Why is it hard to make a humanoid robot? Pro Preview

The robots that resemble humans are called humanoids. In order to create such robot we have to think about how we understand that we're people. We don't make a lot humanoids because of three major problems.

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  • #1404
  • 16 Jul 2019

The first is artificial intelligence (AI). Our brains work in a really complex way, which we don't fully understand. Scientists are making progress in creating artificial intelligence that can learn like us and possibly make the right decisions in any situation. Unfortunately, we do not yet fully understand human feelings and therefore we can not recreate human brain.

The second problem is the way people move and how difficult it is to make a robot moves the same way. To walk, we use hundreds of muscles and complex "programs" that tell us when to use which muscle. This is something that we have been learning since we were born and this is why it is extremely difficult to figure out how to program a robot with our years of experience. The other part of this problem is the external one: as long as we're using hundreds of muscles to move, we will need hundreds of motors and pistons to recreate them in a robot.

The third problem is rather thematic and it is the question "Why? We evolved as a species, because our body is designed to be capable of doing lots of things very well. Most of the robots we create have a particular purpose. For example, if we want a robot that puts stamps on sheets, we'll just put a stamp on a motor and we'll be ready. We don't need this robot to be able to jump or to have a whole human hand with hundreds of muscles. We need only one - the one that is capable of making the movement in the way we need. Therefore, for most of the tasks we can create something more simple than humanoid and it will do the work.

Despite these huge problems, scientists around the world are looking for ways to create the perfect humanoid robot!

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