, Healthcare, Retail, Tourism and Agriculture 5.
The robots today are lot more flexible as well as robust and with the help of sensors enabled through Artificial Intelligence are lot smarter when it comes to the decision making in certain situations. So if we look at this million dollars question that how robots are useful in industrial revolution 4.0? The answer is that these smart robots are now performing surgeries (you read it right), being deployed for space exploration as well as search and rescue missions both in peace time and war zones., these robots are flexible enough that they can also jump, roll, backfilp and even run. Furthermore, more than 35% of healthcare organizations are using the services of robots in terms of logistics as well as utilities 6.
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: Robots and Humans a Bumpy Love-Story
If you ask me about the robo-human romance, well that is some topic to talk about. It is understood that these smart robots are actually replacing humans thus widening the gap in labor related work with many now out of jobs. However, a counter argument is that robots are simply taking the jobs away from humans that are dangerous and have a high fatality rate.
Say, mining and we know that thousands of humans lose their lives while working in mines each year, which is a huge figure and needs immediate attention. Though, the counter-counter argument is that those who won’t die while working may die while looking for work and it makes a lot of sense. But, looking at the bright proposition, there are a lot of benefits that the smart robots through robotics in AI are offering.
- These robots are freeing up the humans to use their foremost important ability i.e “Thinking” to plan a better future with the autonomous machines and industrial revolution 4.0.
- How about giving the sewer cleaning job to a robot? Well its a dirty job and I think every human will like to keep restraint from it.
- Here is another one, what if the robot does the detonation of a bomb for us humans? Even if the bomb explodes, we simply lost a machine not a human being.
- There are various endeavors in industrial sectors where smart robots or their cousins chatbots can save a lot of money, like call centers? (next time you make a call to a call center, remember to ask them about their family etc, that might be a chatbot).
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: Some Simple Real-Life Examples
Now let us look at some real-life use-cases where these smart robots are being deployed
- A group of Google Engineers designed a robot called “Nuro” and is just about half the size of a car. This handsome hunk is used to deliver groceries in Texas & Arizona 7.
- Well how about security? Sure, why not! Let us introduce you to “Cobalt Robotics”, a well-known robotics company that offers security through robotics in your house and claims to be 65% cheaper and lot more reliable than its human counterpart (cringy isn’t it!) 8.
- Well what about “GoBetween” a smart police officer that reaches the traffic violators ahead of its human counterpart and can issue tickets as well? Beware while next time you overspeed 9.
- “Maco” a robotic system that has rendered services in more than 300 thousand knee and hip replacements since the year 2006. Maco uses the data it gets through CT scans, patients’ history, it performs the surgery through the camera mounted on its arm 10.
- Next time you are about to clean your pool, don’t forget that “Dolphin” a robotic system can do the same for you, how enticing isn’t it 11?
There are various other use-cases that reflect such smart robotic systems driven by AI doing the cores not only in industrial sector but homes as well.
How Robotics Artificial Intelligence (AI) Works: The Final Word
It is impressive that the robotics systems are taking their place very quickly among us humans while we are at our workplace or homes. Yet, a huge paradox is still there to be looked in to. Mind you that the current version of AI is called Narrow AI for a reason as it is based on object recognition not “intent” recognition and the robotics is based on the same model. As of now, robotics to Artificial Intelligence is just like a mouse to a desktop. There is a lot of space of development and betterment on which the scientific community is trying its utmost best. But the most important of all things is, will the robots ever have the same emotional feelings as humans and especially towards humans and other such species. Will they have a dilemma when brought in a situation to chose between mind and heart? Will an autonomous car prefer saving its passenger or the child who unknowingly cam on the road in its way? We will surely try to answer these questions in another blog. Till then you take care and stay tuned for the next one.
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- Hazarika, Shyamanta M., and Uday Shanker Dixit. “Robotics: History, Trends, and Future Directions.” Introduction to Mechanical Engineering. Springer, Cham, 2018. 213-239.
- Marr, Bernard. “What everyone must know about industry 4.0.” Forbes Tech. Retrieved from (2016).
- Nayak, Janmenjoy, et al., eds. Applications of Robotics in Industry Using Advanced Mechanisms: Proceedings of International Conference on Robotics and Its Industrial Applications 2019. Vol. 5. Springer Nature, 2019.
- Patel, Ankit R., et al. “Vitality of Robotics in Healthcare Industry: An Internet of Things (IoT) Perspective.” Internet of Things and Big Data Technologies for Next Generation Healthcare. Springer, Cham, 2017. 91-109.
- Waters, Scott M., and Benjamin Wade Julian. “Unmanned robotic vehicle.” U.S. Patent Application No. 29/608,437.
- Vilches, Víctor Mayoral, et al. “Introducing the robot security framework (rsf), a standardized methodology to perform security assessments in robotics.” arXiv preprint arXiv:1806.04042 (2018).
- Neubauer, Sigurd. “Oman: The Gulf’s Go-Between.” Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington 1 (2016).
- Unluturk, Ali, and Omer Aydogdu. “Adaptive control of two-wheeled mobile balance robot capable to adapt different surfaces using a novel artificial neural network–based real-time switching dynamic controller.” International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems 14.2 (2017): 1729881417700893.
- Adami, Ilia, Margherita Antona, and Constantine Stephanidis. “Home trials of robotic systems: Challenges and considerations for evaluation teams.” International Conference on Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction. Springer, Cham, 2016.
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