Good news: a breakthrough in robotics has allowed us to modify a classic 'Dad joke' for use in our new futuristic landscape.
How do you kill off the robotic uprising?
Go for the juggler.
Sidestepping the tumbleweeds, let us give you the science: this strange device is the Circular Cloverleaf Blind Juggler - a robot capable of "juggling" four balls on its tilted paddles. The creation of the Institute for Dynamic Systems and Control, this ball bouncing robot features no sensors, microphones, cameras or anything to tell it what's going on in the world around it. It's able to bounce the balls in circular patterns thanks to a set of algorithms, developed to prove that robots can have an element of control in "dynamic systems".
"The main research project investigates the use of chaos to control dynamic systems that are challenging to control due to their symmetric structure," explains the IDSC website, which hopes to use the research to create robots that can more readily fit into the chaotic world that is human life - rather than having to sense things before acting.
Which is going to offer scant comfort to the world's jugglers once these things start turning up on street corners with a cap, robot dog and a PA system.
