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Artificial Intelligence: Can Small Insect Like Robots Rule the AI World?
The Question that I propose is: Can insect-like robots perform tasks
superior to that of any other style of robot? I am going to prove to you that
the answer is yes, of course they can! With their superior stability and many
less drawbacks that larger wheeled robots the legged “insects” can out perform
even the most powerfully computing machines in many tasks. The applications of
these robots are only limited by our imagination.
Many people believe that
artificial intelligence and robots should only be for “unthinking and repetitive
tasks, or for dangerous but straightforward undertakings” (Economist 83). But as
human understanding and intelligence of computer systems and technology
progresses the idea of artificial intelligence becomes more of a reality instead
of a vision.
Right now a computer can be a matchmaker, a chess champion, and
a useful searcher of medical information. And many people and programs are
changing that with their leaps and bounds by actually giving the machine senses
like a database of knowledge and sight and sound in the forms of a camera and a
microphone respectively.
In one case a robot can sense “hunger” by making a
decision when it is running low on fuel to choose to refuel before it completes
its task that has been scheduled. It may have to refuel multiple times before
the task is completed. The decision can even be made taking into effect the
distance it is away from a refueling station (Economist 84). This is one reason
why a small insect –like robot could be more useful, because it could be more
efficient and adaptive to the task at hand.
Much of the robotics community
believes that a robot will have to be huge in size and programming to be useful
in anything. But many of those types of robots could only mover across smooth
surfaces like floors or roads for it to be stable and have no chance of it
damaging itself by tipping over. The only way that robots could ever move where
humans could, was to develop legs. But legs could be unstable causing the robot
to fall, which concerned many people. But it wouldn’t be a concern if the robot
was the size of an insect since insects fall down all of the time and they seem
to still get around ok (Waldrop 963).
Many of these small robots have been
developed for medical treatment since some are invisible to the naked eye. They
can be anything from pumps to help operate an artificial pancreas to help with
diabetes; another could help with intracellular surgery and even decompose after
its task is completed. In science the microbots could be used to move individual
cells around in a petri dish (Thro 81). As I said before the possibilities are
only limited by our imaginations.
Some of these very small robots are
actually modified computer chips that are so
tiny that the take advantage of
the piezoelectric effect which directly converts electrical energy into
mechanical energy. This effect is not useful in normal size models but in the
microbots it can be very useful (Researcher 993).
One microbot named Genghis
has been a marvel of engineering. With only simple commands the robot acts
instinctively to walk, turn, and jump just as if it were full of life. As
Genghis walks over obstacles it keeps its balance by pulling legs in and out
even as it walks forward. If the robot doesn’t lift its leg high enough to clear
an obstacle it instinctively pulls it back and then lifts it a second time only
higher than the first (Waldrop 963).
The heir to Genghis is being prototyped
to be a mars rover that can walk over the surface like a six-legged insect
easily collecting data with its instruments on its three-kilogram frame. But the
main advantage to the small robot is that for the same price as a hefty mobile
robot you could place a couple of handfuls of the little robots; each of them
carrying different instruments so that if one failed you would still have more
left to take observations. Another advantage of the six legged robot would be
that if it fell upside down its legs and instruments could rotate 180 degrees to
rite the robot so that it could move along (Waldrop 966).
The vision of
robots with the looks, similarities, and the dexterity of the human body is
leaps and bounds away from reality. Many new technologies still have to be
developed to achieve this goal even though some are in place as we speak.
Robotics in general has a long way to move before it can have a drastic clutch
on the term artificial intelligence. The area that is still showing the most
promise is the world of microbots
and insect-like bots that can navigate
rough terrain with nimbleness, and even can act instinctively. The area that
shows the most promise for these bots is in the medical fields which could use
some of these instruments as very precise tools.
Works Cited
“Artificial Intelligence-Are
scientists close to creating a machine that thinks?”
CQ Researcher 7 (1997)
: 985-1008.
Kanade, Takeo. “New technologies and applications in robotics.”
Communications of the ACM 37.3 (1994) : 58-72.
“Not clever enough: will
intelligent ‘humanoid’ robots ever exist?”
The Economist 339.79 (1996) :
81-87.
Thro, Ellen., ed. Robotics: the marriage of computers and machines.
Waldrop, M. Mitchell. “Fast, cheap, and out of control.”
Science
248.4958 (1990) : 959-68.