Beam robotics invented by Mark W. Tilden is about analog circuits for controlling robots. The idea is to avoid microcontrollers and software and use instead resistors, breadboards and capacitor for controlling a line following robot. The problem with BEAM robots is, that they don't provide complex features and it's not possible to build walking robots out of analog circuits, because dynamic walking is non-linear problem which has to be treated with digital computers and algorithms.
On the other hand, there is a topic in the Artificial Intelligence domain available called Fuzzy logic which is based on continuous signals. A value like “left” can become -2, -1, 0 and also numbers with fractions. This makes it a natural choice for simulating fuzzy logic with analog circuits. Some papers are available which are explaining how to do this in detail for example “Alfredo Sanz: Analog Implementation of Fuzzy Controller, 1994“ which demonstrated a working fuzzy logic controller in the SPICE software.
Is it possible to combine BEAM robotics and fuzzy control to build analog intelligent robots?
