Solving the ABC block problem using Human Level Artificial Intelligence

Note:  To make this website free to the public please click on an ad to support my sponsors or you can make a tax-deductable donation using Paypal (click on the donation icon on the left).

Solving the ABC block problem is a very popular problem for AI researchers. I don't think that anyone has built a robot that can solve the ABC block problem in a universal way (not that I know of -- 2013). There are lots of expert programs specifically designed to solve this problem. The ABC block problem is a robot sitting on the floor and he has to stack up 3 blocks (ABC) in alphabetical order.

What I'm trying to demonstrate here is a robot that can stack ABC blocks based on any instructions. Someone might ask the robot to stack up the blocks from A-Z backwards or to stack up the blocks horizontally or diagonally or stack the blocks up based on rules.

In modern AI (2013), researchers are still using hierarchical recursive planning programs in order to solve the ABC block problem. The strip program is very popular because the software breaks up a task into sub-tasks and solves the little problems first before solving the bigger problems. These researchers has to understand that they have to build a robot that can not only stack up blocks, but can do any human task. Using recursive planning programs isn't the answer.

My robot doesn't use hierarchical recursive planning programs or heuristic searches to stack up the blocks. My robot can stack up the ABC blocks using any stacking instructions. You can tell the robot to stack up the blocks backwards or stack up the blocks alphabetically with missing letters. This robot can follow any instructions to stack ABC blocks.

This video was tough to make because I had provide the details of how the robot thinks when he is stacking the blocks. For example, the robot uses the ABC song to understand the order of alphabets. If the robot wanted to know what letter comes before P, he will sing the ABC song in his mind to know what letter comes before P.

Also, there are some things that are very difficult to understand. When the robot wants to grab the A block, but the C block is stacked on the A block, the robot has to know he must take the C block and put it on the floor in order to grab the A block.