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Tesla Optimus Bots Were Remotely Operated at Cybercab Event

(www.bloomberg.com)
217 points mfiguiere | 4 comments | 14 Oct 24 21:10 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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ethagknight ◴[14 Oct 24 22:37 UTC] No.41842902[source]▶
To be honest, the autonomous control of the robot seems like the easier part of the equation. (doing it safely in a room with guests, unguided... thats another matter). The physical limitations and packaging are a big challenge, and I dont think I saw Optimus lift anything remotely heavy.. just pull a beer tap.. a decision that probably speaks volumes about current limits of the technology.

To apply my first point to reality: put an Optimus in its current state/capability, on a commercial 0-turn lawn mower, plug Optimus into the mower's power takeoff, and have someone in another country remotely pilot the mower. That right there is worth every commercial lawn service having at least one on their crew TODAY.

The appeal of hot swapping an operator real time on the equipment you already own, whether it's a push lawn mower or a huge mining truck, provides enormous value right out of the gate. Especially in tasks where the Optimus can handle 90% of the task autonomously but needs to step aside or oversight for the last 10% of the job. Compare to a business model that requires purchase of all new very expensive and unique equipment.

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jvanderbot ◴[14 Oct 24 23:51 UTC] No.41843485[source]▶
I've worked in robotics for over 10 years, at state of the art labs and high quality startups.

There are really only two hard problems in robotics: Perception and Funding.

Perception, especially around a bunch of people, with depth, mapping, understanding traffic and gestures, all in real time etc etc will be a huge problem for these machines for a while.

Funding though? I doubt that's an issue right now.

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1. sterlind ◴[15 Oct 24 00:55 UTC] No.41843839[source]▶
That surprises me. I thought motion planning and motor control would be harder - old memories of Asimo falling helplessly trying to climb stairs, the clunkiness of a robot aligning itself perfectly with a drawer before executing a scripted-looking action to pull the handle, the obvious recorded sequence Atlas uses to get up from a fall. I know Boston Dynamics does impressive acrobatics, but it's all legs and no arms.

Are kinematics and planning solved now? I want to move into the field so I'm trying to learn.

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2. mitthrowaway2 ◴[15 Oct 24 01:43 UTC] No.41844106[source]▶
> Asimo falling helplessly trying to climb stairs

IIRC, that wasn't a control problem but a mechanical failure of a gearmotor shaft.

3. jvanderbot ◴[15 Oct 24 13:35 UTC] No.41848446[source]▶
Here's some closed-course manipulation with arms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuG-qNgLHws

There are others. Controls is hard! You need investment and to solve difficult engineering problems. But we have a pretty good idea that those things are solveable and can demonstrate success b/c they are engineering challenges, not things we fundamentally don't have an approach for yet.

4. jvanderbot ◴[15 Oct 24 17:51 UTC] No.41851107[source]▶
How much of that is actually perception though?

"Where can I put my feet safely?"

"What is the orientation and 6 higher order velocities of my body?"

etc.

I've been told that a perfectly observable / estimable system is trivially controllable. It's one of the reasons I believe perception is upstream of everything - interaction dynamics alone are nearly impossible to just wave away with models.

I don't even work in perception. But I know that everything is fine until you try to go online with perception in the loop. Then you are behind the perception team's debugging nearly all the time.