Newsgroups: comp.robotics
Path: brunix!uunet!decwrl!csus.edu!netcomsv!seer!tomk
From: tomk@seer.gentoo.com (Tom Kunich)
Subject: Re: MIT Insect Robots
Message-ID: <1992Jun18.175623.15359@seer.gentoo.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Jun 1992 17:56:23 GMT
References: <1992Jun16.065514.2629@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>
Organization: Brad Lanam,  Walnut Creek, CA
Lines: 56

In article <1992Jun16.065514.2629@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu> Brad Taplin <btaplin@silver.ucs.indiana.edu> writes:

> (I write stuff about electric cars being only slightly improvable)

>Actually, they will improve, but I guess I measure improvement
>by the millimeter here rather than the mile. My original point

And I stated such. I agree that electric cars are in the future
but they will be practical devices, not the imagined electric
Ferrari of popular fiction.

>>Miata that you mention is one of the most deadly cars in a crash
>
>Various sources would disagree. Its size is a factor, but it is
>is miles ahead of anything like a Pinto in strength and safety.

If memory serves, it has the highest impact fatality rating of
any car ever tested.
>
>Actually, robots in my understanding never have been required
>to be truly intelligent in the strong-AI sense, just capable.

This is a fair assessment. And I agree with you. What has been
fairly well established on this net, though, is that robots
are being discussed as the widely self-modifying devices that
Asimov described. And they are using automobile assembly robots
as examples. I am trying to point out that this isn't a
good comparison nor is the science very transferable. 

>You are so cynical.

I am only trying to counter the wildly optomistic and
apparently unconsidered conversations gouing on here. An
injection of reality if you will. If that seems cynical then
so be it.

>Development in this country is limited because we're myopic
>fools. The Japanese have plans for 150 years down the line.
>Of course it will take time. Time will justify my optimism.

Hasn't the Japanese failure in the developement of the
fifth generation computer taught anyone anything?

It reminds me of the "Far Side" cartoon in which the 
two scientists at the black board show one saying to the
other, "I think you have to work on the middle portion."
On the blackboard is a large calculation and in the middle
portion is written, "And then a miracle occurs".

Most of the talk here is of precisely the same nature. The
middle part -- the real work -- isn't being addressed because
it is difficult. it is easier to talk about work done by others,
work that _could_ be done if the middle part is done, and
work that is so far out in the probability index that it is
more in the realm of fantasy.

