The word robot comes from the Czech word robota, meaning drudgery or slave-like labor. It was first used to describe fabricated workers in a fictional 1920s play by Czech author Karel Capek called Rossums Universal Robots. In the story, a scientist invents robots to help people by performing simple, repetitive tasks. However, once the robots are used to fight wars, they turn on their human owners and take over the world

Facts

• A robot is a machine that is controlled by a computer program to complete a series of actions.
• The most basic robots are programmed to perform and complete the most basic actions over and over again. Basic robots are used in factories to do the things humans would find boring doing over and over again, like picking up things and moving them from one place to another.
• Robots are getting more and more sophisticated all the time as the programs are getting more complicated

Did You Know?

• Some robots are programmed to venture into places like space where it would be far too dangerous to send a human. Robots are also being developed to help surgeons perform difficult operations.
• Scientists have not yet developed a robot that can truly think for itself. Robots rely on their computer programs and the programmer who writes the program.
• The word robot comes from the Czechoslovakian word robota which basically means 'having to do work".