Teaching Robots to Anticipate Human Actions
Robot are getting smarter but are still easily confused.
Even the most advanced bots are confounded by the diverse environments where humans live and work. But if a robot can navigate only a well-ordered lab, what practical use is it?
Not much, says computer scientist Ashutosh Saxena, an assistant professor in the computer science department at Cornell University. Saxena is one of an up-and-coming group of roboticists trying to create autonomous robots that can interact smoothly with humans in everyday life. Saxena is working to give robots the ability to anticipate our actions and, in a sense, anticipate our wants and needs.
The physical act of opening the door and the act of pouring is not the challenging part for the robot. The challenging part is being able to observe
