On Feb 5, 11:44*pm, Pat Flannery <flan...*daktel.com> wrote:
> NASA's "Project M" *tele-operated Moon robot video:http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
> from falling over.
>
> Pat

I'd suspect having long legs might be a means of keeping
dust out of the joints. Whereas the wheel would tend to
be ground up by the unweathered dust and grit as it
works its way into the hub. On the other hand, extra lub
for the wheel hubs might take care of that problem.

I guess I am thinking of a large robotic ant with large
wings for solar collection.

This is just my half baked vision of things to come......Trig

NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
from falling over.

Pat

On 6/02/2010 6:44 PM, Pat Flannery wrote:
> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
> from falling over.

Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
be better.

Sylvia.

Pat Flannery <flanner*daktel.com> writes:

> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?

It's cute and appeals to taxpayers. Or something.

MJ

Sylvia Else <sylvia*not.at.this.address> wrote:

:On 6/02/2010 6:44 PM, Pat Flannery wrote:
:> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
:> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
:> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
:> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
:> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
:> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
:> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
:> from falling over.
:
:Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
:be better.
:

This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
tools housed in the body.

Of course, if people aren't going, why bother with the teleoperated
robots? And what next, selling time to let 'everyman' operate one for
a while?

This isn't science. It's theater.

--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw

On 7/02/2010 12:20 AM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
> Sylvia Else<sylvia*not.at.this.address> wrote:
>
> :On 6/02/2010 6:44 PM, Pat Flannery wrote:
> :> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
> :> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
> :> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
> :> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
> :> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
> :> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
> :> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
> :> from falling over.
> :
> :Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
> :be better.
> :
>
> This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
> teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
> exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
> something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
> a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
> tools housed in the body.

You want public funding to send a spider to the moon?

Sylvia.

Pat Flannery <flanner*daktel.com> writes:

> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around on
> legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated somehow
> because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it from falling
> over.

This is interesting. I'm not sure about the 1000 days, but I'm not privy to
what JSC has been up to.

Anthropomorphic makes sense when you think about it from the controller's
perspective. I sort of know how my autonomous and non-autonomous nervous
systems respond to two legged and two armed systems. I'm not sure as a
human being how I'd best teleoperate an eight-legged system or even a
six wheeled system.

Think of it from the tele-operators perspective.

As far as the comm time lag goes, I'd mentioned a good way to deal with that
many many posts ago, using active resistance feedback to provide a way to slow
our own ground based motions to match those of the device on the moon.

Another item to consider. Sending up lab equipment so that our robot can do
experiments on the moon. It might be easier/cheaper/simpler to modify existing
Earth based human operated lab equipment to deal with an anthropomorphic robot
on the moon rather than start from scratch with some kind of eight legged, four
wheeled or even snake like robot.

Also think of it as a way to get good at designing equipment that eventually
could be dual-purposed and used by humans on the moon as well. This is the
back-door way back to the moon that doesn't hog up all of NASA's budget trying
to do it. I like it.

As for active balancing, put the gyroscopic feedback into a tilt table the human
has to ride back on Earth. Or better yet a 3-axis moving platform the operator
'rides'. The robot falls down, the operator pitches forward face down in the
three axis harness.

Dave

"Fred J. McCall" <fjmccall*gmail.com> wrote in message
news:6vqqm59ttfl7r9m337fs0u12paf92leav6*4ax.com...
> Sylvia Else <sylvia*not.at.this.address> wrote:
>
> :On 6/02/2010 6:44 PM, Pat Flannery wrote:
> :> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
> :> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
> :> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
> :> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
> :> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk
> around
> :> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
> :> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
> :> from falling over.
> :
> :Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
> :be better.
> :

Life on Earth seems to think four limbs and two eyes are the best
solution over the widest range of circumstances. From dinosaurs
to humans, it's a persistant pattern across different species, time
and environments. Life quickly found the optimum and locked
it in, it would appear.

People that sadly think life is only a fluke of chance, more an accident
than anyting else, haven't noticed that randomness or mutations
allow life to fully explore the possibility space, so that selection
can more effectively take place.

Random events, or mutations, are a one of two primary driving forces
for evolution, the other is persistant order, for example four limbs
and two eyes. When the two are in an equilibrium with each other
so that neither dominates the whole, the system spontaneously
starts hill-climbing or evolving towards higher order.

Evolution is a directed path, not a random walk
towards ever higher order.

Increasing order, or creation, is a fundamental property of
The Universe.

Science and religion are both half right, and half wrong.
So each grades out at 50% with is flunking the test
of understanding reality.

There is indeed a 'plan' for Creation, but it's a fundamental
law of the universe. Like any other.

..
Emergence and Evolution - Constraints on Form
http://www.calresco.org/emerge.htm



>
> This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
> teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
> exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
> something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
> a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
> tools housed in the body.
>
> Of course, if people aren't going, why bother with the teleoperated
> robots? And what next, selling time to let 'everyman' operate one for
> a while?
>
> This isn't science. It's theater.
>
> --
> "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
> man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
> all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
> --George Bernard Shaw

Sylvia Else wrote:

> Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
> be better.

I'd think you would want it a lot closer to the ground to aid in looking
at rocks. The way they have it designed it has to kneel down to pick up
a rock sample.
And what's with the mouth on the head in a airless vacuum? It certainly
isn't going to be doing much talking up there.

Pat

Michal Jankowski wrote:
> Pat Flannery <flanner*daktel.com> writes:
>
>> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
>
> It's cute and appeals to taxpayers. Or something.

Gods-damned Cylon toaster.
It will start killing people first chance it gets. ;-)

Pat

Fred J. McCall wrote:
> This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
> teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
> exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
> something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
> a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
> tools housed in the body.

Legs are complex and use a lot of energy; go with wheels or treads:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/WED_T...l_repair_droid

> Of course, if people aren't going, why bother with the teleoperated
> robots? And what next, selling time to let 'everyman' operate one for
> a while?

I get to strangle a selenite with it! I get to strangle a selenite with it!

> This isn't science. It's theater.

It's mystery science theater.
The mystery being if it will get funded.


Pat

Sylvia Else wrote:
>> This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
>> teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
>> exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
>> something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
>> a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
>> tools housed in the body.
>
> You want public funding to send a spider to the moon?

We could get exopomorphic with it in that case:
http://www.midwinter.com/b5/Pictures...s/shadows2.gif

Pat

Sylvia Else <sylvia*not.at.this.address> wrote:

:On 7/02/2010 12:20 AM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
:> Sylvia Else<sylvia*not.at.this.address> wrote:
:>
:> :On 6/02/2010 6:44 PM, Pat Flannery wrote:
:> :> NASA's "Project M" tele-operated Moon robot video:
:> :> http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/0...jscs-proj.html
:> :> NASA says this can be done in 1,000 days from the word "go".
:> :> Is there any good reason it needs to be this anthropomorphic?
:> :> I can see the head, torso, and arms...but having it actually walk around
:> :> on legs rather than using wheels? The legs would have to be automated
:> :> somehow because of the time lag in communicating with it to prevent it
:> :> from falling over.
:> :
:> :Legs have certain advantages, but I'd have thought four (or more!) would
:> :be better.
:> :
:>
:> This looks like Program Funding Via Flash to me. Making your
:> teleoperated robot anthropomorphic is great for SF, but for actual
:> exploration it probably makes better sense to optimize form to
:> something 8 legged that's designed so it can always right itself, with
:> a couple of the legs having 'tool adapters' to use specially designed
:> tools housed in the body.
:
:You want public funding to send a spider to the moon?
:

No. I want public funding to send PEOPLE to the Moon...


--
"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
-- Charles Pinckney

Pat Flannery <flanner*daktel.com> wrote:

:Fred J. McCall wrote:
:> :
:> :You want public funding to send a spider to the moon?
:> :
:>
:> No. I want public funding to send PEOPLE to the Moon...
:
:This may have been a subtle joke on Sylvia's part; the Apollo 9 LM was
:named "Spider".
:

Subtlety on Usenet? Why, that's unheard of!

--
"Adrenaline is like exercise, but without the excessive gym fees."
-- Professor Walsh, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"

> No. �I want public funding to send PEOPLE to the Moon...
>


Yeah and I want a Rolls Royce..... But cant afford it, and besides the
gas mileage is probably horrible

FIRST we need low cost to orbit!!! once private industry finds a way
then everything else will be easier!

NASA went with Ares, knowing it wasnt faster better or cheaper. But
a excellent political payoff to existing contractors..........

this decision has come back to bite the agency, which is good.

they will be more careful in the future