More than 100 students have turned up to a presentation made by Dr. Benjamin Sovacool from Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy on Aug 28, 2009. He has brought up the adoption or non-adoption of technological innovations from a sociological approach, which reveals the underlying reasons from different perspectives.
This methodology, as knows as the social science systems approach, challenges the conventional way people analyses technology. In his presentation, Dr Sovacool had supported his views with examples of the Challenger accident and the picture phone, where the reasons of the failure or non-adoption were much sophisticated. Technology alone was not able to determine the success or failure of the innovation. By looking into the political and social aspects, the exact reason of failure becomes more perspicuous.
An invention might be successful in the laboratory, but might not be well-accepted by the general public. Or it might be adopted for a period of time like the picture phone, but eventually being eliminated due to certain reasons. Another strong example which Dr Sovacool has presented was the non-adoption of electric vehicles. Despite its benefits and advantages, the market of electric vehicles saw a shrink in 30 years time and was eventually overtaken by gasoline vehicles. From the social science systems approach, Dr Sovacool has listed the challenges posed to electric vehicles, including the declining cost of petrol, mass production of gasoline vehicle, advertising, availability of insurance, war, road tax and so on. Due to these economical, political and social challenges, gasoline vehicles became dominant in the market and continued up-to-date.
In conclusion, the social science systems approach suggests the acceptance of technological innovations from a broad sphere, not limited to technical factors. The key focus should be looking into the matter as a whole but not just a single factor. 'Technologies are holistic in the way they interact with the society.' said Dr Sovacool.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Formula SAE Team
Formula 1 always attract people attention because it is a race that not only challenge the drivers to drive the cars as fast as possible, but also challenge the cars itself. After a competition, most of the viewers will have a question in their mind, who is the fastest driver in this race? What car that he use? Who build the car? That's why people always enjoy to watch Formula 1 races and they always curious about it.
Knowing that Formula 1 is quite famous in the world, NUS also create its own Team. They call it Formula SAE Team. It is a project under guidance of Prof Seah Kar Heng which started the project since 2001. The team consist of 12 team members which is divided by 6 student from year 4 and the others from year 3. Actually, every year, Proff Seah select 12 students from year 2 to be trained for preparing them join the main team. But, after 1 year selection, there will be only 6 students who will join the main team in year 3.
The car they use to compete at Michigan is a car that they build themself, by selecting the material, calculating, and even constructing it. The car being constructed not only to reach a maximum speed, but also look for the safety of the driver because in this race we can say that the drivers put his life on the line. One miscalculation, and it is over.
Every year they have to use different car with different model and machine. Until this year, the FSAE team has already built 7 cars which is being used to compete in 7 competition at Michigan, USA. The result is very good. They always raise their rank in the world each year. However, they still have a long way to beat teams from Europe.
Knowing that Formula 1 is quite famous in the world, NUS also create its own Team. They call it Formula SAE Team. It is a project under guidance of Prof Seah Kar Heng which started the project since 2001. The team consist of 12 team members which is divided by 6 student from year 4 and the others from year 3. Actually, every year, Proff Seah select 12 students from year 2 to be trained for preparing them join the main team. But, after 1 year selection, there will be only 6 students who will join the main team in year 3.
The car they use to compete at Michigan is a car that they build themself, by selecting the material, calculating, and even constructing it. The car being constructed not only to reach a maximum speed, but also look for the safety of the driver because in this race we can say that the drivers put his life on the line. One miscalculation, and it is over.
Every year they have to use different car with different model and machine. Until this year, the FSAE team has already built 7 cars which is being used to compete in 7 competition at Michigan, USA. The result is very good. They always raise their rank in the world each year. However, they still have a long way to beat teams from Europe.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Robotics: mobile manipulation
A new generation of robots incorporated the technology of mobile manipulation are turning human being’s wildest fantasy into tangible reality. Though the robots are still not remotely comparable to the androids we have seen in movies like I, robot or Bicentennial man, they will be active in many fields considered dangerous or inappropriate for human beings like planetary exploration and explosive ordnance disposal. In addition, these robots also function as auxiliaries in performing household tasks and navigating vehicles. With these robots, we are witnessing many impossible being turned into possible.
However, several obstacles must be overcome before those robots being produced in mass and widely employed. First of all, the primary problem a mobile robot is faced with is to map and localize itself, in other words, navigate. It may be much easier for us to walk than to teach a robot to navigate with its wheels. In order to achieve this, a generic algorithm for analyzing features of the surroundings and fast speed of processing mass data of images are essential. Second, unlike robots fixed in an assembling line, those robots are required to deal with all kinds of unmodeled or unanticipated situations. As a result, they need algorithms which are able to deal with ambiguities and take real-time actions. Lastly, even though all the theoretical problems are all solved, advances may be bottlenecked by technical limitation, because we have to build small devices which are able to generate disproportionate forces. That is extraordinarily difficult to construct mechanically. Hopefully, all of these obstacles will be overcome within several decades.
In a nutshell, an emerging trend shows the robots of next generation will have the core technology of mobile manipulation. With this new technology, people’s life would be improved and many unprecedented successes would be achieved within decades. However, we must first focus on the hurdles blocking the path leading to the bright future.
However, several obstacles must be overcome before those robots being produced in mass and widely employed. First of all, the primary problem a mobile robot is faced with is to map and localize itself, in other words, navigate. It may be much easier for us to walk than to teach a robot to navigate with its wheels. In order to achieve this, a generic algorithm for analyzing features of the surroundings and fast speed of processing mass data of images are essential. Second, unlike robots fixed in an assembling line, those robots are required to deal with all kinds of unmodeled or unanticipated situations. As a result, they need algorithms which are able to deal with ambiguities and take real-time actions. Lastly, even though all the theoretical problems are all solved, advances may be bottlenecked by technical limitation, because we have to build small devices which are able to generate disproportionate forces. That is extraordinarily difficult to construct mechanically. Hopefully, all of these obstacles will be overcome within several decades.
In a nutshell, an emerging trend shows the robots of next generation will have the core technology of mobile manipulation. With this new technology, people’s life would be improved and many unprecedented successes would be achieved within decades. However, we must first focus on the hurdles blocking the path leading to the bright future.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
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