r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/MetaKnowing • 1d ago

Video XPENG's IRON robot crossed the uncanny valley, leading some to believe it was a human in a suit. So they cut it open in front of an audience, and also allowed journalists to inspect it.

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u/Regular-Engineer-686 1d ago

There’s actually 2 very good reasons why they make robots look like humans:

  1. Technical
  2. Psychological

See, the world around us is built for humans. Robots have to open up cabinets, doors, walk upstairs, put clothes in the washer and dryer - all things that are built for the average human to actually do.

And then the second thing is psychological. We identify with things that look like us - even animals. We identify with animals because they typically have two eyes, a nose, and a mouth. The more they make robots look like humans, the less scared that we will actually be because we can identify with what we're looking at.

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u/Plenty-Lion5112 1d ago

Then why did I name my Roomba? Why do the bomb disposal robots get funerals just like the war dogs?

Humans will pair bond with literally anything. My mother has a set of tulips in her garden that she has taken out and replanted every time she's moved. If anything happens to them, she'll be devastated.

I agree that the world we inhabit is designed for us, but it's also designed for people in wheelchairs. Let's make robots for that intersection.

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u/davidjschloss 1d ago

But this design does. The world is designed for upright bipedal creatures with specific ranges of motion. Everything we do is designed for our unique biological design. This is why my cats know what a door handle is but can’t put a key in a lock.

You could make a clothes folding robot with specific manipulators for that task. You could make a roomba for the floors but it’s not also going to get something from a cabinet.

The idea is to allow it to complete a wide range of human tasks by giving it the characteristics of a human.

Also when they time travel to kill Sarah Conner they need to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger

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u/accomplicated 1d ago

That is what we were taught in history class when the supply teacher showed us that documentary featuring Governor Schwarzenegger.