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> A robot has no way of knowing if the coffee will taste good or contains rat poison Eventually automated systems ought to be able to do this better than most

• j7ake 9y ago
  Because there is no theory linking interaction of molecules to flavour yet, although there are some preliminary work from some labs on this (with beer)
  • setr 9y ago
    Seeing as humans don't usually taste their coffee before serving, identifying flavour is probably not strictly necessary to the task. And given that the act of making good-enough coffee isn't a very difficult task (given how readily available and quickly trained "baristas" are), and how mechanical the process is already, im not sure there's anything to suggest it isn't do-able. Its more likely a matter of cost and scale
    • freeflight 9y ago
      Smelling is already a form of tasting, just like looking at how it behaves because we humans are really good at combining our senses to get the input we look for, that's why most people usually don't taste the coffee before serving, unless it's smelling/looking funny while brewing. Replicating this with electrical sensors is a pretty complex task we still haven't managed to get working, after all we are not only talking about replicating the sense of taste but also the sense of smelling and how they interact with each other.
      • setr 9y ago
        You don't actually have to replicate the interaction though, you just need to identify the particular range of smells that people accept, and have the machine capable of detecting it. Generating a brand new style of good coffee might need the interaction though
        • freeflight 9y ago
          But different people are accepting of different tastes and even those change with age, what people accept as nice smelling/tasting food can be quite subjective because the very same smell can be overpowering to some while appealing to others. How to calibrate a sensor for something like that on a per user basis? I don't know, but apparently it's possible because "electronic noses" do exist but are mostly used in laboratory settings, probably on account of their price. There's also a reason why we still use pigs and dogs for work that require good smelling senses, like search&rescue or truffle foraging. Training these animals is very expensive, but it still seems to be the cheaper option compared to building "smellobots", so I doubt smelling sensor are far enough along to be put into a ton of kitchen bots at small cost.
    • HeyLaughingBoy 9y ago
      Its more likely a matter of cost and scale This is not a trivial matter! Cost is entirely the reason a host of technologically-possible automation hasn't happened outside a lab.
  • jamesrcole 9y ago
    I said "eventually". Are you saying it will never be possible?
    • astrodust 9y ago
      Never is a long time, but it's also a theroetical. The sun will eventually engulf the Earth rendering this argument irreelvant.
      • jamesrcole 9y ago
        It works both ways, though. I was responding to a claim with an implicit "never" possible. Like you say, such a claim is theoretical, and I wanted to ask how that person knew it would never be possible. Smell, taste and poison are all matters of physical molecules and how these interact with human physiology. We already understand these to some extent. We can already build devices that can detect some of these things to some extent. We have no grounds to say it's impossible for a human-level ability of it to be engineered. (Note that lack of positive evidence against X is not the same as positive evidence for X).