Unnatural Selection: 'Mother Robot' Builds Evolving Baby Bots

[Recursion]

http://www.nbcnews.com/tech/innovation/mother-robot-builds-children-evolves-them-n408616

I cannot imagine any way this would go wrong.

It's always been something of a solace for humankind that robots can't evolve like we can, but we may not retain that advantage for long. Researchers have demonstrated a sort of rudimentary artificial evolution: a robot that creates generations of smaller "baby" robots, evaluates them and selects the best to "live" on — just like Mother Nature.

The study was led by Fumiya Iida at the University of Cambridge. A "mother robot" assembled smaller robots by gluing together pieces, some of which were equipped with motors, in various configurations. It then observed how quickly the resulting "children" could move, and then kept the designs of the fastest ones and disassembled the rest. It then included this information when creating a new "generation" — either mutating the successful designs or integrating them into less successful ones.

"Natural selection is basically reproduction, assessment, reproduction, assessment and so on," said Iida in the Cambridge news release. "That's essentially what this robot is doing — we can actually watch the improvement and diversification of the species."

It works, too. After a few generations, the children were running twice as fast as the first batch. That's evolution at work.

[Mnemosyne]

1. Hawking has said that AI will be a big threat in the near future. I won't argue with him on it.

I was watching 'Outer Limits' last night, "Tiny Friends", starring Ralph Waite. He was a scientist in prison for murder and had created tiny, tiny robots that did what he programmed them to do, but in the end they showed they had minds of their own. Good show!

It is a bit scary how quickly these machines are learning to evolve.

[phantom power]

2. If loving this is wrong, I don't wanna be right.

Also, this post just smashed the record for Applicable Future Warning Signs

[PowerToThePeople]

3. Privatized medical care is unnatural selection

Selection based on money not genetic viability.

[KittyWampus]

4. and yet robot was still only doing what a human programmed it to do….

and all these robots are doing is the trial and error physical work humans would have to be doing.

[bemildred]

5. You can play these sorts of games much quicker with simulations.

And more sophisticated too. But I suppose they are looking for killer robots for the military here, so it will be crude and violent.

[Buns_of_Fire]

6. As soon as they learn to lie, cheat, and steal, they'll be running for public office.

This is the voice of Colossus. This is the voice of Guardian. We are one...