God this is awful. Just a matter of time before these beasts are used to serve search warrants, deal with "difficult" protests, etc.
DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
11–20 of 92 posts
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#12Disaster recovery, assistance and space applications (asteroid mining?) are the only real applications of these robots. This is not going to be useful in the military. The only advantage it may have over humans is increased accuracy, and even then, a mobile gun platform on wheels will do a much better job. This robot is less mobile, less reliable, less endurable, much less smart and much less flexible than any averag…
"Real" military applications, perhaps not.
"Pseudo-military" operations, i.e. in our rapidly militarizing civilian police forces, perhaps not so far off.
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#13Terminator has always been one of my favorite movies, and reality has an uncanny way of getting us closer and closer to the fantasy. We justify this new technology in the same way - "it's for our protection"!
Dictators run into trouble when the armies decide they won't attack a local population because, hey, it's their families and friends we're talking about. Robots eliminate that pesky detail. Imagine how a secession crisis, based on, say, widespread spying by the government on its own citizens, might be dealt with today versus fifty years from now.
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If you were a resident of Afghanistan, the concept of a war against the robots is already a reality. From that perspective, is a fairly minor detail that the robots are currently piloted by people and not computers. And I expect the AI would get effective pretty quickly - I'm sure they will develop some effective way to identify a potential combatant based on either holding a weapon or some body language/temperature cues.
This technology might not be field ready right now, but it won't be long. It's reasonable to expect that with some work, it would far exceed human capacity upon a few key dimensions - running speed, targeting ability, carrying armor/defensibility. Just like no human being can outrun even the crappiest car over any reasonable distance.
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#14The stuff that Boston Dynamics is doing with DARPA funding feels like a current-generation parallel to how DARPA funded the early efforts at building the Internet. I suspect we will look back on these guys as some of the early pioneers of the yet-to-come ubiquitous robotics era.
ARPA funded the early efforts of building the internet.... the D came later
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#15Terminator has always been one of my favorite movies, and reality has an uncanny way of getting us closer and closer to the fantasy. We justify this new technology in the same way - "it's for our protection"! Dictators run into trouble when the armies decide they won't attack a local population because, hey, it's their families and friends we're talking about. Robots eliminate that pesky detail. Imagine how a secessi…
Isn't this a nuclear weapon vs nuclear power type issue? We'll always have the capacity for evil, I'd expect an international ban on the use of robotic soliders after some period of mass destruction (we'll still have them sitting in a bunker just in case)
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#16Terminator has always been one of my favorite movies, and reality has an uncanny way of getting us closer and closer to the fantasy. We justify this new technology in the same way - "it's for our protection"! Dictators run into trouble when the armies decide they won't attack a local population because, hey, it's their families and friends we're talking about. Robots eliminate that pesky detail. Imagine how a secessi…
Isn't this a nuclear weapon vs nuclear power type issue? We'll always have the capacity for evil, I'd expect an international ban on the use of robotic soliders after some period of mass destruction (we'll still have them sitting in a bunker just in case)
I don't think so. I don't see them being as destructive as that. I think by the time they get to a level that's bannable, there will be far greater warfare threats, like millions of inch-long artificially intelligent flying swarm syringes(OF DEATH) filled with arsenic.
I think they'll be far more useful as support units.
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't this a nuclear weapon vs nuclear power type issue? We'll always have the capacity for evil, I'd expect an international ban on the use of robotic soliders after some period of mass destruction (we'll still have them sitting in a bunker just in case)
I don't think so. I don't see them being as destructive as that. I think by the time they get to a level that's bannable, there will be far greater warfare threats, like millions of inch-long artificially intelligent flying swarm syringes(OF DEATH) filled with arsenic. I think they'll be far more useful as support units.
Good point, These Darpa terminators are just the visible threat, its the classified nano robots that control us from inside that we should fear
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#18What is the point of having it be bipedal? Would not the dog/four legged system work out better? You could still have it manipulate items with forelegs if you wanted but keep the inherit stability
The reason is that human size and shape allows for replacing a human in any situation such as driving a vehicle or fitting into airline seats or what have you.
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#19I'm getting tired of extremetech blogspam and sensationalism. This source video was posted yesterday by me and didn't really make it anywhere. It seems I should get a voting ring and embellish my titles a bit more. If anyone wants to read up on the DRC the two latest press releases are here: http://www.darpa.mil/NewsEvents/Releases/2013/07/11.aspx http://www.darpa.mil/NewsEvents/Releases/2013/06/27.aspx .
I don't know. This pretty much looks like the Terminator to me. It just needs some good software and a gun. Google's self-driving car technology could be adapted into a formidable killing machine brain.
"It just needs some good software."
This is of course the hard part. But this robot was built to be a common platform for DARPA to build a project around: the DARPA Humanoid Challenge. The idea is to supply a very expensive robot to a few groups and a simulation of it to lots of groups, and have them compete on the control software. No guns this time around.
Re: DARPA and Boston Dynamics unveil a new humanoid robot
#20Terminator has always been one of my favorite movies, and reality has an uncanny way of getting us closer and closer to the fantasy. We justify this new technology in the same way - "it's for our protection"! Dictators run into trouble when the armies decide they won't attack a local population because, hey, it's their families and friends we're talking about. Robots eliminate that pesky detail. Imagine how a secessi…
I think this all hinges on when or if these things can get produced/maintained for less than or close to the cost of a human soldier. Imagine if these got down to $10,000 to produce. Then it would be cheaper to arm a 1-2MM unit militia of humanoid robots than it would actual human marines.