Rise of the Machines

[ericire12]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,532492,00.html

Upcoming Military Robot Could Feed on Dead Bodies

 It could be a combination of 19th-century mechanics, 21st-century technology — and a 20th-century horror movie.

A Maryland company under contract to the Pentagon is working on a steam-powered robot that would fuel itself by gobbling up whatever organic material it can find — grass, wood, old furniture, even dead bodies.

Robotic Technology Inc.'s Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot — that's right, "EATR" — "can find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment (and other organically-based energy sources), as well as use conventional and alternative fuels (such as gasoline, heavy fuel, kerosene, diesel, propane, coal, cooking oil, and solar) when suitable," reads the company's Web site.

That "biomass" and "other organically-based energy sources" wouldn't necessarily be limited to plant material — animal and human corpses contain plenty of energy, and they'd be plentiful in a war zone.

EATR will be powered by the Waste Heat Engine developed by Cyclone Power Technology of Pompano Beach, Fla., which uses an "external combustion chamber" burning up fuel to heat up water in a closed loop, generating electricity.

The advantages to the military are that the robot would be extremely flexible in fuel sources and could roam on its own for months, even years, without having to be refueled or serviced.

Upon the EATR platform, the Pentagon could build all sorts of things — a transport, an ambulance, a communications center, even a mobile gunship.

In press materials, Robotic Technology presents EATR as an essentially benign artificial creature that fills its belly through "foraging," despite the obvious military purpose.

[Erusen]

Time to grab Sarah Connor.

Oh ya, and we should probably do something about those pesky machines too.

[Texas_Bryan]

I doubt the military would endorse a 'body eating' robot.  Right now we frown upon the desecration of human remains, so this would obviously be out of the question.  And keeping a bio mass engine up and running sounds like a pain in the ass, but I'd take a generator setup, got a lot of feral hogs I could use.  This also sounds close to one doomsday theory involving, nano robots, or others, that consume everything available in order to sustain and reproduce themselves.  Eventually consuming near all carbon based items on the planet.  I believe its called 'gray goo' theory.

[Big Frank]

I better be careful about saying "eat me".

[Badgersmilk]

It DOES have a chain saw attachment, what makes people think it will only find the dead ones tasty?  

  

[Sponsor]

[Ping]

Don't worry. This machine is set up to eat zombies only!!!!   

[ericire12]

Don't worry. This machine is set up to eat zombies only!!!!   

Mmmmmmm...... beer brains!

[Kid Shelleen]

Mmmmmmm...... beer brains!

Dang, I had hopes that a couple hundred of these things might get loose in D.C. but the poor machines would starve for lack of brains to eat. Too bad.

[Pathfinder]

I was watching something on History Channel last night, and this thing ain't even the scariest robot that DARPA is working on. Mobile, self-"thinking" things with all sorts of abilities. Scariest question posed was - when do we give a machine the ability to decide to kill on its own?

Some robots - the SWORDS - have already been deployed in the sandbox with limited "thought" abilities - and lethal weapons.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2007/08/httpwwwnational/.

Apparently Asimov was wrong in his 3 Laws. Either that or we have to learn the hard lesson first.

UPDATE: Apparently the SWORDS were withdrawn from combat in 2008 without firing one shot, and amid some confusion over the program. See here: http://www.popularmechanics.com/blogs/technology_news/4258963.html

However, the show last night was copyrighted 2009, so the military is definitely moving in this direction.

[r_w]

Put your tinfoil hats on.

Then read about the work going on in "Self-Organizing Networks."