DeepMind created small humanoid robots with 20 programmable joints and taught them basic soccer skills using Deep RL (Deep Reinforcement Learning). They concentrated on contextually appropriate mobility abilities such “walking, running, turning, kicking, and fall recovery.”
The robots demonstrated “robust and dynamic movement skills,” according to Haarnoja. The study, titled “Learning Agile Soccer Skills for a Bipedal Robot with Deep Reinforcement Learning,” was also published last week on a Google blog.
The robotic soccer project was unique in that it focused on using the complete robotic body—not just the hands or feet—to engage in strategic play.
“Creating general embodied intelligence, that is, agents that can act in the physical world with agility, dexterity, and understanding—as animals or humans do—has long been one of the long-standing goals of AI researchers and roboticists alike,” Haarnoja added.
The DeepMind project’s publication sparked a lot of conversation on social media, but one short video clip grabbed a lot of attention. In the video, a researcher is shown repeatedly pushing down on a robot that is attempting to score a goal. Each time, the robot recovered and got back on its feet valiantly.
Despite the fact that the “abuse” was plainly done to test and improve the robot’s capacity to recover from stumbles and other faults, it prompted Twitter users to comment.
“It’s difficult not to anthropomorphize. STOP BEING MEAN! shouts my brain. “Lol,” remarked John Weller.
“At what point do [the robots] realize it’s easier to kick the football when a human isn’t constantly pushing them and then take action to prevent it from happening so they can play?” N4GERACS inquired.
“I gotta say, given how fast AI is moving these days,” Jeff Kirsch cautioned, “I wouldn’t be so cavalier about shoving those robots.”
Jing Lang adds a word of caution: “I hope they will forgive us for this.”
Those concerned about the shoving may find solace in the words of a famous athlete from another sport, the late great baseball batter Babe Ruth, who once said, “You can’t beat the person who won’t give up.”
