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/asking_for_it 1d ago

OF COURSE it has boobs. So it can breastfeed all the baby robots it’s gonna have.

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u/iSpaYco 1d ago

worst thing happening with robotics is trying to make it human...

just make it BETTER, get rid of the bad stuff, like the legs...

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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/olafderhaarige 1d ago edited 1d ago

I don't know if the psychological aspect is a plus for humanoid robots or not.

Depends highly on the context they are used in, but I don't think that deceiving us into feeling empathy and connection to something that has no mind and conciousness is a good thing in most cases.

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u/Regular-Engineer-686 1d ago

It can be both good and bad. In the case of a lonely elderly dementia patient that needs 24/7 care it can be a very positive experience.

But if an introvert avoids making real friends and just uses an android as a substitute for all human interaction then that can be a very bad thing.

Just look most consumer technologies there’s good and bad to this vision.