Watch a swarm of flying robotic drones construct a tiny building • Hacker News Board

Re: Watch a swarm of flying robotic drones construct a tiny building

#81

Post by jokermatt999 » Tue, Jan 18, 2011, 2:56 PM UTC

BrandonM wrote: post #78

siculars wrote: post #31

Wow, unions are gonna hate these.

The shortsightedness of people worried about fewer jobs because of new technology is ridiculous. If you can build a house for the cost of land and materials only, the cost of living is lowered for everyone. With enough advancement and automation, the cost of life's necessities drops. As it decreases, the amount of human labor necessary to support day-to-day life will drop with it. Eventually we'll be able to support…

Because although a grand vision of the future is wonderful, so is a guaranteed paycheck for the foreseeable future. For the people who'd be replaced by these machines, "eventually things will be amazing" is not much comfort in the face of "and you'll be replaced".

Re: Watch a swarm of flying robotic drones construct a tiny building

#82

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jan 18, 2011, 4:07 PM UTC

scott_s wrote: post #46

andrewcooke wrote: post #37

I'm going to be a pedant here - that does not look like a swarm, and they don't claim it is (in the video, at least). By "swarm" I would understand that all have the same programming and that the assembly process is emergent from simpler instructions plus exploration and feedback. Instead they appear to be programmed to act sequentially with a pre-planned set of actions. There is no feedback, no emergence. In short,…

No smarts? From their behavior, I got the impression that the robots were assessing what was the next step in construction, which included assessing if another robot was still working on construction. They also had to avoid collisions. Anything programmed by humans is a "dumb machine doing exactly what they are told." I think you meant that to mean each individual step was hardcoded. I don't think it was. I think the…

[deleted]

Re: Watch a swarm of flying robotic drones construct a tiny building

#83

Post by siculars » Thu, Jan 20, 2011, 5:17 AM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #80

BrandonM wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The shortsightedness of people worried about fewer jobs because of new technology is ridiculous. If you can build a house for the cost of land and materials only, the cost of living is lowered for everyone. With enough advancement and automation, the cost of life's necessities drops. As it decreases, the amount of human labor necessary to support day-to-day life will drop with it. Eventually we'll be able to support…

Its Capitalism when everyone works for themselves (ok, the money works for them). Its Socialism when we all work for the collective. What do you call it when nobody works?

Arabia? Greece? Hehehe.