Within a decade cars could start driving themselves on highways and in less than 25 years automakers may be producing vehicles "smart" enough to chauffeur passengers through city streets, according to Stanford computer scientist Sebastian Thrun.
A panel of robotics experts said robots capable of multiple domestic tasks, that can also provide companionship for their owners, will be available within 10 years. And the scientists claim it is already possible to give robots such "feelings".
US soldiers in Iraq are giving nicknames and forming emotional bonds with bomb-defusing robots they have come to regard as team-mates, according to the founder of iRobot, the company that invented the machines.
South Korea, the world's most wired country, is rushing to turn what sounds like science fiction into everyday life. The government, which succeeded in getting broadband Internet into 72 percent of all households in the last half decade, has marshaled an army of scientists and business leaders to make robots full members of society.
The author considers the legal and social issues with granting legal rights to an intelligent machine.
"Tales about artificial beings have sparked fascination and fear for centuries; now the tales are turning into reality.."
A conversation with three experts on the future of robots and how they will impact everyday life including the ways wars will be fought.
Mirroring trends in the personal computing industry boom, intelligent robots that can perform tasks usually reserved for humans are starting to creep into mainstream society and could become a multibillion-dollar market in a few years.
The author looks at how the growing use of robots in the workforce and in the military will affect the developing world.
A team of British scientists have created a "robot" that can formulate hypotheses, design experiments, and interpret results on par with the best of their human counterparts.