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MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

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Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#111

Post by Lawtonfogle »

deepnet wrote: post #88

Stuart Russel of AI a Modern Approach fame ( with Norvig ) asks us to consider the ethics of AI research - killer robotics, & hunter drones. http://www.nature.com/news/robotics-ethics-of-artificial-int... He calls for a moritorium until we can get a neural net to learn Asimov's 1st Law. Should the self driving car swerve into you to avoid greater moral hazard ? Humour aside as researchers and robotocists do we have a…

>He calls for a moritorium until we can get a neural net to learn Asimov's 1st Law.

Consider the worst things that governments will do to get an advantage. I mean the downright most inhumane things they have actually done.

Now given this, what chance is there that they will respect a moratorium on research. If violating basic human rights for a small advantage is part of their MO, then it would be foolish to think that a lesser breach of ethical obligations for a greater advantage would not happen.

All we would achieve by a moratorium is a slight slow down in how soon governments access this technology while locking the technology away from access by the general public.

That said, the ability for government militaries to become autonomous and not made up of individuals who have at least some chance of resisting the worst orders is a very scary notion.

We may be approaching the next Great Filter.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#112

Post by Lawtonfogle »

methodover wrote: post #5
tugberkk wrote: post #3

Aside from being a great development; I am really scared that robotics is improving this much. It feels like we are creating our own potential enemy.

Ugh, I really dislike this sentiment. Even assuming the most extreme possibility -- that we create a powerful, sentient machine -- this is no different than what every species on this planet has been doing for a few billion years now. Creating life is what we earthlings do. And yeah, maybe that life form you create goes on to do horrible things. But maybe it goes on to do really good things. You don't know until you…

>this is no different than what every species on this planet has been doing for a few billion years now.

You might want to ask those species how that worked out for them. Also, consider how slow the change use to be compared to the life expectancy of the species.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#113

Post by ChuckMcM »

tgb wrote: post #101
ynniv wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MIT is probably developing advanced algorithms for the Boston Dynamics platform.

I actually can't find any information on their site that that's the case either. I'd have thought they would mention that if it were the case, and this looks a bit different from any of the Boston Dynamics ones I could find.

Since Google owns Boston Dynamics, perhaps this has been 'spun out' or is otherwise detached. There are some pretty strict IP rules in Google and at MIT so it would make sense to spin this out. But either way it is confusing to have the same name on a robot that looks the same but with two different parent institutions.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#114

Post by kaybe »

chinathrow wrote: post #49
DanBC wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait what? Those expensive machines make war harder, not easier. Central African Republic has war with child soldiers using machetes and guns. It's an unpleasant truth: humans are disposable. This is evidenced by a bunch of stuff - rich westerners have their clothes made by poor people locked into unsafe Bangladeshi warehouses; have many of our goods made by low people in terrible and dangerous conditions; by our lac…

Those expensive machines makes not a single child soldier go away - why should it?

I think the point is that humans are a lot cheaper than machines, as harsh as that is, especially if you do not care about them at all.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#116

Post by ChuckMcM »

tugberkk wrote: post #3

Aside from being a great development; I am really scared that robotics is improving this much. It feels like we are creating our own potential enemy.

On the plus side, I would hazard a guess that the 'S' part of PTSD is related more to killing people than it is to killing "things". So warfighters who are disabling and destroying the enemy's machines may be much less scarred by that than ones who were killing the enemy directly.

As for a generalized fear of the emerging technology, that fear is simply your body's way of telling you that it is important that you get it right (other people will feel it too). Same is true for the advancement in laser diodes for example, or recombinant DNA, or lithium ion battery packs. Growing up is scary, but you can't stop it from happening, you have to mature as it goes along or die.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#117

Post by paulmd »

codeshaman wrote: post #11
methodover wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh, I really dislike this sentiment. Even assuming the most extreme possibility -- that we create a powerful, sentient machine -- this is no different than what every species on this planet has been doing for a few billion years now. Creating life is what we earthlings do. And yeah, maybe that life form you create goes on to do horrible things. But maybe it goes on to do really good things. You don't know until you…

The main issue is that this advanced tech creates a powerful lever for mad leaders. 1 clumsy cheetah robot at MIT may not be that scary, but 100.000 fully armed and armoured killing machines, which can avoid obstacles and track humans with all kinds of sensors, under the control of leaders wanting to 'right' the wrongs of history scares the shit out of me. At the same time, this progress cannot (and shouldn't) be sto…

At least at the moment, the limitation is power. Sure, they built a robot that can run and avoid obstacles, but its battery is probably dead in 10 minutes tops. There's a reason it's running on a power harness in the treadmill test.

Unless they invent the Arc Reactor to along with it, those are a long way from the battlefield.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#118

Post by spiek »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #102
spiek wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such an annoying and useless comment. This same comment is parroted EVERY time there's an article about robots anywhere on the Internet. How are you adding anything to the discussion at all?

S/he seems excited and wanted to reinforce that with something more than an upvote. Frankly if his/her comment adding nothing, yours took away from the thread because it has a negative and discouraging tone to it. Be nicer my friend. We are all friends here.

That's fine, then reinforce it with a comment that is interesting, and not a useless cliche.

It's everybody's responsibility to ensure the quality of the discussion remains high.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#119

Post by rebootthesystem »

All of this is neat stuff.

That said, for some reason I am still bothered by the use of laser range finders. To me it makes it all feel like a parlor trick. The easiest way to produce machines that can be used in "Oh, wow! Look at that!" videos that continue to bring in grants.

These robots should use binocular vision and nothing else.

Oh, wait a minute, that's hard, isn't it? Yup.

Re: MIT cheetah robot lands the running jump [video]

#120

Post by IgorPartola »

deepnet wrote: post #88

Stuart Russel of AI a Modern Approach fame ( with Norvig ) asks us to consider the ethics of AI research - killer robotics, & hunter drones. http://www.nature.com/news/robotics-ethics-of-artificial-int... He calls for a moritorium until we can get a neural net to learn Asimov's 1st Law. Should the self driving car swerve into you to avoid greater moral hazard ? Humour aside as researchers and robotocists do we have a…

> Should the self driving car swerve into you to avoid greater moral hazard?

The self-driving car's first priority should be to protect those inside it. Anything else is more complicated. I read an article a little while ago about this topic and it posed a question along the lines of "should a self-driving car do the thing that'll kill its own passengers, yet save a larger number of others around it?" Think about how difficult it would be for a self-driving car to estimate this. Even more importantly, how would two self-driving cars cooperate in the event of an inevitable accident? Would we allow them to directly talk to each other, or are they only allowed to interpret each others' trajectories?

I think the simplest directive is "save your own passengers". That is what human drivers currently do, and I believe in the long run this would be effective at saving the optimal number of lives. Besides, if choosing between a car with this directive and a car that's programmed to sacrifice you to save someone else, which would you buy?

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