14 DAY TRIAL // The Olympic games take place every four years, with the summer and winter games always being two years apart. They are a great way to show off human athletic prowess and bring the world together. Soon, though, we might have more than our fellow man to admire.
You see, officials from the country of Japan have revealed their intention to establish a Robot Olympics event that would take place every four years alongside the summer games.
Prime minister Shinzo Abe said that the competition would perfectly illustrate the current level of technology and lead to a “robotic evolution” under the watch of a council that would help ambitious projects advance.
There is already something along the lines of a worldwide robot competition, or showoff event, called RoboCup and composed of the Robot Soccer World Cup, RoboCupRescue, RoboCup@Home, and RoboCupJunior.
However, the scale of this event is quite a bit smaller than what Japan has in mind, which isn't so unexpected considering that the competition occurs annually.
Currently, the robotic industry is not at the level of “value” and relevance as some would have expected or hoped. Part of it is the bizarre split in the path of development, where bots that can fly are moving forward much faster than those that are supposed to go about by walking.
The other reason is the comparatively low level of advertising, and this is exactly what the Robot Olympics are meant to fix. The fact that such games will be established as a recurring event will help a great deal.
That the Robot Olympics will be essentially attached to the human Summer Olympics will further expand awareness, as the former will basically ride the coattails of the latter.
Humanoid robots would, of course, be a prime attraction at the Robot Olympics, but they will be just one of many types of automated or semi-automated machines. Other examples will include drones, multi-legged walkers and more utilitarian contraptions, like beds which morph into wheelchairs when needed.
Among the robots that already exist, the ones likely to be refined to the point of Olympic worth are the NAO caretaker, the Honda ASIMO runner, even the 3D printed Jimmy from Intel. Even robotic 3D printers like the Hexapod Armed with a Glue Gun might make the cut. Who knows, maybe bots will finally learn how to walk properly by 2020. We don't expect them to be capable of complex katas or anything, but finally mimicking bipedal locomotion properly should be doable.
