Mindless Automatons

Many animals get by with very simple nervous systems and little or no brain. With a proper neural network and sensory system, these animals can perform quite complex behaviors without having to learn them. Even among creatures like ourselves, much of our behavior takes place at the level of the spinal cord. "Reflexive" animal models such as these can serve as a template for robotic programming when the behavior and physiology are understood. It is even possible to use cybernetic techniques to model complex systems in ecology (an example is here) The programming methods for the Aibo and i-Cybie robots is analogous to these animal systems. Get more details here.