Issue date: 11/12/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Stephanie Smith James McLurkin, a robotic engineer, separated fact from science-fiction in regards to the robotics industry.

In 1984, The Terminator opened the gateway to the concept of robots taking over the world. Realistically, though, people have no reason to worry about that robotic Hollywood plot coming true, said James McLurkin, a robotic engineer.

McLurkin was the last speaker in this semester's Chautauqua Lecture Series and spoke Thursday, Nov. 5 in Clark Auditorium about "The End of the World and Other Misconceptions: The Truth about Robotics."

McLurkin has several degrees in electrical engineering and computer science, mainly from MIT. He has worked with Honda, iRobot and is also a professor at Rice University. McLurkin began his talk by outlining three core laws that robots are expected to follow that would keep them from "taking over the world."

The first law states that a robot may not injure a human being or do any action to allow a human to be harmed. The second says robots must obey orders given to them by humans, and the third says robots are allowed to protect themselves so long as they do not break the previous two laws.

"The problem is robots can't read," McLurkin said.

McLurkin showed pictures of robots to the audience, such as the Roomba and ASIMO, created by Honda, which is a revolution in robotic bipedal walking.

"Two of my favorite robots are on Mars," McLurkin said. "They're up there working. One of them has a sprained ankle, but they're still collecting data."

This brought McLurkin to discuss his own work: creating multi-robotic systems.

"The goal of my software is how do you get thousands of robots to work together?" McLurkin said.

He said this would be helpful to those searching for survivors in earthquakes and other natural disasters.

He asked the audience to imagine thousands of tiny robots the size of cockroaches creeping into a disaster zone searching for signs of life. They would relay any messages to robots the size of rats that would develop a rescue strategy. The rat-sized robots would send signals to brontosaurus-sized robots that are capable of manipulating rubble, he said.

McLurkin said his favorite application is sending robots to Mars. To demonstrate this possibility to the audience, he conducted a short demo with an assortment of robots he brought with him. The robots simulated how they might interact with one another on Mars by finding "fossils" and relaying their data to one another with infrared light.

"The robot in motion always knows what the right direction to go is," McLurkin said as if trying to speak to the robot.

McLurkin asked eight volunteers from the audience to participate in a distributive algorithm before concluding his lecture in which he encouraged students to unleash their inner-nerd.

"I'm a nerd," McLurkin said. "And I like it. Live your best nerdy life."

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