Alt-BEAM Archive
Message #00459
To: M le Roux mleroux@itec.co.za
From: Darrell Johnson stymie@simplyweb.net
Date: Mon, 15 Feb 1999 15:15:29 -0800
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: hmmm...i wonder which subject
M le Roux wrote:
>
> >The BEAM/bottom up
> >approach is to make a bot that can start from point A and *not get
> >itself killed* without even trying to get to point B..
>
> How will we know when we have reached this objective?
When your robot doesn't get stuck/destroyed in the environment you
designed it for.
> Surely the required level of surviveability depends on the intended
> application?
Most BEAM bots can barely survive on a relatively cluttered desktop.
Even in a fairly minimal environment a Photopopper will still
occasionally get stuck on something.. Put another bot in with it and
you'll usually just end up with a tangled mess of touch sensors. Take
the walls off a BEAM-park and most all the bots will end up a broken
heap on the floor.. (like my microvore)We have a long way to go to even
get a half-way capable bot.
> I agree that one of the fundamental aspects of BEAM is
> surviveability, but I don't think is should be an isolated (or
> exclusive)goal. We will only be limiting ourselves.
>
BEAM is not intended as a be-all end-all form of robotics. The core of
BEAM, in my mind, is to build reactive, adaptive bodies that will
eventually house the brains to make the bot carry out it's goal. It does
no good to put a complex, goal-oriented brain in a robot that just gets
itself stuck in a corner/on a rock/on it's back.. BEAM tries to build
an intellegent body that does this without needing higher-level
controls.
> It should rather be seen as an integral (and important) part of a larger and
> more far-sighted design process. (not a hurdle to be overcome before any
> further development can take place)
darrell
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