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Reading List – Vehicles

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  • #948
    Christie Veitch
    Participant

    This simple book (subtitled “experiments in synthetic psychology”) has a profound message about how lifelike behavior can emerge from remarkably simple systems.   Cubelets are a kit for kids to build robots, but also a teaching tool for how students can understand complex systems and emergent behavior. Vehicles offers inspiration and deep thoughts on how complexity can arise from simple rules.

    “We will talk only about machines with very simple internal structures, too simple indeed to be interesting from the point of view of mechanical or electrical engineering.
    Interest arises, rather, when we look at these machines or vehicles as if they were animals in a natural environment.  We will be tempted, then, to use psychological language in describing their behavior.   And yet we know very well that there is nothing in these vehicles that we have not put in ourselves. This will be an interesting educational game.”

     

    #1101
    Ken McDaniel
    Participant

    This is a very interesting book that I was exposed to during my studies in computer science over 10 years ago. It was eye opening how the author appeared to create an intelligent “thinking” machine using just simple sensors and logic elements through an easy to follow iterative process. I would most definitely recommend this as reading material for anyone that is interested in robotics.

    #1106
    Christie Veitch
    Participant

    Ken,

    I completely agree! I read chapters of this book 8-10 years ago as well, but as part of my studies in Cognition, Psych, and animal behavior. Reading it again I realized that Braitenberg also powerfully argues that small progressions in combinations of sensors, actions, and logic elements produce compelling new “vehicles” in quick iterations. It’s made me think not just about computer science, AI and Cognition but also about evolution.

    Do you have any other reading suggestions for us? We’d love to hear them!

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