1. Proposal number: 3

“Developmentally Learning the Support Affordance of a Platform”

2. Should this proposal be considered for the Best Proposal prize? no

3. On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate the overall organization/clarity
of the proposal? 8

4. On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate the overall project idea? 8

Then write 2-3 pages of helpful feedback to the proposal's
author(s). The following questions should help you organize your
feedback:

* Overall, is the proposal clear, concise, and well-organized?

The proposal is clear and well organized.

* Does the proposal meet the posted proposal guidelines?

Yes, for the most part. The related work, however, doesn’t include much work in robotics in which robots have probed objects and observed how they move.

* How does the project idea fit within the framework of Developmental Robotics?

The project fits very well in framework of development. The method mimics early childhood exploration of objects.

* Describe what you like BEST and LEAST about the project idea.

My favorite part of the idea is that it deals with learning object affordances.

My least favorite part of the project is that the evaluation is not very clear. To me, it seems that there is a lot more that can be learned from the data than just the
boundary of support.

* Do you have any concerns about the project? Does it seem doable in the remaining time?

The three stages of object exploration will probably take quite a bit to implement. The authors might want to focus on just 2 of them and assume the other is known
a-prior (e.g., the calibration stage 1 may not be necessary if the project is going to focus on other aspects).

* Does it seem too difficult?

It doesn’t seem easy.

* Are there any major details left out?

Yes, some. For example, the evaluation is not very well defined and it is unclear what exactly the robot will learn or anticipate.

* Does the idea rely upon technologies that are not currently available?

No.

* Do you have any suggestions for improvement? Do you have any suggestions for related work that should be cited?

I have a few suggestions for the authors. First, it seems that a lot more can be learned from the data other than just the support boundary. The robot could in
principle use this setup to learn about the friction of the object and the inclined plane. For example, different pairs of objects and plains will result in different
velocities of motion of the object, so perhaps some kind of categorization could be performed.

Along with that, varying the angle of the plane could also be used to learn that at different angles, objects move with different velocities. Also, if using object
visual features in the model, simply using height and width may be insufficient since the shape of the object also influences how it moves - for example, a ball rolls
pretty fast, while a wooden block probably slides slow.

Finally, I would also suggest the authors do a thorough related work section so that other work in robotics in that area is accounted for. This way, the project will
focus on methods that are novel and ensure that the work can be published.