cubelets

The key idea is deceptively simple: each Cubelet does only one thing, but neighboring Cubelets communicate to produce an ensemble with complex behavior.  Sense Cubelets turn signals from the real world (like light, temperature, and proximity) into a number; Action Cubelets turn numbers back into real world signals (like light, motion, and sound); and Think Cubelets (like minimum and maximum) operate on the numbers that flow through a Cubelets-based robot.  Inspired by Braitenberg’s Vehicles (the classic "Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology"), Cubelets aim to get people thinking about how complex systems emerge from local interactions.