Originally published July 15 2005
Wider range of uses for robots
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
From the Roomba, a robotic vacuum used in many American homes, to intelligence-gathering robots used in Afghanistan; robots are making a big splash in 2005. Today new robots are being tested to work with children and help them learn.
Rubi, a teacher's assistant at the Early Childhood Education Center in San Diego, is part of an experiment to study how robots and humans interact.
The robot is also animated with Bayesian artificial intelligence, meaning that it compiles data on its past experiences and changes its behavior to try to achieve certain outcomes.
In other words, if the kids forget there's a second verse to "Itsy bitsy spider," the system will prompt Rubi to prompt them.
In a slight setback in the march of robots into war, the U.S. Army has delayed deployment of a robot equipped with a machine gun.
The Talon Sword, an autonomous vehicle with a machine gun (or rocket launcher) mounted on top that soldiers can fire from a remote location, was supposed to be deployed in live situations in Iraq by April.
Meanwhile, the Roomba is about to become far more customizable in the home.
The Roomba Scheduler comes with a handheld remote control and lets people program vacuuming times and create two virtual walls.
At the same time, iRobot will sell the scheduler, two virtual walls and a software update for $60 to current Roomba owners who want to upgrade their machines.
Also of note Apple Computer has confirmed that it has discontinued its single-processor Power Mac G5 system in favor of an all dual-chip lineup...Yahoo has shut down its user-created chat rooms after reports that some of them were being used by adults to promote sex with minors...In a short-lived mass media experiment, the Los Angeles Times has closed a Web site that allowed readers to rewrite editorials after the site was flooded with obscene messages and photos...More than a third of all CDs purchased worldwide are pirated, according to a record label report.
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