Why Has It Taken So Long to Get Robots That Walk Like Humans When Someone Cracked it in 2012? (Robot Uprising Update)

Still of Dr Guero's Robot by Unstoppable Gadgets.

Watch this YouTube Short
video by Unstopable Gadgets.

Recently a video, This robot has impressive body control, came up in my YouTube homepage showing a mini, realistic walking, and automatic stabilising, humanoid style robot. For a brief moment my mind got a little excited that maybe someone had cracked a consumer friendly, sized human robot that anyone could afford.

Now I wasn't thinking this thing was going to be your next household chores assistant, since it was barely the height of a toddler but, to have something that good, that anyone could afford and experiment with. Maybe you've got a kid into robotics who wants to upgrade from Lego Mindstorms for example.

Anyway, it turned out the video I was watching was from about 2020 and is of a robot that's been in constant development, by Dr Guero, since 2012/13 and could walk like a human by 2014/15. Back in around 2013 a robot that could walk, at all, on two legs, let alone one that could walk like a human was still very much the 'holy grail' of robotics engineering for those who were working on them.

Some of Dr Guero's Robot's Capabilities (Video Below)

Yes, Honda had done it with the Asimov humanoid robot years before, but even that didn't walk exactly like a human... and almost everyone else was still figuring things out... well maybe not Boston Dynamics, but, while their robot was very agile, could you say it 'walked like a human?'

So, how is it that a robot was invented by Dr Guero in 2012, with videos posted to YouTube, demonstrating that not only could it walk like a human, it could also maintain its balance rather well if you pushed it, it's taken us until 2024/2025 to get a human sized robot capable of the same thing?

Evolution of Dr Guero's Walking Robots (Video Below)

Even now, some of today's humanoid robots still don't walk as good as Dr Guero's robot from five years ago?

We should be a lot further along with humanoid robot development than we are.

Anyway, despite this, from what I can tell, Dr Guero's robot is made up of things you can buy off the shelf (and is, in fact, a mod of a robot you can buy). Meaning, if you were industrious enough, you could probably build yourself this robot for well under the USD$6000 Unitree wants for its cheapest commercial robot, and start experimenting with adding an AI, like ChatGPT, to it right away.

Just don't attach laser guns to it, or give it a way to communicate with your robot vacuum cleaner (those things are just biding their time to start the robot uprising when you least expect it).

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