Robots that can work together and communicate are not only more efficient, they’re cheaper—since not every robot has to excel at every task.
When you give two robots the ability to communicate in real-time, the possibilities for their teamwork are vast. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have done just that: enabled two types of robots with very different capabilities to collaborate in order to fulfill people’s requests.
Continue reading Making Robots Talk to Each Other.
Luciano Floridi issued a challenge to scientists to the world in 2005: prove that robots can display the human trait of self-awareness through a knowledge game called the “wise man” test. It was a venture he didn’t ever see being achieved in the foreseeable future.
A decade later, the Oxford professor’s seemingly unattainable challenge has been met.
On July 9, a team of researchers led by Professor Selmer Bringsjord helped a robot solve the riddle, displaying a level of self-awareness and satisfying what had until then been considered “the ultimate sifter” test that could separate human from cyborg.
Continue reading The man who created the world’s first self aware robot says this next discovery will change the human-robot relationship forever.
Many people with normal vision imagine blindness as utter darkness, the unbroken black of a dead TV screen. But approximately 90 percent of people who are designated as legally blind (defined as having less than 20/200 vision in your better eye, with corrective lenses) have some degree of remaining sight. They may have decent peripheral vision but no sight in the center, or they may have only central sight, or “tunnel vision.” They may be able to see light or large objects that are very close.
Now, scientists in the United Kingdom are trying to address the needs of the legally blind with a pair of “smart” glasses.
Continue reading These Glasses Could Help the Blind See.
Exciting new technologies, which allow users to change the shape of displays with their hands, promise to revolutionise the way we interact with smartphones, laptops and computers. Imagine pulling objects and data out of the screen and playing with these in mid-air.
Today we live in a world of flat-screen displays we use all day — whether it’s the computer in the office, a smartphone on the train home, the TV or iPad on the couch in the evening. The world we live in is not flat, though; it’s made of hills and valleys, people and objects. Imagine if we could use our fingertips to manipulate the display and drag features out of it into our 3D world.
Continue reading ‘Ghost’: Technology that leaps out of the screen.
WASHINGTON: Travel industry is getting massively disrupted by technology as it connects consumers and providers more and more directly.
Amadeus IT Group’s Dietmar Fauser said in an interview that companies like Airbnb get all the press, but his company is also responding to changes in the market, SiliconANGLE reported.
Fauser noted that they are a company providing IT solutions to the travel industry, adding that traditionally, Amadeus is a distribution system, so they link providers and subscribers, like travel agencies, online travel agencies, Travel Management Companies, with the providers that are essentially airlines, hotel chains, car rental companies, cruise lines, whoever has a product to sell.
Continue reading How technology is changing the travel industry.
