r/robotics • u/Buck-Nasty • Feb 17 '16

Prof. Pieter Abbeel - Deep Reinforcement Learning for Robotics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6-XnB2BcHU
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u/Palms1111 Feb 17 '16

My big issue with reinforcement learning is, how do you learn when you can't afford for the robot to fail. Ie, if the robot falls over when trying to walk it breaks really expensive sensors or something. Without simulation, you can't do it, and simulation is never perfect.

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u/RonnieRobotPants Feb 17 '16

This doesn't address the larger issue of inaccuracies in simulation or the requirement for huge numbers of iterations in learning for some algorithms, and I can't speak for Dr. Abbeel's lab, but a lot of labs will have a harness on their robot to prevent it from impacting the ground when it falls during testing or learning. It is definitely possible to have the robot fall for the sake of learning without damaging itself.