This is just downright threatening. Software engineer Will Gorman has seen fit to play god and create a robot out of Lego that can build things out of Lego. Really.
The machine is essentially a robotic tank of Lego that is fed instructions from MLCad, a 3D modeling program. As of yet, it can only do up to 8×2 bricks (you know, the Lego brick), and can’t handle much more than simple structures. But imagine a Mk.2 that could work with NXT hardware? What about one that could 3D-print its own Lego bricks?
“There is a recursiveness to this whole thing,” says Gorman of his brainchild. “I love the idea of self-assembly and the Star Trek replicator and I love Legos. I wanted to bring those two worlds together.”
I appreciate your spirit, Gorman, but seriously, do you have any idea what you’ve done? We have, in essence, a self-replicating Lego-bot. You’d best quit while you’re ahead, Gorman, lest you unmake the world with an apocalyptic swarm of Legos devouring the universe at a molecular level and leaving behind a wake of… like, more Legos.
Maybe I’m just being an alarmist, but you can’t tell me that’s an impossible future.
Because I’m not listening.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YZeX8ti7Io[/youtube]
