Word: robots
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...technological, the development in the mid-'60s of the microprocessor, a computer so small that it can be fitted onto a silicon chip no bigger than a pea. As the computer shrank in size and cost, it suddenly became practical as the brains to run a robot. The second development was wage inflation. Two decades ago, a typical assembly-line robot cost about $25,000; that, plus all operating costs over its eight-year lifetime, amounted to about $4.20 an hour, slightly more than the average factory worker's wages and fringe benefits. Today that typical robot costs...
...robot revolution is just beginning, but it is already moving fast. Scarcely a decade has passed since General Motors
...became the first major industrial robot buyer by ordering more than 50 welders. Today GM has 270 robots, and there are more than 3,000 at work throughout the U.S. The biggest manufacturer, Unimation Inc., of Danbury, Conn., was founded in 1959 and cost its parent company, Condec, at least $12 million before making its first profit in 1975. It now produces 40 Unimate and 15 Puma robots a month, and will have estimated sales this calendar year of $42 million. Its chief competitor: Cincinnati Milacron, which makes the sophisticated T3 robot and expects 1980 sales of $32 million...
Webster's definition of a robot begins by describing it as "a machine in the form of a human being that performs the mechanical functions of a human being." Today's robotmakers, however, are devoting very little thought to creating anything that looks or acts human. It is perfectly possible to design a robot that walks on artificial legs or speaks fluent English, but it is much cheaper and more efficient to keep the robot standing in one place and to speak to it in the soothing language of algorithms. Says David Nitzan of SRI International...
...robot's basic function is not to look or behave like a human being but to do a human's work, and for that it needs mainly a guiding brain (the computer) and an arm with claws for fingers. The computer is simply plugged into an electric outlet; cables run from the computer along the robot's arm and transmit instructions in the form of electric impulses to the claw; for heavy work, robots use hydraulic pressure. The Robot Institute of America, an industrial trade group, therefore offers a contemporary, if somewhat prolix, definition of a robot...