http://www.physorg.com/news95434590.html
Is this how far we have come with robotic tech?
I thought there were probably more advances in the area...wow!
Is this what people of the future are supposed to look forward to instead of being assisted by cumbersome people? What is wrong with employing people for the position of helpmate to the aging?
I have always wondered if this would be an area where robots were actually needed. "The Jetsons" was a fun cartoon, and the ideas about the future were advanced for their times but is it what we want to envision for artificial intelligence? I thought they would basically be wired for positions where a human would be harmed in the same capacity...and be made for space explorations...undersea applications and so forth.
I know there are a force of unemployed individuals who would like to be employed in the capacity of helpmate if given the oppurtunity at a rate that would be less costly than such a robot which requires 12 computers to place an item upon a shelf....geeez.
Let us not be too hasty in deciding that the future needs such waste of technology and at such an incredible expense.
Put to much better use in industry where the human element is put into jepardy of potential harm....this is the proper arena for the robotic.IMHO
One step at a time....everyone I've shown the article to has said "I want one", and with Toyota looking at the device, there is the possibility of affordability, reliability and longevity. The first Toyota that rolled off the production line was not a good car, but the current ones rival the best.
I expect the same evolution would occur if the robot is introduced as a consumer item (though a big item for industry too I suspect) and gains acceptance sufficient to move the industry forward (as it seems to me it will be). With capital and market interests driving it, the development of the robot will accelerate.
Social questions:- should we or shouldn't we, where will robots be used, will people lose jobs, etc. are questions that I think should get answered in practice, in the market in an evolutionary manner. After all, I doubt that the model x robot will be threatening anything more than the odd domestic cat that may get trodden on, until model x.1 is released with the anti-cat trodding sensor and software enhancement.
Commercial questions: - should the robot go the way of our favourite operating system - Windows, then it will remain for ever a stupid, unreliable and semi useless beast, so i hope Toyota and others jump on the opensource approach and harness the power of hundreds of thousands of developers. Can you imagine the development that would occur if it became a project on Sourceforge?
I expect the same evolution would occur if the robot is introduced as a consumer item (though a big item for industry too I suspect) and gains acceptance sufficient to move the industry forward (as it seems to me it will be). With capital and market interests driving it, the development of the robot will accelerate.
Social questions:- should we or shouldn't we, where will robots be used, will people lose jobs, etc. are questions that I think should get answered in practice, in the market in an evolutionary manner. After all, I doubt that the model x robot will be threatening anything more than the odd domestic cat that may get trodden on, until model x.1 is released with the anti-cat trodding sensor and software enhancement.
Commercial questions: - should the robot go the way of our favourite operating system - Windows, then it will remain for ever a stupid, unreliable and semi useless beast, so i hope Toyota and others jump on the opensource approach and harness the power of hundreds of thousands of developers. Can you imagine the development that would occur if it became a project on Sourceforge?
I say bring it on. Then eventually each one of us would own and maintain a robot, who go and do work of our jobs. As we make more money, we would purchase more upgrades for the hardware and software, to get better jobs. 
Japan is seriously considering this type of robot for future care of the elderly. The declining birthrate and longer life expectations are combining to create a large percentage of elderly. Unemployment will probably be non-existent, in Japan anyway.
The unemployment argument has been used before. Consider simple labor-saving devices that we (in the West) now take for granted, like the washing machine. They potentially put huge numbers of people out of work. If you look at countries like India, where this sort of thing is still done by hand, huge numbers of people do still work in this "industry". The unemployed in the US could be put to work washing clothes in rivers, but would that be a good thing?
The unemployment argument has been used before. Consider simple labor-saving devices that we (in the West) now take for granted, like the washing machine. They potentially put huge numbers of people out of work. If you look at countries like India, where this sort of thing is still done by hand, huge numbers of people do still work in this "industry". The unemployed in the US could be put to work washing clothes in rivers, but would that be a good thing?
Hey if this works, I'd finally have a date for the weekend
All of this is nice and well. However, the first incident where a robot is hacked and that robot causes human harm. The liability suits may well shut down most of the industry. Also, don't expect public acceptance of these machines anytime soon with movies like the Terminator and Matrix series in popular culture to scare the wits out of John Doe. The first consumer robots to be walking down a public street will be crushed with a baseball bat under claims of self defense before the sun falls that day.
Word up is that Edsinger is heading to CA to start his own robotics company to deliver his tech to commercial markets. Expect the robotics inductry to be a major GNP contributor by the next decade as the processing power continues to increase such thet the "12 computers" of today are simply portions of one complex microchip. As always, the major advances need to be made in software. Let's hope it's not Microsoft with their bugware. 
I have ALS, and a robot that could help me tranfer from bed to chair to toilet to shower to chair to car etc etc etc; would be very helpful and relieve my wife from those tasks. Since the disease is mostly 3-5 yrs length, the robot could be returned when I no longer needed it.