All the previous posts have been about the motion of the robot and the math it takes to achieve that motion. And most of that motion is anchored solidly to the ground.The machine tools and robots and etc, I mean, some of them work on moving objects, like robots painting cars or robots welding, but in reality, it’s all bolted down.

Lets take a look at positions, for a moment. You have a position in space, and so do I. We can look at our positions several ways, most commonly by distance and direction. This generally only works if there’s a road between us, which generally, there is not. We can sort of imagine that, though, as an airplane flight.

Once the airplane takes off, it is no longer connected to the planet. We have to give it’s location as a group of numbers. Imagining for a moment that the earth is flat, we can give that group of numbers as lat, long, and H above G. (Actual pilots have different ways of dealing with this, I’m just trying to simplify) Those three numbers would correspond to x,y, and z. If you know the origin and the destination and the location of the plane and it’s speed, it’s simple enough to calculate the time since departure and the time until arrival.

But this all treats the plane, the departure, and the arrival as dots. They arent, they have mass and occupy space. So there are three other important dimensions- they’re important to the passengers of the plane and damned important to the pilot. Pilots call them “Roll, Pitch, and Yaw”, and they correspond to the robot/machine tool A, B, and C.

The plane has it’s own six axis coordinates. The destination and departure places do as well. So do all of the people on the plane. So do all the parts of the people on the plane; as you move around your left foot has it’s own location in relation to your right, and it becomes fractally complex very quickly.

Now, I don’t know anything about football, but I know a powerful lot about motion. If you watch a football game, you will regularly see a man running, throwing a football at another man running, who catches it.

Think about this for a moment. This is of course a skill learned with some practice, but the sheer computing power required for the thrower to judge the distance he has to throw, compensating for the speed he is moving, all the while controlling his muscles to increase/decrease the speed, while watching for and examining obstacles, actually throw the ball, to another player who must also watch for and avoid obstacles, and intercept the ball, which has it’s own speed and direction and location, being simultaneously slowed by air friction and sped up by gravity in minute increments. And yes, there are incomplete passes but the fact that anyone catches a ball ever is downright astounding. And NFL players do it without ever thinking about it.

So now, do you still fear robots will be taking over soon? No, none of the things i have discussed are impossible to do with a robot, given resources, time, and money, but what would the point be?