I didn’t read the article, i just want to rant into the void about this thing that itches in my mind when I see this topic.
I don’t want a robot that looks human. Even if they manage to make one that’s convincing and isn’t nightmare fuel, I’m still going to be uncomfortable around it. It’s because of the fact that this robot’s existence would be inherently deceptive, trying to fool you into thinking you’re talking to a human, only for you to find out that this thing isn’t human. It falls out of the visual uncanny valley, but into an entirely new one, a more existential uncanny valley. If you want me to trust a robot, you can’t make it immediately try to deceive me into thinking it’s human. Look at movies and cartoons, the most appealing robots in those media are obviously robots. I’m sure there are a good few Androids that look human and are appealing in their own way, but for the most part you get things like Wall-e, or baymax, or r2d2, designs that are not trying to fool you into thinking they’re human. All of those designs have a charm or appeal to them, and they all look like robots. I don’t know where I’m going with this, I’m gonna go to bed.
The main reason of humanoid robots isn’t that the people think that it is a person, it’s because our environment is made for humans and because of this the design to best fit in this environment with several different tasks. The little bot in the article never be apable to wash your dishes, climb stairs or serve you an beer from the fridge. Robots made for one specific task, certainly can have a design specific for it, there isn’t needed an humanoid design.
Ok the full size one is nightmare fuel, but the reachy mini seems cool
