Robotics Professor Answers Robot Questions From Twitter | Tech Support | WIRED

Robotics professor Henny Admoni answers the internet's burning questions about robots! How do you program a personality? Can robots pick up a single M&M? Why do we keep making humanoid robots? What is Elon Musk's goal for the Tesla Optimus robot? Will robots take over my job writing video descriptions...I mean, um, all our jobs? Henny answers all these questions and much more.

Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: Jeff Smee
Editor: Ron Douglas
Expert: Henny Admoni

Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Eric Martinez
Production Coordinator: Fernando Davila

Camera Operator: Alex Grant
Audio: Robert Buncher
Production Assistant: Maria Bosetti

Post Production Supervisor: Alexa Deutsch
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen
Assistant Editor: Andy Morell

Special Thanks: Human And Robot Partners Lab at Carnegie Mellon University


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[Tanyathestoryteller]

I don't know why we are so obsessed about hyper realistic humanoid robots when we can have cute, adorable, cartoony robots!

[xkdcmhat]

I 1000% prefer robots that don't look like humans to be completely honest. Maybe ones that are humanoid, but not human looking.

[TQM]

I recall they did a study a few years ago in Japan (I think it was Japan?) where they assigned companion robots to an elderly community where everyone lived alone. They got attached to their robot companions and some shed tears saying goodbye after the study ended. It'd be cool if robot companions became the norm

[ssiddarth]

What an amazing professor, all kids deserve such great teachers

[abfominaya]

I love Prof. Admoni! She's an amazing professor :) Her class is amazing at CMU

[encapsulated_nomad]

That small break of “excuse me my robot is escaping” 😂

[judahyumul]

Such a well articulated Professor. Thank you for educating us!

[xpeng]

It's pretty good to have this kind of video to let general people know more about one specific area. Because with out those base knowledge, what people said is almost ridiculous.

[AMTunLimited]

One really good reason I hear for people making human-*shaped* robots (as opposed to robots that *look* like people) is that most things are currently made for human shaped operators, so currently a human-shaped robot would be compatible with a lot of things that already exist

[iluvtacos]

Can we get a whole series with her doing robot questions? Because holy cow this is fascinating

[gostovahs]

I'm an artist in the gaming field, we often have shared terms with programmers for completely different things (example - tangents), but as an animator specifically it was interest to find out that you use the term inverse kinematics (IK)! I am guessing it's somewhat similar (didn't fully follow the robot one), but in animation it's when say the leg or arm (a series of bones) follow a point at the end of the bone chain instead of the parentage starting at the top (FK). Anyways, I have never heard the term outside of animation so that was neat to learn you guys also use it!

[tannermcnabb]

Love these when experts in their fields weigh in and answer questions like these. Keep them coming.

[jcataclisma]

One of the nice things to watch by paying attention to her "body expressions", is to notice so many times when she might think "hey, what kind of amateur question is that?" but, suddenly, she remembers that "oh, wait, this is NOT one of my regular classes, with one of my proficient students". 🤓👍 Really nice video!

[akashita]

I loved how perfectly timed the sequence at 8:43 was! It was almost like the robot could hear her, but I'm sure she programmed it. Super awesome ☺️

[thejwvariety]

i was glad she clarified the difference between AI and robotics, and the gigantic overlap between the two

[khalilahd.]

Love a woman in STEM!! She seems to love her job, great interview ❤

[Carolinajunkies]

1 year later and so many of this ladies answers would be so different

[rodeva]

Me, a Robotics engineer, obsessed with watching this video even though I know all of this.

[rosymaze]

As a woman in stem, I love seeing wired show other women in stem. It’s such a male dominated field.

[berniezenis]

Henny's interactions with the one robot were cute.