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The Next Leap In Space Exploration

Posted by Zonk on Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:05 AM
from the not-made-by-man dept.
NASA Robotics Space Science
An anonymous reader writes "The crew of the space shuttle Endeavor recently returned to Earth as ambassadors, harbingers of a new era of space exploration. Scientists at NASA are saying that the recent assembly of the Dextre bot is the first step in a long-term space-based man/machine partnership. '"The work we're doing now -- the robotics we're doing -- is what we're going to need to do to build any work station or habitat structure on the moon or Mars," said Allard Beutel, a spokesman for NASA. "Yes, this is just the beginning." Further joint human-robot projects will "be a symbiotic relationship. It's part of a long-term effort for us to branch out into the solar system. We're going to need this type of hand-in-robotic-hand [effort] to make this happen. We're in the infancy of space exploration. We have to start somewhere and this is as good a place as any."'"
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Submission: Space robotics: the next leap in exploration by Anonymous Coward
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  • Yup! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by maillemaker (924053) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:13AM (#22882856)
    Wouldn't it be cool to launch your robotic servants to Mars long before humans went, and remotely control them (or not) to build the infrastructure for us before we arrive?
    • It would be cool. If only the robots needed to do that were anything more than science fiction. Not that an exploratory mission needs that much in the way of infrastructure in the first place.
    • While the summary tends to allude to such future possibilities, this robot is a long ways away. It is a "human-robot project." Meaning that a human is required to perform the tasks, and that they are not automated. The Canadian Space Agency provides information on the robot. http://www.space.gc.ca/asc/eng/missions/sts-123/dextre.asp [space.gc.ca]

      Doing operations with these robotics requires a communication link, which would first have to be built by automated robotics (which this is not) or humans; I for one believe w
    • Remote Controlling machines on the Moon would be tough with the 1 second lag. I ran across an article about Japanese researchers experimenting with the simulated lag to an orbiting satellite, but I can't find it right this second. Latencies to Mars are going to be many minutes. To do "remote control" you'd need to be able to give high-level commands, like: "okay, you assemble that wall over there. You help him by fastening the screws. You over there, you pile dirt on the back and sides of the hab modul
  • ... I feel like it happens quite late, quite slowly, costs too much and still is underfunded.
  • Huey, Dewey and Louie would be proud..
  • Just what do you think you're doing, Dave?

  • Evangelion? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by The Queen (56621) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:20AM (#22882944) Homepage
    I wonder just how 'closely' together they intend to have us working? *shudder*

  • I've heard this before... (Score:4, Funny)

    by QuantumFlux (228693) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:20AM (#22882948)
    Yes! With our new robotic workers, which we call "Cylons," we will usher in a new era of peaceful space exploration and colonization.

  • Overstated a Bit? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by trongey (21550) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:21AM (#22882960) Homepage
    "Long-term space-based man/machine partnership"? Come on, they installed an assembly robot. Sure, it's a very nice one and pretty complex, but it's not like they fired up freakin R. Daneel Olivaw.

    • Re:Overstated a Bit? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by zappepcs (820751) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:46AM (#22883208) Journal
      I'm with you on that one. A bit too anthropomorphic for my tastes, and I like hobby robotics. We are a long way from having to hold hands with a robot, they are little more than very expensive tools. Robots like the Aibo are little more than very expensive pets. Then again, some people think poison ivy looks pretty. There is no accounting for tastes. To my way of thinking, the robots we have sent to Mars already is an amazing thing so putting on in orbit is hardly a major leap forward in robotics technology. The whole hand holding things is rather sophomoric really.

  • Further joint human-robot projects will "be a symbiotic relationship".
    I can't wait to see how this space exploration research and development is going to change the world as we know it!
    (skynet)
    • That's the most rediculous statement ever. They'll evolve into humans and look dead sexy, everyone knows that.

  • Not even close (Score:5, Insightful)

    by pla (258480) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:25AM (#22883000) Journal
    The crew of the space shuttle Endeavor recently returned to Earth as ambassadors

    Er, no. Sorry.

    They assembled and deployed the Ikea version of a semi-autonomous robot. Not even Darl could stretch that into returning as "ambassadors".

    The "next leap in space exploration" will happen when we start sending out one-way manned missions. Until then, we've done nothing more than piddle around in the local sandbox and thrown some rocks at pigeons.

    • The "next leap in space exploration" will happen when we start sending out one-way manned missions.
      Hey, I think somebody just volunteered! :)
      • Hey, I think somebody just volunteered! :)

        They'd probably consider me just a tad too old for the mission, but if they'd send me... Hell yeah, I'd volunteer!

        History will remember the first man to walk (and die) on Mars. A middle-class software engineer, OTOH, may as well never have existed as far as posterity cares. And aside from the fame-factor, hey, I'll never make it off-planet any other way, so what a cool way to go! :)

  • Lets just hope... (Score:4, Funny)

    by MistaE (776169) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:29AM (#22883024) Homepage
    ....that we don't build any robots that can read lips.

  • Standing on the shoulders of giants (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Thanshin (1188877) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:31AM (#22883040)

    "The crew of the space shuttle Endeavor recently returned to Earth as ambassadors, harbingers of a new era of space exploration. Scientists at NASA are saying that the recent assembly of the Dextre bot is the first step in a long-term space-based man/machine partnership. '"The work we're doing now -- the robotics we're doing -- is what we're going to need to do to build any work station or habitat structure on the moon or Mars," said Allard Beutel, a spokesman for NASA. "Yes, this is just the beginning." Further joint human-robot projects will "be a symbiotic relationship. It's part of a long-term effort for us to branch out into the solar system. We're going to need this type of hand-in-robotic-hand [effort] to make this happen. We're in the infancy of space exploration. We have to start somewhere and this is as good a place as any."'""
    Am I paranoid or you too feel some dismissal of previous work.
    • Not really paranoid, I think NASA are the first to admit their previous mission's flaws; Whilst we put men on the moon, we threw them up there in a tin can, and we certainly didn't 'transport and settle' them there like we are looking to do these days.

      I feel NASA are much more calculated in their choices of missions these days, however I do wonder what their 'final aim' really is. Colonisation of mars? Or is all of this just prep work so we're ready when (if) we eventually make a breakthrough to interstella

      • Re:Standing on the shoulders of giants (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Thanshin (1188877) on Thursday March 27 2008, @12:05PM (#22883430)

        I do wonder what their 'final aim' really is. Colonisation of mars? Or is all of this just prep work so we're ready when (if) we eventually make a breakthrough to interstellar travel?
        I think it's more of a "defensive stance". They are keeping the space travel technology on a reasonable level to be able to react quickly if another country suddenly reveals a huge breakthrough.

        If China suddenly starts to prepare a Mars colonization mission the USA will still have some people and enough infrastructure to keep the option of running for it.

        If nobody makes a move, they can wait until a less expensive investigation route produces a result that makes missions cheap enough.
  • Despite the overwrought and flowery prose, it's just a machine, albeit semi-autonomous. Kind of like a steam engine with a governor. It performs tasks that are difficult or impossible for humans. Thanks.

  • "symbiotic relationship"? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by AJWM (19027) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:50AM (#22883236) Homepage
    Symbiotic relationship? Man/machine partnership? Ambassadors? Hand-in-robotic-hand? WTF?

    It's a fancy toaster, guys, get over yourselves. It's like having a symbiotic relationship with a swiss army knife.

    I'd expect this kind of mystical crap from people who don't understand technology and view it all through Clarke's 3rd Law filters ("indistinguishable from magic"), just as any other primitives do when imbuing things they don't understand with mystical spirits. So is Dextre the god of space robotics now? I weep for the NASA that used to be.
    • "Symbitotic" isn't a mystical term, at all.

      "A relationship of mutual benefit or dependence."

      Normally referring to organic species, but that is do to the fact that machines are just now becoming mainstream enough to start hearing that term.
      For example, it would be correct to say "That man and his pacemaker share a symbiotic relationship". It's just unusually to say that.

      In short, Man missions will start to need robotic assitance, and robots need human assitance.... for Now(bum bum buuuummmm)

      Of course some ne
      • "A relationship of mutual benefit or dependence."

        In what way is the relationship of a user with his tool of any benefit to the tool? How can any non-living object be said to derive a benefit from anything?

        For example, it would be correct to say "That man and his pacemaker share a symbiotic relationship".

        See, you're doing it yourself. That's just animism, although perhaps unconcious animism.

        What does the pacemaker get out of it? If it were an organism, gaining a warm place to live and an energy supply tap

    • It's a fancy toaster, guys, get over yourselves. It's like having a symbiotic relationship with a swiss army knife.
       
      After extensive investigation we've discovered that the symbiotic relationship with the toaster is only slightly painful, as long as the toaster is turned off. No results with the swiss army knife for lack of voluntaries.

  • It's one Hal of an idea!
  • Aren't robots supposed to be autonomous? From what I understand, Dextre is a cybernetic manipulator. Why do people refuse to distinguish between robots and cyborgs?

    • Re:We're in the infancy of space exploration Not! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by netsavior (627338) on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:34AM (#22883070) Homepage
      Come on, we been in space since the sixties, and exploring it even before then. Calling this the "infancy of space exploration" is simply inaccurate.

      We were a seafaring people for about 6000 years before we discovered some of the islands of the world. Industrialization is in its infancy, we are currently in the pre-history phase of space travel.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by andphi (899406)
        Industrialization is in its infancy only if one makes a straight, one-to-one comparison between time elapsed since the first planted crop with time elasped since the first operational factory. I think that metric is flawed, as it assumes that a year in the 1st or 2d century BC has the same production and innovation value as a year in the 19th or 20th century AD. Industrial processes have brought agriculture as close to maturity as possible considering the variables (quantity of sun and rain, quality of soil

    • Re:Space 1999 (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FinestLittleSpace (719663) * on Thursday March 27 2008, @11:48AM (#22883224)
      No we wouldn't. The problems are deep rooted in various areas aside from inevitable apparent bureaucracy in NASA.

      - NASA is VASTLY underfunded, with it's funding being cut on key projects year by year
      - Most of the American public don't give a crap about the pre-history of space, such as throwing up robots and plants and 'seeing what happens'. It's hard to gain funding if noone cares.
      - The current presidency has no charisma or enthusiasm to push space travel, it is simply not in his interests.
      - Space travel is expensive and overall, has very little capitalist pleasing return. When it comes to space, what money you throw up there certainly does not come down. Scientific merit is in hoardes, but it's hard to argue with wall street that it has any merit.
      - Some space technology does not follow 'Moores Law' so sometimes progress slows considerably. In some fields such as propulsion we really are waiting for a breakthrough that is not just 'proven on paper'.
      - Putting humans in space holds very little merit to many scientists. Even NASA don't want people getting sent up for no good reason.

      There's 100 more reasons why we're not living some SciFi dream. I want my space habitat as much as any geek, but I know why I don't have it...

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Kevin Stevens (227724)
        - NASA is VASTLY underfunded, with it's funding being cut on key projects year by year

        NASA's budget is around $16 billion dollars, which is more than Jordan's entire GDP and about another 100 countries as well according to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) [wikipedia.org]

        We spend more on rockets than entire countries produce in a year. $16 billion dollars is a lot of money no matter how you look at it. I am a geek, and space exploration is good and all, but I think $16 billion is mo

        • Re:Space 1999 (Score:4, Insightful)

          by BCGlorfindel (256775) <klassenk&brandonu,ca> on Thursday March 27 2008, @03:54PM (#22886328) Journal
          Manned space travel would encourage the next 'big leap'. The one advantage of robotic missions over manned ones that really makes the difference right now is simply mass. The next 'big leap' IMHO is getting off of chemical propulsion, and the weight and mission time requirements for a manned Mars mission rather requires bigger thinking than just using more chemicals. It should hopefully see serious consideration for ion drives powered by something bigger than a battery, something like a nuclear sub reactor. Putting that kind of propulsion system in orbit could allow manned exploration of not only Mars but much more of the solar system as well.

    • Space 1999 is what we would be living it we didn't have NASA and it's bureaucracy.

      Well, then I say many thanks to NASA and its bureaucracy for keeping the moon right where it is! I'm also glad silver mini skirts never really caught on. However, perhaps "dangling-on-strings" advanced spacecraft propulsion warrants further study.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by geekoid (135745)
      Three rules:
      One - If a human passenger dies, the AI is automatically shut off via a mechanism the AI doesn't control.

      Two - Everyone carries a remote shut off

      Three - It's survival must rely on the survival of the human occupants.

      Of course, since it turns out HAL couldn't think outside it's programming and take an independant action, I would argue it wasn't an AI.

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