Towards A Relational Approach For Tool Creation By Robots

Like a human, a robot may benefit from being able to use a tool to solve a complex task. When an appropriate tool is not available, a very useful ability for a robot would be to create a novel one based on its past experience. With the advent of inexpensive 3D printing, it is now possible to give robots such an ability, at least to create simple tools. We propose a method for learning how to use an object as a tool and, if needed, to design and construct a new tool.