During Tesla’s third-quarter earnings call, Elon Musk once again reminded everyone that his endgame is to become a comic book supervillain. Musk told investors that unless they give him a $1 trillion compensation package, he might walk away. He reasons that he needs enough control to feel “comfortable” building what he literally called a “robot…
The other day US President Donald Trump said: “With a communist in charge? Look, you just go back a thousand years, it’s been done many times, a thousand years, it’s never worked once.” He was talking about Zohran Mamdani, the leading candidate for New York City’s mayoral election on November 4, who says he is…
Support CleanTechnica’s work through a Substack subscription or on Stripe. Earlier this week, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China met in a plenary session and developed recommendations for the nation’s 15th five-year plan, which would run through 2030. There are many aspects of the recommendations that could be explored in more depth,…
Already the world’s richest man, Elon Musk is defending his proposed $1 trillion Tesla pay package—arguing it’s less about joining the trillionaires club and more about making sure he can’t be sidelined. “I just don’t feel comfortable building a robot army here and then being ousted because of some asinine recommendations from ISS and Glass…
Tesla might be an electric auto maker, but CEO Elon Musk has made clear that he thinks of it as much more: an innovator in artificial intelligence and software, a builder of world-shaking robots. He’s also argued that Tesla should be worth a lot more than it is today: up to $20 trillion, he posted…
Elon Musk’s lofty vision for Tesla includes less attention on electric vehicles and a doubling down on its autonomous robots, even as production for the bots have hit numerous snags. The Tesla CEO said on Monday 80% of Tesla’s value would someday come from Optimus robots, the humanoid bots Musk’s company introduced in 2021, intended…
Two new papers in Science Robotics, published on August 27 by UC Berkeley roboticist Ken Goldberg, argue that truly capable humanoid robots remain far further off than the most optimistic timelines suggest. While large language models (LLMs) surged into everyday use by training on vast internet text, Goldberg says robots can’t ride the same data…
The crowd holds its breath: a small metallic man crouches, gathers momentum, and tries to execute a somersault. He spins in the air… and crashes onto his back. The stands erupt in laughter. Meanwhile, in the ring, two more skillful humanoids trade kicks and punches; one loses rhythm, stumbles, and his rival takes advantage of…
A robotics entrepreneur says his company is nearing completion of a “pregnancy robot,” with a prototype to be ready for sale as early as next year. “Some people don’t want to get married but still want a ‘wife’; some don’t want to be pregnant but still want a child. So one function of our ‘robot…
P6-4 is suspended in the air, hanging from a small crane by ropes, with its limbs stiff and limp. Its feet do not touch the ground. It seems inactive, but when running a hand over the cold, metallic frame of its chest, an inner vibration can be felt, like that of computers in standby mode….