[helltone]

Every time I see these headlines, the tech seems to be at least 10 years away from product.

- demos done in a lab controlled environment without the crazy things that happen in a real world.

- no humans nearby so none of the safety features that would be needed should this thing work alongside/near humans.

- no regards for economics, expensive vision models, expensive hardware, no consideration for maintenance and repair costs

[bob1029]

> no regards for economics

This is the #1 killer every time.

You will always find the most efficient farm machinery to be the least human-like in its design principles. The more it looks like something out of Mad Max the better.

Unless we come up with a machine like the combine harvester for blackberries, no one is going to be interested.

[Loughla]

>Unless we come up with a machine like the combine harvester for blackberries, no one is going to be interested.

Good news! https://airharvesters.com/

Clarkson's farm taught me that this is already a thing.

[Animats]

There are several kinds of blueberry picking machines. There are air-blast pickers that blow the berries off the plant. There are ones with wheels of vibrating sticks. There are ones that get a comb around the plant and pull.

Some berries get damaged, yes. Some leaves and twigs get through. They're separated out by a very fast vision-based sorting machine before packing.[1] That's been standard technology for a decade or so.

Apple picking is still in the R&D stage.[2] Cost needs to come down to $0.02 per pick.

It's great to see startups in this area, but the thing has to work. There are too many failed ag robotics startups.[3] Ask "could you pressure-wash this thing"? If there are wires, electronics, and bearings exposed, it's still experimental.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ica3FLAvPas

[2] https://goodfruit.com/lots-of-bots-video

[3] https://www.futurefarming.com/tech-in-focus/field-robots/cha...

[m463]

> Ask "could you pressure-wash this thing"?

Is that a necessary requirement? I mean, that would probably damage current harvesters, who are human people.

I mean, there are lots of parts of cars where pressure washing would probably force fluid into the bearings.

Might that not apply to hydraulic, pneumatic or electronic systems too?

(I do get what you're saying though)

[Animats]

Pressure washing a combine harvester.[1] Also trucks, tractors, etc. End of harvest cleanup for a farm in Minnesota.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-dOW2wn0rM

[elcritch]

Yes, powerwashing would be wanted. That's an IP69K, not too hard to hit with some basic mechanical protections.

Unless you need delicate sensors which need direct contact to samples to work.

Maybe it's not a complete necessity, but generally it's gonna be mixed in with big farm equipment that is power washed. The more you have to "coddle" the equipment the less cost effective it'll be for farmers.

Farm workers generally know how to wash themselves. Still I'd wage good money farm hands have used power washers on each other. Probably work well to clean off work coveralls!

[andylynch]

Used to work on a farm, and yes we did do this.

Also, our wash down hoses were basically power washers, but like 10x the volume.

[pjc50]

> used power washers on each other

Probably, but this is unsafe - you don't want to deal with high pressure jets of water or flying debris near eyes.

[skeezyboy]

>Farm workers generally know how to wash themselves. Source?

[9rx]

> Is that a necessary requirement?

Strictly it needn't be if it offers an even better solution, but, realistically, what startup trying to introduce a new technology (that isn't cleaning technology) has time to also develop a novel way to clean things? It is such an unlikely scenario that it isn't worth considering.

[9rx]

> You will always find the most efficient farm machinery to be the least human-like in its design principles [...] the combine harvester

Oh? I find my human-based process for separating grain to be of the very same principles as the combine. The specific mechanics aren't exactly the same. For example a combine has a fan, while I have lungs. But the principle — using airflow to aid in separation — is the same.

The sprayer is the only piece of equipment on my farm I can think of that employs a different principle to do the job as compared to how I would do the job by hand.

[dagw]

In most cases if you want to machine harvest you have to design your field around that. A vineyard, for example, that is designed to be machine harvested looks very different from one that is designed to be hand harvested. So if you want to machine harvest blackberries at scale you probably have to plant and manage your blackberry bushes in a specific way to allow for machine harvesting.

[MarkusQ]

> "...plant and manage blackberry bushes..."

Have you ever dealt with blackberry brambles? Because "plant" and "manage" aren't the words that come to mind. "Dominate" and "contain"... maybe?

[EA-3167]

This is a classic example of University press releases, you learn to recognize the pattern. Someone who's skill set is PR gets a dumbed-down version of the science, and then converts that into a hype piece that ignores reality in favor of vague statements.

If you want the essence of this technique look at any university press release about fusion technology.

[PaulHoule]

... and if you ask them "got RSS?" they're the least likely to respond.

[FirmwareBurner]

>Every time I see these headlines, the tech seems to be at least 10 years away from product.

There's no incentive for the capital class to massively invest in fruit picking robotics when there are tens of millions of exploitable humans on the planet that you can use do the same job for dirt cheap.

The economic balance needs to change for change to happen.

That's why the capital class is overinvesting in AI, because that can potentially replace the higher paid jobs where the labor has leverage and turn them into similarly exploitable workers.

[ghostly_s]

The quote from the researcher is that one "could [hypothetically] design something that is better than the human hand for that one specific task," which gets turned into "some day this specific device could be better" in the prose, which becomes a suggestion that hey, maybe it already is better! in the headline. Everything published by a Uni PR department is a puff piece, frankly I don't know why they're even allowed here.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

I agree, we should not allow PR puff pieces by universities, or by technology companies, either.

[baxtr]

I am not an "AI will kill all jobs" fan at all.

Although when it comes to precedents, "robots" have (luckily) taken many jobs in agriculture already.

[skeezyboy]

theres something noble about back breaking labour for little pay whilst the owner makes the bulk of the profit.... o wait theres not

[RataNova]

Yeah, this is the classic robotics hype cycle

[01100011]

Well the economics of farm labor seem to be changing dramatically now, so maybe formerly expensive methods become profitable?