Episode 204 – Hot to Trot Bots

Michael and Michael make a rare recording appearance at their favorite coffee shop, Bean Traders, in Durham, NC, to talk about coffee, robot dogs, and much more.   This week’s episode is fueled by discussions on artificial intelligence, machine learning, power storage & delivery, as well as the future use cases for bots both big & small.  Kicking things off with Dominic Tan’s Domo Arigato poster with 262 robots, Michael & Michael then move on to the physical robots, starting with a robotic arm with a dodecahedron grasping mechanism, designed to capture delicate undersea creatures, like jellyfish.  Continuing on with … Continue reading

Episode 203 – Robotic Monks

After a quick vacation week Michael R. brings a meditative view back to the show with a Robotic Monk designed to welcome young visitors to temples in China. He then takes us deep on synthetics and their new religious beliefs as shown on the TV Show Humans. We then look at new robots from MIT that can walk, run, and climb stairs that are littered with debris – all with out any visual inputs. And we wrap the show with a bit of a discussion around the addictive behavior of games. Show Links Robotic Monk – https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/02/a-buddhist-temple-in-beijing-built-a-robotic-monk-to-spread-the-word/ Fisher Price Little … Continue reading

Episode 202 – Everything Old Is New Again

Michael M starts off this episode with true blast from the past, even if it was in the wrong order from the plan — how modern micro-X-ray techniques are able to bring back images from daguerrotypes that were once thought ruined.  The images of photos taken long ago are now visible again, with amazing detail. The team then turns to an MIT Technology Review article on AI, which focuses on the challenge that games present, and what can be learned from how artificial intelligence teams play those games.  The game in this case is Dota 2 — Defense of the … Continue reading

Episode 201 – WWDC, AR and AI

This week co-host Michael R. welcomes back long time friend of the show – Andy Piper. Michael shares his excitement and experiences from Apple’s WWDC conference – including all the other conferences that pop up around WWDC. We then dive in work that Porsche is doing leveraging AR. We also talk briefly about Amazon and the AR (audio reality App) that allows you to experience Skyrim on your Alexa. We look at machine learning via an innovative website called Lobe. And then wrap up the show with a look at how AI is leveraging video games to “learn”. Co-host Michael … Continue reading