A Brief History of Robots: A Millennium of Human Labor Evolution from "Robota" to "Companion" - Investment Notes, Issue 228
Part of our imagination of robots is shaped by Ghost in the Shell.
In Ghost in the Shell, the protagonist, Motoko Kusanagi, is a member of Section 9 of the Public Security Bureau with a fully prosthetic body. Her body is almost entirely made of machinery, with only her brain remaining biological. Through a brain - machine interface, she can directly access the network, obtain information, and even communicate with the consciousness of others. This technology gives her an edge when performing tasks, enabling her to quickly analyze and process complex information.
Ghost in the Shell
Therefore, when we mention robots, we think of them as having embodied intelligence; they are anthropomorphic, can "think", and are our partners. They can perform many unmanned and automated operations, thus helping humans free their hands and improve efficiency. They can deliver food, drive vehicles, and even run marathons.
Not to mention that for those of us who grew up watching various science - fiction films and TV shows about intelligent robots, after being inspired by works such as The Terminator, Ghost in the Shell, and A.I. Artificial Intelligence, the image of robots in a more distant future is shrouded in a veil of charm, mystery, and even a hint of danger.
Ghost in the Shell
However, has the image of robots always been like this to us?
In the long history of humanity, robots represent a simple pursuit of efficiency.
The word "robot" comes from the Czech word "robota", which means "forced labor" or "drudgery". Its earlier etymology can be traced back to the Slavic root "robot - " or "rab", meaning "labor" or "slave".
For humans, robots are not inherently related to intelligence. Endowing robots with intelligence has never been the goal but a means — generally speaking, teaching a robot to deliver food is just for it to perform that task, and teaching it to drive is simply to make it an indefatigable, non - eating, and unpaid driver. It's hard not to say that this underlying demand for robots is to turn this helper into a tool.
Looking down at the floor - cleaning robot at our feet, do we really regard it as a partner? Do we truly believe the intelligent "persona" created for it in the advertisements? In fact, we know very well that it is just a movable broom with sensors. However, this does not prevent it from providing effective assistance in our lives or the value it creates in freeing our hands — although occasionally, it may cause some trouble because it fails to recognize the excrement of cats and dogs.
Human beings' desire to improve efficiency and get assistance through external objects is a simple pursuit, an inborn mindset.
In this sense, robots have existed since ancient times. The most famous example is the "Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse" invented by Zhuge Liang.
According to Records of the Three Kingdoms, this machine could carry more than 400 catties of grain and travel dozens of miles a day, helping the Shu army transport military rations from Hanzhong, Shaanxi to the front line at Qilian Mountain. The journey was hundreds of kilometers long, including a large amount of mountainous terrain, and it would have been extremely difficult to transport supplies using traditional methods. The Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse had legs and could walk. Soldiers only needed to give it a certain push to guide it over mountains.
Reconstructed image of the Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse
In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, where Zhuge Liang is depicted as almost supernatural, this ancient "robot dog" even defied the law of conservation of energy. By patting its rear three times, it could move on its own day and night. Zhuge Liang, the master programmer, even hid a bug known only to him in the "tongue" of the Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse, using this trick to intercept a batch of Sima Yi's military rations.
Even further back in history, the fantasy of "automatic machines" had emerged.
In Greek mythology, Hephaestus, the god of fire, created a giant named "Talos". Made entirely of bronze, it could patrol and guard the island of Crete and is considered the earliest prototype of a "security robot".
The giant "Talos"
In the 9th century, the Banu Musa brothers, Arab scholars, described a series of mechanical dolls in The Book of Ingenious Devices that could pour wine automatically and play the flute, showcasing the ancients' ingenious ideas about automation. In China, Yi Xing, a Buddhist monk in the Tang Dynasty, and Su Song in the Song Dynasty successively created the "Water - Driven Armillary Sphere and Celestial Globe" and the "Astronomical Clock". These devices had mechanical dolls inside that could tell the time and display celestial phenomena, and were hailed as the most complex "automatic machines" in ancient times.
Stories about designing and manufacturing robots also took place in the West before the Industrial Revolution.
During the Renaissance, Leonardo da Vinci designed a "mechanical knight". With a shell made of wood, metal, and leather and driven by gears, it could sit and stand, and its head and arms could also rotate accordingly.
Mechanical knight
In the 1770s, the Droz father - and - son clockmakers from Switzerland created the "writing robot", the "drawing robot", and the "playing robot". Among them, after being wound up, the "writing robot" would lift its mechanical arm, dip the quill pen in the inkwell on the right side of the table, and then slowly write several lines on the white paper. By replacing 40 gears inside, it could write different contents.
Writing robot and its internal structure
Meanwhile, the "Mechanical Turk", invented by Wolfgang von Kempelen, a German craftsman, caused a sensation in Europe. It seemed to be able to defeat human chess players, but in fact, there was a real chess player hidden inside. Although it was a hoax, it ignited the public's imagination about "mechanical intelligence". A bystander at that time even commented, "Even if it's a hoax, we seem to see the shadow of the future."
The Mechanical Turk and its advertisement at that time
At the World Expositions in the 19th century, people were often attracted by mechanical dolls that could play the violin, beat the drums, and even dance. Although these "entertainment robots" were far from intelligent, they gave the public their first sense of intimacy in "interacting with machines".
Left: A 19th - century French acrobatic mechanical man; Right: A 19th - century French magic mechanical man that transforms into a child
The technological progress of robots: From mechanical bodies to intelligent brains
Even super - human figures like Zhuge Liang and Leonardo da Vinci were limited by the technological ceiling of their times and did not think of endowing the robots they created with human intelligence.
The connection between robots and intelligence emerged in the past 100 years, along with the simultaneous progress of technological levels and market demands.
Since the mid - 20th century, with the grand opening of the Third Industrial Revolution, computers have finally made their grand entrance onto the stage of industrial production. If the First Industrial Revolution gave robots a body and the Second Industrial Revolution provided them with kinetic energy, then the Third Industrial Revolution sowed the seeds of intelligence in robots. Since then, intelligent robots have emerged after several stages of iteration.
The earliest robot products needed to be remotely controlled and could not operate independently. In 1947, the U.S. Atomic Energy Laboratory developed a remotely - controlled manipulator to avoid the harm of nuclear radiation to humans, which helped people perform some nuclear test operations.
The remotely - controlled manipulator developed in 1947
In 1954, an American named George Devol built the world's first programmable manipulator. In 1959, the world's first industrial robot, Unimate, was born and was applied to the production line of General Motors. At this stage, people could control robots through pre - set programs to make them automatically repeat certain production operations.
The world's first industrial robot, Unimate
A worker at the General Motors factory recalled, "It didn't wear gloves but could pick up scalding metal parts. We were initially afraid it would replace us, but gradually we found that it saved us a lot of sweat." Social commentators also emphasized, "Robots are not meant to replace humans but to help them with dangerous or monotonous work."
Finally, in 1968, the Stanford Research Institute developed the world's first artificial - intelligence mobile robot, Shakey. It could use sensors and measuring devices to obtain environmental information, plan and make decisions by understanding and reasoning based on known conditions, and set its own actions autonomously. Alan Turing once predicted, "We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see that there is a lot to be done." Shakey is the best illustration of this prediction.
