R2-D2 or Rosie - who would you rather take for drinks?

Iron Giant by tacosauceninja - CC BY 3.0

Which of these is science fiction: self-driving cars, poker-playing computers or robot surgeons? None, as it turns out - they're all real. So, how far are sci-fi robots from the real thing?

As an artificial intelligence researcher who works with robots, I often ask myself that question. From the look of things, there is still a lot to accomplish before current robotics and artificial intelligence research catches up to popular culture, but in some cases, we're closer than you might think.

Here's how eight of pop culture's favourite robots stack up to reality.

R2-D2

Essentially the Swiss Army Knife of the rebellion in the Star Wars saga, this short all-terrain droid saved the galaxy time and time again with its bravery, ingenuity and multiple power tools. Although today we do have welding robots who work in factories following programmed directions, there aren't any yet that can repair a spaceship in the middle of a battle while being able to crack quips in a series of beeps.

• 2/10 True to real life
• 7/10 Would have drinks with
• 8/10 Would bring to family gathering

Bender

In the year 3000, the most memorable robot in Futurama is the alcohol-fuelled girder-bending Bender. Bender is capable of very versatile conversations, complete with his easy manipulation of his close, albeit dim-witted, friend Fry. Although Bender's conversation skills and mechanical strength are far beyond what current robotics can accomplish, the fact that he is fuelled by alcohol is not that far off the mark. A New Zealand company has been making biofuels from the yeast left over from beer for about two years now - so, in our not-so-distant future, a self-driving car could be asking for another pint.

• 1/10 True to real life
• 9/10 Would have drinks with
• 0/10 Would bring to family gathering

The Iron Giant

This 15-metre alien robot could have been the end of life on Earth except for a small bump on its head, which reset his prime directive. The Iron Giant is also able to reconstruct himself as any missing parts slowly roll towards his head and piece themselves back together. These auto-reassembling parts are similar to M-Blocks, small cube-like robots from MIT that can connect with each other to form larger structures such as bridges or furniture without any external moving parts.

• 4/10 True to real life
• 9/10 Would have drinks with
• 7/10 Would bring to family gathering

WALL-E

Waste Allocation Load Lifter, Earth-Class unit, or WALL-E, is responsible for cleaning up Earth. This curious little bot maintained its function for over 700 years. Although WALL-E's shovel hands, all-terrains treads and solar-power technology are all readily available today, the robot's curiosity is still science fiction. It turns out that curious robots are really hard to make, partly because there is no agreed-upon way to mathematically define curiosity. Nevertheless, curiosity in robotic agents is still an area of study, so hopefully we can discover how to program curiousness before we turn Earth into a barren wasteland covered in mountains of trash.

• 5/10 Realism
• 10/10 Would have drinks with
• 10/10 Would bring to family gathering

HAL 9000

2001: A Space Odyssey is a classic that has two kinds of giant robots: one is machine-made by an intelligent species that drives the story's twists and turns, and the other is HAL 9000. HAL 9000 is probably the most realistic on this list of futuristic robots, as HAL - which stands for Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic Computer - is essentially a personal assistant attached to a spaceship. It's easy to imagine going from, "Siri, call Home" to "OK Google, can you open the pod bay doors?"

• 10/10 True to real life
• 3/10 Would have drinks with
• 2/10 Would bring to family gathering

T-1000

The blockbuster that was Terminator 2 featured a robot made of a liquid metal, which allowed it to take on many forms, including super rad blade hands. Ignoring its assassination operating system, the liquid metal is surprisingly more possible than you might think. A lab at RMIT University in Australia has made a conductive liquid metal that can move and change shape based on what is around it. Although this breakthrough could help make electronics fully flexible, the T-1000 is still a long way off.

• 3/10 True to real life
• 2/10 Would have drinks with
• 1/10 Would bring to family gathering

Rosie

Although the Jetson's robo-maid Rosie is an outdated model, the space-age family keeps her around because of her down-to-Earth attitude and relationship with the kids. As every stay-at-home parent can tell you, cleaning and picking up after children is no easy task. Fortunately, there has been a lot of progress in this area - from Roomba vacuum robots to the more high-tech robot maids from Japan that can empty a dishwasher. However, the price tag on robot maids is well beyond most cars and they only work in specialized kitchens. So, it will be quite a while before the household chore list gets noticeably shorter thanks to a robot.

• 4/10 True to real life
• 7/10 Would have drinks with
• 8/10 Would bring to family gathering

Baymax

Out of all of the robots on this list, this large marshmallow pillow probably gives the best hugs. Baymax, from Big Hero 6, is a personal health-care companion that, with a simple scan, can detect vitals and treat nearly any ailment. Robots have an exciting role in health care, from helping with surgery to being used as prosthetic devices and even delivering medication within a hospital. Given these advances, some of the medical functions Baymax has at its disposal will soon be in robots at a hospital near you - minus the rocket-powered superhero stuff.

• 7/10 True to real life
• 9/10 Would have drinks with
• 9/10 Would bring to family gathering

Jaden Travnik, '15 BSc(Spec), is a researcher in the Bionic Limbs for Improved Natural Control (BLINC) Lab at the University of Alberta. He is also a master's student in the U of A's Department of Computing Science.