Research

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Teaching Robots to Play Soccer

On Human-Technology Relations in the Development of Software for Humanoid Robots

For my PhD project, I conducted ethnographic and autoethnographic research on how software for humanoid robots is written. I joined a team of computer scientists who programmed such robots to play soccer as an ethnographer and an active member who contributed to the team’s activities, including programming. Through this research, I aimed to find out how the programming processes and the software that is their result are influenced by social aspects, by imaginaries of robots and artificial intelligence, and by the technological objects the computer scientists interacted with.

Keywords:

Anthropology of Science and Technology, Material Culture, Lab Studies, Humanoid Robotics, Artificial Intelligence