Page 309 - Introduction to AI Robotics
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                                                                        The Hybrid Deliberative/Reactive Paradigm
                                     straight into the boulder! In this case, the behavior arbiter (a precursor of DAMN)  121
                                     had apparently viewed the choices between avoiding to the right and left as equal
                                     and thereby cancelling each other out.
                                     About “Red” Whitaker.
                                     William Whitaker used to have red hair, hence the nickname. Whitaker has had an
                                     impressive career focusing on building the hardware for industrial applications of
                                     mobile robots, including the robots used to clean up Chernobyl (through the com-
                                     pany RedZone Robotics) and Three-Mile Island. Typically, the robots are teleoperated
                                     or contain software developed by other CMU scientists such as Reid Simmons and
                                     Tony Stentz.
                                     Dante and the media.
                                     The Dante project received heavy media coverage, and percolated into the entertain-
                                     ment industry. A small, Dante-like robot appears in the movie, Dante’s Peak,as part
                                     of the team of vulcanologists led by Pierce Brosnan. The robot is continually breaking
                                     in the movie, which is unfortunately an all-too-accurate reflection of the current state
                                     of robotics. In the “Firewalker” episode of the TV series The X-Files, a robot looking
                                     like an Odetics “spider” robot is down in a volcano and broadcasts disturbing images
                                     implying that the vulcanologists have been attacked by a mysterious life form. The
                                     culprit turned out to be a scientist who had quit taking his medication.

                                     EVAHR.
                                     The EVAHR project was cancelled in the mid 1990’s. It was envisioned as a jet-pack
                                     with arms to help astronauts construct the space station. The heuristic is that less
                                     than 20% of the research conducted by NASA will actually be integrated into a flight
                                     package.
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