Show : Section 5 Wednesday October 2003 emiiMD i Pagel The Herald journal t One giant leap for mankind is on Web By Matthew Syme o I like to present a few web sites I’ve run across that readers might find interesting However I have to admit a bit of shame regarding today’s featured site I violated a personal rule and clicked through an ad on a news web site It's not that I want all Internet advertising to go awky (like commercial TV most content sites rely on advertising to pay the bills) but 1 like to think I’m above succumbing to such a raw marketing ploy Nevertheless Id’s just say I accidentally on purpose clicked on an ad purporting to accurately assess my intelligence for free (of course) The ad led to etnodecom a site that provides a range of testing - Mitch MascaiaHerald Journal Autonomous Solutions Founder Mel Torrie and Manager Paul Lewis take a break at the company’s plant k ser- vices mostly for personal edification and partly for fun I soon found myself racking my brain over a list of vigorous IQ questions ' I suppose I have taken IQ tests in the past as the nature of the questions ' Seemed somewhat familiar But I’d never been given my actual intelli- gence quotient The questions ranged from the “two trains leave from New ” to pattern York and Chicago and logic puzzles True recognition to its word after I completed the 40 questions the service presented “a PhD certified and scientifically accurate” IQ score I was neither shocked nor dis- pleased with the result but I won’t be joining Mensa during this life- time The real value of the test comes in the form of a personalized and comprehensive IQ report which not only provides your ranking and an evaluation and explaining your ' but also costs $15 strengths ' I honestly found the document rather insightful It provided relevant' career and strength recommendations based on my intelligence type For my trouble I also received a print- able certification of my intellectual w hen Mel Torrie was a kid he ' worked on his dad’s farm driving tractors “Td drive around in circles for 18 hours a day and I hated it” he said “I just ' kept thinking ‘1 have a brain I should be doing something else’” And today he is Instead of driving tractors he works on them in a big shed next to his house on the southern edge pf Logan But Mel’s tractors are spe- ‘ brain” degree in electrical engineering at Utah State University and working at the school’s Center for Self- Organizing and Intelligent' Systems (CSOIS) when John Deere caught wind of his thesis on something he would later call “MOBIUS” Technically MOBIUS is a “Man Machine Interface for the control and tasking of Multi-Us- The company has created autonomous machines like MURV or mid-90- ' Flann Mitch Torrie Bret Thayn and Paul Lewis Each of them brought to the table their knowledge and experience in electrical engineering mechanical engineering or computer science The team set out to create robots that could free people from “dirty dull or danger- ous tasks” “We don’t want people to ' feel like robots are taking 'away jobs" Mel said “Instead we hope they’ll feel like ‘I don't have to do 'that I can do the things I want to do now like go back to school and use my cial They drive themselves s In the Mel was a master’s over laboring - " Maflhaw Sym Is an Internet Project Manag-a- r at a local technology company and a technophUe We By Jasmine Michaelaori features writer 15-pa- ge nd south Logan Robitics firm employees convinced they have the best job in the world ‘ achievement! My young children encouraged me to visit today’s second site while we viewed the moon and stars one recent evening They wanted to know if anyone had been to the moon We immediately located NASAgov and reviewed the history of space flight via several short videos available for download Of course Neil Armstrong’s monumental first step high- lighted the experience and really got my asking great questions about the solar system After the kids went to bed I couldn’t help but continue to explore the vast database of images from the Hubble space telescope From nebulae to galaxies the images capture the vast beauty of space and illustrate how very' precious our home planet is Many of the more impressive shots are downloadable as wallpaper for your computer’s desktop Beyond the pretty pictures you can review various NASA missions ranging from the recently completed Columbia investigation to the ongoing International Space Station and future Mars exploration Did you know for example two separate spacecraft are at this moment oA route to Mars scheduled for a January 2004 landing? Both contain rovers' designed to perform geological surveys on the history of water on the planet You can read regular mission updates now and come January' live video feeds from the two rovers will be available on the site Best of all NASA's site comes completely free (thanks to us forward thinking taxpayers) is highly navigable and presented specifically for the enjoyment of us earthbound amateur space enthusiasts Enjoy the ride in large-sca- le kk “It’s all about help- ing people reach their potential" remote-controll- ed dan- m — Mel Torrie multiple heterogeneous autonomous vehicles” Interpreted into English it’s basically a program that can make remote-contrcars out of real vehicles It can even memorize certain routes and tasks and execute them without any supervision It turns everyday machines into robots The implications of Mel’s idea were huge and the John Deere people knew it They wanted in on the action They suggested Mel start a company and in 2000 he did He called it Autonomous Solutions Inc and brought along six of his Don CSOIS Cripps Sarah Gray Nick for breakfast ' The Israeli police iise it for investigating dangerous situations like checking for car bombs Mel said US police forces and SWAT teams will probably be using it sometime soon as well Along the same lines is tankTAGS an like robot that crawls over boulders and through rivers Mel expects the US military will pick this one up He sees it being used for reconnaissance logistics medical support evacuation and rescue But there are also prod- ucts like PGAP or Proving Grounds Automation Package a program that allows for quality 247 testing of products without subjecting people to the monotony of the task Goodyear uses this program tire tests for r Autonomous Solutions Inc is also currently working with the US Department of Education on a wheelchair that can move in any direction pivot in place or move from side to side without changing the direction of the chair all through cona simple joystick-lik- e trol Mel expects to send a completed prototype to the 24-hou- : JL Photo courtesy of Autonomous Solutions : machine is smaller than a car but its long clawed arm eats cars backhoe-lik- e in Autonomous Solutions ol Robotic Vehicle e to do some of the more gerous jobs The With its long flexible arm TAGS can effect department in about a month But the employees insist none of this is really work “We basically just get to play with toys all day” Paul Lewis said as an employee scooted around the floor on the wheelchair prototype Would theyever leave to work for a bigger more well known company? “Never” Mel and Paul say in unison "Somebody actually wanted to buy the company a while back” Paul said “but it seemed pointless Wej doing what we love” Mel agreed “Once you’ve had this you can’t go back to having somebody else tell you what to do” he said “We may not be making as much money but at least the fate i$ in our hands” Mel said every aspect of what the company does including carrying its own fate comes down to one main philosophy “It's all about helping people reach their potential” he said “Whether it’s our employees the companies we work with or the consumers who benefit from the products” Or by allowing one farm boy to hop off the tractor and live out his dream a rescue or defuse a bomb Mitch MascareNemd Journal Mitch Torrie controls a smarter TAGS Tbs company expects to sell R to the US miHtary which could use K for reconnaissance logistics support demining medical evacuation and rescue |