"First, we want robots to work for us. Second, when it comes to work, humans have three historical blueprints for recruiting labor: animals, through the process of domestication; other humans, through employment, but also subjugation and outright enslavement; and machines, through the development of physical systems for performing actions. Why does this matter to understanding the present and future of robotics? While we've created an astonishing diversity of machines in the broadest sense,"
"Today our most celebrated robots, all of them marvels of design and engineering, are machine evolutions of animals and other humans. You can see the echoes of those same dogs and draft animals we recruited as labor thousands of years ago in this dog and this dog, another dog, and this mule. And you can see our adoration of humanoid robots in Agility Robotics' Digit, Boston Dynamics' Atlas, Tesla's Optimus, and Unitree's G1."
Two high-level truths shape robotics: humans want robots to work for them and humans have three historical blueprints for recruiting labor—animals, other humans, and machines. The dominant robot designs echo animals and humans, producing celebrated robots that are machine evolutions of dogs, mules, humanoids, and more. Examples include Agility Robotics' Digit, Boston Dynamics' Atlas, Tesla's Optimus, Unitree's G1, and humanoids built to work alongside humans in warehouses and construction sites. Two main reasons drive this convergence: environments and tools have been designed for human and animal bodies, and human psychology is predisposed to anthropomorphize nonhuman objects.
Read at Fast Company
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