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Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

theguardian.com

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Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#81

What is it with media that attributes everything to "Japan"? Here we have a private company trying out a robot made by a much smaller private company, in Japan. It's not like the government of Japan is rolling out gundams across the nation.

Well it is a japanese startup company working for JR-West.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

84% of the global population are in low and middle income countries, and the vast majority of those people could have a significantly higher quality of living in a place like Japan if they were given the neccesary political protections. 6 billion people is not infinity people, and not all of those people are willing or able to move to a place like Japan to try their luck. But the idea that immigration is anywhere clo…

But the immigration seems to have triggered resurgence of fascism and populism worldwide. So while economically sustainable in theory it might be unsustainable for cultural reasons.

Culture can change. It's not an easy fight, but I would bet on economics beating culture in the long term.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

84% of the global population are in low and middle income countries, and the vast majority of those people could have a significantly higher quality of living in a place like Japan if they were given the neccesary political protections. 6 billion people is not infinity people, and not all of those people are willing or able to move to a place like Japan to try their luck. But the idea that immigration is anywhere clo…

But the immigration seems to have triggered resurgence of fascism and populism worldwide. So while economically sustainable in theory it might be unsustainable for cultural reasons.

This is mainly due to blind trust in ideals instead of hard facts when it comes to immigration.

European countries who took in a lot of Mena people have issues because they believe naively in a form of laissez faire.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It reaches 12m on a telescoped crane, the actual scale of the robot body looks pretty small, smaller than the cab of the truck. Pretty human scale all things considered, makes one wonder if it's goign to be mounted on treads or legs one day for indoor use. It does look very cool indeed.

in the context of a train line, you may not want it any taller, since there are things like overhead wires to deal with if it gets any taller.

I don't think the argument is that it should be bigger. Just that if it's not enormous we should not describe it as enormous.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#85

Enormous humanoid robots for everything! Have you ever watched one of those videos where somebody makes a mini concrete building in a few days? I'd be cool to just scale that up, if it's possible, perhaps with faster-setting concrete or something.

Bad idea of the day: Perhaps you could "Ender's Game" it, to have a kid playing with legos control a giant robot, building a full-sized version of that set remotely. What could go wrong.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point, the sensor count exponentiates and the optics get a lot more complicated if you want a fully integrated system. Nothing on the market I know of but with where we are on the scaling curves now might be the time to try something like it - you could put together a basic proof of concept with a load of commercial sensor elements and wide angle lenses on a sphere. Eventually you can consolidate the central sen…

(It would look like kind of like a dragonfly eye)

Mind blown. Can insects get depth perception with just one eye?

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#87
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya it's not a human, you're not limited to binocular vision and can have multiple sets of cameras pretty easily of you wanted. Who knows what the designers are thinking.

I'm pretty sure they're thinking "giant robots are awesome!"

The ball-like robots from Gundam literally had a speech about them in Japanese parliament, so... :D

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure they're thinking "giant robots are awesome!"

Maybe that kind of childish decision-making is why Japan is failing as a country.

How many homeless fentanyl addicts you saw in your last trip to Osaka or Tokyo?

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#89
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya it's not a human, you're not limited to binocular vision and can have multiple sets of cameras pretty easily of you wanted. Who knows what the designers are thinking.

I'm pretty sure they're thinking "giant robots are awesome!"

I doubt it. Boston Dynamics creates humanoid robots as well, and makes design decisions which aren't always maximally efficient, but no one makes such an infantilizing assumption about American engineers.

Re: Japan introduces enormous humanoid robot to maintain train lines

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that kind of childish decision-making is why Japan is failing as a country.

How many homeless fentanyl addicts you saw in your last trip to Osaka or Tokyo?

You're not making the point you think you are, or at least not remotely well.

Look at big picture stats to draw a conclusion instead of pointing out a pretty obscure US problem that has no bearing on the claim made.

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