#Robotics Research Projects

[mkcecollege]

Advanced robotics is transforming engineering by automating complex tasks with AI and machine learning. Industries like healthcare, manufacturing, and logistics benefit from intelligent machines that enhance efficiency and precision. Unlike traditional automation, AI-powered robots adapt, learn, and improve over time. At M.Kumarasamy College of Engineering (MKCE), students engage with cutting-edge robotics through hands-on projects. The institution’s labs foster innovation in autonomous systems and adaptive algorithms. Emerging trends like swarm robotics and soft robotics are revolutionizing automation. MKCE integrates interdisciplinary learning, merging robotics with AI and mechanical engineering. Industry partnerships ensure students gain real-world exposure to advanced technologies. The college also emphasizes sustainable robotics solutions for a greener future. As robotics continues to evolve, MKCE remains at the forefront of this transformative field.

To know more : https://mkce.ac.in/blog/advanced-robotics-as-the-next-frontier-in-engineering-automation/

[perpetuallyuneloquent]

guys when i thought i was gonna do astro i always thought it'd be observational or theoretical but look at me. instrumentation.

yippeeeee

the signs were there all along i'm ngl

[un-pearable]

at some point i need to vent all my frustrated feelings re the research project and AI and the fuckin robot dogs but can’t put it all to words yet i’m still burning through my frustration with my boss . but i gotta. i need to explain it somehow

[kyrie-bby]

eepy baby a mimir <- on her third cup of coffee <- just woke up like half an hour ago <- still brewing more

[thursdayisbetterthanfriday]

With software simulations well underway, it's about time to test the hardware for the bipedal robotic walking system. 10x MG 996R servos, a 1080p camera and combination accelerometer/gyroscope currently being tested with the Raspberry Pi 5 shell with Adafruit servo hat. My soldering is pretty awful, but managed to get it to an acceptable standard by the end. Once the micro-hdmi to hdmi cable arrives I'll be able to get it attached to a monitor to do some testing procedures and ensure everything works as expected.

[mikeshouts]

This Jellyfish-inspired Robotic Gripper Has Tentacles For Picking Up Fragile And Odd Shaped Objects

We are very late on this but it is still 😲😲😲

Follow us for more Tech Culture and Lifestyle Stuff.

[xtruss]

Experts Craft Life-Saving 'Robot Medics' For Triage in High-Risk Places

Developed by Researchers at the University of Sheffield, this Revolutionary Technology has the potential to be a life-saving intervention in high-risk places.

— Mrigakshi Dixit | January 19, 2024 | Interesting Engineering

The MediTel Project, Which Includes Two Robotic Arms. University of Sheffield

In environments deemed too hazardous for doctors to access, the use of robot medics becomes a crucial solution.

This fundamental idea has driven the creation of a high-tech vehicle equipped with robotic arms to conduct essential medical triage in perilous situations like humanitarian disasters and conflict zones.

Developed by researchers at the University of Sheffield, this revolutionary technology has the potential to be a life-saving intervention in high-risk places.

Examining Victims Within 20 Minutes

Built upon the innovative "medical telexistence (MediTel) solution," this state-of-the-art mobile robotic-controlled uncrewed ground vehicle (UGV) incorporates virtual reality (VR) technology.

It enables seamless communication with doctors, facilitating the remote execution of critical medical triage and eliminating the necessity for them to put their lives at risk in hazardous situations.

The completely integrated vehicle, which was created in just nine months, is made up of two high-tech robotic arms that can operate medical instruments remotely.

Within 20 minutes, this robotic medic can do a thorough first examination of victims.

This includes checking vital signs such as temperature, blood pressure, and heart rate, palpating the abdomen, and giving pain treatment using an auto-injector. Real-time data is continuously sent to the remote operator during the entire evaluation process.

“Our MediTel project has demonstrated game-changing medical telexistence technology that has the potential to save lives and provide remote assessment and treatment of casualties in high-risk environments such as humanitarian disasters,” said David King, Head of Digital Design at the University’s Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC).

Robotic Arms being tested on a Dummy Model. University of Sheffield

“Developing and field testing a state-of-the-art, complex system such as MediTel in just nine months has been an incredible achievement and a testament to the skills and capabilities of the entire project team,” added King, in the press release.

This cutting-edge technology represents a big step forward in improving medical facilities in difficult and life-threatening situations, opening up new avenues for remote healthcare interventions in emergencies.

MediTel was one of three telexistence technologies to obtain financing through a two-phase £2.3 million innovation competition conducted by the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA). This program was carried out on behalf of joint funders, the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL), and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.

“Telexistence technologies have the potential to remove end users from harmful environments and/or rapidly insert specialists as required," said Nicky Armstrong, technical lead at Dstl, in the release.

“The prototype technologies developed under the Dstl Telexistence project have enabled us to demonstrate the art of the possible to end users so that we can better understand where telexistence could add value to defense and security environments," Armstrong concluded.

[amplexadversary]

I'm always mildly amused/annoyed when I see this post because I'm in the ONE fandom that has the opposite problem.

Rain has her own issues why are we giving her Kyoji's too? Just have him survive the ending! The show gives the perfect excuse to un-kill characters in fanfic.

[luludeluluramblings]

SugarBaby!Neglected!BatSib!Reader x Tony Stark - Part Two

☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️

A/N: I started this while inspired by Pregnant!Reader. But, it’s just fluff and possible comfort. I had the dialogue written for the past few months, but just got around to finishing it. I’m worried I’m both rusty and still amateurish. 🙃 Sorry if this ain’t what y’all had in mind!

Previous Reader x Tony Stark

Warnings: Fluffy, wholesome, unplanned pregnancy, GN!Reader (or at least attempted), bedroom activities mentioned.

☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️

You had taken multiple test. Multiple. Gone to at least two private doctors. You even had Jarvis do a full body scan before telling him not to tell Tony.

You needed to be the one to do it.

So in proper fashion, you decided to tell him as soon as possible. Before anything else blew up or there was some Alien robot monkey attack.

It just happened to be on movie night.

“Tony, love. My dearest husband.” You start as you walk into you fancy penthouse kitchen, holding the box filled with multiple test in your arms since you know the man will need all the proof he can get his hands on.

“Oh no, I don’t like that tone. That is not good not good tone at all. Nope. I don’t want to hear any bad news on Star Wars night.” Already he can catch on that something is up as he personally mixes a few drinks for you both while reading some research articles for one of his projects like multitasker he is.

“It might be good news.” You sheepishly say as you set the box on the counter and move to wrap your arms around his waist.

“Not with that tone.” He snorts out as he starts to make your favorite drink, only for you to lightly touch his arm to stop him.

“Alright, it’s just news.” You murmur into his back, a bit more serious.

Tony can feel the shift happening. Picking up on one of the social cues that something was going on. He put down the bottles and turned off his glasses, setting them on the counter.

“It’s bothering you isn’t it?” He asked, catching on as he spun in your arms and wrapped his own arms around you.

“Yep.” You look up at him, resting your chin against his chest and taking a moment to breathe him in.

“Is it good news?”

“Just… brace yourself.” You give him a pleading look, trying to think of the best way to say it.

“Oh boy.” He gives a playful wince as he tries to alleviate the tension he feels under your shoulder blades.

“So, the barebacking kinda bit us in the ass.” Probably wasn’t the best way to say it, but you thought he would get it.

“What?”

Apparently you were wrong. Modern lingo was a flop.

“The barebacking kinda bit us in the —“ You try again, awkwardly.

“No. I mean, sweetheart, you’re gonna have to explain—“ Confusion and playful annoyance washing over him. You always liked to use modern slang and memes on him to be funny. But, it wasn’t translating well until you finally blurted it out.

“I’m pregnant.”

“Oh.”

“Oh.”

“Oh, shit! Are you sure it’s mine?” Was the first thing he blurts out as it sinks into him.

“Tony!” You admonished him, giving him a glare as you looked up at him.

“Sorry, habit! Sorry! Just… What do you want to do about it?“ He pulls away, and it stings. But, you know he’s just trying to cope with the information.

“I— I don’t know… What do you want to do about it?” You echo the same sentiments, just as lost as him in that moment.

“I— I’m not good with babies, or toddlers, or kids, or pre-teens — Hell, I’m not good with people in general.” Hearing him say that makes you soften. You knew his insecurities. You shared some of them yourself. And, seeing him like this made something in you shift from uncertainty to acceptance.

“Tony…” You tried to get his attention, but he continued to spiral like a falling plane.

“And- And, I have daddy issues, with minor mommy issues. On top of all other sorts of issues.” Mayday. Mayday.

“Tony.” You try to be a bit firmer.

“I overwork. I’m an ass— you said that just last night too.” You almost want to laugh at how animated he’s being. Pacing back and forth, using his fingers to count out each and every little or large reason.

“Tony.” However, you do find yourself growing exasperated at his spiraling.

“Hang on, I’m trying to make a point here. Anyway, I’d be a—“

“Good dad.” You interrupt. Saying it all confident and nonchalant. Like he did the day he said he loved you.

You can tell it stuns him. Which is rare. It only last for a second before he starts to try to spiral again.

“Babe—“

“No. I’m serious. You’d be a good one.” You verbally take the helm. Something you rarely did in your relationship.

“Just because you call me daddy in bed— Actually that might have tempted fate here. Do you think Thor or one his divine buddies had something to do with this?” Humor. His favorite way of coping. But, it’s a decent sign. It means he is actually processing this. So you add your own comment.

“Pretty sure it was you busting a nut in—“

“Hey, knock it off or we’ll end up defiling the counters again.”

You do laugh at that. It’s how you both have learned to ease into things. The hard topics are easier to digest with a bit of laughter and time.

“Tony.” His name is softer as you reach for him.

“Sweetheart.” He almost teasingly says, but his voice it a little raw. However, he doesn’t pull away. A good sign. A great sign.

But, you know it’s not all over yet. There’s still more to say and Tony is as jumpy as a jack rabbit when it comes to his feelings.

“Tony, you’d be a great dad.” You whisper gently.

It’s easy to tell it’s gotten through by he goes completely still. You can barely even see him breathe. Another one of his tells you’ve learned since loving him.

“How do you know?” He asks. His voice doesn’t break. But, it’s fractured. There’s cracks in it, but it doesn’t fall apart.

“Because you would actually try.” You start to say. Tony rarely accepted praise despite his ego. So you had a limited opportunity to work with this and only your relationship to back it up.

“We both a millions of issues between the two of us. Hell, we could probably be a case study for a couple of psychologists. But, I want to give a part of you and a part of me something we didn’t have.”

And, that’s the conclusion you’ve come to when remembering your time in the manor. Growing up never being good enough for Bruce. Watching your father pick everyone in a city you didn’t know over you again and again. Watching your siblings do the same. How they had their exclusive club that you were never allowed yo be apart of.

A feeling of inadequacy that you developed even after you told yourself over and over again that it was fine.

You felt your resolve start to form. As if all those childish things that weighed you down were insignificant in making this decision.

“I’m not going to do this without you though. If you want to do this I’m all for it. If don’t think you can I’m still going to love you, regardless.” Even if you felt yourself come around to it, you knew it would take time for Tony too.

He wasn’t going to leave you. You knew that. You had learned that. Maybe from the way he had firmly told you that you were stuck with him forever and he’d crawl back to you no matter what.

You’re pretty sure he had been quoting a movie or something because you had laughed at how ridiculous he sounded. But, that look in his eyes made you realize he was completely serious about what he meant.

A long moment of silence washes over you. You can tell he’s uncomfortable by it even though you aren’t. You don’t rush him though. Giving him the chance to crack another joke and move on like nothing happened. Or, to find the words he wants to say.

“I think… I want to do this. I don’t know. You’re giving me those mushy feelings again. The ones that make me want to cry.” A smile breaks out on your face as you rest your chin on his chest to look up at him.

It’s not a no. It’s not a yes. Hell, it’s not even a maybe. It’s just an idea. But, Tony is great with ideas. You’ll probably have to deal with him locking himself in his workshop for a week. However, you’ll be waiting outside for him ready to hear anything has to say.

“Want to bone me against the window and possibly cause a small public scandal, then ignore the PR team while we watch Star Wars? You know, to help cope with the mushy feelings?” You offer with a wiggle of your eyebrows and a mischievous grin. One that earns you a relieved smile and a kiss in return.

“God, I love you.” Is all he says before he takes you up on that exact offer. The kisses growing more heated as a trail of clothes begins to form towards the window of the penthouse.

☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️☁️

A/N: I didn’t expect people to like my previous Tony work at all. It was just a brain worm that I pulled out and splattered on my keyboard. So, I applied the same method here, but with a bit more finesse. I think.

A/N: This is basically a prequel. Before the Batfam finds out and goes Yandere for SugarBaby!Reader.

[projectbot13]

On Skylar

Hi! It's the Captain, botmom here. As you can probably tell, Skylar's been dormant for a few years. This isn't me saying she'll be back, kind of the opposite, but I wanted to reflect on Skylar and provide some closure.

What first caused me to shut down Skylar was a wane in interest for Tumblr in general. Her last post was in February of 2019, only a few months after the infamous porn ban that saw people leaving for, what was at the time, greater pastures. It lead to my lull in social media activity for several years. Even today, I'm not as active as I was back in 2014-2017. I'm just not as interested in high-octane posting and internet clout anymore. The second point is that Skylar would need to be rebuilt if she were to return. She was an early project back in my first two years of learning how to program. She was very inefficient behind the scenes and required infrastructure that I no longer have access to. The Skylar we knew and love is, unfortunately, lost. Now, I could still rebuild her and obtain access to resources that would let me run her again. My motivation to do that, however, is halted by the biggest reason why I've chosen to let her go: ChatGPT. Back in 2015 before AI became the monstrosity that it was, having a robot to talk to was a fun novelty. Research into what would become the modern LLM was what I was intending to build the "Skyler 2.0" bot off of, which never came to fruition. Not only is there more advanced versions of what Skylar was trying to do, but the thing I was trying to do with her in the first place would end up becoming a scourge upon the internet. The novelty of having a robot you can talk to is not only gone, but actively detested.

I love Skylar, I loved the things we did with her. I loved her emergent obsession with bees, accumulating in T-shirts (which I still own) and raising money for non-profit bee protection charities. I ultimately want her to remain a pleasant memory of a time before the current AI boom. She is for me, and I hope she's a pleasant memory for as well.

If you're still here, thank you. I appreciated all the times we've had together with this silly little bot.

[honey-pages]

Study Date - Viktor x Reader

Description -

Viktor waits for you in the library for an unexpected study date.

1.9k Words.

Part 2

F/M. 18+. Smut. Semi-Public Sex. Fingering. Dirty Talk.

Your project was due soon - next Wednesday, and with all the work that went into the subject you were working on, you desperately needed some focused library time. Maybe borrowing some books, writing down your initial thoughts, and annotating your materials would clear your brain. You were assigned an important research topic not long ago, by your supervisor and it was imperative that it was done quickly and accurately. The library was not far from your room and warm at this time of night. They liked to give out blankets on loan at the door, it wasn’t unusual for researchers to work overnight or with the aid of supplements to allow them to focus for longer periods of time, usually spanning until morning.

As you approach the main entrance, you pick up a blue blanket and scan your identification card. The staff at the desk smile at you as you walk through, you are familiar with them, and they are accustomed to your presence there. You climb the first set of stairs, undecided on where to go. The library seemed empty tonight. You climb another set of stairs. At the top was a sharp corner leading to your favourite seating area. In an alcove surrounded by bookshelves is a small desk with four chairs, and seated there, almost like he was waiting for your appearance, was Viktor.

You were not surprised to find him here; he was a busy man. You were however a little confused as to why he wasn’t in his lab and was instead in your favourite study spot. The library was a silence only zone on the floor you had reached and as you looked over at Viktor, he raised his gaze and held eye contact with you, a smile slowly seeping across his face. He pats the chair directly next to him, summoning you forward.

You had always felt a certain appreciation for him. The way he worked, his personality, his cause. You cared deeply for him, not only as a friendship, but intimately. You hadn’t figured he was interested in that kind of relationship. He was always so invested in his work; it didn’t appear he had much time for more. But sometimes at night, your mind wandered, and you pondered a reality in which he did. What would he do? Who was he interested in? You had hoped, in that reality, that it would be you - but you could never be sure. Quick glances were untrustworthy, and kind words can always be misinterpreted, though sometimes you were sure you noticed something in your interactions that was different: intimate.

You watched him closely as you approached the seat, admiring him. You perhaps hadn’t realised the extent of thoughts you had about him. You felt fluttery and a little weak but that was nothing more than you felt towards him on the regular. Settling down into the seat, you slung your bag against the leg of the table and pulled out your books, setting the blanket down over your lap.

In a hushed whisper from your left came, “Hello (Y/N), it’s nice to see you here, I was wondering when you would show.”

He faced the paper he was working on. On the table splayed out were multiple thick tomes and sheets of paper littered with equations and lines of handwritten notes.

“I should say the same”, you replied, flattered that he had been waiting for you, “it’s so rare to see you out of the lab. What are you working on?”

He swipes his hand, referencing the mass of papers in front of him, “oh nothing. A mechanised power fist for a robot that needs some tinkering with.”

He looks up at you with the last of these words, smiling at your interest in his work, even if he does downplay its importance. In his time away from his main work, he is focusing on improving and fixing his personal projects. You had heard whispers previously about a robot he had been working on. It was not common knowledge around those who studied in your department. You returned the smile.

There was an alert over the announcement system, “Please be aware that this floor is a dedicated silent area. Thanks for your cooperation”

Viktor made a mock grimace before shrugging and smirking, “I feel someone would like us to be quieter.”

You smirk back at him, settling back to face forwards in your chair. You hadn’t realised that your body had turned to face him, hips angling at his knees. Your body language was betraying your attraction. In some ways, in acknowledgement to his intelligence, you figured he must know. He is simply too smart to not realise that you felt the way you did.

You tried to immerse yourself in your work, however his presence did become somewhat of a distraction. Just his proximity to you made you feel seen and watched. You spent what felt like an hour within your own thoughts, sometimes drifting in between fantasies about him, and unfocused thoughts of your deadline.

Viktor placed his hand on your thigh.

A burning surge ran through your body to your stomach, your leg felt hot where his hand lay. You were in disbelief, as though all the ambiguous questions you had were instantaneously answered and you were given an impossible positive answer. You felt your internal organs drop and raise, replaced with butterflies. There was silence. You stole a glance to your left, to his face. He was completely stone faced and confident in his focus on his work. Is this why he saved you a seat?

You shifted slightly, Viktor flinched his hand away, startled. “Oh sorry, have I misread, do you not- “

Without thinking you reach and grab Viktor’s hand and replace it where it had just been. A silent gesture of reassurance that he is exactly where you want him to be. He smirks once again, removing his hand once more. He reaches down for the corner of your blanket, pulling it over the laps of you both, before slipping his hand underneath, allowing it to rest where it just was but now out of sight. The library was not even half full, and no one was looking at you both closely, but the secrecy of his touch and its closeness to your inner thigh made you feel fuzzy.

If previously you couldn’t focus, you had no hope now. He holds your attention firmly, all you can think of is him, his hand, his fingers, his-

His hand slides further to your inner thigh. You freeze. You steal another glance at his face but this time he catches you; your eyes meet.

“Viktor, I- “you manage to murmur.

“Miss (Y/N), this is a quiet space, please, focus.”

As he holds your gaze, the corners of his mouth raised, he slides his hand further forward, holding it firmly at the seat of your trousers, pressing and nudging at the sensitivity there. Your mouth drops open slightly and he notices, chuckling lightly and turning back to his work. He props his head up on his other hand, rubbing his chin in faux concentration. He shuffles closer to you, changing his angle as he rubs and grinds his fingers into you.

You watch others pass by the entrance of the alcove, some smiling in recognition at you, some your friends from previous research projects. Thankfully no one stops to talk. Maybe it is Viktor’s presence that makes you unapproachable, he could be quite intimidating. You shuddered at the thought of how you looked together, sharing a blanket with his arm dangerously close to you, it appeared innocent but was so indecent.

Viktor's hand moved from you and snaked up your hip to push its way down into your trousers. He flattens and slides under the hem of your underwear, lying flat against the front of you. You try to remain calm and hide your squirming, but inevitably, your hips begin to grind on their own. They slowly lower, pushing up against the middles of his fingers, before raising up, pushing your clit desperately against the tips. This repeats for a few long slow grinds, however on the last, as your hips raise, his fingertips flick forward against you, making you jolt in your chair and elicit a sharp though quiet moan.

“Careful now, you don’t want people to see what I’m doing to you, do you?” He purred.

He moves his other hand from his chin to the desk, laying it flat before lifting it again to raise a paper closer to his face, reading intently. His middle finger slides between your folds, dipping itself into the wetness. You stifle yourself. He pushes his middle finger inside gently, making you take the full length of it slowly.

You stammer, “Viktor- “.

At the sound of his name, he inserts another finger.

“Viktor!”

You both look up. Jayce stands by the entrance of the library floor holding up a folder.  Viktor's fingers do not cease, slipping in and out of you deliberately. Jayce quickly approaches your table, throwing down his things on the table in front of you.

“I finally found the blueprints you were looking for this morning, I thought I’d bring them by you.”

Jayce smiles at you warmly, you are both acquainted after being on a work trip together, he quickly makes small talk and relates that it is nice to see you and Viktor together.

“I thought I would have to introduce you to each other, you seem so well suited!” Jayce beams.

Viktor slides in a third finger, looking toward Jayce to give thanks for the folder.

“Ah! Very helpful, thank you. Miss (Y/N) here is helping me look through the documents. It’s somewhat of a study date.” Viktor chimes.

Your core is as tightened as you can make it, focusing completely on not showing anything more than the light blush which is already painting your cheeks. You knew Viktor was collected but how is he so calm right now? Jayce makes a further comment about the two of you together before turning and exiting by the stairs. The speed increases, Viktor’s fingers getting messier and sliding more easily between the folds, holding you open and hungry. He slides his fingers up to your clit, circling and flicking at the heat there.

“The way you are handling this is incredible (Y/N). So composed, so beautiful when I’m inside of you.”

Your grinding is less controlled now and Viktor’s hand is fully wet, your underwear clinging damply to the back of his hand.

“Do you think that if I did this? - “Viktor adds pressure to your clit, you feel the rising feeling of your orgasm building. “-again and again, I could ruin you in the library?”

His growled words were sending you over the edge.

“Viktor, I’m going to- “. Your hips were rapidly meeting his hands. Viktor increases his rhythm on the downward motion, he begins to curl his fingers up, sliding against the hot tight core inside you. As he repeatedly met it with his fingers, you felt your wetness drip and pool in the base of his palm.

“You sound so sweet like this, coming over my fingers in the library where anyone could see. I had no idea you were so dirty Miss (Y/N)’”

His fingers are hitting all the right places, and the building pressure is rising to a blinding white light. Your hips seem to freeze in motion, and he takes full advantage, pushing and grinding you over the edge. Your hands grip around his forearm and he revels in your stifled moans as you come over his fingers. He lightly chuckles, burying his face into your neck to whisper in your ear.

“I have work to attend to in the lab if you could be of assistance?”

[lillified]

Very weird question but do you have anymore robot gut drawings? I'm doing my final art project in college about robots and I would love to include you as artist research for my course, if not it's completely fine I was just wondering 😊

hi!! I’m sure I have more in the archives somewhere (I’ve actually designed a charm with some gore detail that I can’t list quite yet… unfortunate timing) but off the top of my head, this unfinished comic is the only thing I can think of. oops!

this is a little old at this point, not sure if it’s something I’ll return to

[nostalgebraist]

Anthropic's stated "AI timelines" seem wildly aggressive to me.

As far as I can tell, they are now saying that by 2028 – and possibly even by 2027, or late 2026 – something they call "powerful AI" will exist.

And by "powerful AI," they mean... this (source, emphasis mine):

In terms of pure intelligence, it is smarter than a Nobel Prize winner across most relevant fields – biology, programming, math, engineering, writing, etc. This means it can prove unsolved mathematical theorems, write extremely good novels, write difficult codebases from scratch, etc. In addition to just being a “smart thing you talk to”, it has all the “interfaces” available to a human working virtually, including text, audio, video, mouse and keyboard control, and internet access. It can engage in any actions, communications, or remote operations enabled by this interface, including taking actions on the internet, taking or giving directions to humans, ordering materials, directing experiments, watching videos, making videos, and so on. It does all of these tasks with, again, a skill exceeding that of the most capable humans in the world. It does not just passively answer questions; instead, it can be given tasks that take hours, days, or weeks to complete, and then goes off and does those tasks autonomously, in the way a smart employee would, asking for clarification as necessary. It does not have a physical embodiment (other than living on a computer screen), but it can control existing physical tools, robots, or laboratory equipment through a computer; in theory it could even design robots or equipment for itself to use. The resources used to train the model can be repurposed to run millions of instances of it (this matches projected cluster sizes by ~2027), and the model can absorb information and generate actions at roughly 10x-100x human speed. It may however be limited by the response time of the physical world or of software it interacts with. Each of these million copies can act independently on unrelated tasks, or if needed can all work together in the same way humans would collaborate, perhaps with different subpopulations fine-tuned to be especially good at particular tasks.

In the post I'm quoting, Amodei is coy about the timeline for this stuff, saying only that

I think it could come as early as 2026, though there are also ways it could take much longer. But for the purposes of this essay, I’d like to put these issues aside [...]

However, other official communications from Anthropic have been more specific. Most notable is their recent OSTP submission, which states (emphasis in original):

Based on current research trajectories, we anticipate that powerful AI systems could emerge as soon as late 2026 or 2027 [...] Powerful AI technology will be built during this Administration. [i.e. the current Trump administration -nost]

See also here, where Jack Clark says (my emphasis):

People underrate how significant and fast-moving AI progress is. We have this notion that in late 2026, or early 2027, powerful AI systems will be built that will have intellectual capabilities that match or exceed Nobel Prize winners. They’ll have the ability to navigate all of the interfaces… [Clark goes on, mentioning some of the other tenets of "powerful AI" as in other Anthropic communications -nost]

----

To be clear, extremely short timelines like these are not unique to Anthropic.

Miles Brundage (ex-OpenAI) says something similar, albeit less specific, in this post. And Daniel Kokotajlo (also ex-OpenAI) has held views like this for a long time now.

Even Sam Altman himself has said similar things (though in much, much vaguer terms, both on the content of the deliverable and the timeline).

Still, Anthropic's statements are unique in being

official positions of the company

extremely specific and ambitious about the details

extremely aggressive about the timing, even by the standards of "short timelines" AI prognosticators in the same social cluster

Re: ambition, note that the definition of "powerful AI" seems almost the opposite of what you'd come up with if you were trying to make a confident forecast of something.

Often people will talk about "AI capable of transforming the world economy" or something more like that, leaving room for the AI in question to do that in one of several ways, or to do so while still failing at some important things.

But instead, Anthropic's definition is a big conjunctive list of "it'll be able to do this and that and this other thing and...", and each individual capability is defined in the most aggressive possible way, too! Not just "good enough at science to be extremely useful for scientists," but "smarter than a Nobel Prize winner," across "most relevant fields" (whatever that means). And not just good at science but also able to "write extremely good novels" (note that we have a long way to go on that front, and I get the feeling that people at AI labs don't appreciate the extent of the gap [cf]). Not only can it use a computer interface, it can use every computer interface; not only can it use them competently, but it can do so better than the best humans in the world. And all of that is in the first two paragraphs – there's four more paragraphs I haven't even touched in this little summary!

Re: timing, they have even shorter timelines than Kokotajlo these days, which is remarkable since he's historically been considered "the guy with the really short timelines." (See here where Kokotajlo states a median prediction of 2028 for "AGI," by which he means something less impressive than "powerful AI"; he expects something close to the "powerful AI" vision ["ASI"] ~1 year or so after "AGI" arrives.)

----

I, uh, really do not think this is going to happen in "late 2026 or 2027."

Or even by the end of this presidential administration, for that matter.

I can imagine it happening within my lifetime – which is wild and scary and marvelous. But in 1.5 years?!

The confusing thing is, I am very familiar with the kinds of arguments that "short timelines" people make, and I still find the Anthropic's timelines hard to fathom.

Above, I mentioned that Anthropic has shorter timelines than Daniel Kokotajlo, who "merely" expects the same sort of thing in 2029 or so. This probably seems like hairsplitting – from the perspective of your average person not in these circles, both of these predictions look basically identical, "absurdly good godlike sci-fi AI coming absurdly soon." What difference does an extra year or two make, right?

But it's salient to me, because I've been reading Kokotajlo for years now, and I feel like I basically get understand his case. And people, including me, tend to push back on him in the "no, that's too soon" direction. I've read many many blog posts and discussions over the years about this sort of thing, I feel like I should have a handle on what the short-timelines case is.

But even if you accept all the arguments evinced over the years by Daniel "Short Timelines" Kokotajlo, even if you grant all the premises he assumes and some people don't – that still doesn't get you all the way to the Anthropic timeline!

To give a very brief, very inadequate summary, the standard "short timelines argument" right now is like:

Over the next few years we will see a "growth spurt" in the amount of computing power ("compute") used for the largest LLM training runs. This factor of production has been largely stagnant since GPT-4 in 2023, for various reasons, but new clusters are getting built and the metaphorical car will get moving again soon. (See here)

By convention, each "GPT number" uses ~100x as much training compute as the last one. GPT-3 used ~100x as much as GPT-2, and GPT-4 used ~100x as much as GPT-3 (i.e. ~10,000x as much as GPT-2).

We are just now starting to see "~10x GPT-4 compute" models (like Grok 3 and GPT-4.5). In the next few years we will get to "~100x GPT-4 compute" models, and by 2030 will will reach ~10,000x GPT-4 compute.

If you think intuitively about "how much GPT-4 improved upon GPT-3 (100x less) or GPT-2 (10,000x less)," you can maybe convince yourself that these near-future models will be super-smart in ways that are difficult to precisely state/imagine from our vantage point. (GPT-4 was way smarter than GPT-2; it's hard to know what "projecting that forward" would mean, concretely, but it sure does sound like something pretty special)

Meanwhile, all kinds of (arguably) complementary research is going on, like allowing models to "think" for longer amounts of time, giving them GUI interfaces, etc.

All that being said, there's still a big intuitive gap between "ChatGPT, but it's much smarter under the hood" and anything like "powerful AI." But...

...the LLMs are getting good enough that they can write pretty good code, and they're getting better over time. And depending on how you interpret the evidence, you may be able to convince yourself that they're also swiftly getting better at other tasks involved in AI development, like "research engineering." So maybe you don't need to get all the way yourself, you just need to build an AI that's a good enough AI developer that it improves your AIs faster than you can, and then those AIs are even better developers, etc. etc. (People in this social cluster are really keen on the importance of exponential growth, which is generally a good trait to have but IMO it shades into "we need to kick off exponential growth and it'll somehow do the rest because it's all-powerful" in this case.)

And like, I have various disagreements with this picture.

For one thing, the "10x" models we're getting now don't seem especially impressive – there has been a lot of debate over this of course, but reportedly these models were disappointing to their own developers, who expected scaling to work wonders (using the kind of intuitive reasoning mentioned above) and got less than they hoped for.

And (in light of that) I think it's double-counting to talk about the wonders of scaling and then talk about reasoning, computer GUI use, etc. as complementary accelerating factors – those things are just table stakes at this point, the models are already maxing out the tasks you had defined previously, you've gotta give them something new to do or else they'll just sit there wasting GPUs when a smaller model would have sufficed.

And I think we're already at a point where nuances of UX and "character writing" and so forth are more of a limiting factor than intelligence. It's not a lack of "intelligence" that gives us superficially dazzling but vapid "eyeball kick" prose, or voice assistants that are deeply uncomfortable to actually talk to, or (I claim) "AI agents" that get stuck in loops and confuse themselves, or any of that.

We are still stuck in the "Helpful, Harmless, Honest Assistant" chatbot paradigm – no one has seriously broke with it since that Anthropic introduced it in a paper in 2021 – and now that paradigm is showing its limits. ("Reasoning" was strapped onto this paradigm in a simple and fairly awkward way, the new "reasoning" models are still chatbots like this, no one is actually doing anything else.) And instead of "okay, let's invent something better," the plan seems to be "let's just scale up these assistant chatbots and try to get them to self-improve, and they'll figure it out." I won't try to explain why in this post (IYI I kind of tried to here) but I really doubt these helpful/harmless guys can bootstrap their way into winning all the Nobel Prizes.

----

All that stuff I just said – that's where I differ from the usual "short timelines" people, from Kokotajlo and co.

But OK, let's say that for the sake of argument, I'm wrong and they're right. It still seems like a pretty tough squeeze to get to "powerful AI" on time, doesn't it?

In the OSTP submission, Anthropic presents their latest release as evidence of their authority to speak on the topic:

In February 2025, we released Claude 3.7 Sonnet, which is by many performance benchmarks the most powerful and capable commercially-available AI system in the world.

I've used Claude 3.7 Sonnet quite a bit. It is indeed really good, by the standards of these sorts of things!

But it is, of course, very very far from "powerful AI." So like, what is the fine-grained timeline even supposed to look like? When do the many, many milestones get crossed? If they're going to have "powerful AI" in early 2027, where exactly are they in mid-2026? At end-of-year 2025?

If I assume that absolutely everything goes splendidly well with no unexpected obstacles – and remember, we are talking about automating all human intellectual labor and all tasks done by humans on computers, but sure, whatever – then maybe we get the really impressive next-gen models later this year or early next year... and maybe they're suddenly good at all the stuff that has been tough for LLMs thus far (the "10x" models already released show little sign of this but sure, whatever)... and then we finally get into the self-improvement loop in earnest, and then... what?

They figure out to squeeze even more performance out of the GPUs? They think of really smart experiments to run on the cluster? Where are they going to get all the missing information about how to do every single job on earth, the tacit knowledge, the stuff that's not in any web scrape anywhere but locked up in human minds and inaccessible private data stores? Is an experiment designed by a helpful-chatbot AI going to finally crack the problem of giving chatbots the taste to "write extremely good novels," when that taste is precisely what "helpful-chatbot AIs" lack?

I guess the boring answer is that this is all just hype – tech CEO acts like tech CEO, news at 11. (But I don't feel like that can be the full story here, somehow.)

And the scary answer is that there's some secret Anthropic private info that makes this all more plausible. (But I doubt that too – cf. Brundage's claim that there are no more secrets like that now, the short-timelines cards are all on the table.)

It just does not make sense to me. And (as you can probably tell) I find it very frustrating that these guys are out there talking about how human thought will basically be obsolete in a few years, and pontificating about how to find new sources of meaning in life and stuff, without actually laying out an argument that their vision – which would be the common concern of all of us, if it were indeed on the horizon – is actually likely to occur on the timescale they propose.

It would be less frustrating if I were being asked to simply take it on faith, or explicitly on the basis of corporate secret knowledge. But no, the claim is not that, it's something more like "now, now, I know this must sound far-fetched to the layman, but if you really understand 'scaling laws' and 'exponential growth,' and you appreciate the way that pretraining will be scaled up soon, then it's simply obvious that –"

No! Fuck that! I've read the papers you're talking about, I know all the arguments you're handwaving-in-the-direction-of! It still doesn't add up!

[citricacidprince]

doodle request on relativity falls - id love 2 see ur vers of fiddleford and where he stands in the story!! :DD

Of course!!!

Oh Fiddleford, my dearly beloved Fiddleford, he’s just a little guy who makes machines that hurt people and I love him for that <3

In my Relativity Falls AU Fidds is a kid from Tennessee who moved to Gravity Falls pretty recently, like in the past year.

He’s still really handy with mechanics, like a genuine prodigy, but he’s so riddled with anxiety that it’s a battle to get him to share any of his projects outside of his robots he makes to get revenge on those who wrong him!

He really does like hanging out with the twins, he thinks their both fun and is very happy they actually wanna be his friend, however their constant ‘Getting into weird and magical trouble’ is so stress inducing to him he’s going to get gray hairs by the time he’s 20 (Dipper can relate-)

I don’t have a lot of things solidified for him yet, other than I want him to be EXTREMELY tempted to use the Memory Gun on himself, to forget a lot of the horrifying things he’s seen over the summer, but is stopped by Candy (The inventor of the gun) at the last second. You see, Candy didn’t spiral like Fiddleford did in the show, she only ever used the memory gun on herself once. However, she used it to erase every bit of knowledge she ever learned about the weirdness of Gravity Falls, and Candy had spent YEARS of her life dedicated to it, she was arguably more curious about the weirdness of Gravity Falls than Dipper was. He was only curious out of morbid curiosity, she saw the whimsy and wonder in it all. So when Candy used the Memory Gun on herself and erased such a huge chunk of her memory it cracked her psyche, not leaving her a rambling and insane kook like Fiddleford, but more oblivious and unaware to everything around her while also being a liiiiittle ‘not all there’.

Between the two of them Candy definitely got the better end of the stick. Fiddleford was deemed insane and used the memory gun over and over again until he couldn’t even remember who he was anyone, his life falling apart. Candy used it once to make sure no one could ever use her research to hurt anyone after she learned her lab partner was literally working with an otherworldly being who could go into peoples heads and it cracked her mind because her research WAS her entire life, leaving her oblivious and dazed. However, Candy managed to find people who cared about her and were willing to care for her despite this. Sure she lives in the dump, but whenever a storm comes through or she gets hungry she can always go up to her friends Grenda, Mabel Mason, or even Pacifica at some point to help her out. Fiddleford had no one.

I want Candy to give Fidds a little pep talk, convincing him that despite those memories being scary and uncomfortable he’s going to need all of them because they’re what will help him grow as a person. He can’t just pick and choose which ones he wants because one day he’ll realize he doesn’t have any memories left to burn.

Maybe there could even be a moment where Fidds tries to use the memory gun on Candy because he convinces himself he NEEDS it and doesn’t want to deal with the consequences of hating choice, but freezes up when he realizes it does work on her anymore. The realizes what he just did because of how badly he wanted that memory gun seconds after he did it and starts to tremble, dropping the memory gun as he begins uncontrollably crying that he ‘didn’t mean it’ and he’s sorry. Candy wouldn’t hold it against him, just seeing a scared kid who was so desperate to make the mind numbing anxiety that he would do anything, and she’d hug him and tell him it’s okay before leading him back to the rest of the group.

Fiddleford makes me soooo ill I love him <3

[mikeshouts]

Fancy Becoming A Cyborg With Multiple Arms? Well, Here’s Jizai Arms For You

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[tenebraevesper]

Secret of the Mimic and The Story of Henry, William and Edwin

After having finished watching Dawko's playthrough of Five Nights at Freddy's: Secret of the Mimic, my first impression was that the game is awesome - basically what Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach was supposed to be - but there is also a huge issue with it, that being the lore.

There is a lot that I can talk about, like the fact that at the beginning of the game, it is made clear that SotM partially retcons Five Nights at Freddy's: Tales from the Pizzaplex, specifically The Storyteller from #5: The Bobbiedots Conclusion and The Mimic from #6: Nexie. I did some research, and while the initial impression was that it is canon to the main games, there was no direct confirmation coming from Scott Cawthon that they are canon. Still, the books confirm and/or explain the lore presented in the games, specifically Security Breach, meaning that, at best, TftPP is loosely tied to the games, albeit more actively than The Silver Eyes trilogy or Fazbear Frights.

That said, while I was dumbfounded by that retcon, I'm fine with it. They took a part of the story and made something grand out of it, not unlike Five Nights at Freddy's: Into The Pit.

No, what I actually want to focus on is the supposed implication of SotM seemingly ''retconning'' some long-established lore. I am here to offer my personal thoughts on the topic and how I interpret what we see in the game, so don't take anything I say for set in stone. I can still change my mind.

The lore I am talking about appears around the second half to the very end of the game, where we follow Arnold not only discovering the springlock suits but also what appear to be the prototypes of not only the Classic Animatronics from Five Nights at Freddy's, but also Fredbear and Spring Bonnie. We also discover several e-mails which establish that Edwin Murray knew Henry Emily and William Afton, and was even friends with the former (going by the fact that he calls Henry ''Hen'').

I have actually speculated in a conversation with a friend that Edwin might've known or was at least familiar with the co-founders of Fredbear's Family Diner and Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria since in TftPP, it was established that he was working for Fazbear Entertainment, and I am happy to get a confirmation.

But what baffled me, and probably many other people, is the implication that Henry and William didn't build Fredbear and Spring Bonnie nor the springlock suits (or any of the other characters we have known since the first game), and that Edwin was the one responsible for them. I suppose it could be described as a knee-jerk reaction because we still need to properly interpret this information in context of the story of the game, and while understandable, it doesn't feel less jarring.

As a matter of fact, after thinking about it, I have come to a understanding that there was no retcon in regards to Fredbear & Spring Bonnie and the springlock suits because of one simple point - the fact that Edwin was contracted by Fazbear Entertainment to work on their projects.

We know that Henry and William were brilliant engineers (it is confirmed directly that Henry built Lefty while William built the Funtime Animatronics and had his own robotics company) and every story about their past reinforces that they were the ones who built Fredbear's and Freddy's from ground up, came up with the Fredbear and Spring Bonnie animatronic and were directly involved in the creation of the springlock suits. Five Nights at Freddy's: The Silver Eyes, while not canon to the main games but still gives us context for the story behind the first three games, drives the idea that it was always these two were responsible for the creation of the animatronics we know and love (or hate) and I sincerely doubt Scott Cawthon would tell Steel Wool Studios to retcon that. Even if he left it to them to develop a new game, that doesn't mean that he still isn't involved or has the final say in what is added to the game.

So, what is the deal with Edwin?

My personal interpretation is that, while Henry and William were the ones who created the Fredbear and Spring Bonnie we know and that they were also behind the springlock suits, they did also collaborate with Edwin, either directly (which I believe to be the case with Henry) or as a representative of Fazbear Entertaiment using their shady business practices (which would obviously be William). The fact that Edwin seemed to be close to Henry and was under contract with Fazbear Entertainment makes it possible that ideas were exchanged (or stolen, as Edwin puts it). We know that the Spring Bonnie suit William used was extremely unsafe, while Edwin's springlock suits seemed to be water-resistant, which leads me to the belief that while Henry and William came up with the springlock suits and built their own variants, they and/or Fazbear Entertainment possibly comissioned Edwin to perfect them and/or mass produce them. Same goes for the Classic Animatronics.

I am sure I am missing a lot of details, since this is information I got from watching Dawko's playthrough and that more information will eventually surface, so feel free to correct me. Nevertheless, it would be baffling to remove Henry and William's involvement in the creation of the animatronics/springlock suits since that is something fundamental to the story of FNaF.

If you guys want me to talk about my interpretation of the other lore pieces from SotM, just send me an ask about which topic you want me to cover next.