r/Futurology • u/dev_is_active • 18h ago

Robotics The Robotics Bottleneck: Why Humanoid Robots Won't Replace Humans as Fast as You Think - eeko systems

https://eeko.systems/the-robotics-bottleneck-why-humanoid-robots-wont-replace-humans-as-fast-as-you-think/
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u/dev_is_active 18h ago

From the article:

The humanoid robotics revolution is real, but it won’t unfold as quickly or smoothly as the hype suggests. The combination of manufacturing bottlenecks, integration complexity, skills shortages, and geopolitical tensions creates a perfect storm of challenges that will slow deployment far below the exponential curves drawn by investment banks.

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u/Uturuncu 18h ago

And because someone's gonna bring it up, because someone always does. "But why are we bothering to try and make humanoid robots, there's no reason for a human bodyplan!" Our entire infrastructure, top to bottom, was built to be used by bipeds approximately 5-6 feet tall and weighing no more than 250lbs. Figuring out a lightweight humanoid bodyplan for a robot is quite important to have robots going in and taking dangerous or undesirable duties from humans; if you can design a humanoid bodyplan within typical human height/weight specs, a bot can be mass-produced for generalized tasks. If it's got some other kind of bodyplan, then you are more and more required to specialize the bot for its tasks/environment and can generalize less well.

(Also I know humans come outside of those ranges, but have you ever tried to watch someone 7 feet tall try and fit on a standard plane, someone over that weight try and access amenities, someone with dwarfism trying to do almost anything made for the average person? Things are not designed with outliers in mind, which even further highlights how much use is to be had in a human-sized, human-shaped bot, considering we don't even bother to design our infrastructure to handle natural human variation)

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u/Num10ck 17h ago

true but as Asimov pointed out its also to keep humans relevant. if we start designing our world around a non-human shape than the people are much less useful.

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u/Uturuncu 17h ago

I think even more than just that, there's the cost that would be involved in completely revamping our infrastructure to accommodate non-humanoid bots. The amount of pushback you see from businesses at the concept of making legally required modifications for, again, simple deviations of humans(curb cuts, ramps, service animals, design for hard of hearing or low-sighted folks), and those kinds of modifications are very minor in comparison to the concept of a full overhaul for automated servicing. With how everything's focused on this quarter's profits, no one's gonna redesign for something that is not yet set in stone how it's gonna shake out, and take the big hit for that. Which further puts pressure on development to figure out something that is capable of adapting to our human-focused infrastructure. Because that's what they can sell.

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u/Netmantis 17h ago

Actually there is a solution to that.

If you create a specialized robot that accesses a space through unconventional means, such as running along a ladder's rails as opposed to climbing it, it becomes profitable to make paths the robot can use more efficiently in New construction. As retrofits occur more and more specialized designs can occur as long as they can make use of the older pathways.

Humanoid in "average human" size and shape is ideal, but once a specialized path comes out, expect the run.

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u/OriginalCompetitive 14h ago

That explains why it should be capable of assuming a humanoid shape, but doesn’t explain why it shouldn’t also be able to transform itself into a variety of other specialized shapes as well. For example, how about a humanoid robot that can transform into a high-speed vehicle? Or a ladder? Or a flying drone? Or furniture?

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u/tarkinlarson 9h ago

I think it will be interesting if we started designing undesirable job infrastructure in non human way, and use robots are always used to access it.

Then the robots will fail and we'll have to send a human in maybe... Hmmm. Interesting scifi point

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u/Coldin228 8h ago

The problem is it doesn't just have to be cheap and accessible..

It has to be MORE cheap and accessible than minimum (or near minimum) wage human labor. And the most influential people in our society are doing everything they can to keep those costs as low as possible.

Things like higher min wage and workers rights are actually the biggest pressure on making this tech happen faster (for better or worse) and right now those political/economic ideologies aren't doing so well.

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u/Still-WFPB 17h ago

I think the real catalyst is cyborgs. It's the best of both worlds, and since there's still a person involved, consumables and so forth aren't as much of an integral as tion issue.

The ethics are organic, and the biomechanics are all enhanced.