∂13-MAR-75  0950		network site AI
 Date: 13 MAR 1975 1249-EDT
 From: SUZIN at MIT-AI
 To: tob at SU-AI, tenenbaum at SRI-AI
 
                      ABSTRACT
 
           General Aspects of Robotics Systems
 
 An integrated robotics system should be able to interact
 intelligently with its environment, so it needs subsystems
 for perception, cognition and motor functions. Until one
 specifies the use for which such a system is intended or
 at least the world in which it is to function, little solid
 progress can be made defining more clearly the manipulative,
 locomotive, sensing, problem solving and world modelling
 subsystems required.
 
 We do not now have the physical devices or the knowledge
 required to build a credible general-purpose system and
 the greatest success in the recent past has been in the 
 design of systems intended for specific industrial
 applications. Those of us who would like to study the
 structure and behaviour of such robotics systems in the
 hope of elucidating some aspects of human psychology
 must be disappointed to see the use of special ad hoc
 techniques. Yet these techniques are often forced on us
 because of a lack of more general, elegant mechanisms 
 or the unfortunate mismatch between mechanical and 
 biological systems in terms of processing capabilities.
 Perhaps it is time to part ways, at least for a while,
 and study the two domains independently.
 
 If one follows the route of building systems tailored to
 specific applications domains one is faced with a few 
 additional problems. One has to learn a great deal about
 the application and how it is dealt with presently and
 ultimately has to study the constraints imposed by the 
 domain including the all important economic limitations.
 This makes the design task harder but more challenging.
 
 Berthold K. P. Horn
 
  Above find abstract for tutorial. I apologize for it
 being late - but only found out a week ago or so that
 it was needed. Comments are welcome too, please. cheers, bkph