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Robotics: fun facts and quiz
The essentials in 7 ideas, with fun facts, an illustrated story and a quiz to see how much you know.
The essentials
What Robots Are
A robot is a machine that senses its surroundings, decides what to do, and acts, often by moving. Some look human; most don’t.
Key fact
Most robots in use today work in factories.
Factory Robots
Industrial robot arms weld, paint and assemble products with great precision. The first, Unimate, started work at a General Motors plant in 1961.
Key fact
Over 3 million industrial robots work worldwide.
Robot Senses
Robots sense the world with cameras, lidar, touch sensors and microphones. Lidar measures distance by timing pulses of laser light.
Key fact
Robot vacuums map rooms to plan their route.
Robots at Home
Robot vacuums and lawnmowers already work in millions of homes. They map rooms, avoid obstacles and head back to charge themselves.
Key fact
The first Roomba went on sale in 2002.
Walking Robots
Walking on two legs is surprisingly hard for robots. Modern humanoid robots can run, jump and even do backflips, thanks to fast balance control.
Key fact
Honda’s robot ASIMO walked on stage in 2000.
Robots in Hard Places
Robots explore Mars, inspect the deep ocean and help surgeons make tiny, precise movements. Surgical robots are controlled by a human surgeon.
Key fact
Surgical robots filter out the tiny shakes of a surgeon’s hands.
The Three Laws
In 1942, science fiction writer Isaac Asimov imagined the “Three Laws of Robotics”, the first being that a robot may not harm a human. They’re fiction, but they shaped how people think about robot safety.
Key fact
Asimov also coined the word “robotics”.
Fun facts
Around 1206, the engineer al-Jazari described a boat of mechanical musicians that could play different tunes.
Unimate’s first job was lifting hot metal parts out of a casting machine, work too dangerous for people.
Mars rovers use their cameras to steer themselves, because radio signals take minutes to reach Earth.
The company behind the Roomba also built bomb-disposal robots for the military.
Some “passive walker” robots have no motors at all: gravity alone carries them strolling down a gentle slope.
In 2009, the robot sub Nereus reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench, about 11 km down.
Asimov later added a “Zeroth Law”: a robot may not harm humanity.
Story: The Chess Machine With a Secret
The Chess Machine With a Secret
1770, Vienna. Wolfgang von Kempelen unveils the Turk: a life-size figure at a cabinet that plays chess, and wins, against anyone who dares.
For decades it tours Europe and America, and is said to have beaten Napoleon and Benjamin Franklin. Nobody can work out how it thinks.
It didn’t. A human chess master was hidden inside the cabinet, moving the pieces. A real robot has to sense, decide and act for itself.
True or false?
Tap your answer to see if you got it, and why.
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Question 1 of 10
Robots sense, decide and act.
Show the answer
True. That loop is what makes a robot.
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Question 2 of 10
Robot arms weld, paint and assemble products.
Show the answer
True. With great precision.
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Question 3 of 10
Lidar measures distance using laser light.
Show the answer
True. Timing how long the light takes to bounce back.
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Question 4 of 10
Robot vacuums can return to charge themselves.
Show the answer
True. They find their dock automatically.
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Question 5 of 10
Some robots can do backflips.
Show the answer
True. With very fast balance control.
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Question 6 of 10
Surgical robots are controlled by human surgeons.
Show the answer
True. The robot follows the surgeon’s movements.
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Question 7 of 10
Isaac Asimov wrote the Three Laws of Robotics.
Show the answer
True. In a 1942 short story, “Runaround”.
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Question 8 of 10
All robots look like humans.
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False. Most are arms, carts or vacuums.
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Question 9 of 10
The first industrial robot worked in a bakery.
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False. At a General Motors car plant, in 1961.
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Question 10 of 10
Robots can’t sense anything around them.
Show the answer
False. They use many kinds of sensors.
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KnowSoda learns what you know and brings back what you’re about to forget. Robotics has 6 more ideas at the Advanced and Expert levels.
Sources
- International Federation of Robotics — World Robotics report
- Robotics Hall of Fame / Encyclopaedia Britannica — Unimate (1961)
- Honda — ASIMO history
- NASA — Mars Pathfinder and Sojourner (1997)
- Isaac Asimov (1942), “Runaround”, and the Three Laws of Robotics
- Rubenstein, Cornejo & Nagpal (2014), programmable self-assembly in a thousand-robot swarm, Science 345
- Mori (1970/2012), the uncanny valley, IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine
