Robot

September 23, 2008 by dwyke
Filed under Golf Equipment, Main Story, PR Material

At last – I have discovered the ultimate gadget. It is a robot that acts as your own personal caddy. The great Bobby Jones once famously said “If I needed advice from my caddy, he’d be hitting the shots and I’d be carrying the bag”. 75 years later there are still those who question the caddy issue. Does the perfect caddy exist? Surely not, at least not in human form. And who wants to play eighteen holes with an imperfect caddy?

According to Lawrence Donegan, in his brilliant book Four-iron in the soul, a caddy needs all of the following attributes:

the golfing brain of Jack Nicklaus,
a thick skin,
the psychological sophistication of a £500-an-hour shrink,
low cunning,
the motivational powers of a five-star general,
a robust constitution,
strong legs,
the organisational skills of a Psion 3a,
loyalty, and
guile.

Donegan should know what he’s talking about, because he became a caddy for pro-golfer Ross Drummond for a season, travelling with him on the European Tour from end to end. Donegan’s book is an eyeopening account of what really goes on behind the scenes. The world that caddies live in turns out to be a rather dark place, but lit by bursts of adventure and hilarity. It seems that caddies are mostly a weary, cynical, resentful lot. They cope by gathering together with other caddies, drinking heavily, and swapping stories about how useless are the very golfers who pay their wages.

In fairness, it can’t be an easy life being a caddy. They are hired and fired on a whim, blamed for talking too much, or too little, or wincing, or smirking, or standing in the wrong place, or breathing at just the wrong moment. Not to mention recommending the wrong club, or judging the wind direction wrongly, or not finding a lost ball.

When Donegan began working for Drummond he didn’t know much about what the role entailed, but he managed to get the job by sheer naïvety and enthusiasm. Drummond told him “I’ve never really had much faith in caddies, they always let you down. It’s almost as if they want to let you down on purpose, make you sack them so they can go and work for a more successful player.” At the end of the season, after Donegan had caddied for him in Cape Town, Morocco, Portugal, Madeira, Madrid, Versailles, Valderrama and a lot more places besides, he admitted that he still didn’t know how to be a ‘proper’ caddy even then, let alone a perfect one.

But perhaps the perfect caddy does indeed exist. Enter Asimo. Asimo is a robot that could become the most flawless golfing companion imaginable. Let’s measure it against Donegan’s checklist. Strong legs? No problem there – solid metal. Thick skin? Certainly – solid metal once again. organisational skills? Sure – it’s a computer on legs, for heaven’s sake. It could organise the entire Ryder Cup.

So far so good. But what about the rest of the checklist? Expecting a robot to have the golfing skills of Jack Nicklaus is clearly a bit of a stretch. On the other hand, Asimo watches and learns without ever tiring. It sees where the ball goes, and could calculate and locate its position with accuracy. So,during the time it takes you to lick your finger and put it into the air in a pretence that you know how to judge the weather, Asimo has calmly calculated the exact distance to play, the precise wind direction and strength, the difference in height between you and the green, the moisture level of the ground, the length and type of grass, and about a hundred other little things that you hadn’t thought of, including the technical specifications of the clubs and the ball you happen to be using that day. Before your finger is even dry, Asimo has done more calculations than you will do in a lifetime, chosen precisely the right club for the occasion, and given it a nice little polish.

Let’s see what else was on the list. Robust constitution? Look, Asimo has a robot constitution, which is presumably as robust as you can get. Certainly more than a caddy with a hangover. Loyalty? Certainly. In fact, Asimo will never bad-mouth you in its life. It will always be there for you. From early morning practice sessions to late night chores such as cleaning your golf shoes for the following day, Asimo is your faithful assistant.

But how about those psychological and motivational powers? The ideal caddy has to be able to lift your game and get you through the low times.How can a robot do that?

For my money,Asimo wins on that count as well. Look, do you really want a £500-an-hour shrink shadowing you around a golf course for five hours? Just imagine what would happen when you make a terrible shot. Out of the corner of your eye you would see your psychiatrist weighing up how to say something motivational to you, when all you want is dignified silence. I once heard of a man who hit his shrink over the head with a paperweight, causing a large bump to appear. “Shrink that!”, he said triumphantly.

No, a £500-an-hour psychiatrist is the last thing you need. If you do meet one, I recommend you buy him a house and run off. It will be cheaper that way.

Asimo The Loyal Robot, however, is a different proposition entirely. Compared with the average playing partner it would be glorious. No fatuous comments, no gratuitous remarks, no smirks or grimaces or whistlings through clenched teeth or feeble hoppings from foot to foot or any of the other peculiar things that caddies and partners do when you play an appalling shot. They say “Oh, bad luck!”, when the truth is that you simply played like a fool. In contrast, Asimo stands discretely on the sidelines, watching with quiet enthusiasm where the ball disappears to, and makes absolutely no editorial comment to make on the subject. No disdain, no boredom, no impatience, no clumsy attempts to cheer you on, nothing. The silence is not of someone thinking you’re an idiot and not saying – It is the peace of a colleague who is incapable of having such thoughts in the first place. Bliss.

What’s more, you could program Asimo to recognise a superb shot when it does eventually see one. So, on that rare occasion you would hear the phrase “Oh,well done! Nice work there!” and know that these aren’t the words of someone who really means “You lucky little squirt” or “You couldn’t repeat that shot in a thousand tries, not even if I offered you everything I own.” No, when Asimo says “Well done” it really would mean “Well done”, based on completely objective criteria. No need for false modesty in response – it really was a brilliant shot. How wonderful it would be to have such a colleague, cheerfully sharing your journey with you, never tiring, never losing faith in you. How great to have a caddy who not only doesn’t mind when you are grumpy but who doesn’t even notice when you are.

It’s hard to think of a negative side to such a chum. Would Asimo get rusty if it rained? Not if you gave it waterproofs. What if its battery runs down? Simply place emergency spare ones at strategic points along the course, perhaps next to the refreshment stands. By the way, it turns out that Asimo’s battery is located in its belly. At refreshment times, therefore, you both fill your stomachs and, refreshed, carry on.

But what if everyone bought such a robot, thus removing your cunningly-won advantage? Simple. You would all settle down to enjoy the game. Golf would enter a new Civilised Age, where everyone would have the most polite assistants imaginable, a personal Jeeves but without the all-knowing twitch of the upper lip. Who wouldn’t rather like having an intelligent servant on hand 24 hours a day, and without need of guilt. Discrete,supportive, useful, steadfast. Life would be pretty good, don’t you think?

But how realistic is all this? Does Asimo exist? Yes. Asimo is indeed real. There aren’t many around, but as I write these words there is at least one in Britain.What does it look like? When you encounter it for the first time you are struck by its short stature. It is only 1.2m high, about four feet tall. But what mostly strikes you is its undoubted humanness. You find yourself quickly forgetting it’s a robot at all, because it moves like a little person. In fact, like a boy.

Why a boy and not a girl? It’s hard to tell. Perhaps having a name ending in ‘o’ leads you into that direction. Either way, this little character has personality when it moves. It’s partly the arms, the way they are bent in a serious and determined way, like the arms of a little chap proudly walking onto the stage in a school hall on prize-giving day. He seems to lean forward slightly, eager to discover what life is about, but silent and good-mannered in a way that no actual child is today.

Actual children of Asimo’s height today watch Celebrity Love Island on their personal TV sets in their bedrooms, thus learning how to become annoying when they grow up. In contrast, Asimo is the model child that listens and watches and learns, doesn’t interrupt, doesn’t binge-drink, doesn’t present you with mobile phone bills, doesn’t demand expensive clothes, and doesn’t swear at you or say “Do you think I’m bothered?”

You cannot help smiling at Asimo. I think that anyone who doesn’t smile when watching him must be another robot. Perhaps this is how you tell people and robots apart.

Asimo is better natured than most people. You, perhaps. He also has a longer attention span than you have, and is quite possibly an altogether better person than you have ever dreamed of becoming.This makes him a role-model.

When he walks, he moves his hips the way a person does. His is not the walk of clunky robots we see in movies, like the one in Star Wars, the tall one with the annoying voice and the stiff action. Asimo moves in a way that can only be described as pleasing. You have to see it to believe it. There’s a website that shows him following a lady across a room. He keeps a respectful distance behind her. She then stops and turns. Asimo stops too, then seems to think for a moment and then takes a small step back in order to maintain the respectful distance.

In another sequence he is walking towards a lady and she raises her hand as if to ask him to stop. He obediently stops. In yet another video, she keeps walking into his path and he has to repeatedly walk around her. He never seems to get irritated by this.

When someone nods to him, he nods politely back. When someone holds out a hand, he shakes it with earnest courtesy. He once shook the hand with the Prime Minister of Belgium, which is something.

When Asimo walks, he walks with a cheerful eagerness and a strangely naïve deference, but also, perhaps, a hint of wistfulness. I have seen people’s eyes well up when confronting Asimo for the first time. I completely understand. Perhaps it has been so long since we have seen well-behaved children that we find ourselves melting a little at such a sight, drifting off for a moment into a Victorian romantic land of unfeasibly good manners.Yet all we are doing is peering at a robot. Who would have predicted it?

But the big question is: could Asimo really be a caddy? Yes, I think so, one day. He can already walk on sloping surfaces, including carpets, so a well-manicured course should be no problem for him. He could be programmed to select the optimum club, taking into account wind and weather conditions deduced from sensors that can be attached to his body. He can watch where the ball went and help you find it.

All of this is perfectly possible today.

Not only can he walk, but – be amazed at this – he can run. Really. Admittedly we’re not talking about a fast sprinter here. Asimo runs at about 3km per hour. But running it is, and he avoids bumping into people and falling into holes. It’s quite a sight.

He could also pull a golf cart. At this point I need to admit a little creative licence with some of the photographs we show here: we have brazenly taken liberties by retouching them slightly, placing golf clubs in his back pack. In reality, his back pack today is full of computer equipment. One day, with future miniaturisation, our photo could easily become real. One day, he will be able to walk in rough grass and tell you amusing anecdotes to help pass the time, and judge your mood from your body language and the electromagnetic waves emitted from your body. One day, he will be not only the perfect caddy but a perfect assistant, cooking your food, mixing your drinks, babysitting your children, cleaning your house and car, ironing your clothes, walking your dog, filling in your tax forms and driving you to work. One fine day all these nice things will happen.
But not quite yet. In fact, Asimo is not yet available for purchase. He is participating in various research projects, and occasionally he wows crowds at science museums and as the star guest at store openings, particularly car showroom openings. Honda car showrooms, to be precise. Honda created Asimo. He walks about, shakes people’s hands, bows, walks up and down stairs, learns his way around, holds a tray of drinks, and generally acts the part of the perfect assistant. But it will take time for someone to program him to be a caddy,and until then you will have to be a little patient.

When that day comes, the golfing powers-that-be will have to decide what Asimo actually is. As a caddy he can advise you on golf club selection. But as a mechanical device, he can’t. It’s a tough decision for the authorities to make, but it’s my bet that the public demand for such the perfect caddy will be overwhelming. A living, walking, charming, dependable character who everyone will want at their side at all times, in fact. I don’t know if Bobby Jones would have approved, but we have changed a little since those days. Today, we are the We Want It Now generation. Try stopping us.

My only hope is that Asimo continues to be trained in pleasing ways. It would be tragic if he learns attitudes from people around him. Imagine if he suddenly throws your clubs into the lake, swears at you, and walks off. “You’re fired!” you shout. “Do you think I’m bothered?” would be his reply, as he
disappears towards the bar.

www.world.honda.com/ASIMO

Tags: asimo, honda, robot