Robots

Robots:

Though they may seem the stuff of science fiction, robots are actually quite vital to our everyday lives. The more romantic idea people have of robots is that of humanoids and/or androids. However, that is far from the reality of robotics today. The field of robotics spans a spectrum of uses and features. One the one hand you have something like Boston Dynamics that is responsible for petman and cheetah. And on the other hand you have robots that repeat mundane, repetitive tasks over and over. Like the robot invented by MIT students whose sole job is to zip zippers. 

But the most widely used application of robots is actually the manufacturing industry. Factories are more and more employing robots to assist them in simple repetitive tasks. This eliminates human error and improves efficiency. With so much research being done in AI, and robotics in general, we will probably have robot helpers aiding in minor chores throughout our day pretty soon. If robots were to disappear, costs of production, and by extension, goods, would go up. As would quantity as production speed would be greatly affected. 

Although having a robot butler is a dream for many, the development of humanoid robots has been rather slow. This is because such a robot is a very large and complex project. Even when we look at petman, we see that it only performs one function: walking. Researchers have not even been able to successfully create a robot that mimics even a part of our bodies. You can think back to high school Biology to see why it seems to be so difficult. Still, robots have become an essential part of our everyday lives. Although they are thought to be autonomous artificially intelligent 'life forms', their use is more like that of an indispensable tool. Something like a hammer. Plain, boring, and doesn't do much, but no toolkit would be complete without one. 

Petman:

Cheetah:

Zipper Bot: 

And.....

Nightmares: