The Robotic Chair
Max Dean, Raffaelo D’Andrea, Matt Donovan
The Roots Store, 100 Bloor St. W
Posted June 18th, 2007
There’s a thirt-fourt-fifteen year old tan goblin standing in front of a lacquered canoe. Orange face on lime golf shirt with sky blue shorts?
“Hi.”
“Hi. I’m here to see the robotic chair?”
“It’s right up that first escalator.”
“First?”
It's not just a ROOTS store. It may very well be the ultimate ROOTS store. But I've never been to Vancouver, so who knows. At the very least it's the kind of place you can visit on a Friday afternoon and try on calf-skin jackets in front of a twenty foot mirror. You can even pirouette alongside your personal shopper type to better see your own ass, swaddled tightly in bun dividing leather slacks. You can absent-mindedly finger the stitching. You can twist and adjust the pre-worn in droopy bits of your potential new post-rugged outerwear. You can even raise your voice a little when it comes to discussing the ridiculous price of such a garment, presenting the air of a discerning fashion-o-phile while staying resolute in your stance on being able to afford it, admiring the buffalo hide. At least that is what this gentleman has decided to do on his Friday afternoon. Methinks he doth protest too much? Or perhaps I'm being unfair. But he really does seem to want us watching him shop. We track his movements with our eyes and he, in turn, collects non-verbal telemetry from us, the seemingly passive observers. And how our eyes may flit and glint will surely effect which brown jacket he buys. But enough of that. The kilt man speaks. We're here to watch the robotic chair.
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 931 - break
"Every break is random."
- Kilt Man -
The chair falls apart. There are four legs, a back rest and a seat toppled onto a 10'x10' platform. There is a camera mounted on the ceiling directly above the mangled chair. Kilt man is the facilitator; he stands off to the side, fielding questions and explaining the robot's movements. To his left there is a laptop running a C program. The program’s directives are laid out in plain English.
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 932 - finding left, forward leg.
There is a whirring sound and the seat lurches forward, inclined plane battle-bot style. Minus the rotating knives.
"The robot is completely autonomous."
- Kilt Man -
And indeed kilt man does nothing. The chair advances on its own motorized wheels towards the closest severed leg. Once the leg is aligned with its corresponding joint the seat slowly cajoles the leg into itself with a faint click and whirrrrrrrr. Now the chair is armed. It is able to position the remaining errant bits rather than steer around to meet with them. The next leg is appended in half the time.
"The form that reconstructs itself."
- Kilt Man -
Holy shit! Someone call Sarah Conner immediately, this machine is rebuilding itself. There is a self-contained program at work. The cycle starts with the self-destruction of the chair. Then, the robotic heart of the beast, the part for your ass, tracks itself via telemetry from the ceiling-cam. It relates itself to the position of its fallen limbs. It steers around the platform obeying the boundaries of this demonstration. It can problem solve. It is smart enough to use its already assembled appendages to gather more. It is capable of accumulative, rational processing. It is autonomous. The program is executed and the kilt man has only to stand there and grin as this bastard monster of the future gropes around the ROOTS store at Bay and Bloor with cold, unfeeling, inhuman precision. Don't you people get it? This is Leviathan. This is the first wave. Soon we'll have anarchist toaster ovens, rosicrucian roto-tillers and...oops!
With a dull thud the now half-a-chair has accidentally tipped leg number four off the edge of the platform: outside the boundaries of this demonstration. The now half-a-chair sits on the precipice, un-moving... confused... it kinda looks like this -> h
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 945 - uhhhhhhhhhhh... now what!
"Hmmmm... Oops!"
- Kilt Man -
The audience inhales as the leg teeters on the brink. The audience seems let down when the leg finally falls. Kilt man strides over to the fallen leg and sets it back in the center of the platform. Score one for humanity.
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 951 - Riiiiggghhhht! Now I remember I'm a fully autonomous learning robot! Finding right, rear leg. bzz bzz bzz
ME THOUGHTS
TIME - 6:39pm - What the hell is that guy doing trying on leather jackets in 30 degree weather? Get something that breathes you ninny! At least the dude in the kilt will be comfortable. I hope I can convey that message using only my disapproving eye brow twinges. GRRRRRRRRRRR!!! Buy some nylon you naïf. GRRRRRRRRRRR!!!! Burn holes through jacket with eyes. GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! Why in the hell would someone build a robotic chair?
The chair is now fully legged. It kind of looks like this -> H
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 955 - finding back
A rather ingenious mechanism folds out through the top of the seat and meets mid-air with the back rest. It attaches and then folds upright. The robotic chair has put itself back together again in approximately seven minutes.
Bring on the real servos!!!!
With a relatively deafening roar the beast begins to rise up onto its four rigid limbs. I am reminded of "Chairee" from Pee Wee’s house of autonomous, screaming, bi-polar furniture and 'dots'.
La la la la.
Let’s connect some shall we:
www.roboticchair.com
http://fe34.news.sp1.yahoo.com/s/nm/ 20070605/tc_nm/japan_robot_tech_dc
http://www.space.gc.ca/asc/eng/iss/ canadarm2/evolution.asp
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/ kids/2006/04/robots.html
After a fair and thorough deliberation the gentleman across from us has decided not to buy the seal loin jacket after all. The shopping assistant is grinning and nodding with obvious contempt.
Observer in front of me to her companion: "It's kinda surreal watching this robotic chair while that guy tries on clothes."
CHAIR THOUGHTS
TIME - 958 - break
"There are two breaks for every cycle."
- Kilt Man -