Redefining Robots

Originally published in SMITHSONIAN (February 2000)
by Paul Trachtman
(Editor's note: An obscure philosopher once noted that "Science serves two purposes: to examine and explain the inexplicable; and to suggest the yet-to-be." At times these two directions converge, particularly when something is created that functions despite a lack of understanding how exactly it operates. Tunnel diodes are just one example.
In this excerpted story, an engineer at Los Alamos National Laboratories has created a new approach to robotics that has completely contravened the "accepted practice" in design. Despite naysayers, he continues building units that: a) are easily replicated and b) function. He is regularly castigated or, worse, ignored by academics in AI and robotics.
And yet these robots are functioning.... RM)
The sign taped to the door reads: "Please Don't Feed The Robots." Mark Tilden unlocks the door and leads me into his Los Alamos lab. He sets his laptop case on a table and walks straight to the barred windows where sunlight filters in on a large sandbox he calls his "Robot Jurassic Park." The white sand is full of tracks, and alive with several species of little solar-powered "bio-mechanical" insects. He watches as they sun themselves, wake up for short, random walks, and then doze off again to soak up more energy. A wire-legged bug, soldered together from tiny transistors, sensors and motors, with a solar cell stuck to its back, begins walking in one direction, then suddenly veers off in another, catching Tilden's eye. "When it makes a decision like that, what has just gone on inside its head?" he asks. "As the builder, I have to admit that even I don't know."