Chapter 1: History of robots

The first known examples of robots may be found in ancient cultures all around the globe. During the time of the Industrial Revolution, humans gained the structural engineering competence to manage electricity. This allowed for machines to be driven by tiny motors, which was a significant step toward furthering the Industrial Revolution. During the early part of the 20th century, the concept of a humanoid machine began to emerge.

The early applications of contemporary robotics were in manufacturing plants, where they were known as industrial robots. These factory robots were stationary devices that could do various manufacturing activities, hence reducing the amount of labor required from humans. Since the early 2000s, manufacturers have started developing industrial robots that can be digitally programmed and possess artificial intelligence.

At the very least, the notions of artificial slaves and companions may be traced all the way back to the ancient traditions of Cadmus, who is supposed to have seeded dragon teeth, which afterwards developed into soldiers, as well as Pygmalion, whose statue of Galatea was the one who brought her to life.

In a great number of ancient legends, artificial humans played a role, such as the talking mechanical handmaidens (Ancient Greek: ????a? ???sea? (Kourai Maspero|publisher=BoD|year=2009|isbn=9783861950967|pages=108}}</ref>

The Buddhist scholar Daoxuan (596-667 AD) provided a description of humanoid automata made from metals that read religious scriptures inside of a monastery that included a magnificent clock. When Buddha Shakyamuni passed away, the "people of precious metals" shed tears.

The Indian Lokapannatti is a compilation of cycles and lores that was created in the 11th or 12th century after the common era, Archytas of Tarentum, a mathematician who lived in the fourth century BC, proposed the concept of a steam-powered, mechanical pigeon that he referred to as "The Pigeon." Aristotle, following up on an earlier allusion in Homer's Iliad, mused in book 1 of part 4 of his Politics (written about 322 BC), that automata could one day bring about human equality by making it feasible to do away with slavery:

There is just one scenario in which we can conceive of managers not requiring subordinates and masters not needing slaves. This scenario applies to both management and slavery. This condition would be that each instrument could do its own work, either at the word of command or by intelligent anticipation, like the statues of Daedalus or the tripods made by Hephaestus, of which Homer relates that "Of their own motion they entered the conclave of Gods on Olympus," as if a shuttle should weave of itself, and a plectrum should do its own harp playing. This condition would be met if each instrument was able to fulfill.

During the time when the Greeks ruled Egypt, the city of Alexandria became the home to a number of engineers who were skilled in the construction of automata. Manuscripts were left behind by Alexandrian engineers documenting working automata that were driven by hydraulics or steam. These texts date back to the polymath Ctesibius (285-222 BC). Ctesibius was known for creating automata that took the form of humans and were often used in religious rites and the worship of deities. Hero of Alexandria (10-70 CE), who is considered to be one of the last great Alexandrian engineers, built an automaton puppet theater about the year 1070 CE. In this theater, the stage settings and the figurines moved mechanically. In his work on pneumatics, he outlined the steps involved in the production of such automata.

The Cosmic Engine was a clock tower in China that was 10 meters (33 feet) in height and was constructed by Su Song in Kaifeng, China, in the year 1088 CE. It contained mechanical mannequins that chimed the hours, rang gongs or bells, and featured a variety of other devices.

Around 1495, Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) created a drawing of a humanoid that is considered to be one of the first examples of verified automation. Drawings depicting a mechanical knight in armor that could sit up, wave its arms, and move its head and mouth were found in Leonardo's notebooks, which were uncovered in the 1950s. These notebooks were found in Italy.

Rene Descartes, a philosopher who lived in the 17th century, had the belief that animals and humans were both biological machines. During his most recent journey to Norway, he brought along a mechanical doll that was designed to appear like his late daughter Francine.

Beginning in the year 1900, L. Frank Baum used cutting-edge technology in the Oz series of children's novels that he wrote. Baum related the tale of the cyborg Tin Woodman in his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which was published in 1900. The Tin Woodman was a human woodcutter who had his limbs, head, and body rebuilt by a tinsmith after his wicked axe had separated them. In the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1907), L. Frank Baum introduces readers to Tik-Tok, a copper clockwork guy who must be constantly wound up and who unexpectedly stops working.

In 1912, Leonardo Torres y Quevedo created the first machine that was completely self-sufficient and able to play the game of chess. In contrast to the human beings who controlled The Turk and Ajeeb, the automaton known as El Ajedrecista (The Chessplayer) was able to play the game on its own without any assistance. It was only able to play endgames with three pieces, mechanically moving a white king and a rook to checkmate a black king that was being controlled by a human player.

The term "robot" was first used in a play published by the Czech Karel Capek in 1921.

R.U.R.

(Rossum's Universal Robots) was a spoof of the science fiction genre, The term "robot" originally referred to man-made biological organisms that were developed to do disagreeable physical work.

The United States of America is responsible for the manufacture of some of the early designs of industrial robots. These manipulators contained joints that were modeled on the kinematics of the human shoulder, arm, and wrist. This allowed them to reproduce human actions such as pulling, pushing, pressing, and lifting. Control over motions was possible via the use of cam and switch programming. Willard V. Pollard submitted the first patent application for such an arm in the year 1938. It was titled "Position Controlling Apparatus" and had electrical controls, a pneumatic cylinder, and motors that drove six axes of motion. The huge drum memory, on the other hand, made programming time-consuming and challenging.

Isaac Asimov came up with the Three Laws of Robotics between the years 1941 and 1942, and in the process, he also came up with the term "robotics." In 1945 Vannevar Bush released As We May Think, an essay that probed the possibility of electronic data processing. He accurately anticipated the development of computer technologies such as digital word processors, speech recognition software, and machine translation. Ted Nelson, the man credited with inventing hypertext, eventually gave him credit for his work.

1943 saw the adoption of the human central nervous system as the control paradigm for automatic weapons systems by Arturo Rosenblueth, Norbert Wiener, and Julian Bigelow. In doing so, they were the pioneers of cybernetics, which comes from the Greek word for "steersman," and they modeled data processing on the assumption that an animal constantly communicates its sensorial experience to its central nervous system as automatic and involuntary feedback. As a result, animals are able to regulate processes such as respiration, circulation, and digestion.

In 1951, Walter released the article titled "A Machine that Learns," which detailed how his more sophisticated mechanical robots demonstrated conditioned reflex learning and operated as intelligent agents.

The first Unimate was purchased by General Motors in 1960 from Devol, and the following year, it was put into operation at a facility in Ewing Township, New Jersey, with the purpose of lifting hot bits of metal from a die casting process and placing them in cooling liquid.

At the Rancho Los Amigos Hospital in Downey, California, a robotic arm known as the Rancho Arm was constructed to assist disabled patients. In 1963, Stanford University purchased this computer-controlled arm from Rancho Los Amigos Hospital.

The beginning of the 1970s saw the development of precise bombs and intelligent weaponry. Through the use of terminal guidance, weapons became robotic. Following the conclusion of the Vietnam War, the first deployment of laser-guided bombs occurred. These bombs were able to locate their target by following a laser beam that was directed in that direction. During Operation Linebacker in 1972, laser-guided bombs were used, and although they were successful, they still relied primarily on human operators. Once the weapon was fired, the operator did not need to pay any more attention to it or take any additional action. These weapons were initially used during the latter stages of the Vietnam War.

In 1981, Takeo Kanade was the one who invented the first "direct-drive arm." The motors for the arm were housed inside the body of the robot, making lengthy transmissions unnecessary. This innovation was a first of its type.

The Food and Drug Administration gave its approval to one of the most advanced robot-assisted surgical machines in the year 1994. John R. Adler was the one who came up with the idea for the Cyberknife, and in 1991, the first system was put into operation at Stanford University. This image-guided surgery was performed using a radiosurgery device that also used robotic placement. Patients suffering from malignancies of the brain or...