Robonauts ~ Affordably Accelerating to the Stars

Astronauts, Cosmonauts, Taikonauts... Robonauts. The affordable pioneers of space civilization will be automata, both teleoperated and entirely autonomous mechanisms acting on our behalf. I'm all for humans in space -- indeed, I too want to go Beyond Our Cradle -- but the pathway will be paved by our machines doing all the dirty and dangerous work for us. The next visitors to the Moon, for instance, really need to be Armbots and Buzzbots, not more extraordinarily expensive humans.