Analysis of Current Developments and Ethical Issues in Robotics

This report provides a comprehensive overview of current developments in robotics. It begins with an introduction to the field, defining robotics and highlighting its significance. The discussion section delves into different types of robots, including pre-programmed, humanoid, autonomous, teleoperated, and augmenting robots, detailing their functionalities and applications across various sectors such as manufacturing, healthcare, and logistics. The report then examines recent advancements, focusing on the development of the humanoid robot Atlas by Boston Dynamics. It also explores the integration of technology, mechanics, and computer technology in robotics, analyzing trends in robot design methodologies, including industrial and service robots. Furthermore, the report addresses ethical issues associated with robotics, including Asimov's laws and societal considerations. The conclusion summarizes the key findings and emphasizes the importance of ongoing research and development in this rapidly evolving field. The report includes diagrams, references, and an appendix to support the analysis and findings.

Running head: CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS IN ROBOTICS
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS IN ROBOTICS
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CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS IN ROBOTICS
Table of Contents
Introduction....................................................................................................................2
Discussion......................................................................................................................2
Robotics......................................................................................................................2
Developments in robotics...........................................................................................5
Ethical issues of robotics............................................................................................7
Negative issues of the robotics...................................................................................9
Conclusion....................................................................................................................10
References....................................................................................................................11
Appendix......................................................................................................................13

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Introduction
The implementation of automated machines and intelligent machines is allowing the
various sectors of the world to improve significantly. The robotics sector could be described
as the sector of science and engineering that allows the machines to perform various tasks
without the intervention of the humans. The robotics sector mainly includes the designing,
construction, the operation as well as the use of the robots empowered by the computer for
perception, sensory response, control and the information handling. It has been predicted that
the robotics could develop the machines that could effectively substitute the humans as well
as replicate the human actions.
This research report intends to analyse the robotics sector and analyse the present
developments in the robotics. A brief discussion of the robotics sector and the benefits of the
robotics sector has been provided in this report. The ethical considerations and the societal
considerations has been analysed for determining how the robotics are used in the modern
times under the ethical considerations. A brief diagram of robot has been provided in the
report along with proper labelling that provides clear description of the various parts of the
robots.
Discussion
Robotics
Robotics could be considered as the intersection of the science, technology as well as
the engineering that generates machines who work without any kind of human intervention.
With the progress in the technology, the robotics sector has seen significant development
(Siciliano and Khatib 2016). These particular robots mainly involves the mechanical arms
that are tasked with the wielding or even screwing on specific sections on any car. Presently,
the use of robotics is increasing and the creation as well as the utilisation of bots is being

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done that helps in exploring the harshest conditions of the Earth, robots that helps the law
enforcement as well as the robots that helps in each of the aspects of the healthcare. There are
several features of the robots that makes the machines stand out of other machines and people
are benefited from the use of the machines (Taylor et al. 2016). The robots mainly comprises
of various kind of efficient mechanical construction. This mechanical prospect of the robots
assists in completing the tasks within any particular environment for which it has been
designed. According to the recent survey, it could be analysed that the Mars 2020 Rover’s
wheels have been respectively motorised as well as made of the titanium tubing that assists in
firmly gripping any of the harsh condition of the outer planet. The robots comprise of the
electrical components that helps in controlling as well as powering the machinery.
Specifically, an effective electric current is required for powering the large quantity of the
robots. The robots mainly comprises of distinct level of effective computer programming
(Halperin, Kavraki and Solovey 2017). Deprived of any effective code in the robots, the robot
would not be able to perform that they are tasked to do. The insertion of program within the
robot enables the ability in the robots of knowing the task and the efficient method of
executing the task.
There are various kinds of robots that are presently being used in the various sectors
of the world. The most common kind of robots are:
Pre-programmed robots: The pre-programmed robots have the ability of operating
within any controlled environment where they are tasked with some of the monotonous, and
simple tasks (Kurfess 2018). The most primary kind of the pre-programmed robot could be
considered as the mechanised arm within any automative assembly line. There is only one
purpose of the robot, for welding the door, for inserting any specific section within the engine
and the job is performing that the task is longer, efficient as well as faster than any human.

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Humanoid robots: The humanoid robots could be considered as the robots who looks
similar and mimics the human behaviour (Yang et al. 2018). These kinds of robots commonly
executes the activities that are human like and have been designed for looking similar to the
humans with having almost similar faces as well as the expressions such as the humans. Two
of most common types of the humanoid robots are the Boston Dynamics’ Atlas and Hanson
Robotics’ Sophia.
Autonomous robots: the autonomous robots mainly operates with significant
independence from any kind of human operators (Rich, Wood and Majidi 2018). These kinds
of robots are commonly designed for executing the tasks within any open environment that
does not need any kind of human supervision. The most common example of the autonomous
robot in this sector could be considered as the Roomba vacuum cleaner who utilises the
various kind of sensors for roaming through the home.
Teleoperated robots: The teleoperated robots could be considered as the mechanical
bots that are managed by the humans. The most common kinds of the teleoperated robots are
the human controlled submarines that are used for fixing the leaks underwater in pipes during
the BP oil spill or the drones that are used for detecting any landmines placed in the
battlefield. These kinds of robots commonly work in the extreme conditions in the
geographical situations, with adverse weather and the circumstances (Whitesides 2018).
Augmenting robots: The augmenting robots are either used for enhancing the human
abilities or even replacing the abilities of any human that has been lost. Some of the common
types of the augmenting robots could be considered as the robotic prosthetic limbs or the
exoskeletons that are utilised for lifting the heavy weights (Corke 2017).
These kinds of robots helps the humans in various sector by assisting in their work
and allow improve the efficiency of humans. The main uses of the robots are in the sector of

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manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, home and the travelling. The robots that are used in the
manufacturing sector are considered to be the oldest as well as most popular user of the
robots (Lynch and Park 2017). These kinds of co-bots as well as the robots works for
efficiently testing as well as assembling the products, such as the cars as well as the industrial
equipment. It has been predicted that there would be significant rise in the use of robots in the
various sectors of the world.
Developments in robotics
The performance of new humanoid robots Atlas is presently allowing the major
developments in the robotics sector. The Boston Dynamics, who are the US engineering as
well as the robotics design company discovered around 1992 is the completely owned
subsidiary of SoftBank group. Atlas is presently using the vision system for aligning itself
and for measuring the distances to any kind of obstacles.
Provided the development within the sector of the robotics, it evokes the need of
making profile of the production in the associated areas significantly detailed. Described the
integration documents mutual interaction of the demands as well as the needs among sectors
of the robotics as well as the associated areas entering it (Selig 2017). This kind of questions
could be easily supported by the fact that the robotics is the interconnected area that has been
well-defined by the incorporation of the technology, mechanics, as well as the computer
technology. The analysis of the provided development of the robotics, but majorly analysis of
the trends as well as realisation of development within the details of the technical explanation
forms view as well as the view of efficiently identifying the profile of the development of the
associated areas majorly in these areas:
In the sector of the methodologies to the robot design: The perception of the industrial
robots has been stabilised, the development of the robot families has been effectively solved

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in the comparable sizes as well as types, innovative concepts of the serial structures is being
solved and the parallel structures, the concept of the service robots, that evolves form
introduction of major requirements of the application, non-structure of the operating
environment as well as the technologies of the realised tasks. The conception of the motion
systems is required to be effectively resolved as the action supporters that are renovating the
arriving energetic signal within the mechanical production provided by the position, the
moment or the speed, high needs on the potency, working parameters and efficiency,
minimise the size design as well as the working dependence has to be resolved effectively by
concept of the huge functional integration. It has to be done for improving the means and the
methods of designing of the robots.
The recent state of art of the robotic technology could be easily documented by the
presentation of the chosen kinds of robots as well as the selection of the probable applications
that could be effectively arranged agreeing to the present grouping of the technique.
Industrial robots: The automatic equipment with the pre-programmable operating
systems for performing the motion as well as the control functions in the procedure of
products that replaces the analogical functions of the human in the manipulation as well as
the technological operations. The IT has been conceptually designed form the mechanical
systems as well as the control systems (Miller and Nourbakhsh 2016).
Service robots: The constant and commonly permitted definition has not been
believed in the present times, and the interpretation that has been approved is that the robots
are the mobile devices that are completely programmable that completely or partially
performs the service operations. The service operation has been presently comprehended for
being the operation that does not properly serve for the creation of the goods but it functions
in the favour of the people, the mechanical systems or the other objects. Decisive as well as

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the constructionally most crucial characteristic of the service robots is the locomotion parts
that secures the mobility. The structure of the locomotion parts has been efficiently solved as
per the kind of the tasks that is supposed in being performed by the service robots and at
similar time, the complete service robots has been created in the concept as well as the details
according to character and the type of environment.
The recent development of the swarm robotics is considered as the innovative
approach for coordination of the multirobot systems that comprises of the huge number of the
relatively easy physical robots. A primary intention of the method is studying the complete
structure of the robots in proper manner that any preferred collective behaviour appears from
the inter-robot interactions as well as interactions of robots with any environment that is
motivated but not restricted by this emergent behaviour viewed in the social insects. This is
analysed that the collection of the comparatively primitive distinct behaviours improved with
the communication would generate the huge set of the complex swarm behaviour (Niku
2020). The probable applications for the swarm robotics involves tasks which demands the
extreme miniaturisation for the purpose of instance disseminated sensing the tasks within the
micromachinery or the human body. From other perspective, the swarm robotics has been
considered to be most appropriate for the tasks that demands for the extremely inexpensive
designs for any kind mining tasks, or any kind of agricultural foraging tasks. The artists are
presently using the swarm robotic methods for realising the innovative forms of the
interactive installation of art. Both the miniaturisation as well as the cost are considered to be
the hard restrictions that emphasises the simplicity of individual team members and therefore
motivating the swarm intelligent approach for achieving the meaningful behaviour on the
swarm levels.

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Ethical issues of robotics
Around the time 1940s, the American writer Isaac Asimov created the main three
laws of the robotics where it has been argued that the intelligent robots must be effectively
programmed following the manner that when tackling the conflict, it must remit as well as
obey these following these three laws:
 The robot might not harm any human being, or using the inaction, allowing any
human inn being the coming to significant harm (Hines et al. 2017)
 The robots should obey the accurate orders that are provided to it by any human being
excluding where such kinds of order would conflict within the First law
 The robot should protect their individual existence till these kinds of protection do not
conflict with the first or the second law
The ethics could be considered as the sector of the philosophy that studies the human
conduct, the moral assessment, the notions of the evil and good, wrong and right, injustice
and justice. The concept of the roboethics introduces the fundamental reflection of ethics that
is associated with the specific issues as well as the moral predicaments produced by the
deployment of the applications of robotic. The roboethics mainly deals with mainly the code
of the conduct which is required to be implemented by the designer engineers of the robotics
and it should implement within artificial intelligence of any robot. Using this type of any
artificial ethics, the roboticists should ensure that the autonomous systems would have the
ability of exhibiting the ethically acceptable behaviour in the situations during which the
robots or any of autonomous systems like the autonomous vehicles interacts with the humans
(Cianchetti et al. 2018). The ethical issues are considered to be rising till the time more
increasingly advanced robotics would be developed. The service robots have been developed
for being peacefully living as well as interacting with the humans where the lethal robots
have been created for sending to fight in battlefields as the military robots. As per the recent

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researches conducted by the researchers, it has been determined that mainly the cognitive
competences of the robots does not equal with the humans and therefore the lethal robots are
considered to be unethical as it makes several mistakes simply than the humans. And it has
also been believed by the researchers that the even though the unmanned systems would not
have the ability of perfectly behaving in the battlefield, it could execute the tasks with more
ethics than the human beings. The military robots are being developed in the present times for
performing in the battlefields. It dates back to the Cold war as well as the World War (Riek
2017). Several mines have been tracked by the German Goliath and the Soviet teletanks also
helped in the discovering the mines from fields. The military robots could be used for firing
the gun, disarm the bombs, carry any wounded soldiers, detect the mines, fire the missiles
and even fly. With the recent development of the robotics in the modern times, and the
prediction of improvement of the robots in future, the roboethics would be increasingly
crucial as soon as the people enters the era where increasingly advanced as well as the
sophisticated robots along with the common artificial intelligence would become the integral
part of the daily life. Hence, the present debate in the social as well as the ethical issue in the
advanced robots should become significantly crucial. The present growth in the sector of
robotics as well as the swift development in the sector of artificial intelligence needs the
roboticists and the humans be extensively prepared for tackling the issues. As there is
significant advancement in the roboethics, several researchers argues that the robots would
effectively contribute in the development of improved world where the tasks would be easily
completed by the robots (Nolfi et al. 2016). Several researchers also argued that the robots
are significantly incapable of being the moral agents and must not be developed with the
embedded capabilities of moral-decision making.

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Negative issues of the robotics
Even though the introduction of the robotics has allowed the development of
improved machines in the modern era, but there are some negative aspects of this field that
has to be considered. Even though the robots are being created for assisting the humans in
improving life, but it could also be used for causing significant harm to the people. The main
disadvantage of the robotics sector is that when any common people operates any robot, there
are several functions that are restricted and these restricted functions could only be accessed
by the programmers or the created. With the implementation of these kinds of restrictions, the
robots might not act appropriately during the time of emergency or any unexpected occasion
(Van der Loos, Reinkensmeyer and Guglielmelli 2016). The revenue that is required for
building the robotic systems as well as the robots are presently extensively high and it leads
to significant consideration while developing the robots. Besides this, it might require
additional funds as well as spaces for providing the required facilities for developing the
robots.
Conclusion
Therefore, it could be concluded from the research that the introduction of the
robotics in present world has helped the various sectors but there are some considerations that
are to be considered for ensuring that the use of robots is done appropriately. Robotics could
be considered as the intersection of the science, technology as well as the engineering that
generates machines who work without any kind of human intervention. The pre-programmed
robots have the ability of operating within any controlled environment where they are tasked
with some of the monotonous, and simple tasks. The humanoid robots are considered as the
robots that looks similar and mimics the human behaviour. The autonomous robots mainly
operates with significant independence from any kind of human operators. The teleoperated
robots could be considered as the mechanical bots that are controlled by the humans. The

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recent development of the swarm robotics is considered as the innovative approach for the
coordination of the multirobot systems that comprises of the large number of the relatively
simple physical robots. The ethical issues are considered to be rising till the time more
increasingly advanced robotics would be developed. The service robots have been developed
for being peacefully living as well as interacting with the humans where the lethal robots
have been created for sending to fight in battlefields as the military robots. The concept of the
roboethics introduces the fundamental reflection of ethics that is associated with the specific
issues as well as the moral dilemmas produced by the development of the robotic
applications.