Atlas the robot was killed off yesterday, only to rise from the dead today. So don’t write off the robot uprising just yet. Boston Dynamics released a video on Tuesday announcing the retirement of Atlas, the most famous humanoid robot in the world. But eagle-eyed observers noticed something curious in the announcement. The description in Atlas’s retirement video said the hydraulic Atlas was going away. And skeptics were right to take notice of that word.
And then there’s Tesla, which is trying to build its own humanoid robot, even if it’s currently way behind the competition. Arguably the most interesting tidbit in the latest announcement from Boston Dynamics includes hints that Atlas might start to move in decidedly non-human ways. And the video clearly hints at that with the rather dramatic new contortions of Atlas.