A new breed of robot - [control robotics]

Designers of artificial cognitive systems (ACS) have, until recently, tended to adopt one of two approaches to thinking robots: classical rule-based artificial intelligence or artificial neural networks. However, a new breed of cognitive, learning robot developed through the European Union-funded project COSPAL (cognitive systems using perception-action learning) combines the best of both worlds. In this paper, the author describes the challenges faced by artificial cognitive system design and defines the progress made through the COSPAL project initiative.