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Exoskeletons for Human Performance Augmentation
xlogan writes, "The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is soliciting innovative research proposals on Exoskeletons for Human Performance Augmentation (EHPA). The agency has put their proposal online.
" The sheer number of mundane tasks I could accomplish with an exoskeleton is amazing. Why, I could rearrange furniture in the blink of an eye, all while defending the Earth from Evil! And with my super-enhanced vision and hearing, I might finally be allowed to join The Justice League of America [?] .
I like the idea because you basically have to come up with all-new technology. Power source, power train, and actuators need to be completely replaced with technology we don't have in order to make the result any smaller than a tank. Giant Robots for Everyone!
Non-computer research tends to be a lot slower than computer hardware or software development, so the exoskeleton they want won't be possible for decades. But the kind of software they want would be great for a highly mobile minitank.
Think Patlabor military labors. Put electric wheels at the end of 4 articulated legs. Drive the thing with a turbine/generator and hydraulics. Then develop the software needed to coordinate sensors and actuators at superhuman speed.
You get an armored vehicle that can drive cross-country at 100kph -- basically a cybernetic horse. Call it mechanized cavalry...
When they get gadgets that permit reasonably-sized exoskeletons, the software will be ready for them.
That was the Davy Crockett.
It was a 75mm bazooka on a tripod or a Jeep and it had a bug squash head nuke warhead. If I was at home I have a book with a bucha info about it. It was withdrawn after about two years in server.
There were some articles about 6 monthes ago on the BBC and maybe here on /. about the new polymer muscles being developed. Now if that ain't straight outta BT...and now this DARPA call for development of Elementals...
"An operator inside of an exoskeleton has
several advantages that your typical
remote-control model lacks."
And it has several of disadvantages too.
A. An android will not get emotional. That is,
an android will not be disturbed by his
girlfriends being "shagged" by another man,
or his mother-in-laws' keeping tab on his
bedroom behavior or whatever.
An android will just do whatever it is
ordered to.
B. An android will not take coffee break.
C. An android will not need pay hike, and it
will not strike if the working condition is
not ideal.
There wouldn't be an android branch of
AFL-CIO.
D. An android will not become a spy for a
foreign and perhaps potentially hostile
regime.
E. If an android is "killed", it is just a
broken machine. Just like your old XT which
is not working anymore - you just throw it
in the trash.
Now let's take at the advantages you have pointed out -
"First is more control and depth of input.
A person inside of one these would have
depth perception, periphrial vision, and
(assuming the machine's not too loud) audio.
Also, being inside allows for more control
over how the input is managed (eye
movements, etc.)
Unless the human inside the droid has a direct "open-window" interface to the outside - the human operator inside the exo-droid will "see" and "hear" through the video camera(s) and microphone(s) mounted outside. Perception-wise, it is no different from a human operator in remote location, controlling the exo-droid via virtual-reality.
If there is an "open-window" interface for the operator, then the human operator inside the exo-droid will be vulnerable to bio and/or chemical attacks.
If you insulate the operator from such a thing, then, the operator will have to "perceive" the world out there like I have just outlined above.
The "eye-movement" detector that you mentioned could be used in the remotely-controlled virtual-reality settings as well.
"Second, a human being, as an operator,
will be able to handel an exoskeleton
far more intuitivly than a remote-virtual
body. This will result in far less
training than would otherwise be needed.
We all know how to work a body."
True, if you put a human being inside the exo-droid, the "handling aspect" will be more intuitive, but, the human-operator will also have to face with everything that the "intuitive" things brings - including the direct blow if the droid falls down, and so on, and so forth.
But, if you think that putting a human being inside the exo-droid will mean a more responsive droid, I don't think so.
Imagine yourself without cloth on, and then, imagine yoruself with many layers of clothes on. Tell me in which case do you feel more agile, or easier to move about?
A person inside an exo-droid will be feeling like a person with VERY, VERY THICK cloths on. You can't move as easily, you don't feel that you are as agile as before, and each and every movement you make will be a chore.
Whether or not putting a human being inside the exo-droid, the droid will not be as agile as a living thing, at least not in the level of technology we have today.
"Third, you gotta admit, it's pretty damn
cool. It feeds out monkey-egos to
personally be able to pick up the
car/steel beam/whatever. You just can't
get that kind of rush via remote..."
True, the feeling would be awesome. But then, what we need is a tool that do heavy lifting and something that can do dangerous work for us, we need no egoistic operators acting like robocop, wrecking havoc to the ordinary citizens.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Because its a pain in the ass to build a robot that is bipedal and has as wide a range motion/mobility as human being.
Instead of putting a LIFE human being at the place of work, why not use the virtual reality technology into work, and operate the exo-droid virtually - via remote control.
I suspect that while, pilots may be replaced more easily (i.e. sooner) than human ground troops, It will eventually happen. The problem for the exo-droid is that the human form + brain, though fragile is still much too versitle to be replaced completely. Most of the AIish projects that I've seen take a lot of space/energy/effort just replicating one or two of the features that are build into the sack of water that is the human body. Yes there is a japanese company that has robot that can walk up and down stairs... But can it crouch, sideslip, and jump or climb over obstacles?
--locust
If I remember rightly, the problem then was the same problem as would afflict a modern-day exoskeleton - lack of a compact, efficient, and sufficiently powerful energy source. They tried compressed air, which only gave ten or so minutes of marching.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
You know what the Superfriends are doing, right?
Watchin' the game, havin' a Bud...
DARPA: Do All Rightwing Assholes Post Anonymously?
I can believe that an exoskeleton could be built with hydraulics and/or electric motors. The trick is coming up with a compact power source that will run the suit for some reasonable amount of time. Maybe they could use something like the APU used on the Space Shuttle. It weighs about 90 pounds and produces 135 horsepower. The downside is that it runs on hydrazine, which is very nasty stuff.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
3Gs is the structural load limit for the Shuttle. 9Gs is a typical limit for sustained stress on a trained military fighter pilot. The 3G limit on the Shuttle allows it to carry passengers who don't have the physical strength and endurance of fighter pilots.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Does anyone remember that Bear Suit article from several months back? Does anyone have any updates on it.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
It's actually by Larry Niven. It's in his collection All the Myriad Ways and more recently in his N-Space collection.
Re-read the requirements. They're not asking for a complete battle ready exosuit, they're just asking for a machine that can do one or more of the following:
1) Allow the user to carry a heavy load.
2) Reduce the effort expended by a soldier on a long hike, thereby increasing endurance.
3) Allow a person to walk or run faster than normal.
4) Allow a person to lift a heavy object, or do strenuous work with reduced effort.
5) Jump higher and/or further than normal.
Things like armor, weapons, environmental controls, communications, etc., aren't required or requested. DARPA just wants a basic exoskeleton to augment the human body, with a braindead simple way to operate it. Development of the other systems will come later, they're just looking for a base platform to start with.
There is nothing so pathetic as seeing a beautiful young theory roughed up by a tough gang of facts.
I want a Zero 1 personally, or maybe a Talgeese. Geez, the fun I could have with a Gundam. The idea of human augmentation is a very good one, a single platoon could have the fighting capability of an infantry battalion. The drawbacks to more technological solutions are that a single soldier will cost millions of dollars to train and outfit. IIRC and M-16A1 (the front-line assult rifle of the US military) costs close to 16 thousand dollars per unit. How much would a basic exoskeleton cost? If a single soldier costs 100 million dollars they aren't going to use them. For 100 million dollars they could outfit several companies worth of standard foot infantry. Would a single exo-soldier be equivilent to a company of foot infantry? I doubt it, a mobile exoskeleton couldn't be too heavily armoured even with Chobham armour. A well places RPG or AT-4 would send one soldier and 100 million dollars worth of exoskeleton to the scrap heap.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Take the bear suit, add some actuators or hydraulics to move the limbs, throw on a weapon and your ready to kick some ass! :)
Q.
That's the Nuclear Rocket Launcher your talking about. I forgot the name, but it was pretty colorful for what it was. Two guys with a tube that fire rockets and tips with low yield nuclear weapons. I remember a weapon specialist saying it was a step above a Nuclear Grenade.
Linux O Muerte!
Well, he could put a giant "laser" on the moon, and call it the "alan parsons project".
Wow... when the Slashdot Effect becomes more than even .mil sites can handle, you know you've got a world power in the making... can you say "Geek Nation"? I can see it already... Rob as the Benevolent Dictator, Jeff as the Consultant for Kewl Nanotech Stuff. JonKatz would be in charge of the State Religion, of course. I think I'd be very happy there, as long as the Moderation Militia kept all the hot grits people away from my pants... and as long as federal law made sure that Bjarne Stroustroup would be shot at sight!
Seriously, is the site actually slashdotted (of course, it may not be when you read this) or is it my DNS's fault?
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
If there is a VR presence, as the original poster suggested, the human controller won't know that the helicopter isn't a humanoid interface.
The OI, as it were, hides that fact. The user thinks he's moving naturally, and the system compensates for him, appropriately.
-AS
-AS
*Pikachu*
Someone can hijack the frequency/control, perhaps, and take over the body?
There isn't the bandwidth to transmit the signals, sensations, and control data?
If it's remote, why make it manlike, then? Why not, say, a small helicopter?
-AS
-AS
*Pikachu*
Ohhh yeah. No more getting my butt kicked by the Queen Alien after she rips Bishop in half and sends that annoying little half-pint Newt into the access tunnels. No siree. Next time I find myself in THAT situation I'll just don my ARPA funded, Catepillar built, lemon yellow power armor and KICK SOME XENOLOGICAL BOOTAY!
It's gotta have the welding torch, though. It's useless without the welding torch. A Queen Alien can withstand grendades, bullets, flame throwers, evil looks, and even a thermonuclear explosion, but the sight of a 1.5" long yellow flame causes her to have a coniption fit.
From reading the article, a proposal could involve something fairly simple: If you can come up with a way to reduce the stress on the human body when moving while carrying a load, it would qualify. I'm sure a very basic exoskeleton that simply augments carrying ability (reduces strain on the human skeleton) is easily feasible given today's technology. Interesting they have $50M to throw at this sort of problem.
Too bad I don't have a background in biomechanics or mechanical engineering...
-- Jeremiah
Ladies and Gentlemen (and trolls), I give you the SpringWalker Not a bad base to build from, eh?
Does anyone remember the exoskeleton that Ripley used in Alien? That big yellow walker in the cargo bay of the ship? Did anyone happen to notice the old Caterpillar logo on the walker? Caterpillar as in the construction equipment manufacturer.
An android will not get emotional.
The idea of emotionless androids is good for Star Trek plots, but it doesn't work in the real world. You would end up with an andriod with virtually no ability to select among goals (e.g., "duck!" or "charge!"), and less ability to create novel goals (e.g., blow up the bridge to stop the tanks). It would be nice if pop science to catch up to at least late-60's AI in this regard.
An android will not become a spy for a foreign and perhaps potentially hostile regime.
The same has been said of computers. Hopefully it would be a little less false in this case.
If an android is "killed", it is just a broken machine.
People get quite attached to their machines; cars have provided ample opportunity to study this in the wild. The situation would probably be worse with such a intimate relationship between the operator and the machine. Plus, if the cost of the machine is too high, it would be cheaper to lose soldiers (though it would have to be very high--I'm always suprised when I see how much it costs to train a grunt, let alone a technically adept grunt).
Perception-wise, it is no different from a human operator in remote location, controlling the exo-droid via virtual-reality.
Not quite. Visual and auditory feeds can be recreated faithfully, but balance and, to some extent, posture and other body-centered senses are more tricky. In fact, I'm not sure how balance could be recreated without actually knocking the operater on the floor when the suit fell over, which IMO is not terribly desirable. (OK, that inner-ear thing from a month or so ago would work, but that would require the operator to be seated, which would mean off-loading all of the details of navigating terrain to the robot itself.)
If there is an "open-window" interface for the operator, then the human operator inside the exo-droid will be vulnerable to bio and/or chemical attacks.
How? What's wrong with a transparent sheet of glass or one of those nifty LCD window-with-HUDs they were thinking of using on tanks a few years back? I consider a car a pretty open interface, but it can sealed against bio/chem weapons without impairing your view any.
A person inside an exo-droid will be feeling like a person with VERY, VERY THICK cloths on. You can't move as easily, you don't feel that you are as agile as before, and each and every movement you make will be a chore.
This is an assumption. A major part of this project seems to be retaining, or even enhancing, the agility of he user. If the net result was what you described, why in God's name would DARPA be working on it as an infantry rig? Infantry lives on mobility, not armor, and trying to reverse that would be a death sentence. DARPA isn't stupid, you know; they aren't going to ask soldiers to wear tanks everywhere they go.
And you left out the problem of lag. I can tell you from personal experience that even a hundred milliseconds makes a big difference in 'combat' situations (like Quake ;-). You would probably pick up that much just in the transition from the operater's controls to transmitter, let alone the time it takes for the stupid mech to interpret the message, act on it and respond. If you're fighting a live opponent (e.g., a TOW) and lose, say, 500msec, it could ruin you whole day. (Apparently tanks can dodge anti-tank rockets if they see them coming and have time to move; there was something about it on some .mil site I passed through several months ago. Very cool.)
All of that said, I do think that unmanned is the wave of the future. However, I'm betting on semi-autonomous vehicles where humans 'crews' are, at most, offering tactical and strategic advise to the drones. (Though I do think they will be in the field, for practical reasons.) Deathmatches are great fun, but if I need to get something done give me good old-fashioned real-time strategy ;-)
although I can imagine the first round of test subjects tearing off their own face as they scratch their nose or breaking their leg as they swat a bug on their knee.
It's just such a cool idea. How about a macho looking one for those romantic evenings at home with the misses wouldn't go astray either. Or a beafy one to take down the pub and tear the bouncer a new orifice. The possibilities are endless!!
Alas gallinaceas de urbe bovis volo
Open Source would not be as popular if Window$ was GPLed
But if windows was GPLed, it would be Open Source, and therefore, opensource would be just as popular (maybe), now wouldn't it?
think about it...
I just finished Starship Troopers a few weeks ago (super quick read, read it at the bookstore!) and this was the first thing i thought when I read this book. Sure we need another half century of development, but its not far-fetched at this point.
The thing thats really neat about Starship Troopers is that the coordinated team of MI (mobile infantry), maybe a few dozen, doesn't really give specifics, in their suits, can level a whole city.
What it means in practical terms is a single (expensive) suit and a well trained mobile infantry men can take the place of 10s maybe hundreds of infantry men. Making for a much smaller military, and military budget (its people who are expensive after all).
Really neat stuff, will be really interesting to see what happens during out lifetimes.
Spyky
They've been doing this stuff since the fifties.
They used to call 'em "Man Amplifiers" (which dates them to before the Women's Lib movement.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The Alien II forklift-armor was inspired by the previous generation of powered-suit research by the military - with a little obvious extrapolation.
Remote-control master-slave manipulators and the like dates from Heinlein's story "Waldo", back about world war II
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
It's tough to get the balance right for a walker, without being in it or being suspended and thrown around to mimic the slave's movements in a remote control center.
The latter is a bit safer - but a lot more expensive, and you can still get broken by it if something goes wrong and the limits don't function adequately (or maybe a sprain even if they do work).
That being said, there's a lot you could avoid by running it remotely (as you demonstrate with your landmine example). Working inside a radioactive, toxic, or biohazard environment come to mind, as does deep-sea, vacuum, earth-to-near-orbit, near-orbit-to-lander, etc.
But many of those have been anticipated as well.
See Heinlien's _Waldo_ for several of them. There's a story from similarly long ago by another author where the remote was biological, adapted for a methane environment, and controlled from orbit, etc.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
It's a thought, true enough, but I don't think that's what they're really looking for. They're looking, not for invulnerable humans, but for stronger, faster, and deadlier humans. Without either a) a massively heavy base, or b) an incredibly complex motor-system AI to keep center of gravity, the machine won't be any stronger. If you're piloting one of these machines, you'd need to see where its feet were going, and you'd have to look ahead - both at once. So it's not going to be any faster. And any remote-controlled atomaton will have lag - slower reflexes, and hence not as deadly. What your solution is about is a smart missle. Fast, doesn't care about terrain, and packs a punch.
Dave
Barclay family motto:
Aut agere aut mori.
(Either action or death.)
What it will really need is an excellent API so that you can extend it. The last thing I want to do is invest $300,000 in a really state of the art exoskeleton just to have it become completely obsolete when XO-Skeleton 2005 comes out.
The net will not be what we demand, but what we make it. Build it well.
wacking off with this thing?
Now people won't mistake him for being a superhero with that tacky nick of his.
It looks like ARPA has given up working on innovative things such as the Internet. It's probably time they had a break and start inventing toys for big boys like the Pentagon! Hmmm...maybe they'll also start inventing those plastic toy soldiers to recon work in future too.
One has to wonder whether will end up with giant mecha one day. Hopefully someone from Slashdot might build that giant penguin mecha from those Penguin Computing banners, so we can all pay a nice visit to someone at Redmond = ).
-- "I can't tell the future, I just work there." -- The Doctor
- In Homer's Illiad, Achilles could be considered to have personal armor, except his heel
... - Heinlein's Starship Troopers
- H.G. Wells War of the Worlds, where the Martians could be considered to be wearing some kind of suit.
- Asimov's Foundation, with his reference to personal force fields.
- Marvel's Iron Man?
- Macross
- Mobile Suit Gundam
Hey, maybe I'm stretching it, but surely somewhere there's a first?Wow!! Does this sound anything like a certain book I know written by Robert Heinlein (Starship Troopers). Actually though, it sounds like a very cool think they're doing if it all works out. Who wouldn't want to be able to lift cars one-handed, leap tall buildings in a single bound, etc. :)
Perception is reality
An operator inside of an exoskeleton has several advantages that your typical remote-control model lacks.
First is more control and depth of input. A person inside of one these would have depth perception, periphrial vision, and (assuming the machine's not too loud) audio. Also, being inside allows for more control over how the input is managed (eye movements, etc.)
Second, a human being, as an operator, will be able to handel an exoskeleton far more intuitivly than a remote-virtual body. This will result in far less training than would otherwise be needed. We all know how to work a body.
Third, you gotta admit, it's pretty damn cool. It feeds out monkey-egos to personally be able to pick up the car/steel beam/whatever. You just can't get that kind of rush via remote...
Feminism is the wild notion that women are human beings.
The problem with a virtual body is that it will never replace the capabilities of an infantry soldier. Throughout history man has tried to win wars from a distance with artillery, bombers, tanks, and cruise missiles. The problem is that to win a war, killing people and blowing up equipment from a distance is not enough. You have to send in the infantry to finish up at the end. Look at Kosovo for example. Yes, our bombing campaign brought them to the peace tables, but now that there is peace in the area American soldiers are inside Kosovo keeping the peace. Without the presence of real live soldiers the war would break out again. And because most of the United States Army's missions are peacekeeping, soldiers are going to have to be onsite. Exoskeletons are just not gonna cut it in the middle of a peacekeeping operation when communication is needed. Another point to ponder: I think that exoskeletons will be used mainly to mount weapon systems that would be too heavy or bulky for a soldier to otherwise carry. And, because an infantry squad only has one heavy weapon member per squad, the saw gunner, every soldier will probably not have an exoskeleton except the one soldier with the heavy weapon platform.
We are homer of borg, you will be hmmm...donuts...
Fight Spammers!
Like with the bionic man, he jumps off of a 8 story building, his legs can take it, but half his spine would be crushed from the impact. Or he can lift 1000lbs, but his should would fall off.
You have to take into account the secondary effects of the forces on the body.
Fight Spammers!
I don't think you can get both speed/jumping and strength/payload capacity simultaneously.
or its at least a really tough design...
significant increase in strength and payload capabilities means that it has to be self supporting almost.
Having shock absorbtion, ability to turn hips and shoulders, and to just keep your balance in a bipedal system all get compromised.
you almost have to go with caterpilar chains for movement, and so you might as well make a mini tank. Since a mini tank can't go that many more places where a big tank can go, you might as well keep your big tank.
In a lightweight frame approach designed to stress balance for some minimal strength inprovement, anything that enhances your strength, is going to hurt your flexibility. In a quake type combat environment, you need to be able to turn quickly (hip and shoulder flexibility) and aim/fire.
They should be designing boots that make you faster, jump higher in one suit that helps combat situations where nimbleness is needed, and a different strength suit for the guys who have lug around the rocket launchers.
Hey, this isn't right. "Starship Troopers" wasn't just about the fancy weaponry -- they should first establish a proposal investigating the social effects of limiting the franchise to veterans, or lashing as a replacement for imprisonment for certain offences.
;-)
Seriously, though, it IS funny to see that every single thing in that list came from Starship Troopers, and I don't think any suit-based thing mentioned in Starship Troopers was excluded. I really have to suspect that the whole idea for this particular suggestion originated from one person reading Starship Troopers for the first time.
COOL.
-Billy
Um... Of course, I wonder what this will do to our warfare? It could make it worse... Or better. I'll have to ponder that. Of course, it wouldn't affect guerrila warfare.
--
No, this isn't another GPL zealot screaming "Open-Source Everything!", I've actually got an interesting idea. Why not try an open source style community development project for something like this? I mean, how many hardware hackers here could figure out the electronics needed for this thing? How many programmers here could write the OS and a component style architecture to run it? How many engineers here could come up with efficient actuator designs or durable frames? If a system like this were developed and the military passed it over, then participants could count it as a hell of a learning experience. If the military actually accepted the design and paid out the US$50mil, then the funds could simply be divvied up among the various contributors or even donated to pre-agreed upon charities.
I don't have time to manage a project like this myself, but I would definitely contribute to such a project if somebody were willing to put it together (I've got a complete body cooling/heating system that I designed for a friend who races stock cars. It runs 6 hours on 4 D cell batteries and can maintain a skin temperature of 45F to 80F in a -20F to 130F environment).
There is nothing so pathetic as seeing a beautiful young theory roughed up by a tough gang of facts.
http://www.theonion.com/onion3123/hawkingexo.html
One of my professors is working on these projects right now and has been for awhile. The US military has had stuff in the past, just not what you may consider "exoskeleton." They loosely considered Rocketpacks and things like in Alien(s? when Ripley put on the big loader robot suit thing and kicked the mother's ass) as exoskeletons.
He is working on the propulsion parts right now. One of the problems they have with "skins" that make you stronger is that they can crush you. That would suck.
The leaping great heights is done using jet/rocket devices. As for the power problem, I think rotational inertia storage a la Rolex's Oyster Perpetual motion stuff would help if you have the suit "turned off." That could charge the batteries during unpowered walking or during rocket assisted leaping.
I am going to talk with him about working on these projects and maybe submitting a proposal myself.
IANAL, but I play one on
can you here it, its just very faint.
its the sound of thousands of anime fans quietly chuckling with joy.
The most useful idea in this direction to date was from Kraft Telerobotics, which once built a backhoe with force-feedback controls. You put your hand in the gripper and made digging motions, with the backhoe following along. The force feedback was good; they claimed the operator could dig around a pipe by feel. Great for muddy trenches. Didn't sell; Kraft was geared to selling to researchers, not building contractors.
So it ought to be possible. Useful? I doubt it. Too many actuators and joints for a fieldable machine.
..is to build a big robot exoskeleton you can use to crush your enemies... Now this is news for nerds!!
But seriously, robots like this have been science fiction for decades, it's interesting to see respectable institutions taking this seriously. I imagine successful implementation of this technology would again change the face of warfare. With anti-aircraft missles easily mountable on each soilder, perhaps air power will not always be king?
Something to think about... This could be the biggest paradigm shift until they discover a good repulsorlift and make hovertanks.
--
Do you think Hemmingway would have written so many novels if his typewriter had been capable of Open GL hardware-accelerated 3-D graphics?
Exoskeleton means something hard (skeleton) outside with softbody inside - which means, for every exo to work, a human must be inside operate it.
If the purpose of the exo is to do heavy-lifting and/or other tough/dangerous stuffs, putting a human inside still mean if accident happens, someone will get hurt, or may even die.
My own proposal -
Why not make a remote-virtual body instead?
Instead of putting a LIFE human being at the place of work, why not use the virtual reality technology into work, and operate the exo-droid virtually - via remote control.
That way, the exo-droid can do all types of things, including stepping on landmines, without having the operator risking injuries.
What do you think?
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
The whole exoskeleton population has a nervous twitch at the turn of each century or on a leap year
Cult of the Dead Cow develop a tool exploiting vulnerabilities in the exoskeleton security, forcing it to perform Monty Python Silly Walks and the Can-Can every Tuesday at 3pm.
The 'Eiffel 65 effect' - the suit locks up solid and the whole world turns blue
Each service pack applied to the suit alters its behaviour subtly. This damages user confidence and they require counselling
Shock troopers from the DoJ keep attacking you with chain-saws, to remove functionality which they feel shouldn't have really been bundled into the suit in the first place
Personally - I'll stick to waring the hides of dead animals - much safer and warmer.
Stephen Hawking has written another book. It's about time as well.