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Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

m.good.is

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Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#101

Post by lostlogin »

tezza wrote: post #77
nir wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of my friends served in the IDF engineering corps and cleared mines in the Golan as part of their service, I assure you they're not goats :) (Many mines are also designed to be triggered under a certain weight, so goats can walk freely on them and not get hurt) One interesting method I read about is seeding the area (from the air) with a certain flower. When it blooms, the contents of the ground affect the color…

Lol. I wasn't saying goats are the only methods! Merely a cheap passive solution. Dedicated and skilled engineers best of course.

Not sure passive is the right word.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#102

Post by chernevik »

It is depressing to me that a community as smart as this is so congratulatory of such inch-deep stuff. Oooh, landmines! Design! Shiny! But a fast perusal of the comments shows that this approach is at best problematic. And a deeper reading of the comments suggests this might very well be a dangerous anti-pattern.

People, you are some of the brightest and cleverest people walking the earth. And the earth has some nasty problems. They won't be solved by meaning well or looking cool.

In my early days I worked with homeless and mentally disabled people, I migrated to government policy to solve larger problems, but I was perpetually frustrated by the refusal to ask hard questions of stuff that sounded good. And you know what? I am so sorry to tell you, but there are people who have noticed this persistent absence of accountability, and who are willing to exploit it.

I have no particular reason to believe that the designer in the OP is a cynic. But you do his effort to help no favors by upvoting it to the moon because it looks cool. The informed and thoughtful critique in the comments DOES help, and a dialogue talking about the potential application of design to the problem would help still further. Here are a few ideas: - Kids ignore warning signs around mine fields -- why not design hideous boundary demons to frighten them off? - Design "clear trail" markers apparent in all weather and easily moved to reflect cleared sections? - Mapped displays of mined areas as targets for Apple vs Microsoft battles to see who can clear more? - Does the computing power of Raspberry Pi offer new possibilities for cheap clearance -- maybe gather seismographic data with controlled explosions to be analyzed for "echoes" of a landmine? - Declaring total clearance is a problem, what if there were a program that took 99% cleared land and used as grazing pasture for 10 years so the cows can find the missing bombs?

These don't strike me as half bad and I suck so I expect most of this board can come up with better and more detailed.

The guy is trying to do something and that's great. But let's not just congratulate him and move on. Let's actually think about whether the damn thing helps, and if not, how design could help more.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#104

Post by monochromatic »

sgdesign wrote: post #31

Sorry for going completely off-topic, but I'm slightly annoyed at the overuse of adverbs like "hauntingly" and "wildly". "Hauntingly" might be tolerated here even if it is very hyperbolic, but "wildly low-cost"? What does that even mean?! Why can't the headline just be "Beautiful, Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines"? Oh, and another one that has been popping up a lot around here lately is "vanishingly" (I…

I am wildly supportive of this sentiment.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#105

Post by ms4720 »

primitur wrote: post #43
_djo_ wrote: post #13

Sadly, demining is not this simple or easy. Mine rollers and mine flails like this have been tried and tested since WWI but none have proven completely effective in finding and clearing mines. This is partially because they only work well on totally flat terrain and rapidly lose effectiveness in rougher terrain where a large number of mines are typically buried. In practice, solutions like this achieve only 50-60% ef…

Surprise, surprise .. 'authorities' are 'doing it better'. Well, this tech is not for the authorities. Its for children to use to help clear the danger away from their villages. Its a tech that anyone can apply, not just those with access industrialized manufacturing facilities and the 'mine-clearing economy'. 99% clearance rate? I think most villages would be happy with being able to clear a safe path for their kids…

A safe path is 99+% clear, this is not a 99% solution. And please keep in mind human nature, a false sense of security will kill you. If it is a flat out no go zone people will avoid it, if they think it is safe they will find mines on there own. Fear can keep you alive and anything that lessens the fear of the minefield without rendering it safe is a net loss of human life in my opinion.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#106

Post by batgaijin »

chernevik wrote: post #102

It is depressing to me that a community as smart as this is so congratulatory of such inch-deep stuff. Oooh, landmines! Design! Shiny! But a fast perusal of the comments shows that this approach is at best problematic. And a deeper reading of the comments suggests this might very well be a dangerous anti-pattern. People, you are some of the brightest and cleverest people walking the earth. And the earth has some nast…

I think people like ideas like this because the idea that USA is going to back down to some where-the-fuck-am-I place in northern Cambodia and Laos to remove the bombs we dropped is laughable: http://truth-out.org/news/item/3001:landmines-and-cluster-bo...

You act cynical and as though you have a 'realist' point of view, but nowhere do you mention holding the countries that dropped these weapons accountable. Why don't we shame them? Why don't we pay for handicapped children to come to the USA and peacefully sit in on protests? Why not make this the embarrassing issue it should be?

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#107

Post by wtvanhest »

reitzensteinm wrote: post #48
primitur wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not suitable - for military purposes. DEODU is a military organization, and any conclusions it makes must be viewed in that light. Mine-clearing is a war tool as much as it is a peace tool.

You're getting downvoted because civilian requirements are higher than military. If you manage to clear a field such that there is a single mine in it, it will likely become safer to march through than avoid - there are plenty of other things that can kill you, and they must be triaged in war time. However, if you take that same field after the war is over and put a farmer on it, it's basically a matter of time until…

While you are probably right about this mine clearing tool, there have been previous examples that show the military’s requirements for particular items are much higher than civilian requirements in times of relative peace. Obviously when there is a world war, requirements go down dramatically to get things done, but when making purchase decisions in time of peace it seems that requirements are very high. Items like devices/vehicles etc. get very expensive and complex.

[Added] I’m talking from a US perspective, but it seems plausible that most developed country militaries spend on technology when in time of peace.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#108

Post by LaGrange »

humbledrone wrote: post #44
anthonyb wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only very slightly. Also, it suffers from the same problem as the Mine Kafon, in that it's a more-or-less random walk and you won't know whether the whole area is cleared.

> Only very slightly. Just to be clear, are you saying that it is only very slightly better for a sheep, rather than a human child, to be maimed by a land mine? That seems to be what you wrote, but I'm having a very difficult time reconciling your world view with my own, so I'm hoping that I am somehow misunderstanding.

Both involve sentient beings. This is not about valuing children less. This is about valuing sheep more.

This might be an uncomfortable world view, taking how much we depend on non-human abuse in our civilization, but it's not the only case where we built it on abuse of others, human or not.

Re: Low-cost Solution to Clearing Afghan Landmines

#110

Post by JoeAltmaier »

_djo_ wrote: post #64
TeMPOraL wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favourite solution so far was to use plants that turn red near mines, thus pretty much creating red circles around their location. I read about it few years ago in a science magazine, but somehow the research seems to have died. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demining#Plants

Unfortunately Aresa Biodetection, the company behind that, stopped all research into their strain of the thale cress plant for landmine detection. I would guess that they hit a dead-end in their research, perhaps they could not make it reliable enough.

Maybe they couldn't find a farmer brave enough to seed a minefield?
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