The future has arrived: Optimus, the robot of Elon Musk, will be presented on September 30 at the AI Day of Tesla. Although skepticism does not cease around him, it is expected to work with several advanced artificial intelligence functions.
What will be seen that day is a prototype yet to be improved, but it is much more than what was previously seen, when it was just… a human in disguise. This humorous appearance only generated more criticism.
Tesla AI Day has been pushed back from its original date of August 19 to September 30, giving engineers at Elon Musk’s company more time to improve various features.
Musk did not elaborate on what the humanoid robot will do that day.
The most recent thing that the tycoon explained about Optimus he did it in an article for China Cyberspace, a monthly magazine run by the Cyberspace Administration of China.
“Human society is based on the interaction of a bipedal humanoid with two arms and ten fingers. So if we want a robot to adapt to its environment and be able to do what humans do, it needs to be roughly the same size, shape, and capabilities as a human.”
Technical data on Optimus: height, weight and possible functions
Tesla’s humanoid robot will measure 1.76 meters tall, with 56 kilograms of weight. It will be able to lift up to 20 kilograms and will walk up to a speed of 8 kilometers per hour.
This creation of Elon Musk would be based on artificial intelligence with a focus on vision, instead of LiDAR or Radar.
Among the functions that the Tesla robot will perform, the tycoon indicated that, initially, it will replace people in “repetitive, boring and dangerous” tasks. But he puts the emphasis not on industries or factories, but on the home.
“The vision is that they serve millions of homes, in tasks such as cooking, mowing the lawn and taking care of the elderly,” Elon Musk said at the time.
Criticism and doubts about Tesla Optimus, Elon Musk’s robot
Reuters spoke with various experts about what they expect to see on September 30. For them, it has to overcome what has already been observed in other similar robots.
“If you just make the robot walk, or make the robots dance, this is done,” he said. Nancy Cooke, professor at Arizona State University. “That’s not that impressive.”
For Gene Munster, managing partner at Loup Ventures, the likelihood of it going to scale is low. “It’s infinitely more difficult than self-driving cars,” he said, recalling Tesla’s complications for its Autopilot technology.
While Shaun Azimi, leader of NASA’s engineering team for robotics, noted: “Driverless cars weren’t really shown to be as easy as thought. And it’s the same with humanoid robots to some extent.”
“If something unexpected happens, it is very difficult to be flexible and resistant to these kinds of changes.”