We have already blogged about Robotars – humanoid robots that are controlled virtually from a remote location – and NASA’s efforts in this field are developing further with their Robonaut 2.

At the recent Artifical Intelligence Lunch Debate the diverse group of experts discussed the implications of this sort of blended reality. This is particularly in relation to the use of sensory feedback technology which gives users a more heightened and tactile experience and that provides new and more tangible ways of behaving through and with new representational forms.

Commenting about the problems with traditional understandings of artifical intelligence at the Lunch Debate in June, Professor Noel Sharkey suggested that with robots and avatars we should not be saying “I think therefore I am” but instead,  ‘I feel therefore I am’.

Daily Galaxy has a great article on the Robonaut 2 which is below:

NASA’s Robonaut 2, or R2, is getting ready to work on the International Space Station in November but it’s already tweeting about preparations under the account, @AstroRobonaut.

The humanoid robot — complete with a head, arms and an upper torso — will be the first dexterous humanoid robot in space and it assures its followers in one of its first tweets alluding to 2001: A Space Odyssey that, “No, no relation to Hal. Don’t know if I’d want to admit to having him on my family tree if I was. [Definately] don’t condone his actions.” It also tweeted that it’s not related to Boba Fett.

Is this another vivid sign that we have entered the dawn of the age of post-biological intelligence?

Although there are already several robots in space — including the famous now AI-enhanced Mars Rovers, which have been zipping around the red planet for years — NASA and G.M.have created the first human-like robot to leave Earth.

The robot is called Robonaut 2, or R2 for short, and it weighs in at 300 pounds, with a head, torso and two fully functional arms. At first, R2 will be monitored in space to see how it performs in weightlessness, but NASA hopes to eventually use R2 to assist astronauts during space walks and to work alongside engineers in the space station.

In a joint news release, John Olson, director of NASA’s Exploration Systems Integration Office, said, “The partnership of humans and robots will be critical to opening up the solar system and will allow us to go farther and achieve more than we can probably even imagine today.”

According to researchers on the project, “Robonaut systems are the first humanoids specifically designed for space.”

Robonaut is a collaboration between the Robot Systems Technology Branch at the NASA Johnson Space Center and the US military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to build a robotic ‘astronaut equivalent’. Robonaut looks a bit like a human, with an upper torso, two arms and a head – all controlled by a human operator through telerobotic technologies. Robonaut was designed with the concept of creating a robot for tasks that ‘were not specifically designed for robots.’ In order for the Robonaut to complete these ‘human-like’ tasks, it is equipped with hands that are actually more dexterous than those of an astronaut in a pressurized spacesuit.

In 2004, the second generation of Robonaut gained mobility when engineers attached its body to a Segway Robotic Mobility Platform (RMP) commissioned by DARPA. Using virtual reality instruments, a human operator was immersed in the Robonaut’s actual environment and was able to perform remote operations.

According to researchers on Robonaut, “As the project matures with increased feedback to the human operator, the Robonaut system will approach the handling and manipulation capabilities of a suited astronaut.”

With more ‘haptic technology’ which uses sensory feedback to recreate the sense of touch, a user might wear gloves that allow them to ‘feel’ objects in a virtual world. You could examine the texture and weight of rocks, or even experience the crunch of icy martian dirt.

Dr Grace Augustine’s Avatars on Pandora go well beyond current technologies. We’re not going to be growing any biological avatars for human explorers in the lab – but modern robotics are getting close to providing a ‘human’ experience through increased dexterity and mobility. Robotic avatars could allow humans to fully experience the environment of other worlds. Through the eyes of robotic avatars we could watch the sunrise over the rusty, red crater rims without having to “experience suffocation, the icy death of -200 degrees C on their skin or the sting of microscopic dust in their eyes.”

Even though NASA and others have come a long way in developing avatars, the technology still has a long way to go before we’re having adventures on Pandora-like planets. Perhaps more advanced civilizations on distant worlds have developed avatars just as good as those in the movie.

R2 will be a passenger on the Space Shuttle Discovery, which is scheduled to head to the space station in September.

Source Credits:

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/08/robonaut-2-the-first-humanoid-tweeting-from-space.html

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Avatars_In_Space_999.html

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/14/nasa-and-gm-robot-heading-to-space-station/?src=busln