00:00A household robot grabs the spotlight at the White House, right next to U.S. First Lady Melania Trump.
00:06Does that mean they are finally ready to do our housework? The demonstrations look impressive.
00:11There's something going on that I call humanoid theater, where people are making videos.
00:15They're all humanoids, you'll notice. They're mostly black and white, and the background is black and white.
00:20It looks very clean. But in real life, nothing's like that.
00:23Handling the unpredictable mess of a real household is something else, and moving around isn't even the biggest challenge.
00:30The real test is using hands.
00:32Human hands are packed with thousands of touch sensors.
00:35They constantly tell us what we're holding and how it's moving.
00:38That's why we can pick up a glass, feel its weight, adjust our grip, and put it down without thinking.
00:45Robots don't have anything close to that level of touch.
00:48So why all the hype about humanoids as household robots right now?
00:51The success of ChatGPT and other AI systems has fueled hopes that robots are about to have their breakthrough moment,
00:59too.
00:59But physical AI is very different from language intelligence,
01:02which means the jump from impressive demos to useful household robots may still be a long way off.
