Maurice Leacock is a senior technical product manager at iRobot, which manufactures (among many other devices) the Roomba, the hands-free vacuum cleaner that bumps around your living room. He’s also a husband and father of two (soon to be three). Between personal and professional obligations, he was kind enough to enlighten us about the mechanics of creating a real robot, the pratfalls of fictional ones, and why a microwave oven isn’t a robot at all.

What does a real robot look like?

We describe robots as devices, platforms or systems that “perform dull, dirty and dangerous jobs that folks are unwilling or unable to do.” That can be applied in quite a few ways. The Lexus that can park itself is technically a robot—it can semi-autonomously do something that usually requires complex human mechanics, brain power and a lot of practice to do accurately and precisely every time.

Read more HERE.