PITTSBURGH — Scientists in the 1950s proclaimed the robot the wave of the future. It would free housewives of drudgery and fill factories with a tireless steel-collar work force. But in many ways, the wave has been a washout.
Robots can paint cars, salvage nuclear fuel and even assist in brain surgery, but they're still pretty dumb. And they are far from the science-fiction promise of comic books and movies.
"Robots now are significantly better than (they were) 30 years ago, but that doesn't necessarily mean we are anywhere close to an R2-D2 or C-3PO," says Raj Reddy, director of The Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, referring to the robot characters in the "Star Wars" movies.
Orders for American-made robots have been falling since their peak of $501 million in 1984, according to the Robotics Industries Assn.
Experts say automating a factory is more complicated than just buying a robot and putting it on the assembly line. In addition, they say, some industrial robots are too complicated and prone to failure and, when they do work, they don't always fit in with factory operations.
About 33,000 robots work in the United States, mostly in manufacturing, with auto makers buying at least 40%, says robots association spokesman Jeffrey A. Burnstein.
"It's not a revolution. It's an evolution," Burnstein says. "Robots are another new, productive technology in the same way that computers were."
Japan is the world's leading robot user, followed by the United States, West Germany and France.
"Robots are still dumb," Reddy says. "They're dumb because we haven't taken the trouble to put the pieces together, not because we don't know how. That takes money and time and effort, and we don't have the money."
But today's robots can:
--See. They don't see like humans, but they can recognize forms and shapes and measure distances through sonar, ranging devices and lasers.
--Hear and speak. They use computers that recognize thousands of words.
--Smell. Their sensors can detect smoke or fumes.
--Move. They most often roll on wheels, but some models hop on one leg and others walk with as many as eight legs, ambling like a spider on uneven terrain.
--Touch. They can recognize texture and the force of a movement, such as pressing.
Many robots have one or two of these abilities to some degree, but creating a competent robot that combines most or all of them has been difficult.
