Boston Dynamics "Big Dog"

[Thaurismunths]

Caught wind of this the other day, and to be honest it scares me.
The youtube clip is of Boston Dynamics' Big Dog, one of the most advanced quadruped robots around. The clip demonstrates how agile it is and mentions that the robot weighs 250 lbs and can carry 350 lbs. Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

http://www.bostondynamics.com/content/sec.php?section=BigDog

http://youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1Ww

[Chodon]

Wow.  Pretty amazing technology. 

Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

I'm kind of torn on if doing this would be a good or bad thing.  Yes, it would prevent troops from being killed.  Would it lower the barrier for entry into conflicts if a country had nothing to lose though?  Would we just parachute drop 100 of these things in every time there was a little trouble in some country?  What do we have to lose?  There aren't going to be any pictures of dead soldiers on TV with these.  Is that a bad thing?  Nobody wants to see dead soldiers on TV, but it's the only thing that keeps us from sticking our nose in everyone else's business (more than we already do, I mean). 

Furthermore, would they even make a difference?  History has shown us that no matter how much you bomb, shell, or demoralize a population you can't say you "won" unless you're willing to put your soldiers' boots on the ground and kick the other guy out of his fox hole.  Wars aren't won from the air or from artillery or even from nuclear bombs.  They're won when the foot soldiers go in.  Could these serve as a substitute for foot soldiers?  Should they?
I'm torn here.

[Chodon]

Here's another video...amazing

http://gizmodo.com/372272/video-of-bigdog-beta-quadruped-robot-is-so-stupid-its-hilarious

[wintermute]

DARPA's Urban Challenge is the robot fight that really excites me. Not only because the competitors have advanced amazingly in the last few years, but also because it has the very real possibility of changing our lives within a few decades.

Who here wouldn't want a driverless car?

[Thaurismunths]

Wow.  Pretty amazing technology. 

Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

I'm kind of torn on if doing this would be a good or bad thing.  Yes, it would prevent troops from being killed.  Would it lower the barrier for entry into conflicts if a country had nothing to lose though?  Would we just parachute drop 100 of these things in every time there was a little trouble in some country?  What do we have to lose?  There aren't going to be any pictures of dead soldiers on TV with these.  Is that a bad thing?  Nobody wants to see dead soldiers on TV, but it's the only thing that keeps us from sticking our nose in everyone else's business (more than we already do, I mean). 

Furthermore, would they even make a difference?  History has shown us that no matter how much you bomb, shell, or demoralize a population you can't say you "won" unless you're willing to put your soldiers' boots on the ground and kick the other guy out of his fox hole.  Wars aren't won from the air or from artillery or even from nuclear bombs.  They're won when the foot soldiers go in.  Could these serve as a substitute for foot soldiers?  Should they?
I'm torn here.

The technology, like all technology, is neither good nor bad, it's the application that matters. In this instance we wouldn't see our dead solders on the evening news, but weapons are meant to be used on people not other weapons. That makes this a bad thing.
On the other hand, using such bots in hazardous exploration, or for carrying trade goods through the Cerberus Fossae would be awesome.

[Heradel]

On the other hand, using such bots in hazardous exploration, or for carrying trade goods through the Cerberus Fossae would be awesome.

Or parts of the world where the roads are mostly theoretical.

[Darwinist]

Caught wind of this the other day, and to be honest it scares me.
The youtube clip is of Boston Dynamics' Big Dog, one of the most advanced quadruped robots around. The clip demonstrates how agile it is and mentions that the robot weighs 250 lbs and can carry 350 lbs. Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

We're already strapping machine guns on to (flying) robots and sending them to the sandbox.  How about the Predator?  It's blown up suspected terrorists but I think it is used more for surveillance in hostile territory.   I would rather have a bunch of Big Dogs over there than our neighbors, parents and siblings. 

When I watched the video it reminded me of the AT-AT's.  Crazy.  What a feat of engineering.

[Thaurismunths]

Caught wind of this the other day, and to be honest it scares me.
The youtube clip is of Boston Dynamics' Big Dog, one of the most advanced quadruped robots around. The clip demonstrates how agile it is and mentions that the robot weighs 250 lbs and can carry 350 lbs. Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

We're already strapping machine guns on to (flying) robots and sending them to the sandbox.  How about the Predator?  It's blown up suspected terrorists but I think it is used more for surveillance in hostile territory.   I would rather have a bunch of Big Dogs over there than our neighbors, parents and siblings. 

So it's ok as long as it's their people who are dieing?

[wintermute]

So it's ok as long as it's their people who are dieing?

I think we all agree that the ideal situation is that no-one dies. Failing that, fewer people dying is better than more people dying, right? If one side replaces all their combat personnel with robots, that would reduce the total number of casualties and be an incremental improvement.

But it may then lead the strategists to authorising tactics that would be unthinkable if they had actual humans on the ground, thus increasing the number of casualties on the opposing side, which would be a bad thing.

Overall, I think that reducing the number of soldiers in warzones (on all sides!) is a good thing and to be encouraged. Ideally, they'd be replaced with nothing, but failing a mass outbreak of sanity I doubt that's likely any time soon. Replacing them with robots has potential pitfalls that may lead to increased deaths. But, overall, it's probably a good thing.

Especially as robots are unlikely to rape eachother.

[Heradel]

So it's ok as long as it's their people who are dieing?

I think we all agree that the ideal situation is that no-one dies. Failing that, fewer people dying is better than more people dying, right? If one side replaces all their combat personnel with robots, that would reduce the total number of casualties and be an incremental improvement.

But it may then lead the strategists to authorising tactics that would be unthinkable if they had actual humans on the ground, thus increasing the number of casualties on the opposing side, which would be a bad thing.

Overall, I think that reducing the number of soldiers in warzones (on all sides!) is a good thing and to be encouraged. Ideally, they'd be replaced with nothing, but failing a mass outbreak of sanity I doubt that's likely any time soon. Replacing them with robots has potential pitfalls that may lead to increased deaths. But, overall, it's probably a good thing.

Especially as robots are unlikely to rape eachother.

In an ideal world yes, however your argument fails to take into account the effect on the leadership and countrymen when the decision to go to war is divorced from a fear of the death of fellow countrymen. One could argue that one of the causes of the Iraq war was a fundamental disconnect from the military and their families to the ruling class. Only a few in congress now have relatives in Iraq or have served themselves there, and without a draft the vast majority of a populace will be more willing to agree to a war as it's effects on them are limited.

If we have robot soldiers less people will die in each conflict, but I would theorize that the number of conflicts would increase because the pain of entry into a conflict is nearly obliterated. War is a horrible thing, and one of the reasons that the first world has largely pulled back from it is that their conflicts have been so bloody and horrible that they created institutions to avoid it, and the cost of entry was high. It is less so now that we rely on volunteer armies and the numbers of people who were drafted in WWII and Vietnam are decreasing.

There is almost no just war in evidence in history. At the end of long horrible wars we have peace because the population has become so aware of the horrors that they no longer have the ignorance to allow it to pass. We haven't had one of those in a while, thus Iraq, though it appears that we may finally be beginning to become aware of it.

[Darwinist]

Caught wind of this the other day, and to be honest it scares me.
The youtube clip is of Boston Dynamics' Big Dog, one of the most advanced quadruped robots around. The clip demonstrates how agile it is and mentions that the robot weighs 250 lbs and can carry 350 lbs. Really, what's stopping them from strapping a machine gun on its back and sending it out to the sand box?

We're already strapping machine guns on to (flying) robots and sending them to the sandbox.  How about the Predator?  It's blown up suspected terrorists but I think it is used more for surveillance in hostile territory.   I would rather have a bunch of Big Dogs over there than our neighbors, parents and siblings. 

So it's ok as long as it's their people who are dieing?

War is never OK.  But it seems like an inevitable and shameful part of humanity. 

[wintermute]

But it may then lead the strategists to authorising tactics that would be unthinkable if they had actual humans on the ground, thus increasing the number of casualties on the opposing side, which would be a bad thing.

In an ideal world yes, however your argument fails to take into account the effect on the leadership and countrymen when the decision to go to war is divorced from a fear of the death of fellow countrymen.

I'm pretty sure I specifically noted that that was a concern, yes.

[Heradel]

But it may then lead the strategists to authorising tactics that would be unthinkable if they had actual humans on the ground, thus increasing the number of casualties on the opposing side, which would be a bad thing.

In an ideal world yes, however your argument fails to take into account the effect on the leadership and countrymen when the decision to go to war is divorced from a fear of the death of fellow countrymen.

I'm pretty sure I specifically noted that that was a concern, yes.

Well, I was speaking more of war in the political aspect, and I read your thing meaning the strategists ordering a genocide where you know it'll be carried out since the soldier's don't have a morality circuit. I'm thinking that making the only cost of war manufacturing (which the Military-Industrial Complex would love) would make it a lot easier to declare war and get the public to go along. I'm sorry if you feel I mischaracterized your argument.

[Chodon]

In reality I don't think these things would really work.  They don't have the ability to adapt and adjust like humans do, meaning once someone knows how they work they can get around them or exploit weaknesses the robot can't overcome.  Humans are always thinking an adapting.  Their reactions to situations are unpredictable.  Granted, if they were properly deployed or (as Heradel proposes) sent in as genocide machines they would probably be pretty damn effective for a while.

In addition this "new" hearts and minds kind of war isn't going to be won by robots (since they have neither).  It is going to be won by convincing an entire country that people who don't believe in the same God as you shouldn't be killed.  It's not easy with people to people interactions.  It's impossible with robots.

[Tango Alpha Delta]

It's always scary but necessary to think about the downside of technology; the dangerous applications with their unintended, escalating chains of consequences.

SFnal reference: Second Variety, by Philip K. Dick, and of course, Screamers, starring Peter Weller, which was based on it.

Or, to paraphrase:
"Robots don't kill people... well, okay, these do, but only because they're told to!  No!  Not us!  AIIIGGGH!!!" 

[Thaurismunths]

In reality I don't think these things would really work.  They don't have the ability to adapt and adjust like humans do, meaning once someone knows how they work they can get around them or exploit weaknesses the robot can't overcome.  Humans are always thinking an adapting.  Their reactions to situations are unpredictable.  Granted, if they were properly deployed or (as Heradel proposes) sent in as genocide machines they would probably be pretty damn effective for a while.

Yet.

[Heradel]

Granted, if they were properly deployed or (as Heradel proposes) sent in as genocide machines they would probably be pretty damn effective for a while.

Let me just say that I fully advocate the reintroduction of various/all medieval torture instruments for anyone that programmed and then allowed them to be deployed to create a genocide.

[birdless]

When I watched the video it reminded me of the AT-AT's.  Crazy.  What a feat of engineering.

Ha! That was my first thought, too: AT-ATs v1.0.

I don't think we're anywhere close to sending these things out on their own (exlcuding for use in genocide). That would require some exponential jumps in the development of AI. I can see these being developed for remote-control, however.

[Russell Nash]

Fit them with some 3D maps and GPS and they can be used to deliver equipment (or bombs) in hostile areas.  I think they really only have to up the speed before these guys are combat ready.

[birdless]

They're really freakin' cool and really freakin' scary at the same time!

[Chodon]

Fit them with some 3D maps and GPS and they can be used to deliver equipment (or bombs) in hostile areas.  I think they really only have to up the speed before these guys are combat ready.

Target acquisition would be a major PITA.  How can you tell if something is a guy with an RPG or a bush?  How do you tell it when to stop firing?  How do you prioritize targets?  What if it runs out of gas in the middle of a firefight?  What if its signal is jammed?  It is a LONG way from being combat ready.

[birdless]

How can you tell if something is a guy with an RPG or a bush?

A guy with a bush walks into a bar…

[Heradel]

Fit them with some 3D maps and GPS and they can be used to deliver equipment (or bombs) in hostile areas.  I think they really only have to up the speed before these guys are combat ready.

Target acquisition would be a major PITA.  How can you tell if something is a guy with an RPG or a bush?  How do you tell it when to stop firing?  How do you prioritize targets?  What if it runs out of gas in the middle of a firefight?  What if its signal is jammed?  It is a LONG way from being combat ready.

Long being give or take three to five years with current defense spending budgets. Predators already barely need pilot control, and that the math isn't that hard for target acquisition. 

[Thaurismunths]

Fit them with some 3D maps and GPS and they can be used to deliver equipment (or bombs) in hostile areas.  I think they really only have to up the speed before these guys are combat ready.

Target acquisition would be a major PITA.  How can you tell if something is a guy with an RPG or a bush?  How do you tell it when to stop firing?  How do you prioritize targets?  What if it runs out of gas in the middle of a firefight?  What if its signal is jammed?  It is a LONG way from being combat ready.

I think you're thinking of something way more complicated than we are.
I expect you're picturing a fully automated, semi-independent war machine. We, or at least I, are thinking of something like a land-based predator... for now. I don't think anyone plans on loosing the Big Dogs of war just yet, even though we already have robots in Iraq.

As to target acquisition we aren't as far out as you'd suppose. A friend of mine is one of the leading developers of pattern recognition software. Right now the trouble isn't disseminating between a bad guy with an RPG or a Bush, it's telling if the enemy has the safety on or off.

[Tango Alpha Delta]

How can you tell if something is a guy with an RPG or a bush?

A guy with a bush walks into a bar…

One of them is a fanatic with poor impulse control just looking for an excuse to kill every last m*f* on the planet...



...and the other is a guy with an RPG.



(Thanks, I'll be here all week... hey, by the way: is the RPG D&D?)