Master, will I assemble your flatpack? How a C3PO butler robot could be only five years away

Published on Thursday 16 April 2009 22:02

HELP could soon be at hand for anyone struggling to assemble their flatpack furniture.

Scottish scientists yesterday claimed we are only five years away from a generation of robots capable of putting together wardrobes, beds and chairs.

Professor Jon Oberlander, a computer expert at Edinburgh University's School of Informatics, said researchers were already close to developing such robots in the laboratory and it would only be a matter of time before such machines were available in the home.

"A robot that can help you put together a wardrobe is absolutely on the cards," he said.

"In the lab we have things that are close to being able to do that. It will happen within the next five years. In the home would be the next step."

Speaking at the Edinburgh Science Festival, Mr Oberlander said researchers were exploring the ways in which humans and robots interact.

"People automatically engage their social skills when they interact with a robot," he said.

"If your girlfriend had a furniture construction robot, she would probably treat it the same way as she treats you.

"The good news is that you won't be as expensive, and a robot won't buy the wardrobe in the first place.

"What we are working on, specifically, in Edinburgh is human-robot interaction. When you or I do something together, like assembling a wardrobe, we effortlessly collaborate to bolt, screw or nail things together. Even if we are not talking, we don't hurt each other or get in each other's way and there is an effortless choreography.

"That requires a kind of mind-reading. It requires a whole series of different skills including being sensitive to social signals – seeing where someone else is looking, their facial expressions, where their hands are, if they are going to pick up an object and hand it to you, all these subtle things. Is this impossible for robots? Absolutely not."

However, he urged caution over how advanced such robots should be.

"Safety is paramount because you don't want to unleash a robot which is potentially quite powerful," he said. "It has to give way to a human being and putting together a wardrobe is a brilliant example of that.

"A general purpose humanoid robot, a real C3PO, a sort of butler robot who goes around doing things for you and translating languages is possible.

"Many of the things you need to build a C3PO are already here. Whether people put them together though, is as much a social choice as a scientific possibility. It is not inevitable."

One German robot, complete with head and arms, which Prof Oberlander is helping develop, is already able to help people put together relatively simple objects. His team has already developed a robot which can walk like a human and climb stairs.

He added: "If you are trying to predict the future of robotics over the next few years, what we will see is more and more special purpose robots, really well tuned to a particular task really well. You won't see an awful lot of general purpose robots."

Professor Oberlander will present his ideas at the University of Edinburgh's Informatics Forum, part of the Edinburgh International Festival of Science, in the capital's Crichton Street, tonight at 6pm.