It was a matter of time that Microsoft Robotics Studio had a competitor. Last month Gostai released URBI 1.0 RC2. Release candidate 1 was out just the same month (December 2006) Microsoft released their version 1.0 of MSRS. URBI is available under GPL license. (MSRS is also freely available under a Non-Commercial license).
URBI is very in the same line where MSRS is. The key idea of these sorts of products is to offer a general programming framework for robotics. And this is quite new. We were used to have software simulators, programming libraries for concrete robots or robot families. The great advantage of a product like this, is that you can focus on you robotic application without bothering too much about concurrency, asynchronous I/O, and distributed processing. Additionally, a robot controller written using these new tools should be easily portable from one platform to another (given analogous sensors and actuators).
URBI is based on a script language which offers new features like parallelism, event-driven programming, and distributed object management. Multiple programming languages can be used as the URBU functionality is enclosed in the liburbi library, which can be integrated languages like C++, Java, Matlab, Python, etc.
It seems that some governments are taking very seriously the possibility of the everyday use of robots in society. Japan and South Korea are worried about human safety in a world where many critical tasks can be performed by machines. They share the Issac Asimov’s vision of a future world where human beings and robots coexist. However, they don’t seem to trust mechanical creatures controlled by only three simple laws.
As reported by The Times a few weeks ago, Japanese robotics experts assure that the famous Three Laws are not enough to keep us safe when the next generation robots become a reality. A 60 page draft document titled ‘Guidelines to Secure the Safe Performance of Next Generation Robots’ is being discussed by the industry, researchers, and lawyers with the aim to elaborate a law that protect us effectively.
This draft document proposes the creation of a central database where all incidents of human harmed by robots will be recorded and accessible by robot manufacturers. Therefore, robots must be equipped with the corresponding mechanisms to log and communicate any injures they cause to people during their task accomplishment. Japan is envisioning a near future where robots play a key role in society and they have detected the need for a well-built regulation. It is foreseen that the domestic robot market grow in Japan up to more than 3.3 trillion yen in the next 15 years. Assistant robots able to help and chat with pensioners are already a reality. Nursing robots, security patrol robots, home assistant robots are going to be common in the coming years.
This is a filmed lecture of Christof Koch, neuroscientist famous for his contributions to the quest for understanding the underlying mechanisms of consciousness. He has been working jointly with Francis Crick researching on the visual perception and specifcally attention and consciousness neurological mechanisms.
The video is provided by the University of California - Berkeley. The graduate council lectures series. Foersters Lectures on the inmortality of the soul. Lecture's title is 'The Quest for Consciousness: A Neurological Approach", and is conducted by Christof Koch, Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology from the California Institute of Technology.
This is a filmed lecture of Christof Koch, neuroscientist famous for his contributions to the quest for understanding the underlying mechanisms of consciousness. He has been working jointly with Francis Crick researching on the visual perception and specifcally attention and consciousness neurological mechanisms.
The video is provided by the University of California - Berkeley. The graduate council lectures series. Foersters Lectures on the inmortality of the soul. Lecture's title is 'The Quest for Consciousness: A Neurological Approach", and is conducted by Christof Koch, Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology from the California Institute of Technology.
This is an enterview with Francis Crick (the Nobel Laureate co-discoverer of the DNA) conducted by the neuroscientist Nick Spitzer at University of California - San Diego.
The discussion is centered about Dr. Crick's research on human consciousness.
These are some excerpts from an enterview with Daniel Dennett. The series are titled Understanding Genetics. Points of View. Source: www.thetech.org/genetics. Questions are very much related with the content of two of the Books written by Dennett: 'Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meaning of Life' and 'Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon'.
Part 1: What is it about Darwin's Idea that is so dangerous?
Part 2:
You've described the design of natural selection as "brilliant" but "mindless". Can you explain?
Orgel's Second Rule: Evolution is cleverer than you are. Francis Crick (British molecular biologist, 1916-2004 ) quoted by Daniel C. Dennett in Elbow Room (1984).
Part 3:
How do you explain evolution to skeptics? How can you convince them? Can you?
There exist more parts of this enterview but as the are more related to religions I haven't added them here.
Blog... 
Conscious Robots RSS Feed
