[roombad]

I don't think it's really true to say that the issue is hardware or software. There is lots of robotics in everyday life, from autonomous vacuums in our homes to autonomous factories producing the goods we consume. The reason we don't have millions of little robots buzzing around us is... there's very little need for it.

The average human spends most of their time barely engaged, our brains and bodies are operating far below what we're capable of, the romanticised sci-fi vision of a world filled with intelligent robots performing every menial task for humans builds on the idea that humans have better things to do, but do we? We already have enough knowledge and resources to end world hunger, to bring a high standard of living to every human, but we choose not to: our problem is social, not software or hardware.

As an aside, I'd dispute the claim that hardware is lagging behind software: Tesla has lots of money and lots of smart people and they haven't been able to deliver self driving cars after more than a decade of promises (because of software).

[squabble]

Can you be more specific about what the social problem is? Do you know of anyone who is working to solve it?