The only thing that really spoils it for me it is the intense jealousy that I feel when I realise that some people get to build dancing robots for a living!
It's certainly very impressive - I wouldn't mind betting that dancing is trickier to get right than some of the more "practical" uses that they've demonstrated before (that's always how it feels whenever I hit the dance floor, anyway!
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tulamide wrote:because science took over those laws from a sci-fi author
I was always drawn to science fiction where the "science" part was taken seriously, and which looks at the psychological and social implications of it. I've been very glad to see that the roboticists themselves have been leading the calls for a debate about what society should be allowed to use autonomous systems for (the military in particular, of course), and I think that fiction writers have had their part to play in that by exploring potential futures.
Spogg wrote:I think the movements are just so human the motion enters the so-called “uncanny valley”
I find that interesting. Usually with the "uncanny valley" effect, both the looks and the behaviour are very close to being human-like, but ever so slightly off in an intangible way. Here, though, the difference is very obvious at first glance - these can't be anything but robots. But the behaviour is a whole new level of being human-like, and dancing is hardly something we'd expect an emotionless machine to be doing.
Usually the very obviously non-human appearance would work against the uncanny valley effect; but unlike, say, C3PO or The Terminator, we cannot just remind ourselves that these are actors in costumes, puppets, or CGI (apologies to Star Wars fans if I just spoiled anything for you!) Maybe some people can't shake the subconscious feeling that being able to so closely mimic human behaviour implies that there must be "human minds" trapped inside the machines?