18. Automata
| Automata have at the moment an important place in the UR society, even though their distribution is not homogeneous in all branches of industry. One must note that there are several types of more or less advanced automata, and that the only a few are capable of behaving as human beings (without the feelings however), they are so expensive that they are only used for very important governmental actions, like the exploration of the solar system. An automaton consist of two systems, its mobile system, i.e. its body, which according to its model enables him to walk, to mechanical move its head... and secondly its computing system, i.e. its mechanical brain. The mobile system, thanks to knowledge of clockwork mechanisms can have various shapes and capacities : automaton shaped like a mechanical horse, or a mechanical man, even a legless chess player, or a armless accordionist. I will start by speaking about the source of energy, which is both important for the mobile and the computing systems : The system giving the worse result of autonomy uses spring power, it usually needs to be winded up every hour, one will note however that nothing forces the user to wind up the automaton manually, a nonmobile system can wind up the springs by using a source of unspecified energy (water, wind, gas, electricity, Red Coal) the automaton will have to limit its sphere of activities around its "charger". Secondly : a system rather close to springs, on the constraint level, but which is much more powerful : the electric battery, it also needs to be reloaded (and not inevitably at a house electric plug, one simply uses a converter : wind-electricity, gas-electricity...) Last but not least, the system giving best autonomy is : the closed vapor circuit, supplied with a portable mini-furnace, however according to fuel used, the results are variable, energy from wet wood has the worst output and 100% pure Red Coal (Governement authorization required) for the best output. Let's talk about the computing system : It will be noted that the brain and the sensory system are in fact only of miniaturized polygraphic technology (the overcost comes from the miniaturization). Phonography is used to hear and to speak it is a technology which is the already rather expensive if one wants an automaton really mobile, indeed the majority of automata singers only pretend to sing while the room is bathed in music from all corners by loudspeakers. However if one wants an automaton with vocal answer, phonographic technology is needed. Visiography (which consists of small crystal grids which give electric signals when they are excited by light for the reception) is the equivalent of the human eye. It is an easily miniaturized technology, however interpretation is more complex than that of the phonographic voice recognition. Note that the interesting aspect of many home polygraphs is their connection to the PolyGraphic Network, an automata having the accessories necessary can connect aswell, if a PGN cord is at its disposal, however a new technology allows this communication without cord : it is named the ElectroMagnetic Communication (commonly called Radio in our world). The EMC needs reasonable sized receptors, the average automaton can integrate, however the transmitter needs to be very big if one wants a good range. Thus the most powerful automaton in the UR (those on Notos, Eole's sea moon) can answer to the mother ship up to a 5 km distance. The computing engine is the automaton's brain (but not its memory), and is needed to answer complex orders and to carry out precise tasks, often the brain capacity directly limits the mobile and computing capacity of the automaton, indeed a fine clockwork body unable to distinguish two vocal orders correctly is wasted technology. |
