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The term robot was made
The word "robot" is first used in 1921 by Czech playwrite Karel Capek in his play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots). The play involves a factory that builds artificial people to be servants for humans. In 1926, Metropolis becomes the first movie to portray a humanoid robot on screen. -
William Grey Walter's 'turtle' robots
William Grey Walter developed what are considered the first electronic autonomous robots called machina speculatrix.
The turtle-like robots were named Elmer and Elsie and were capable of way-finding to reach a charging station when their battery levels were low. -
The Laws of Robotics were made
The three robotic laws were made in 1942 in a story "Runaround" made by Isaac Asimov. although they were foreshadowed in a few earlier stories. The Three Laws are:
1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. -
Neural networks are introduced
Artificial neural networks (based on the neural networks in the human brain) are computing systems designed to simulate the way the human brain processes information. -
The turning Test was Developed
The Turing test, developed by Alan Turing in 1950, is a test of a machine's ability to exhibit intelligent behaviour equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human. Turing proposed that a human evaluator would judge natural language conversations between a human and a machine designed to generate human-like responses. -
George Devol files for Unimate patent
Norman Heroux, George Devol and Joe Engleberger designed and marketed the first programmable robot arm - called Unimate - and sold it to General Motors in 1960. This paved the way for industrial robots to complete repetitive, difficult or dangerous tasks. -
The first incarnation of Siri - ELIZA - was developed
ELIZA was one of the first of these, created by a professor at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory between the years 1964 and 1966. The programme could carry out a conversation via text by following a 'script' that directed it on how to respond. -
SRI develops Shakey the robot
"Shakey" the robot was designed by the Stanford Research Institute between 1966 and 1972 and was a landmark in robotics due to its blending of hardware and software so that it could perceive its surroundings. -
NASA lands on the moon
NASA used cutting edge computing and robotics technology to land humans on the moon for the first time in 1969. -
First self driving car goes for a test drive
Self-driving cars are still not mainstream today, so it might be surprising to learn that the fist autonomous car took itself for a drive in 1986. The Mercedes-Benz van incorporated mirrors and sensors and was able to drive successfully on empty streets. -
Honda releases ASIMO
Honda releases ASIMO (Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility), its iconic humanoid robot designed to be a personal assistant that can understand voice commands, gestures and engage with its surroundings. -
AlphaGo defeats Lee Sedol at Go
On March 15 2016 AlphaGo, an AI system built by UK company DeepMind, defeated the world champion Lee Sedol at the ancient board game Go. This was a major milestone for DeepMind's research into creating artificial intelligence that can 'learn' how to solve problems regardless of the context, unlike Deep Blue which is programmed for a specific use case.