Final Project

Adam C.

Legislator:  Wayne Christian, Representative

(Click on the image above to enlarge.)

Artificial intelligence. What a concept. Could you imagine building a robot that looked at acted almost human? What would we do with it? I know what I’d do. I’d send it to another planet. Let’s use Mars for example.

Instead of risking ten or so lives of a crew going to Mars we could send a few robots (of course we would send people after the studies were done with the robots). These robots of course would not have feelings or anything so you would have absolutely no fighting. That is one of my worries about sending a crew of humans to another planet. First off it would take a long time to get there. Spending that much time with a lot of people can be very hazardous to your health. People start getting mad at other people for stupid reasons. I know this because I recently went on vacation to Washington, D.C. with my family. It took 2, 12 or so hour days to get there in a car. Being cramped in like that with the same people will make you very irritable. Robots will not do that. They are smart machines, yes; but they are also stupid at the same time. When was the last time you saw two robots fighting because they were mad at each other? I think that sending a smart robot that is built a lot like a human would be a great accomplishment in our challenge of getting humans to Mars. If these robots could walk like humans and do many other things that humans do then we would probably better understand what we need to build or invent to make life easier on Mars, even before we get there. For example: Artificial Intelligence that could walk exactly like humans. What purpose would that serve you may ask? The answer, of course, is terrain. It should be a lot like walking through a desert with a lot of rocks but that is still unknown to the fullest because no one has ever walked on Mars before. Sure, we have sent robot rovers but they did not walk. Small steps like walking robots could really help human colonization on Mars more than many would think.

These robots of course would have to wear the same kind of suit that a human would wear if he or she were up there. This test would be a test of mobility. If the robot were designed to move like a human then you could put any kind of suit on it and see what kind of limitations the suit would give to the human if he or she were to wear it. For example: Arm movement. If there is a suit that is in mind to be sent with a human crew to Mars that is supposed to help him out and has never been tested in the environment then it is still just an experiment until fully tested for effectiveness. If you send this suit with the robot to Mars and it tests it and finds it very maneuverable and advantageous then that should be the suit to send with humans. If the robot’s test comes back that it is very hard to move and has many limitations in different ways then we could do work on the suit to better the maneuverability and eliminate the limitations so that humans could use the suit when we go to Mars.

For the next test there will be the need of humans present. Crash test dummies. Now, you must be thinking, “Crash test dummies?” Yes, crash test dummies. The reason why you will need these is for vehicular use testing.  

The atmosphere and gravity are different on Mars so we will need to do a few crash tests with our Martian vehicles and crash test dummies. Imagine the scenario that one of our elite astronauts is driving the new NASA All-Terrain Martian Vehicle (ATMV) to pick up some samples of rock when he suddenly hits a jagged sending him out of control and into a deep crevice puncturing his suit and air supply (he was tossed from the vehicle). Even with all of the safety devices that the astronaut could use to fix his suit and air supply nothing would have been more effective than a safe vehicle that would have prevented him from being tossed to the Martian surface.

Without the crash test dummies there may not even be any idea of what kind of wrecks could occur on Mars. I think that these dummy robots would be very valuable to human kind and the colonization of Mars.

Without robots on Mars humans would be blindly walking into traps that we didn’t know existed. Even though some people don’t like robots and don’t believe that we should create artificial intelligence I think that it would be a very valuable tool for the exploration of the moon and other planets, mainly Mars. I think that we should send a crew of robots to Mars first. No humans, just robots. Even though there is a larger margin of error because these are robots and not humans I think that it would still be worth it.

Humans on Earth would control the ship they travel in, which would be difficult because of the time margin of communication between Earth and the spacecraft. The mission to Mars with robots will be harder than the mission to Mars with humans in my view. But if we succeed with the robot mission then we have bettered ourselves as humans. We’ve taken the next step toward colonization.

Sources:

(Artificial Intelligence) http://library.thinkquest.org/2705/

(Artificial Intelligence) http://nua-tech.com/paddy/ai_etc.shtml

(Crash! Test Dummies Get Smarter)

http://services.worldnet.net/~spurgeon/crashtest.HTM

Last Updated:  09/10/01