Robots can run faster than elite human sprinters, but are they really athletes?

A humanoid robot running 100 metres in 9.39 seconds sounds extraordinary. At this week’s World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, one machine reportedly beat the world record held by Usain Bolt, while another jumped higher than Javier Sotomayor’s long-standing high jump mark. On the surface, these achievements appear to represent a new frontier in sport. But comparing robotic and human performance is fundamentally flawed. The World Humanoid Robot Games brought together more than 2,000 robots…