Boston Dynamics keeps working on their BigDog quadruped robot, which will probably grow to be the future Star Wars AT-AT of the Pentagon. Its evolution since the last time we saw it is nothing sort of mindblowing, and a bit spooky.
It looks like an actual biological quadruped. Seeing it climb through rubble, snow, jumping over obstacles like a wild goat, and saving a near-fall on iced ground at the last second (fast forward to the middle of the video) defies belief. It feels so “animal” that I almost feel bad when they hit it to demonstrate how it regains balance on its own.
The new version of the robot can now carry 340 pounds, which is almost triple the previous weight. It looks to me that that $10 million funding they got from Darpa has been put to good use.
Tom McGuire is a web designer, developer and educator specializing in learning everything there is to learn about everything. He also firmly believes in ‘Touch, not Tech.” He co-runs a boutique style digital media company called Visual Moxie and he spends a lot of his time thinking about and sharing his knowledge of the internet, information philosophy and web design and development.
