Do you want to Super Size that? P.136 Class Discussion #2

     Rodney Brooks  is helping pave the way in the study of artificial intelligence, AI. I like to call him a robot maker. He is a robot maker who believes in the bottom up approach to AI. The robots he will make will have  “to learn to crawl before they  learn to think.” (Dery 125)

     Brooks’ belief that small size is an advantage comes from the life he lives and breathes in and “his realization that in the natural world, small size and smaller brainpower aren’t necessarily barriers to evolutionary success.” (Dery 128) Brooks could see this in the termite and the bee, two organic life forms who follow simple rules to achieve complex results, the basis for his insect-like robots. Brooks and colleagues have also developed artificial life-forms like the Squirt the cockroach robot, Genghis who targets human prey, and Attila who is a spider-like robot. These insect-like robots use sensory information to navigate their surroundings. One of Brooks’ robots could fit in your pocket, is named Squirt, and acts like a cockroach. Brooks does not want to follow American fast food culture and Super Size it, he wants to keep it small. And for good reason. Brooks recounts the reasons for keeping it small. The reasons are personal, financial, and functional.

     AI is in its infancy if the actual goal is to have a human-like robot who thinks and possesses consciousness. This is one of the reasons Brooks chooses “small”. The technology and research is so far off, he wants to be able to see his own concepts come to fruition. The second reason revolves around  money. If the robot project is small in size, it will be less expensive then a larger robot. And consequently, it will be cheaper to make and can be mass-produced. The money overlaps into the functionality of the robot. Brooks has a vision for his Gnat robot. In an essay he authored, called “Twilight Zones and Cornerstones: A Gnat robot double Feature”, the small in size Gnat robots would assist in medical procedures that “unclog arteries, mend severed neurons or crawl across eyeball to perform retinal surgery” and the gnats would also be able to assist with household chores like cutting grass and painting your house. (Dery 128) The future looks bright for Brooks, even if it “small”. I look forward to trading in my iRobot Roomba vacuum for a couple dozen gnats!