Archaeology, neuroscience, and robotics join to investigate robots that invent tools

The METATOOL project received 4 million euros from the European Innovation Council (EIC) and the 'Awareness Inside' Pathfinder Challenge to investigate how robots can invent new tools as ancient humans did. A consortium of seven research institutions and companies including Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, led by Ricardo Sanz (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid) and Pablo Lanillos (Donders Institute, Radboud University) has been funded by the European Innovation Council with four million euros to investigate how robots can develop cognitive abilities for inventing tools as ancient humans did around three million years ago. Archaeology, neuroscience, and robotics join forces to shed light on this technological leap that our ancestors achieved, and to develop novel technology inspired by human metacognition and awareness. Understanding the past to create the future. There is no consensus about when our specific modern human cognitive and metacognitive abilities evolved, and what drove the origins of tool invention and creation. We know, through archaeological records of ancient technologies, that there was a critical transition from using tools, a widespread animal behaviour, to making tools. Around 3.3 million years ago, our hominin ancestors made the first tools, creating simple stones with sharp edges.