From Da Vinci's Mechanical Knight to Optimus
AI can write poetry and explain physics — but it can't pick up a coffee cup. This book is about closing that gap. 12 chapters on how intelligence gets a body, who's building the future of physical AI, and what it means for all of us.
Newly published by Robonaissance. 3–5 deep-dive articles weekly on AI, robotics, and the future of civilization.
From the first mechanical automata to the foundation models being trained right now. The first two chapters are free — unlock the full 12-chapter journey.
The Robot's ImageNet Moment, and why seeing isn't the same as understanding.
Motors, sensors, batteries: the unglamorous breakthroughs that made capable robots affordable.
Teaching robots through trial and error, the simulator revolution, and robot "imagination."
How large language models gave robots common sense. The RT-2 and VLA breakthroughs.
Figure, 1X, Sanctuary, and the new generation betting billions on humanoid robots.
Elon Musk's gamble: is robotics a manufacturing problem or an AI problem?
Unitree, Agibot, and whether the EV playbook will work for robots.
What "deployed" actually means. The chasm between demo videos and commercial reality.
Foundation models for robots, scaling laws for physical AI, and the data problem no one has solved.
When machines can do what we do, what is left that is distinctly human?
Whether you're an investor evaluating the next wave, an engineer building it, or simply someone who wants to understand what's coming.
You follow AI developments and want the full picture of how physical AI is evolving beyond chatbots and image generators.
Evaluate the humanoid robot boom with frameworks for separating real progress from demo-day hype. Chapters 7–11 are your map.
Gain historical context and a synthesis of the competitive landscape. Understand how your work fits the bigger picture.
No technical background needed. This book explains why embodied intelligence matters and what it means for the future of work and humanity.
Perspectives from readers across tech, investing, and beyond.
"Finally, someone who explains robotics with real people, real stories, and real insight instead of jargon and hype."
"I came for the Tesla analysis. I stayed for the history. I left understanding why this matters more than I thought."
"The best framework I've found for evaluating robotics companies and claims."
Read the first two chapters at no cost. Subscribe to unlock the complete 12-chapter journey.
On a September morning in 1961, a two-ton machine made history by doing something utterly mundane: it picked up a piece of hot metal and put it down somewhere else.
The machine was called Unimate, and it stood on the factory floor of a General Motors plant in Trenton, New Jersey. Its job was to tend a die-casting machine, pulling freshly molded metal parts from the press and stacking them for cooling. The work was dangerous, repetitive, and mind-numbing. It was also, for the first time in history, being done by a robot.
Unimate performed flawlessly. It repeated the same sequence of motions, hour after hour, with a precision no human could match. The arm swung to the die-casting machine, the gripper closed on the part, the arm swung back, the gripper released. Again. Again. Again...
50+ companies. Billions of dollars. A 500-year dream finally within reach. Understand what's happening — and what comes next.
