Chasing the Dream – one of NASA’s potential crew taxis

dream chaser. photo from NASA

NASA’s Commercial Crew Development Program involves three alternative designs. Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser spaceplane happens to my favorite of the three. The other two designs are SpaceX’s Dragon capsule and Boeing’s CST-100 capsule. For purely aesthetic reasons, I prefer the spaceplane. It just looks cooler, you know? For some reason, I also get the feeling that the spaceplane have a bit more elbow room in the interior.

Thus far Dragon appears to be in the lead. Unmanned Dragon capsules have already launched to the International Space Station a couple of times on cargo resupply runs. However, I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the little spaceplane. SpaceX has also recently unveiled their Dragon V2 crew capsule. (It looks a bit cramped in my opinion, but I guess we should get used to cramped quarters as opposed to the more spacious Space Shuttles.) It will be at least two more years until the Dream Chaser spaceplane is launched into orbit on top of an Atlas rocket. That sounds like a long wait, but time flies! (no pun intended.)

Runaway AI – WIll robots be the death of us all?

chess playing robot

An article in The Atlantic magazine from yesterday discusses the possibility, and likelihood, that artificial intelligence will eventually engage in anti-social behaviors that destroy human beings.

The main gist of the argument is that an artificial intelligence will eventually be programming itself with sub-goals in order to achieve their main goal. The article uses an example of a robot that is programmed to play chess. Even if its only stated goal is to play chess, the AI might develop other sub-goals in order for it to maximize its goal of playing chess. This might include eliminating any thing (or person) that stops it from playing chess.

Judging a robot by it’s cover

Robopanda, by WoWWEe Robotics

 

From a recent Wall Street Journal article:

“There is another problem for these robots: Many of them are, in fact, scary. They look like big metallic spiders, faceless Storm Troopers, and soulless assassins from a dystopian future.

To address such concerns, developers at the NASA-funded Jet Propulsion Lab in California have tried to create a “panda-police look,” said Brett Kennedy, the team leader. At the moment, RoboSimian, the lab’s entry in the contest, looks more like a black-legged spider than a cuddly mammal. “We don’t want it to be too scary, and we also want it to be a piece of equipment that someone’s going to want to pick up and use,” he said.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304773104579270681906745124

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Of course, the least scary appearance would probably be the look of a human being. Or, would people object to that as a robot impersonating a human?

Astro-Android companion-bot

NASA’s Robonaut

Up on the International Space Station, NASA has sent up a robot called the Robonaut. Seen in the picture to the left, it is a torso with two arms and a head. Its main mission is to perform tasks that may be too dangerous for the human crew. The Robonaut mimics the appearance of a human being so that it can use the same tools that the human astronauts use.
There will soon be a different type of android on the International Space Station. JAXA (Japan’s Aerospace Exploration Agency) will be sending a small android up to the space station whose purpose will be different from that of the Robonaut. The JAXA-bot, yet to be named, will only be about 13 inches tall. It’s job is

Seeing, Listening, and Thinking: Will androids ever be able to do these things?

A recent article in the New York Times piqued my interest over the Thanksgiving weekend. While not about androids specifically, it discussed the growing speed and accuracy of an artificial intelligence technique called “deep learning” or otherwise known as “neural nets” (as they resemble the neural connections of the human brain.) Some of us might recognize the term “neural net” from the android Lieutenant Commander Data of the Enterprise. How far are we from such an android?

Understandably, the computer programs of today are nowhere near the sophistication of a human mind. And while I was excited to read the article, it turns out there was a lot more progress in the “recognition” aspects of the computer programs (seeing and hearing) than there was about the thinking aspects.

As a side thought, I wonder whether the character trait of curiosity can ever be programmed. The android Data was portrayed to have levels of curiosity. One of our current Mars rovers is even named Curiosity. But will androids ever see something and think “Hmm… that looks interesting. Maybe I should investigate further.”

Greetings!

However you have stumbled onto this blog, hello!

My name is Vincent. I currently contribute to a television news blogsite called “TheTwoCents.” The site has short recaps and reviews of tv episodes for most of the shows on television. Right now, I cover NBC’s Revolution and ABC’s Last Resort. Many other great shows are covered, so check it out!

http://thetwocentscorp.wordpress.com/

 

I also occasionally write fanfiction for some scifi series from recent years. Check me out at fanfiction.net by searching for author name VinEsquire. (indeed, I am a former attorney with dreams of becoming a writer). I have entries for Star Trek, Firefly, and Fringe.

As for this blog, I originally created it because I needed a wordpress login, but may decide to write some short stories and post them on the blog. Why not? As the blog tagline suggests, I will try to incorporate androids, rocketships, and spies!! (one of my fanfics arguably does this, based on captain proton of Star Trek Voyager)

Anyhow, thanks for reading. Have a fantastic day!!

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