ORIGINAL

 

History of Robotics: From Archytas of Tarentum to Da Vinci robot (Part I)

 

Sánchez Martín FM, Millán Rodríguez F, Salvador Bayarri J, Palou Redorta J, Rodríguez Escovar F, Esquena Fernández S, Villavicencio Mavrich H.

 

Department of Urology. Fundación Puigvert. Barcelona. Spain

 

Actas Urol Esp. 2007;31(2):69-76

 

“The only real errors are human errors”

(Last Law of Robotics. Anonymus)

 

SUMMARY

HISTORY OF ROBOTICS: FROM ARCHYTAS OF TARENTUM TO DA VINCI ROBOT. (PART I)

Robotic surgery is the last technological novelty in urology. It is interesting to know its history to learn how robots work. Manufacturing machines that resemble humans has been going on for more than 4000 years. There are references to King-su Tse, classic China, who invented an automaton in 500 b. C. Archytas of Tarentum (about 400 b. C.) is considered the founder of the mathematical mechanics, and one of the classic teachers of the western robotics. During the Middle Ages, Renaissance and Classicism, robots were constructed by people like Hero of Alexandria, Hsieh-Fec, Al-Jazari, Roger Bacon, Juanelo Turriano, Leonardo da Vinci, Vaucanson or von Kempelen. In the XIX century there were important advances in the engineering fields and also in robotics. In 1942, coinciding with the beginning of the modern robotics, Asimov published the “Three Laws of Robotics” based in the mechanics, electronic and computing. The robotics development in industrial, war and aerospace levels during XX century allowed the appearance of high precision robots, useful in surgery, like the surgical da Vinci® robot (Intuitive Surgical Inc, Sunnyvale, CA, USA).

Keywords: Robotics. Robotic urology. History of Robotics. History of Medicine. Archytas.

 

The image of the robot as a machine similar to human being has been prevailing in the cultures for many centuries. The desire to manufacture machines able to carry out independent tasks has been a constant in the history, through which they have described great number of devices, direct predecessors of current robots1. The future of surgery will be linked to robots, machines in which the human being has overturned his inventiveness from the antiquity.

The term “robot” was firstly used by Karel Capek (in his play “R.U.R.” “Rossum’s Universal Robots”2, written in collaboration with his brother Josef and published in 1920. The word “robot” comes from the Czech word “robota” meaning “work”3, in the sense of obligatory nature, understood like servitude, forced labor or slavery, specially related to the so called “hired workers” that lived in the Austro-Hungarian Empire till 1848. This concept is directly connected to the “master-slave” terminology of current robots, when the units based each movement in a human order. In the play “R.U.R.” the assembly lines manufacturing performed by human-like mechanical creatures is developed both in narrative and philosophical aspects. Some years later, the play was adapted for the screen in the film “Metropolis” and the term robot remained with this meaning. Even the Capek’s robots were organic artificial humanoids; the word robot is almost always used to refer to these mechanical humanoids. The term android could refer to any of these, while a cyborg (“cybernetic organism” or “bionic man”) is a creature with combined organic and mechanics parts. (Fig. 1).

 

FIGURE 1. Archytas of Tarentum, one of the first automated machines builders in the history.

 

History of Antique Robotics

Around the year 1300 b. C., Amenhotep, son of Hapu, constructed a statue of Memon, king of Ethiopia, that emits sounds when, at dawn, it is illuminated by the rays of the sun. The Egyptians developed advanced mathematical models and constructed very sophisticated automatism, like the water clock. There is evidence of the abacus existence between year 1000 and 500 to b. C, although doubts persist whether it was invented in Babylonia or China. This mathematical tool allowed the development of computation and artificial intelligence that went being developed parallel to the interest by the automatism and the design of machines emulating the human being. Adam could be considered the first robot of history, in Christian Jewish mythology, reflected in the Bible. God created him from a moldable material (mud); afterwards he programmed and gave him the first instructions4. Greek mythology also contains references on the artificial life: Prometheus created the first man and the first woman with mud and gave life to them by means of the celestial fire. Pygmalion was a king and a mythological priest that discovered how Galatea, one of the statues that it had carved, took life, thus revealing the archaic interest of the human being in robots. Ovid narrates it in his mythology: “Pygmalion went to the statue and, when touching it, it seemed to him that it was warm, that the ivory softened and that, quitting his hardness, he touched it again and thinking he was wrong he could verify that the body was flexible and the veins gave their pulsations…” In Roman mythology, Volcano constructed mechanical devices that he used like servants; while in the Hebrew the Golem took life by means of a words combination in the context of the cabalistic magic. In Scandinavian the giant Mökkurkalfi or Mistcalf was constructed to aid the troll Hrungnir in a duel with Thor5.

In China, King-his Tse, invented in the 500 b. C. a flying magpie of wood and bamboo, and a wood horse able to jump6. Around year 200 b. C., Philo of Byzantium, inventor of the repetitive catapult, constructed an aquatic robot7. In 206 B. C., the first Han Emperor found the Chin Shih Hueng Ti's treasure. It included a mechanical toys orchestra that moved independently. In old Greece, Archytas of Tarento (referenced in English like Archytas of Tarentum8, and in some references in Spanish like Architas de Tarento9), philosopher, mathematician and contemporary politician of Platon10, considered the father of mechanical engineering and precursory of the robotics, invented the screw and the pulley, among other many devices. He made the first self-propelled rocket of the history that used with military aims. Around year 400 b. C. built the first artificial, self-propelled flying device, a bird-shaped model propelled by a jet of what was probably steam, said to have actually flown11. About year 300 b. C., Cresibio (or Ctesibius12 or Ktesibios13) invented a water clock (or clepsydra) and an organ that emitted sounds by water impulses14. His friend Philo of Byzantium invented in year 200 b. C., an aquatic robot and a repetitive catapult15. In year 62 Heron of Alexandria shows, in his book “Robot”, the designs of toys able to move repeatedly by themselves, like birds that fly, chirp and drink; or devices that worked from the force generated by mill arms or circuits of boiling water, rudimentary precursors of the steam engine16. Also, designed, mechanisms like the fire machine that opened to doors of the temples or magical altars where the figures extinguished the fire of the flame. In imperial Rome, they very fond of the robots, that were exhibited in private celebrations, like the banquet of Trimalco, in which a fruit bowl presided by Priapus threw a perfume jet when a light pressure was exerted17. In year 335 d. C., Hsieh Fec constructed a Buddha mounted in a four wheels car that moved without aid. The Far East had also some contributions18: In the year 700 d. C., Huang Kun constructed several figures, human and animals that sang and danced6. In the year 770 d. C., Yang Wu-Roll constructed a monkey that extended the hands and shouted “Help”, keeping its coins collection in a bag when it reaches certain weight. Prince Kaya constructed in year 840 a doll that spilt water. In the year 890, Han Chih Ho displayed a wooden cat that hunted rats. In 1050 Hindu prince Bhoj wrote the Samarangana-Sutradhara, that includes commentaries on the construction of yantras, machines able to act by themselves. In the XII century Al-Jazari (or Al-Djazari)6, constructed musical robots impelled by water, with applications in the kitchen and also he was an important constructor of water clocks19. The Arabs, in addition to the clock, invented various automatisms, like the water dispensers, gathering the Greco-roman and Asian inheritance, looking for not only fun but also utility in labor tasks.

Clocks could be considered as the oldest and most perfect machines closed to automaton concept and consecutively to the robotics. Es frecuente hallar relojes que incluyen figuras humanas móviles que se mueven con el orden de las horas. The clock in Munich cathedral and the Anker (Ankeruhr) in Vienna are two good examples. The Strasbourg rooster the oldest robot presently worked from 1352 till 1789. It was part of the cathedral clock and, at noon it flapped its beak and spread out its feathers20. In Spain, the Papamoscas (“Flycatcher”) of Burgos cathedral, constructed in the XVI century, consists of a mechanical man that opens its mouth every hour on the hour and it is still working (Fig. 2).

 

FIGURE 2. The “Papamoscas”, automaton of the Burgos cathedral that opens its mouth every hour.

 

The most famous Middle Age automatons are the mechanic servant of Albertus Magnus (1204-1282) and the talking head of Roger Bacon (1214-1294)6. In the year 1235, Villard d’Honnecourt, perpetual-motion machine constructor21, writes an outlines book, including sections about mechanic gadgets. An example is an automaton angel22. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) constructed an automatic lion in honor of Luis XII than opened its breast to reveal the royal coat of arms23. En 1495 he made one of the first recorded designs of a humanoid robot of the Western World: A mechanical knight able to sit up, wave its arms and move its head (it has a flexible neck) and open and close it jaw. These machines are likely to be based on his anatomical research recorded in the Vitruvian Man and its mathematical clues. About year 1500, he also designed a mechanical calculator, predecessor of Blaise Pascal`s operational calculating machine invented a century later, thus meaning that the Italian genius projected robotics from a formal and computer point of view24. Salomon de Caux (or Caus) (1576-1626), studious of steam as energy source, constructed various automated devices taking gardening as a base (fountains, birds)25. At the beginning of XVI century, Hans Bullmann created a few androids simulated people of which some can even play musical instruments; en 1533 Johann Müller, known as Regiomon­tanus, constructed in several flying metal and wood birds; and ten years later John Dee showed in England a wooden beetle that could fly11.

In Spain of the XVI century, Juanelo Turriano (originally Giovanni Torriani) (1500?-1585)26, appointed Court Clock Master by Emperor Charles V, constructed the “Wood Man”, a monk robot able to walk and to move head27. Salomon de Camus (or Camus le Lorrain)28 (1576-1626) constructed a car in miniature with horses, footmen and a lady in its interior, which moved harmoniously17. In 1640, René Descartes (1596-1650) constructed a robot, that he called “Mon Francine”, in his daughter`smemory29. In 1662 the inauguration of the theater of Takedo robots in Osaka6 takes place. In the XVII century GW von Leibniz (1646-1716) defended the use of the binary system as a base for the automatic calculation, definitively establishing the bases of the actual computation30. The materials used for the construction of robots were wood (parts with form), iron (fixed structure, supports, hinges), copper (which is moldable and allowed the construction of thinner parts), leather (cables, footwear) and the fabrics. The first models used the application of direct force to make movements, facilitated with sets of pulleys, gears and handles. In this phase the robots were replicas of the human being that made a serie of simple movements. The machines went assuming tasks of aid to the man and ended up repelling in the own conception of the world and the animated beings. The mechanics affected the study of nature, spreading to the anatomy science; of which agreed models with that conception were elaborated, like “De Humani Corporis Fabrica” (On the workings of the human body) from Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564) who conceived the man like a complex mechanical structure31.

The artificial intelligence development was parallel to the automaton invention. Special mentions deserve, with its calculating machines, John Napier (1550-1617) (1621), Wilhelm Schickard (1592-1635) and Charles Babbage (1791-1871). On the other hand Leonhard Euler (1707-1783), Allen Marquand (1853-1924) and John Venn (1834-1923) worked in logical algorithms32. The development of mathematical models with mechanical operative like the one of George Boole (1815-1864), allowed moving from classic robotics to the modern one, taking the computation as base33.

Jacques Vaucanson (or of Vaucanson)34, (1709-1782) is one of the most famous and complete constructor of automated androids of history35. Person of great talent crossed all Europe presenting his devices. In 1738 built an automaton flute player that played Baroque melodies. The toy made the digitization on the instrument and followed with the eyes the score. He also achieved one of the landmarks of the history of the robotics when constructing a mechanical duck of more than 400 movable pieces, done of copper that drinks, eats, sing, wades in the water and digests its food like a real duck (fig 3). There is a copy of the duck of Vaucanson in the Museum of Robots of Grenoble. Other references of the classic robotics are the Swiss watchmaker Pierre Jaquet-Droz (1721-1790)36 and their Henri-Louis son. They constructed scale models with animated landscapes (1774) - the most famous was the well-known “the cave” - and diverse dolls able to write (1770), to draw (1772) and to play in the flute or in an organ (1773), amongst which it stands a lady interpreter, which replica is conserved in the Museum of Neuchatel37. Anyone can accede through Internet to tunes for wind instruments and piano executed by these automatas35. Jean-Frederic Leschot, watchmaker and partner of Jaquet-Droz, specialized in the manufacture of prosthesis to replace amputed limbs, being able not only to cover the aesthetic aspect but to develop to a high degree of functionality for arms and legs constructed38. In 1795 they ordered from Frankfurt a left arm for the Strakham baroness. To the request, Leschot answered: “I am, thanks to God, in a position to fulfill your request. Many items of this kind have already been entrusted to me by people who were always satisfied and relieved. A few years ago, I made I made an artificial arm for a young lady whose arm has been amputed almost up to the shoulder and it is very useful to her and nothing shows when she is dressed”. The construction of artificial members goes back to Ambroise Pare (1510-1590) that developed models of surprising complexity38 (fig 4).

 

FIGURE 3. The duck of Vaucanson, one of the most ingenious automata of the antiquity.

 

 

FIGURE 4. Superior limb prosthesis constructed by Ambroise Pare.

 

Friedrich von Knauss (1724-1789), technician, watchmaker, impressed in 1760, the court of Francis I, emperor of Prussia with his automaton writer, the principal mechanism it constitutes a horizontal roll composed of pins, introduced into appropriate openings. When moving, the pins press on a keyboard containing keys, each key corresponding to a letter. After having drawn some characters, the Writer automatically dips his feather in the inkpot in front of him. A special mechanism located behind moves the shelf towards the left after each letter; when a line is finished, the shelf is push at the same time in the horizontal and vertical direction. Von Kanuss was the precursor of the typewriter39. In 1783 the Abbot Mical, displayed in the Academy of Paris two metallic speaking heads that were able to say several sentences, like “The King brings peace to Europe” and “Peace crowns the King with glory”40. I.e. speaking heads represent a very interesting chapter. The Pope Silvestre II (~938 –1003), constructed of brass that replied “yes” or “not” depending on the answer41. There was one speaking head attributed to Saint Albert the Great (1206-1280)42 and also an automaton that walked; destroyed by one of his disciples, Saint Thomas of Aquin to escape from witchcraft suspicion40. In Spain, the speaking head of Tábara (village of Zamora), that warned if there was a Jew in the village, shouting “judaeus adest”; o or one owned by the Marquis of40. One of the most odd episode of “El Quijote” (chapter LXII, second part) told the “enchanted head adventure”, where a speaking metallic skull is described.

In 1785 the watchmaker Pierre Kintzing and the cabinet maker of the Queen David Rontgen (1743–1807), constructed a dulcimer placer android that belonged to Marie Antoinette and can still be admired at the Museum of Technology in Paris43. Antoine Favre, inventor of the music box in 179644, contributed with two important concepts of robotics: the automatism with repetition of a preprogrammed task; and the precision of the functional mechanism with a cylinder with projections of a revolving disc with orifices. This last device connects directly with the punched card of the loom of Jacquard, cards of census of Hollerith in XIX century and cards of the first IBM computers.

In 1769, the Hungarian engineer Johann Wolfgang Ritter von Kempelen (o Ján Vlk Kempelen)45 (1734-1804), constructed one of the most famous automata of the history: a machine to play chess (Fig. 5). The machine was built in the shape of a life-size man who sat in front of a large cabinet that served as a table. The man was made of wood and dressed in Turkish clothes. He was usually referred to as "the Turk." Before the automaton was used, all the doors of the cabinet were opened on opposite sides (one pair at a time), and a candle's light was shined through the cavity, to demonstrate to the audience that no one was hidden inside. The first third of the cabinet was filled with clockwork gears, while the rest was more or less empty. The (human) opponent played on a separate table with a separate board and pieces. A large key was used to wind up the automaton's mechanism before each game. The automaton always played white, thus going first. The operator started the game by reaching inside the small door in the torso of the automaton and flipping a switch. The sound of machinery could be heard each time the automaton moved. Games usually lasted about 30 minutes. The mannequin won the most complicated match and become famous in Europe when it defeated Napoleon Bonaparte three times in the Vienna palace of Schönbrunn en 1809. It is said that the emperor, furious, threw away the pieces of the board. The chess robot also won Emperor Joseph II and Russian Empress Catherine II46. No one manager to reveal the secret of the machine and, of course, all of them ignored that in fact, they were paying against chess champion Johann Allgaier, who was hidden in the cabinet47. Kempelen never was discovered and even today there are aspects of the device that are still a secret. In addition to “the Turk”, he constructed other devices, like a manually operated speaking machine48. By the end of XIX century two similar devices, “Ajeeb” and “Mephisto” were constructed. Pillsbury and Gunsberg, famous chess players were two of the hidden players49. At that time automata primarily had a recreational character and were exhibited in fairs and circus. Afterwards, as from industrial revolution, it started to be used in productive functions.

 

FIGURE 5. Von Kempelen chess player automaton, “The Turk”, in an engraving that shows a hidden man inside the cabinet directing the match.

 

During XVIII century, advances in the industrial field, had already happened like the steam engine of Thomas Newcomen (1664 - 1729), later developed by Humphrey Potter - who introduced a new concept: the feedback and by James Watt (1736-1819)50. In 1801 Joseph Marie Jacquard (1752-1834)51, a textile industrialist, made a fundamental contribution to the robotics when designing a system of automatic operation of the looms, programming his movements. One is a multiperforated cardboard that allows classifying some tasks and repeating them in identical form52 Many years later IBM incorporated this system of programming in its first computers53. In 1801, C. Spencer had invented a machine that produced screws, nuts and washers of variable size, based on the substitution of interchangeable guides, which acted as a “program”43. In 1828 the English physicist Robert Willis constructed a machine that pronounced the vowels by means of tubes of reed40. In 1834, the physicist André-Marie Ampere (1775-1836) initiates the way of the cybernetics, settling down the principles of sciences of the government of machines. In 1898 Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), inventor of the electrical motor of alternating current54, presented what some people considered as the first robot of the modern history: a radio controlled was demonstrated to the public during an electrical exhibition at Madison Square Garden of New York, from which it patented the Teleautomation, a torpedo remoted-control for military use11. Between the end of the XVIII century and principles of the XIX the brothers Maillardet (Henri, Jean-David, Julien-Auguste, Jacques-Rodolphe)55 constructed a robot that drew pictures and wrote verses in both English and French56. The motions of the hand are produced by a series of cams located on shafts in the base of the automaton, which produces the necessary movement to complete seven sketches and the text57 Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin (1805-1871) (nothing to do with Harry Hudini, famous magician in 1920)58, father of the modern magic59, and Stevenard, become famous because of their automata. Phineas Taylor Barnum (1810-1891) founded the “Barnum-Baily Circus “and the “American Circus” in which he gathered together dozens of automata, some of them brought from Europe, amongst which was the speaking machine of professor Joseph Faber of Vienna predecessor of gramophone40. In 1891 Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931), in addition to his important contributions to the technique (incandescent lamp, gramophone), he constructed several automata, amongst them a speaking doll. In 1906, Lee de Forest (1873-1961) developed a well-known triple incandescent light bulb known as triode60. The triode was vital in the development of long-distance (e.g. transcontinental) telephone communications, radio and radars. The triode was an important innovation in electronics progress and sustained the development of the computation machines until the invention of the transistors. The first robots are more or less complicated mechanical devices that developed a fixed program, but that did not use the feedback necessarily.

Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) used “the robotic” term for the first time and postulated the three laws of the robotics in his book “I Robot”61 published in 1950, coinciding with the heyday of modern robotics (Fig. 6).

 

FIGURE 6. Isaac Asimov, in 1965.

 

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Correspondence author: Dr. F.M. Sánchez-Martín

Department of Urology. Fundació Puigvert. Cartagena, 340-350.

08025 Barcelona. Telf. 934 169 700

Author e-mail: fsanchez@fundacio-puigvert.es

Paper Information: History of Urology

Manuscript received: september, 2006

Manuscript accepted: november, 2006