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Robotics History

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First use of the word “Robotics”:

The word robot was firstly introduced to public by Czech writer Karel Capek in his play Rossum’s Universal Robots (R.U.R), published in 1920. The play begins with a factory that makes artificial people known as robots.

The word “Robotics”, was coined accidentally by the Russian-born, American scientist, Issac Asimov in 1940s .

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The three laws of Robotics:

Issac Asimov also proposed his three “Laws of Robotics”, and he later added a “zeroth law”

• Zeroth Law – A robot is not allowed to injured humanity, or, through inaction it allows humanity to come to harm.
• First Law – A robot can not injure a human being, or, through inaction it allows a human being to come to harm, unless it would violate the higher order law.
• Second Law – A robot should follow the orders given it by human beings, except when such orders give by humans would conflict with a higher order law.
• Third Law – A robot is allowed to protect its own existence as long as such protection would not conflict with a higher order law.

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The first industrial robot: UNIMATE

In 1954 first programmable robot is designed by George Devol, who coins the term Universal Automation. He later shortens this term to Unimation, which become the name of the first robot company in 1962.