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Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

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Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#31

Post by me_me_me »

SuchAnonMuchWow wrote: post #20
HarHarVeryFunny wrote: post #13

It's interesting that a lot of people, including here on HN, find this new Atlas (does he/it have a name?) a bit unnerving or creepy. Historically what people have found creepy about robots is when they become too human-like, especially facially - the "uncanny valley" where the face is so close to human that the slight differences give the feeling that something is wrong - like a dead body brought to life, perhaps. W…

I think it's still the same "uncanny valley" phenomenon: because the body looks more like a human, we are more creeped when we discover how it moves its joints because we were expecting something more human. We wouldn't be creeped by a car/robot moving its wheels in weird directions, but we are with a humanoid robot moving its legs that way.

It looks like its possessed.

Something straight out of Exorcist.

Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#32

Post by HarHarVeryFunny »

me_me_me wrote: post #31
SuchAnonMuchWow wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's still the same "uncanny valley" phenomenon: because the body looks more like a human, we are more creeped when we discover how it moves its joints because we were expecting something more human. We wouldn't be creeped by a car/robot moving its wheels in weird directions, but we are with a humanoid robot moving its legs that way.

It looks like its possessed. Something straight out of Exorcist.

The head at least needs to be changed and made to look more friendly, or at least not like an emotionless alien eyeing you up for paperclip conversion.

It's a bit odd to follow the human form factor (I get the logic - for a human-designed world), but then not at least also give it a human-looking head, or maybe better a dumb/cute looking head.

Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#33

Post by bryanlarsen »

HarHarVeryFunny wrote: post #32
me_me_me wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks like its possessed. Something straight out of Exorcist.

The head at least needs to be changed and made to look more friendly, or at least not like an emotionless alien eyeing you up for paperclip conversion. It's a bit odd to follow the human form factor (I get the logic - for a human-designed world), but then not at least also give it a human-looking head, or maybe better a dumb/cute looking head.

Wouldn't a more friendly looking face push us further into the uncanny valley and make it more creepy, not less?

Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#34

Post by HarHarVeryFunny »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #33
HarHarVeryFunny wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The head at least needs to be changed and made to look more friendly, or at least not like an emotionless alien eyeing you up for paperclip conversion. It's a bit odd to follow the human form factor (I get the logic - for a human-designed world), but then not at least also give it a human-looking head, or maybe better a dumb/cute looking head.

Wouldn't a more friendly looking face push us further into the uncanny valley and make it more creepy, not less?

I wouldn't have thought so, but it's hard to predict how people are going to viscerally react!

I wouldn't have anticipated people finding the rotation/double-jointedness creepy, but it does seem to be a fairly widespread reaction.

Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#35

Post by generuso »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #23

Company secrets, I suppose, but I wish there was more info on the engineering of it. Custom motors? What do they look like? (I see a lot of ventilation suggesting heat.) Are there anything like tendons (springs I suppose) so that the motors are being assisted to a degree in lifting the mass of itself? Love to see a dissection so to speak.

Boston Dynamics is notoriously secretive.

But unlike with hydraulics, where Boston Dynamics have developed their own valves and pumps and organically shaped 3D printed in titanium manifolds, there is only so much that one can do differently from others with the electro-mechanical actuators and motor controllers.

Everybody is using the same brushless motors with one of a few known types of gearboxes.These technologies are so well developed that one usually has no choice but to source the components from the experts in their respective domains.

For now, the closest one can do to looking inside of the new Atlas, is to look at other modern robots. For example, here is what is inside of the Agility Robotics' bipedal robot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzIX2KGqpzI

And here is a teardown of a joint from a very popular Universal Robots' arm: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oje2ucwe3vI

Other than that, one can read Boston Dynamics' patents covering some of the design choices for their older robots, including for the electric quadrupeds: https://patents.google.com/?assignee=Boston+Dynamics

Re: Boston Dynamics' new electric Atlas robot is swiveling nightmare fuel

#36

Post by rst »

SuchAnonMuchWow wrote: post #20
HarHarVeryFunny wrote: post #13

It's interesting that a lot of people, including here on HN, find this new Atlas (does he/it have a name?) a bit unnerving or creepy. Historically what people have found creepy about robots is when they become too human-like, especially facially - the "uncanny valley" where the face is so close to human that the slight differences give the feeling that something is wrong - like a dead body brought to life, perhaps. W…

I think it's still the same "uncanny valley" phenomenon: because the body looks more like a human, we are more creeped when we discover how it moves its joints because we were expecting something more human. We wouldn't be creeped by a car/robot moving its wheels in weird directions, but we are with a humanoid robot moving its legs that way.

In particular, the sections of the demo video where it does something anatomically impossible for humans -- rotating legs in the hip joints, rotating its torso to switch front and back -- are absolutely uncanny valley stuff.
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