Posted by Jeremy Scott in Uncategorized | 1 Comment
Robot Conducts Symphony, World Domination Nearly Complete
(photos by AP)
A robot built by Honda has conducted the Detroit Symphony.
I know. Hard to believe, right? Who knew that Detroit even had a symphony?
It’s also hard to believe that a robot conducted that symphony. Does this mean that conducting isn’t all that hard after all… or that the robot is just super-duper advanced?
The Honda-bot, named ASIMO, is a multi-talented guy. At 4′ 3″–hey, just like Tom Cruise–he can walk, run, and respond to simple voice commands–hey, just like Tom Cruise!
But seriously, this is the first time ASIMO or any other robot has ever conducted a symphony, so I guess it’s a pretty big deal. However, the story is a bit deceiving. Seems that ASIMO isn’t quite as advanced as you might think. He was only mimicking what he had seen a human conductor do. From the article:
As it conducted, it perfectly mimicked the actions of a conductor, nodding its head at various sections and gesturing with one or both hands. ASIMO took a final bow to enthusiastic shouts from the audience.
ASIMO has its limits. ASIMO’s engineers programmed the robot to mimic Charles Burke, the Detroit Symphony’s education director, as he conducted the piece in front of a pianist about six months ago. But it can’t respond to the musicians.
So it’s not as though ASIMO is thinking for himself. Rather, he’s just regurgitating behaviors that have been modeled for him. (Tempted to go for a third time on the “Hey, just like Tom Cruise” joke… but I’m worried that would be one time too many). 
ASIMO stands for Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility. Boy, that just rolls off the tongue. Maybe we should add that as a possible name in our Name Our Robot poll. Or not.
Look, if robots are conducting symphonies, and that’s national news, I think we can all breathe one big sigh of relief about the whole “robots taking over the Earth” concerns. Of course, if ASIMO is so good at mimicking, I guess all that needs to happen is for some idiot to show him The Terminator or The Matrix and we’d all be in serious trouble.
I’ve always liked Tom Cruise’s acting and his looks. I even had a dream about him one time. I think he likes being a father, he always has a big smile on his face when he’s with his kids.