Exhibition tracks 500 years of robots

Описание: (7 Feb 2017) LEAD IN:
They may appear futuristic, high-tech, perhaps even science fiction, but man has been designing and creating robots for centuries.
A new exhibit at London's Science Museum traces five-hundred years of robotic development, showing how far we've come, and how far there is left to go.

STORY-LINE:
Animatronic babies, three-wheeled droids and sci-fi creations, robots are invading London's Science Museum.
This new exhibit - named 'Robots' - explores 500 years of robotic development, from simple automation to interactive droids.
It features over 100 robots, including some working alongside humans in workplaces today.
"If it's one thing that we understand at the Science Museum, it's that visitors, people, are fascinated with themselves," says curator Ling Lee.
"We love seeing ourselves reflected in the cultural artefacts around us, in the technology that's created for us.
"We think that humanoid robots are this brilliant combination of hubris, and science and technology, but also a healthy dose of egocentricity, creating these machine things in our image."
While they may appear futuristic, man has been experimenting with robots for centuries.
The exhibit shows how early automation in clockwork machines provoked ideas about the human body as a machine, leading to the creation of early robots.
This Silver Swan, a life-size clockwork automation built in 1773, shows our endless fascination with replicating living things in mechanical form.
"The definition of robot has changed over the course of time," says Lee.
"Robots themselves have existed as automated beings that are capable of being programmed for many, many hundreds of years.
"We begin the story at the Science Museum five hundred years ago, which is where we have our earliest artefacts on display, but really in literature and archives, you see evidence of robots going further beyond that."
Robots have made frequent appearances in popular culture since the word 'robot' was first used in 1920.
The exhibit features a replica of 'Maria' from 1927 science fiction film 'Metropolis' and a 'T800 Terminator' recently used in 2009's 'Terminator Salvation'.
Curator Anna Darron says robots are often used in popular culture to symbolise our own fears and anxieties about the future, such as the role technology plays.
"Creating a robot that looks almost humanlike, but not quite, it's very unsettling to us," she says.
"A lot of the science fiction robots that we create are very malevolent characters because they're personifying these anxieties we have about the future.
"And so, in a way when we're battling these robots, we're battling our fears and think that's a really powerful image."
Nowadays robots aren't so much invading Planet Earth as working in factories or interacting with humans.
The exhibit includes various so-called cobots (collaborative robots) which use smart, flexible robotic arms to carryout precise tasks.
There's also this Kodomoroid communication robot from Japan. It's designed as a 'newsreader' for Miraikan, the Japanese National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation.
Darron says the role robots play in our lives and the jobs they take from human workers is a serious topic in robotics.
"I think it's been a question that's been asked of all disruptive technologies throughout history; 'How is our relationship with technology going to change? And how is it going to impact our world?" she says.
Centuries of robotic development has allowed scientists to replicate the human image with increasing detail and complexity.
The exhibit includes this Telenoid communication android from Japan.

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