Slashdot Mirror
US Army to Try Out New, Anime-based Uniforms
PenguinRadio writes "This is being reported in a few places, most notably USA Today which has an article about the US Army teaming up with MIT to develop a new nanotechnology-based outfit for our soldiers that can detect bio hazards, injury, and other funky things. The 5 year, $50 million grant also wants to look at bending light around the uniform to create some sort of invisibility." CNET has another story. The Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies has its own web page, of course.
Didn't I see this in the Final Fantasy Movie?
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Hmm.. What does Anime have to do with any of this? Are Slashdot editors hoping that female soldiers will be outfitted with scantily-clad, breast-hugging Anime style getups?
You see this sort of thing (powered and/or cloaking exosuits) in anime, but you also see it in every other walk of science fiction too. ex: Starship Troopers, every other comic book ever published, etc, etc.
Neither of the articles mentions anime either. I'm just wondering where the "anime" reference in the article title came from. Left field, apparently, unless I missed something! (which is entirely likely)
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
We Metal Gear fans have long known that stealth camo and nanomachines became standard equipment for FoxHound operatives in 1995. "Find... Big Boss! Destroy... Outer Heaven!"
How do they plan to power these things???
;-)
Army trained hamster powered generators carried in backpacks perhaps?
That's funny, neither article makes any sort of mention about anything regarding anime.
Oh, it must be that Slashdot editorial style. "Well, that picture looks sort of like something vaguely reminiscent of anime. OH! I KNOW! The uniforms are ANIME-BASED!"
Sheesh. And I bet they wonder why subscriptions aren't as high as they expected.
Hate to say it, but most new technologies don't seem to get very far until the pentagon decides they're useful. Hopefully this will prime the pump of a nanotech industrial revolution.
"If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're right." -
How the hell does that qualify as anime-based? Simply because they include some sort of technology not yet in use?
I'm so damned sick of this anime crap. Now it's even cropping up outside of it's own category!
This space intentionally left blank.
...also wants to look at bending light around the uniform to create some sort of invisibility
Finally, the goodness of a second-class Arnold movie makes it's way into the military!! Now it's just a matter of time until we're cuttin' peoples heads off with extendible boomerang blade thingies ala P2.
There are 01 types of people in this world. Those that understand binary, and me.
I'm missing the anime reference here. Is it that it's so high-tech that it seems like it belongs in anime, or is there a direct reference I'm not familiar with?
Ignorance kills, complacency kills, hatred kills, but usually not the ones guilty of them.
"Waste of Money". This will never succeed in full, MIT just wants the money to dink around with.
This is especially a waste considering how little soldiers are actually used anymore.
The army is gearing up for the Predator invasion if we too are invisable we shall have the upperhand... Buwahahahaha
"All I can tell the "lesser of two evils" folks is that if they keep voting for evil, they'll keep getting evil."-Lp.org
Can even show proof of concept beyond an artist's rendition?
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
I didn't realize that Starship Troopers (1960) or Predator (1987) were anime.
note to selves: be sure uniforms can survive a battlefield slashdotting, because your webservers can't.
four-oh-four
does this mean that army men will now move in that jerky 3-frames-per-5-seconds anime motion mode?
I bet the enemy will quail in fear at the army men's new giant goggly eyes.
Starship Troopers definitely popped into my mind. A bunch of gorillas. ;)
-Lucas
Put me down for $100 on MIT for the 2007 NCAA torney.
-- Nobody should take away Microsoft's freedom to innovate, particularly since they haven't used it yet
Bending light to render someone invisible? Whoa need I say more than 'the Philadelphia Experiment'. The first cyborgs were the guys merged waist high into the deck of the ship.
I don't buy it. Maybe *maybe* detectors on one side can replicate detectors from the other, but it can't be omnidirectional... you'd have one side "invisible" but only from one direction. Not very effective....
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
I guess the invisible aspect of the new uniform will make Solid Snake's life easier in the next iteration of Metal Gear Solid. Wait, all the enemies has one too, damn...
Supercharged shoes could release energy when soldiers jump, propelling them over a 20-foot wall.
-What happens after the wall, is there also a parachute, or are you just supposed to land after your 20 foot fall.
Micoreactors could detect bleeding and apply pressure.
-So that the enemies crackers can cut off circulation in battle to help their side
Light-deflecting material could make the suit blend in with surroundings.
-So that the number of soilders hurt or killed by friendly fire increases.
MIT's research centers had been working on nanotechnology ideas long before getting involved with the Army, but not with military applications in mind.
-Isn't that how it always happens, soon the MIT reasercher will make a peace time achievment award.
"The secret of success is to know something nobody else knows." -Aristotle Onassis
Is this a record for earliest use on an off topic term?
What we need to do is apply this to my room-mates clothes... create "soft--and almost invisible--clothing" that keep the biohazards in!!!
tell me - how are little soldiers actually used? and how little are they? Are we looking at a shrinking ray? or just recruiting wee folk from the Irish American community?
Since this is "obviously" anime inspired (and not just sci-fi in general) does it include colored hair for detecting airborne pathogens? Youknow, hair changes color when dangerous substance found. What about wildly contrasting colors that act as camoflage - not to hide from but to distort the enemies' aim.
Oh and don't forget the huge eyes that are obviously being used to detect hidden dangers like IR tripwires.
And don't forget that at least 50% of the soldiers wearing this gear are going to be females with more curves than a Jan and Dean song.
"Hi Charlie" "Hi Dave, where are you?" "I'm over here!" "Where" "Over here" (Starts waving arms around to find him) "That was my face..."
I am the breaker of Chairs!
But what happens when them come back down?
Shockwave Flash movies are the greatest thing to happen to non-sequitur humor since Japan.
No, no, this isn't flamebait or outright dismissal, but really - a "5 year contract" to develop what their description seems to portray as super Anime' Battle Armor(tm)? Somehow, I think this will end up being a big money pit for a long time before anything that flashy comes anywhere near to reality...
On a less cynical note, though, I imagine a lot of more "down-to-earth" inventions may come out of the program (advances in polymer science, immunoassay-like tests, and so on) if the people running it can refrain from wasting the money too badly in attempts to impress clueless legislators with flashy gadgets when the 5 year budget is over...
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
Hmmmm... Didn't Disney do that for the Army during WWII? [smirk]
IANAL, but I've seen actors play them on TV
In other words INVISIBILITY!!
Or am I mistaken... Soldiers will still need light to hit their eyes to be able to see.. I guess a pair of floating eyes won't raise too much suspicion.
What about infrared? Soldiers will still glow in that region.
Jumping 20 ft with some sort of exoskeleton still seems unlikely to me - remember, the landing deceleration won't be too much different than jumping off a 20 ft building without any exoskeleton (that hurts!).
It just doesn't seem plausible. The only thing useful I could see an exoskeleton useful for would be to lift/cary heavy loads. Any other ideas?
..........FULL STOP.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
One article mentioned using "powered shoes" to enable soldiers to clear 20 foot walls in a single bound. I suppose the reporter must have been watching too many anime - or action flicks. I hope the source for that quote was yanking the chain of the reporter. The human skeleton just isn't strong enough to handle a vertical leap like that. The hips would collapse under the acceleration. When pole vaulters make those leaps a lot of it is due to the springinness of the pole spreading the acceleration out.
You either believe in rational thought or you don't
With all the technology and money being poured into this, why not just make better remote warfare technologies?
I mean why bother making a uniform that provides instant medical care for the soldier, when you can completely remove the soldier from the battlefield?
Some may argue, but the primary method for getting what you want in a war is to KILL, therefore people are necessary in a war.
I acknowledge this, but while someone must get killed, doesn't it make sense to let the enemy's soldiers get killed, while yours are sitting comfy drinking coca-cola and watching pr0n?
The whole premise seems like a massive waste of time.
"A terrorist is someone who has a bomb but doesn't have an air force." -William Blum
I have a shirt that can track how many days I've gone without bathing, using a "handsfree background olfactory indicator". High tech stuff, really.
Also, I haven't tried it myself, but I think past the 30-day point it is indeed actually capable of bending light waves. It could probably also melt steel. Though due to the olfactory indicator mentioned above, it isn't exactly what I'd call "invisible"...
Can I have a million dollar grant for this invention? Erm, yeah, I'll understand if you don't want to deliver the check in person.
This is all well and good when our soldiers have them; however, what is stopping the Terrorists from getting these too. Afterall they did manage to steal several giant aircrafts, so I dont suppose stealing a suit of armour is much harder. What happens when we cant kill the terrorist because we made the damn suits too good.
"where are we going, and why am I in a handbasket"
glasses and you can see your team. Oh wait so can the enemy. Back to the drawing board.
Get a life, man.
:: Imagine There's No Windows(tm). It's Easy If You Try.
You sit there with Windows humming along nicely (aside from a reboot five to seven times per day) and are bored to tears. You click refresh several hundred times a day on Slashdot, hoping that you'll be the first human to post when a new story is put onto the front page.
Why not dab into Linux a bit and see how the elite do computer work?
MONOLINUX
Admittedly, the artist rendition of the concept is rather anime-ish, but I'd say it looks more like a cross between the kind of body armor seen in two recent videogames: Metal Gear Solid and Rockman X.
Particularly the legs.
Any case, it'll be interesting to see if they can actually pull it off. I have my doubts about the light reflecting stealth camo, but the nanomachines sound plausible enough. Reading the whole design they're aiming for, though, makes me think they've played far too much MGS2. The body armor specs are almost identical to the sneaking suit.
Truth is stranger than science fiction, indeed!
OK, look at the situation: they want to do nanotechnology research, and they want big money to do it.
So what do you do? Tell the Army you can make soldiers invisible, especially with the war on terrorism happening, and watch the money come pouring in.
~ now you know
Bend light? The best we've been able to accomplish around the lab is break wind.
The GOOD news is, every female soldier will now be a 38 DDD.
The bad news is, these suits are NOT proof against suddenly-appearing, demonic phallic tentacles.
--- Jump!! Fire!! Bullet time!! - Lego version of the Matrix
Because so many people seem to be having trouble with this...
One would assume that they said "anime-based" because these sorts of battle suits crop up a lot in anime (although generally without invisibility) -- take Bubblegum Crisis, for example. The suit pictured in the article--along with the drawing style and the fact that the wearer is apprently female--looks suspiciously anime-like.
Compare to this.
Also, a little note to the humor impaired: The phrase "anime-based" in the title of the story isn't there to imply that the Pentagon is actually trying to be anime-like. It's a joke.
Look closely at the Army's own webpage with their little picture of what the armor suit might look like...
He's holding a Pulse Rifle from Aliens!
I think it's really weird that a filmmaker decides to make a film that's a metaphor for Vietnam in which superior technology is beaten by an organic enemy; an obvious moral. But now the Army wants those Pulse Rifles.
Have any of you seen pictures of the OICW? It's the Army's latest attempt at a replacement infantry rifle for the aging M16 (A rifle which when first made, had a plastic stock stamped with Mattel's logo because they were manufacturing the plastic parts). I swear, the people in charge of defining the equipment a future soldier will be wearing must sit around all day and watch Aliens over and over and over...
I saw some recent footage of a new integrated networking system for mobile soldiers. All these soldiers are checking their PDAs and typing into their wristpad. In some way I can understand the advantage of having access to all that information, but time and again history has proven that soldier's overreliant on technology get their asses bit.
** http://www.nkhumanrights.or.kr/ ** Human rights in North Korea. 1 million estimated dead from starvation.
Mayhaps you should read such science fiction classics as Starship Troopers and the Forever War.
This is not the sig you are looking for...
Maybe our soldiers could dress like Japanese Nurses.
Disconnect your television. Do your own research. Draw your own conclusions. They're probably lying. Don't be a sheep.
...that the female soldiers get Hentai themed uniforms?
"A terrorist is someone who has a bomb but doesn't have an air force." -William Blum
I was watching the Discovery channel the other day and I saw a peice on asteroids and how little the government gives them ($1 million from the NASA budget) to help track the many floating around space. Alot that, if they hit earth, would cause a global catastrophy, even the end of mankind. Sure, military forces is a good cause for funding, but I, for one, would like to see more money spent in causes like that, as opposed to bending light and creating armor.
-Miko
Miko O'Sullivan
everyone is saying "jumping 20 feet is impossible," but people used to think going faster than 100mph was impossible. If there is a way to do it, some smart engineer will figure out a way.
Dear Gov't:
:-)
Next I'd like to see some Eva or Gundam based mechs. After that, how about some TIE fighters? Oh yeah, and then those angel-arms from Trigun.
That the "wrong" people do not get this.
Is it just me, or does the background in the "illustration" on the article look suspisciously like a post-apocolyptic wasteland?
Is it a good thing that the people desiging these suits are working from the premise that the world will be a shattered smoking dystopia? I'm not convinced they have the right frame of mind...
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
Well, obviously now soldiers will be allowed to walk around with big, shaggy, turquoise or bright green hair.
--- Jump!! Fire!! Bullet time!! - Lego version of the Matrix
Or worse, he will be killed and we will have to give a primitive weapon to his killer as a trophy and abandon the planet.
science is a religion
People, is this what you want the future to be? More efficient fighting machines and weapons to kill your fellow man? This makes me very angry.
Aren't we already capable enough of killing all life on the entire planet many times over. Nuclear, biological, chemical weapons. You name it, we got it. Do we really need more tools to kill?
Let's channel some money away from the militaries towards making this world a better place. There has already been enough killing. Violence begets violence. At the worse end of the barrel is always a human, a living, thinking person who will end his life because of reasons he may not even completely know!
This might be a good thing from technology point of view, but not from the point of view of the humanity as a whole.
Is your domain name taken? Take a Look! (In the future "comment ads" can be removed by simply subscribing. Sorry for any inconvenience
OK, If they can generate energy from body movement, why not use some sort of body that really can generate movement?
Pocket sized Hedgehogs in combination with these piezoelectric sheets could power the entire suit with nothing but their heart...
Now that does require that these suits are not used in winter because the rodent can't be hibernating.
That brings up an interesting point though....
[Officer] "Men, remember not to lick your collars"
[Private] "......mmmmm......."
Maybe we can be an even match for the predator.
And on that note: what wavelengths would they redirect? How feasable is it to extend it to infared?
Click on article .. Look at picture. Anime. If you havent watched any Anime and dont know what it is, then dont bother. They simply put the reference in there because the artist rendition is basically Anime in itself. It's disturbing to see the amount of people with an IQ of an ant asking where the Anime is, when the link is posted right in front of you. Sheesh.
damn, you've blown all their ideas out of the water. thank god we didn't spend any money on all this unachievable technology! you sir, are a genius!
fuckhead
This is SLASHDOT, what do you expect? INTELLIGENCE? Well, maybe if you read at -1...
Liberty in your lifetime
Visualize a tube, heck, a sphere, oh, six feet high, studded with a grid of fibreoptics.
each one is connected to a corresponding point on the opposite side.
Now, since the volume is much much larger than the surface, I see no problem with something like this having enough room for the fibre as well as an opaque object.
Now, make the sphere human shaped, and wrap the fibre as a layer over the top inch or two.
Light-deflecting material could make the suit blend in with surroundings
Light deflecting? Pining for the fjords? What kind of talk is that? Perhaps:
If there is anything to this, it would seem more likely it's some kind of display camoflage, like a computer display displaying the image of the cube wall behind it...
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
...one of you people will ask, DOES IT RUN LINUX? and if it doesn't, screw the military and MIT, God forbid something with circuitry in it doesn't run linux...
Should the military get involved with an academic institution like MIT? Aren't there many security issues there?
"I guess a pair of floating eyes won't raise too much suspicion.
What about infrared? Soldiers will still glow in that region.
"
In Quake one, it was pretty hard to see the floating eyes, when a player gor the invisible powerup. it could work.
The jump shoes are reminicient of quake secret level low gravity board..
It sure looks that way if you check out the pictures...
Somebody years ago may have made the same remark about small, solid-state personal radios with headsets that are commonly used by soldiers and police now.
Evil is the money of root.
give me $50 million, i'll show you how to disappear
"i can never say no to anyone but you"
I think that the nanotechnology part of the deal is going to be the most fruitful. As for bending light.... It would be much easier to create a camera/lcd type array. Have tiny cameras every cm or so, then have them feed directly to the lcd on the opposite side of the body. Only problem is the shadow thing, as well as self-lumination. Bending light is quite awhile away. Therm-optics (GitS, anyone?) is most likely a more efficient and practical alternative. My guess is that it would be much less expensive, as well. As for the EMS part, it's humanitarian enough, but in battle once you're wounded, you're pretty much out of the fight. It would save lives, true, but would not sway the battle for anyone. In my opinion the army is putting it's money in the wrong place. A soft-body is still a soft-body. You want to gain an advantage in battle? Make it a hard-body. Powered Armor comes to mind, where-as exoskeletons seem to be the rave on everybody's "Something that should be seen in the next Arny movie" part of the brain, they only serve to make a soft-body stronger, they're not going to help stop the bullet. These flashy new bdu's aren't either. They'll either just increase the bulletee's chance of living or confuse the shooter.
Of all the Universal Constants, here's one I know: Nice guys finish last
Mobile Suit Gundam
Also the lack of depth on the created image is a big concern. At best they will come up with new $50,000 fatigues that will automatically change between desert (chocolate chip), jungle (pistachio), and snow (vanilla) camoflauge, instead of giving the soldiers $200 in fatigues.
It will not render them invisible, but in a jungle setting, a lot harder to detect, maybe. At night it would be really effective.
In the day, on an open field it would be almost completely useless, though.
The original poster was seriously confused. Don't people pay attention in physics classes anymore?
Simple considerations tell us that geometrical optics is an excellent approximation for any large object. The size of the object is much, much greater than a wavelength of light, so optics reduces to tracing rays from your eyeball to the source, and thence reflected or absorbed as the case may be. There is no such thing as "bending" visible light around a macroscopic object. You can make a suit which is nearly fully reflective (not a good stealth tactic -- you would appear like a nice shiny mirror), or nearly absorptive (in which case you would appear black), but there are plenty of ordinary materials that already work quite well for either purpose.
Since I presume that the nanotech folks at MIT are well aware of this fact, I doubt they proposed to "bend light" in their suits. Rather, they are probably going to implement something which Nature has long realized in chameleons and various other creatures : "invisibility" through blending in. Various miniaturized digital cameras could sense the background that a suit was in, and change the colorations on the suit (perhaps using a variation on the "digital ink" concept) accordingly. Hence, a suit could appear sandy-yellow when in the desert, white when in the desert, and camoflouge when in the jungle.
Since we all already doing essentially that when outfitting soldiers (no one wears the bright red of old British regulars anymore), it is unclear whether there is any real advantage to this concept, especially given the cost. Particularly since, to anyone equipped with infrared night vision goggles, every body temperature objects glow like a beacon.
Bob
Science, like Nature, must also be tamed, with a view turned towards its preservation.
Haven't we already seen this in The Absent-Minded Professor (1961) or was it Son of Flubber (1963) ?
:)
It was one of those Disney movies in the 60s... When the professor attached Flubber to the bottom of the basketball team's shoes..
I just started reading this a few days ago. Drexler even talks about nanotech "smart-suits" in the book.
Check it out: "Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology" by K. Eric Drexler
http://www.foresight.org/EOC/index.html
Karma: NaN
Supercharged shoes could release energy when soldiers jump, propelling them over a 20-foot wall.
This is nothing new, flubber has been around since the days when Jerry Lewis was funny. I ain't takin that bet!
Stop Continental Drift! Reunite Gondwanaland!
The 5 year, $50 million grant also wants to look at bending light around the uniform to create some sort of invisibility.
IANAS (I Am Not A Scientist), so correct me if I'm wrong... But if you're bending light around a person, that means THEY can't see the light either. Right?
If so, this approach would be limited to situations where vision is not necessary, perhaps holding a hidden position until it is time to move out. Or maybe they would use some sort of devices to allow a soldier to "see" things outside the normal human visual spectrum, thus allowing them to see something despite not being able to see the normally visible light.
Just my 2 :)
Mozilla's a nice operating system, but it needs a better browser.
Because I didn't catch a somewhat obscure Anime reference.
Please forgive me. I have much better things to do than watch television or movies. I've never watched that much, I prefer to do things like...
G O
O U T S I D E
I have a life outside of Anime and computers. Sorry to have rankled your nerves so much.
Now, to be at least someewhat on-topic, I don't believe anything like these uniforms vcan be manufactured cheaply enough to outfit any sizeable portion of anyone's army. Strictly for special forces only.
If I weren't nailed to the penis, I'd be pushing up the daisies!
After all, eyes don't need to reflect light to function, just absorb it.
What you'd end up seeing is two little spots on the back of the soldier's head where there just wasn't enough light bent around.
Yeah, I have a webcomic...
I wouldn't be so fast to deem this a waste of money, even if this project doesn't create some superman suit, think of how many millitary technlogies have ended up to benifet civilians in the end. Anyway I think its hard to deny the powerfull benificial effects modern technology has had on the US military. The next big thing has to start somewhere, and very often its a big fat check from the pentagon.
What signature defines me as a person?
We're gonna make soldiers so incredibly expensive that we can't afford very many.
Then we'll send them into battle, whereupon they'll be vastly outnumbered by hoards of people carrying rocks.
Last words? "Ah... now here's a problem we didn't consider..."
if you feel shunned because you don't get the reference: don't panic. it's not that important in the big picture. on the other hand, there are millions of people who do understand it, so crying foul makes you appear somewhat ignorant. kind of like if i were to say you're about as quixotic as the man from La Mancha and you thanked me for the compliment.
sorry to interrupt--go back to your idiot box and comfortable place on the couch.
But why do you need to put a soldier inside it -- isn't it just extra weight?
How about some system that will actually allow American soldiers to aim? and something to stop them shooting at civilians, their own side, the red cross, and the british. LOL ;)
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
This won't come close to working. Think about it... pick a spot on your sphere. If you try to look at a point in a straight line through the center of the sphere, you would see the same thing. Now walk about 45degrees around the sphere and look at the same spot. You'll be seeing the "image" from "behind" the old position, not the new one. This is the problem I'm talkign about.
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
Suckers musta been crushed into a pancake under such high (10g) loads...
... Expose the Challenger Conspiracy!
Ah, this is great. The next time we uproot a culture's main food crop (as the UN did when inducting several African countries in the early 60's), bomb the bejeezus out of an already beleagured nation (as we are seeing right now in Afghanistan), or flex our muscle in foreign lands to keep our oil supply rolling (as we have been doing for decades in the Middle East), we won't have to bother with the nagging threat of insurgency against our grandiose dreams of consumer-heaven through global slave-wage labor! And at such a reasonable cost, you have to wonder, why do we bother with ANY aid programs at all? Let's just dump ALL of our money into researching technology to ensure our stranglehold on the entire world's economy and the military might to quash any dissidents without so much as a blip on a radar screen?
If you couldn't see the sarcasm dripping off that post, I'll translate: Just another waste of money that will keep very intelligent men working on weapons of destruction and subjugation instead of solving REAL problems, will ensure the government's popularity with a populace that is ever-swooning over the latest techno-garbage that allows us to rape pillage and steal the world over, and it keeps the army blokes happy with new toys and a whole new reason to send young men who don't know any better to die for something as arbitrary, meaningless, and sad as "their country."
Give up your pointless nationalism. Decry the insane amount of money being spent on such unnecessary and ludicrous investments. If you don't want people dying, don't start wars. If you don't want people being nerve gassed, don't make someone want to use them. If you want people to stop attacking you, stop provoking them. Our money and resources would be better spent HELPING these countries and their citizens rather than HINDERING their growth and development, thereby pissing them off to the point of bombing us.
We don't need any more military toys.
Light-deflecting material could make the suit blend in with surroundings.
"You see anyone?"
"Nope. All I see is that big, large-breasted-female shaped mirror."
"Me neither. Want to go get a beer?"
"Dude!"
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
I think that if they actually could pull this off, then a heat-sensing system would have just as much trouble picking out the soldiers as an unaided observer.
go back a reread Necromancer... Gibson already thought of this
... but can they make them blister free? Blisters are no joke no matter how high you can jump.
This is part of the Objective Force Warrior Program. From that page: ""The Objective Force Warrior will be a Formidable Warrior in an Invincible Team, Able to See First, Understand First, Act First, and Finish Decisively." Despite the capitalization, diction, and picture, which remind one more of a video game than a project of the federal government, the page is for real and provides some interesting reading. See also The Natick Soldier Center, which hosts the OFW program.
We've sent our soldiers into Afghanistan with camouflage uniforms. Great idea, right?
They're GREEN camouflage uniforms.
Just you wait. When we decide WE want anime-based uniforms you'll be seeing a bunch of Canucks running around at super-slow speeds with blue streaks blazing behind them to let the enemy know right where to shoot.
--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
jkl;
Ghost in the Shell had the characters basically wearing a suit that made the wearer invisible. The drawing from the story looks like a straight up rip off of the art concept used by said anime.
_ __
However, who ever submitted the story could have made that clearer.
Still does not mean that a dozen jokes would not have come out of the comparison. I am not sure this will happen though considering how cheap a body is next to the cost of a plane or a tank but we can hope. The American military putting its soldier's first? I hope so.
_______________________________________________
ACK
The real problem being when they are sneaking stealthily by the enemy and someone's AIM Buddy Alert goes off.
You know what?
Republicans in the White House.
Economy making slow recovery from recession.
We have a boogeyman again (Axis of Evil (tm)).
Hawaiian shirts at the mall.
My tax dollars are funding ridiculous sci-fi inspired defense schemes.
People chant "USA" at the drop of a hat.
Now all I need is to ressurect the Where's the Beef lady, and my flashback will be complete. What year is it again?
"You know why you do not see me styling wit my homies? Because I have no homies!!" -Mojo Jojo
So, you want to see your room-mate naked all the time?
These prisms are expected to weight 1 tonne each, hence the powered armor for the soldier so they can carry them. Also, guns are a problem because you have to exit the prism unit before you can fight - miraculously become visible behind the evil dictator before you shoot him.
Where is my $50mil?
As anyone can obviously see, this artwork was ripped off of the upcoming Metroid game for Nintendo GameCube! I mean, isn't that a big gun attched to their right hand? And look at the helmet style!
I wonder if you can trademark nano-tech robot suit designs, and then cry patent infringment. "I swear, I was the first one to think of making the suit come in 5 different colors!"
Ever since bush got into office, all of the classified parts of the military seems to get revealed, now our stealth armor is being revealed
no its not new, nano technology is new. Nano technology works in labs, no ones made products out of them, this suit can be made, but not for $50 million. I think more like $500 million, due to the fact that theres no way create vast amounts of nano bots.
Prototypes I'm guessing, already exsist, thats why the military is willing to pay, but will this be cheap? hell no.
I'd think this technology would be very useful, not just for military but also for law enforcement.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
As I said when I submitted this 5 hours ago(no I'm not bitter:-) ), is that this technology has potential for very good non-military uses. The enchancing of strength could help people with Muscular Schirrosis move around more freely, or help people who've had a leg smashed by a car or something walk again. Lots of fuzzy warm stuff could result from the development project that can benefit humanity(as well as letting otakus live out anime dreams of a exosuit).
-Henry
"Useless organic meatbag" -HK-47
Do they really think that these kevlar suits will stop a round from anything bigger than small arms fire? What are the nanobots gonna due pull your F***ING intestines back in after you get cut in half from a tank round. I thought the point was to remove people altogether or have these guys missed the whole point. Now a suit of Armor like the Battletech Clan Suits...that would be cool. Missles and super crushing claws and...I've said too much
There is no such thing as "bending" visible light around a macroscopic object.
If you'd pay attention in physics class you'd know about gravitational lensing. And since gravitational lensing is typically induced by astrophysical bodies I'd say it is indeed possible to bend visible light around a macroscopic object.
Yeah, I know what you're thinking, but think about what people said was not possible about 150 or so years ago.
The issue is that you emit infrared energy constantly. About the only way to be "invisible" would be to have the ambiant air be the same temperature as you. Good luck.
Even after that you're going to leave tracks - either hotter or colder than the ground - which can be a pretty big giveaway.
Realistically, the idea here isn't to become perfectly invisible. It's to reduce visibility to opponents. If you refract enough of the light around you so that your enemy can't see you before you're in firing range, then the fact that he can see you when you get 100 meters away is pretty irrelevant. By the time you're 100 meters away, he's dead.
I forget most of these details so if someone else can find them feel free to correct me to the point of embarresment.
Light can be bent given suffecient gravity, astronomers have used massive celestial objects as gravity lenses to gain better understanding of the distance of stars. The only problem is the amount of gravity you would need to bend light around somebody would probably destroy the planet in the proccess.
What's the difference between an MIT mechanical engineer and and MIT civil engineer?
.
.
.
.
Mechanical engineers build weapons, and civil engineers build targets.
Ha!
Seeing: IIRC, the idea behind invisibility is to sew fiber opbics into the fabric, which shunt the light around the body and out the other side. I don't think 100% invisibility would be practical. Rather, they're simply trying to reduce visibility as much as they can.
But what would be really cool is if they could use it to move light from the back of your head to the side of your eye, giving you sort of a rear-view mirror.
Infrared: What would be really cool is having a refrigeration unit on your suit. The heat could be collected in something disposable in your boots, and then driven into the ground. The idea comes from "Red Mars," which had a stealth vehicle that did basically the same thing.
Exoskeletons: Presuming that the devices on your feet could absorb much of the impact, and there were gyros to make sure you didn't land head first, jumping might be possible. As for carrying heavy loads, I don't know how practical that would be for long distances. After all, you need to carry a great deal of stored energy. It might just be easier to build a small one-man vehicle (say, a motorcycle on steroids). It would be much more useful in hand-to-hand combat, or for sprinting short distances quickly.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
The Slashdot Maxim:
/.ers playout their Fantasy/SciFi desires or, at least, let them think they can.
Any story about killing is cool as long as it involves high-tech gadgetry, which will let
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
The military is going to hire Cobra Commander!
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
This will fuel the fire of those who think America is evil because they think we stict our nose where it doesn't belong. But this will be cool. I can't wait.
At the next eco-hypocrisy-meeting, count the private jets used to get to the meeting. Should be interesting to see that
Put me down for $100 on MIT for the 2007 NCAA torney.
or the Darwin Awards...
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
Man, Iget out and they start coming up with kool junk!
Just make sure you always land on your feet
Wait! I know! A joke is a story with a humorous ending! Thank you SPOCK!
I was watching Predator on AMC and they had some interviews and how-they-did-the-FX stuff during commercial breaks. Somebody (the director? can't remember) mentioned that they had a screening for some military guys and a general came up to him after the film and said he "WANTED that!" (speaking of the predators armor). - I guess he had the pull to actually fund his movie inspired techno-lust.
Give me a Gundam.
What'd be cool is if they all get those Dune outfits built for riding sandworms and stuff. You know, the ones where you can drink your own bodily excretions and... uh.. nevermind
Interesting how the anti-microsoft camp post how this is microsofts problem. Wasn't this originally posted a few days ago as a major linux hole?
"...Alright Gordon, your suit should keep you comfortable through all of this..."
Couple with some technology like this we could have some seriously effective soldiers. Not that we don't already...
there was some article in Finnish popular-sciense style magazine about this years ago, like you say, the suit would detect the light from the other side of the suit and simply try to imitate that on the other. at best it was speculated to work at chameleon levels,ie not invisible at all, but that's enough to fool watchmens eyes especially if you stay still against some bushes'n'sh*t. it would be quite handy to have suit that would allow you to be hidden first in rocks and 10 minutes later in grassland..
and well, they had pictures from 'predator' on that article too.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
ENGINEERING MANAGER: "Ok, the suit resists bullets, mortar fire, acid, cold, heat, biological weaponry, nerve gas and electrical discharge. On to the final test."
ENGINEER: "Ok, boss."
(Female soldier steps forward. Her eyes are particularly large. Her hair is a strange lemon yellow color)
ENGINEERING MANAGER: "Release the tentacles!"
ENGINEER: "Yes, sir!"
(Tentacles emerge from the ground. The suit rips into fifty million pieces, each one strangely hovering in mid-air)
The ENGINEERING MANAGER starts slamming his fist against the desk.
ENGINEERING MANAGER: "Back to the drawing board. Private. Go rescue the recruit."
ENGINEER: (agog, ducking various flying fluids) "With all due respect, you first, sir."
--- Jump!! Fire!! Bullet time!! - Lego version of the Matrix
Right now, I'm naked.
THAT's something you didn't know. I hope.
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
I shit on your haircut.
However, I agree about the linux thing. You are +1 insightful. Thanks for posting.
The US Army should stick to doing computer simulations of 'force multiplier based scenarios' and leave their soldiers to direct ineffective air strikes. Dont get me wrong, the USA military is very very good at certain things, just low-intensity imperial/colonial skirmish style warfare is not one of them.
The US Army has consistently shown an inability to produce quality light infantry of any real value on the field in recent times. (The troops of General Lee's army not withstanding, of course)
Rather than build multimillion dollar nanotech gear, they will get a much better ROI by simply recruiting hardy, cunning and laconic young men, then kitting them out in Turbans and rusty old Kalashnikov rifles.
The disgraceful conduct of 'Operation Anaconda', and the dishonourable retreat against a 'vastly inferior' force of 'wild tribesmen' is simply history playing itself out again for the hundreth time.
Read up on the 1st Afghan War, 2nd AW, 3rd AW, 4th AW, 5th AW, and you will see that the whole thing is just a bad sequel. Even the attitudes of the opposing personalities are identical.
Also, can anyone recall Monte Cassino ? Against a well motivated, cool and experienced enemy in prepared defensive positions, the doctrine of force multiplier ratios becomes blatantly discredited. I am sure that nonotech suits would not have made an ounce of difference at Cassino, or Vietnam, or Afghanistan, so why bother ?
People, people.... The Mighty Stephen Hawking is way ahead of the pack on this one.
I'll belive in a suit that can bend light when we have soliders out in the field almost completly invisible that can use a laser designator to drop nukes on a zerg... I mean Afghanistan town.
I like replies better than Karma, even if they are flames, because that tells me I got someone thinking.
It's gotten now so that the US Public and US News media simply find it amazing that US Soldiers can get hurt and die in a war.
:
So, the USArmy have to react to this by making their soldiers much tougher and less likely to be hurt. Thus you are sending soldiers out in $5 to $10 million dollar armour (by the time development costs are factored in) to fight against people armed with $2000 rifles and street clothes
The danger is that you end up flipping right over to the material-cost issue. Remember the insane news reports when a Stealth Fighter was shot down ? Combine that with body-count-syndrome and you'll end up with
"3 Soldiers were killed today in an ambush in Tasmania today, and a further 4 were injured by cybothylacines. A total of 14 PBA-4C's were damaged or destroyed, with a total cost of over 100 million dollars added to the death toll"
"President Winona Ryder rejected claims that the Tasmanian Uprising was a waste of cash, pointing out that the New Zealand invasion had to be stopped at all costs"
Was I the only one who read the article, saw the enhancements, and thought "Samus"?
Jesus fucking Christ, you God damned moron... you are the lucky 100th idiot to actually bother posting on
Here's a little hint: It's a damn joke. Ever seen the movie
G H O S T
I N
T H E
S H E L L
? ! ? ! ? !
No, I suppose not, or you would've caught the reference. Now, please step right up, bend over, and collect your prize...
Unfortunately, with the new inviso-suit you have to de-cloak in order to fire your weapon, so there are still a few kinks to be worked out.
Oh, and does it run Linux?
Mmmmmm... Bold, yet refreshing!
Take a look at the image on the USA Today page, then take a look at this image. Look familiar? Radix 1
We're going ot have an Army full of Predators. I wonder if the suit will come with a mask that allows them to see in 8 different ways.
OH NOES! TEH INTARWEB IS BORKEN!
Why not first use the technology as a replacement for camo paint. I am sure the nanotransisters themselves may not weigh that much but my guess would be that the entire getup would be heavy and probably does not disperse body heat well. It would however be useful as a cover for army tanks and the likes due to the many color terrains/roads etc. and the over all difficulty of frequently changing the color.
Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
Seems to me as though the powers that be in the US Army should read
more of the right kind of sci-fi: Frederick Pohl's "The Wizards
of Pungs Corners" would do for a start. Sorry, can't find it on
the net. Originally published 1959; you'll find it in Penguin's
"Connoisseur's SF" anthology, and doubtless other collections.
(Please God, let it be that at least one other reader of slashdot
knows what the fuck I'm talking about...)
Soon, none of our GI's will be able to board a commercial aircraft.... *SIGH*
Is that 20 ft including your height or 20 ft as of your feet? That's a 25% difference... and if the mention a 20ft wall they're implying as of your feet...
Remember:
If you are jumping over a wall, you probably can't see what's on the other side. It could be ground, it could be another 10 ft to the bottom of the empty swimming pool...
You have a suit strapped to you, limiting your movement, or free at your joints allowing you to sprain them
You have a suit straped to you, increasing your momentum that must be stopped when you hit ground.
As someone who has fallen from about 15 feet repeatedly (pole valut), I can tell you it DOES hurt if you land in something other than grass, sand, or polyurthane foam, even if you hit on your feet. Nothing major usually, but it's possible. And your talking aother 5 to 10 (see first question) feet up.
- Sig
For anybody not yet familiar with this stunning piece of bullshit, there are several in France (remember now, this is the country that reverese Jerry Lewis as a comic genius) who believe that the whole 9/11 incident was a machination of the Bush administration in order to have an excuse to increase military spending (to what end only grander delusionaries can explain).
The principle evidence they cite is that the damage to the pentagon cannot be explained in terms of a single Boeing jet, and could've only be the result of a smaller explosion. The real "stunner" these snail sucking rifle dropping morons proffer is the apparent lack of damage to the inner rings and the isolation of damage to a single narrow section whereas the wings should've chomped more of a hole in the pentagon (yeah, cause we all know those wings are like knives made of tungsten-carbide and are solid right).
Their other "big evidence" is the lack of any recognizable part of a boeing in the debris (as if there should be large chunks left over after a plane slams into the ground floor of a building, and several hours of incineration under burning kerosene).
Of course, for anyone who actually witnessed any of this happenning, none of this is plausible, and the morons even considerign the possibility do so only after lackadaisically accepting the premise that Bin Ladin directly works for the CIA (a contentious link whose closest foray into the truth may have been over 20 years ago when we financed and trained the Mujahadin (not any current organization claiming to be the "Mujahadin" mind you) to fight the soviets, which was long before Bin Ladin got involved in the Jihad against the Soviets or Al Qaeda even existed - he was still living the comfy life as a construction Magnate in the very early 80's).
One thing to keep in mind when you hear the outrageous conspiracy theories like this is to follow the power (kinda like following the money, except that only the narrow minded actually think money is the ultimate corruptive influence). In this case, the article is based on the work of an author of the book (Frenchman, go fig eh?) called "The Appalling Fabrication" (not quite a literal translation - my french is rusty). Notably, the book is an incindiary piece of fiction which attempts to portray an alternate reality regarding the 9/11 events as the truth, and is written by a member of Voltaire Network, which is nothing more than perverted organization that seeks to further communist ideals by citing the works of such luminaris as Jefferson and Voltaire.
Personally, I'd be ashamed to post this kind of stupidity on the internet, much less on slashdot in a thread totally unrelated to the 9/11 issue.
Not just the French think this. Lots of Arabs (I guess I should say Muslims) think this too, but instead of thinking that the Bush administration fabricated it they think Jews did. At least, that's what they were saying on 60 minutes.
This sounds more like a general Sci-fi thing.
BlackGriffen
jump-assist? detects and treats wounds? sounds like a step towards the HEV suit from half-life. i wonder if it tells you when your ammunition is depleted, too.
I dont think it was a conpsircy, I do think the government is taking advantage of the situation for their own benifit.That was the mistake, sure they should raise the budget for war, but how are they doing this while aoso having tax cuts? Theres no logic in that, wheres the money comingg from? Social Security, HealthCare, etc?
If Bush were to call off his tax cut and just raise the military budget people wouldnt be crying conpiricy, but because Bush is getting everything he wants, it seems as if he planned the whole thing.
I think the Tax cut was a bad idea, back then people werent sure it was a bad idea, now we need to raise the budget for all these things and theres no money to do it with, so now we are going to be back in debt because of the tax cuts, or bush will take money from social security, its a lose lose situation.
We are at War, what I'd do is temperarly raise taxes for the period of a year, forget about the tax cut for a few years, make the military more modern by using the new surplus on the military, security and not just in airports but all highly popululated areas.
People however were so worried about saving a buck or two (litterally thats how much you save unless you are a millionare) that we got caught off guard and had to suffer through a recession, and now we are in debt and have budget problems, Bush keeps sending more money for all of these things with no taxes to actually pay for it, how can you cut taxes yet keep giving more money? Our surplus is gone due to the taxcut and 911 combo.
People believe it was planned because of the timing, as soon as the tax cut goes through, we are attacked when our guard is down the most.
I dont think Bush planned it, simply because i dont think hes smart enough to do it, not because i think he wouldnt do it.
I believe we were attacked, I believe bush was stupid and didnt have any defenses for an attack. Now we know we are under attack and hes still cutting taxes, I'm thinking WTF?! I'd cancel the whole trillion dollar tax cut because that trillion dollars is desperately needed now more than ever.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
France, meaning those in France who are quoted by American media, is such a parrot of certain leftist American policies that it isn't even funny.
Well, it is funny. It's like watching a mobster movie where the boss is trying to come up with an eloquent euphamism for something and the stupid henchman blurts out what the boss is reluctant to say in so many words.
But the funny part is how these French think they are so anti-American and original thinking and defiant, when their opinions are created and branded in the salons of the good ole U. S. of A.
I'm not speaking of this particular notion of the Bush conspiracy -- which was indeed whispered here long before it occurred to anyone in the MidEast (transmitted via satellite as "speculation" of what they were "going to" think) -- but of european and particularly French anti-American policy in general.
In every thread there's always some schlemeel who says "Been there, done that". It's my turn.
This concept was first discussed in an issue of Omni magazine way back in the day. In that article, the idea was to use quantum fields to create energy fields what "warped energies" around the soldier. The advantage was, no special uniform was required, as this was accomplished by a device. Also, kinetic energies would warp around the field, so bullets would zig around like they were being steered. The downside was that the soldier would have to wear special gear to see radiation outside of the visible spectrum, otherwise he'd be in his own little cacoon of blackness. Of course, as with most cool stuff in Omni, the science was mostly theory and wild semi-fiction.
Fast forward to popular mechanics a few years back, where aircraft skin coated with special liquid crystal elements and photo receptors would display on one side of the aircraft the view from the other. The net effect would be that the aircraft would appear to be invisible even as it flew against variable backgrounds of cloud, sky, and ground.
Also, there was a show on the Discovery channel narrated by Gillian Anderson (hot momma) that had a rather lame demonstration of the same concept, where microscopic elements on a gilly suit type uniform would reflect the surroundings thereby blending the soldier in better.
As for the Anime tie in...the author of this story must be related to John Katz, cause I don't know of any anime storey involving cloaking uniforms as part of an armies arsenal.
it worked in the movie, and that was a technologically advanced alien that could only be killed by Arnold...... and he almost got his ass kicked anyway
oh, and Danny Glover destroyed one up in the sequel.
so we already have 2 actors that have figured out how to defeat this technology...... hrmm
His reactions while they seem positive, does not take into account that tax cuts are only going to hurt us.
I agree tax cuts can help revive an economy after a recession, but they should be temperary, taxes should be raised when the economy is strong, lowered when the economy is in recession.
The trillion dollar tax cut hurts us in the long run , because of the lack of the republicans to properly manage a budget.
Alot of people didnt like clinton, but we had a surplus which is now gone. That surplus could have been used to pay for 911 and the war on terrorism, etc.
Right now we have no surplus due to the tax cut, so wheres the money being used for the war on terrorism coming from? Social Security? HealthCare? or are we just overbudget and in debt again?
Tax cuts can be good at certain times, and the timing has to bee precise, such as during a recession. But in times of war i'd think a tax cut is the dumbest move possible, how do you pay for the war with less taxes?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
The Geneva Convention requires that lawful combatants must wear a uniform or visible insignia and carry their weapons openly.
I believe invisibility clearly (pardon the pun) violates both points.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
"That was the mistake, sure they should raise the budget for war, but how are they doing this while aoso having tax cuts? Theres no logic in that, wheres the money comingg from? Social Security, HealthCare, etc?"
It's actually very simple when you consider that over 50% of Federal Income taxes come from businesses and individuals in the upper 1% of the corporate and income tax bracket. Those are the
people and corporations whose budgets drive massive economic engines. When you don't take capital away from them in the form of taxes (and, don't forget, the more complex the taxes the more it costs to administer them, hence the real costs of taxes is always greater than the amount on the balance sheet), that leaves more for them to reinvest in buying equipment and paying payrolls and growing their business. Those expenditures increase sales tax revenue and payroll taxes, invariable coming back to the government in other forms of tax revenue (i.e., although they don't reap as much in cap gains taxes, they find greater increases in payroll taxes). It's actually such a very simple concept that it's difficult to concieve of it's simplicity, which leads many less educated people (mostly politicians) to brand it as "voodoo economics" (sound familiar). it worked so well for Reagan that the resultant economic boom lasted into the 90's. Unfortunately, Reagan had to deal with increases spending in sectors besides the military to buy of the democratic congress, resulting in deficits. And, history will probably repeat itself if Daschle and his band of merry socialists get their way again.
So put some sort of cooling system in the suit - lower the external temp to <= atmosphere/ground temp, and you're invisible on the thermal spectrum, too.
Sounds a bit like the Hazardous Environment suit in half-life...
I wonder if it'll talk to the user? That'd be sweet....
-= ddkwe =-
Will they be able to get through airport security?
Considering the likely level of sophistication of battlefield robotics in the next few decades (ie. ROV tanks and other vehicles, small recon buggies etc.), there will still be a need for specialized and "discreet" soldiers like the Green Berets & SEALs. These are after all, men (so far, men) who are more deadly with only a kabar knife and a loincloth than most people would be with a rocket launcher, and are trained to penetrate far behind enemy lines. Automate *that*! Even the "Terminators" lacked... any subtlety whatsoever :-)
Freedom: "I won't!"
Assuming the idea of using a system of cameras that record one side and shoot it through the other could you imagine the processing power necessary to keep the image up? Hell, moving slowly against a brick wall might be difficult, I don't even want to think about the suit trying to refresh if you were sprinting through say, a crowded city street or a supermarket aisle.
-Unicron
Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
well now we know that MIT are huge bubble gum crisis fans :)
Ave Molech Setting
There's an A10 Warthog in the background, but the other flying vehicle appears to be an "Orca" VTOL from "Command & Conquer". I suspect somebody's been taking extended breaks in the lab...
Freedom: "I won't!"
I remember reading an article in popular science a few years back, where the Air Force was adding lights onto test aircraft that illuminated the aircraft itself - which was painted a light blue pastel color. In tests, after the aircraft took off from the runway, it disappeared from view about a thousand feet from the observers.
The other technology they were testing was by applying large LCD panels to the sides of airplanes to display similar colors/light intensity as the surrounding sky.
I bet dollars to donuts this is what MIT has in mind - which wouldn't make it too useful for troops in near proximity to enemy soldiers.
I was in the Canadian Armed Forces (Army) as a Sargeant and there's a few things that, in my practical experience, we could have used. The same would hold true for US Army uniforms:
1. mimetic shading - not invisibility - would have been nice to have the uniform lighten or darken based upon surrounding light levels - not invisibility - but a tan uniform when it's night isn't as useful as a darker brown, and a green dazzle cam isn't useful when you're on the sand (bright light).
2. the wound detection would have been useful. A few times I got moderately injured but was so pumped on endorphins and adrenaline that I didn't notice until I reported back to the CP and someone noticed my combats were dark with blood. So something like that would really have helped. To you this sounds silly, but when you're in action you sometimes forget minor details like wounds when your life is up for grabs.
3. better resistance to grime and dirt - so it's easier to brush it off when the officers get on your case about how you looked after wading through bogs and swamps or rolling down hills.
Just a few thoughts.
-
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
obviously you've never seen MIT's attempts at sports...
as someone who's actually played sports at MIT, i'll take that bet any day.
Read the PDF's at the institute for soldier nanotech.
The emphasis of the research program is on technology for enhancing the uniform and personal equipment. Communications, surviability, sustainability, mobility and lethality.
Currently soldiers carry about 92lbs of equipment and weapons, then add another 30lbs for food and water.
They are looking for lighter body armor with integrated sensors and built in air flow cooling. Yet that provides filtering to protect against biological and chemical attacks. Some of this will be nanotech materials (carbon nanotubes and ceramics for stronger, yet lighter armor) and other parts will be MEMS or regular radio, sensors and displays.
They want to be able to attack beyond line of sight and provide a further integrated group of soldiers (extending the communication and integration of todays soldiers, tanks, planes and satellites)
They want an integrated hydration and waste elimination system, so that the uniform, body armor would let the soldier keep fighting without being slowed to attend to bodily functions.
The midterm goals (5yrs) are to have body armor that is 5-10 times better than current armor, provide biological/chem protection and sensors, and have all the gear weigh about 30-60lbs instead of 90-120lbs, provide more comfort under harsh conditions, help reduce effect of injuries (detecting wounds and applying medication and reduce bleeding), helmet displays and better communications and info, better camoflage and reduced heat signature, light weight and lowre lasting power sources (micro-turbines, fuel cells).
They were also looking for ways to improve the mobility of the entire force (soldiers, lighter tanks etc...). Being able to deliver more soldiers more quickly to the target location and having them ready to fight right away.
They were also looking to make field bases mobile. Smart armored personal carriers moving at 40mph would replace stationary field bases.
For lethatlity, they are looking at direct and indirect engagement, less than lethal engagement, target detection/recognition, synchronization of fire, target handoff, ID friendly/enemy/noncombatants, target designation.
Midterm goal looks similar to but better than the marines in the movie Aliens. (video communication for everyone, protection from chem and bio)
The long term goals that they will also be researching are artificial muscles and other enhancements that have already been highlighted as having more anime-like characteristics.
It is about integrating advanced individual components into systems for maximizing the effectiveness of each soldier and the combined effectiveness of many soldiers.
The long term goals begin to look like some anime, comic book and star ship trooper concepts.
you just have to have enough mass to generate a strong gravitational field *sigh*
Cybernetic/Wired 'suits' have been tossed around in literature long before anime/manga started tossing ideas for them around.
Anyway, call me when the marines start issuing powered armor. Blood for Sanguinius!
The economy isnt more important than security!
What about retirement? stability? Taxes are for stability, security, etc. Its like a backbone.
IF I am brainwashed into thinking taxes help th economy (which i never stated but you assume)
Then you are brained by thinking its always a good idea to lower taxes.
If we had no taxes, we'd have no public school.
no law enforcement, no way to control the people, we'd have complete anarchy.
Taxes are needed to maintain stability and security, when stability and security are threatened taxes should be raised, when people prove they can handle the responsbility of having lower taxes then you lower them.
This is my opinion. I mean if we didnt have crime we wouldnt need police and if we werent attacked by terrorists we wouldnt need homeland security.
This money has to come from somewhere right?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
They are rich damnit, why do i care if they cant buy a new mansion or another car for their collection of hundreds?
Please!
Rich people pay most of the taxes because they make most of the money, that is fair.
Everyone should pay a percentage of taxes based on how much they make, the poor deserve tax breaks because most people are poor, the majority should overrule the top 1 percent.
Most people NEED social security, healthcare, public schools etc because MOST people arent rich.
Why do the rich need to save money on taxes? So they can waste their money on junk they dont even need? While some poor person cant retire anymore and cant get free health care or decent schooling because of it?
The rich SHOULD pay most of the taxes because the poor are the workers of society who allow the rich to be rich in the first place.
Regean did horrible, socalism? Socialism is not a bad thing, theres benifits to Socialism, in fact if technology keeps going the way its going, Capitalism leads to Socialism and theres no way around it really.
The Regean Economic boom or whatever crap you talk about, helps the top 10 percent of business execs, and people who are already rich, the tax cuts help people who are already rich, so having a good economy = helping the rich? What about the working class? I'm not rich, most people arent rich, how do we benifit by these tax cuts when we only get a few hundred bucks, big fucking deal!
I'm not saying tax cuts are bad, I'd take a few hundred bucks extra any day, but when tax cuts happen when we dont even have the surplus for a tax cut anymore, i think its stupid.
So we are having the war on terrorism.
Homeland Security is created (wheres this money going to come from?)
Raised Military Budget (wheres this money coming from?)
Increaded R&D for Nano Technology (where is this money coming from?)
Increased Budget for schools (where do they find free money?)
Bailout for Airport companies (why the hell are we paying for this?!)
If you are so pro capitalist, dont you agree we should have proper budget management?
The president and you, seem to think we can pull money out of our asses without taxing anyone, but newsflash, we dont have enough money to pay for all of this, and perhaps if we DIDNT have tax cuts we would have been able to pay for it easier.
I'm not saying keep taxes raised for the sake of keeping it raised, and I'm not saying its bad to lower taxes in a recession, What I am saying is, when theres a Surplus, lower taxes, use the Surplus money to pay for all of the emergency expenses, war, defense, and security.
When theres no surplus there should be no tax cut.I mean if we cut taxes while trying to fund a war with money we dont have, this money is coming from lets see the Education Budget, Social Security, HealthCare, etc etc that benifit the poor and middle class MAJORITY.
So its taking from the Majority who need these benifits, to pay for the war on terror? Why should we do that when we can just raise taxes and let rich guys likee Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and others pay for it? Why should someone not be able to retire, or get medicine over unpredictable events?
Taxes are for Security,
In a world with absolutely no taxes at all, meaning a pure capitalist anti socialist world that you want.
Theres no law enforcement, Hire your own personal body guard or get killed by criminals.
Theres no public school, either you can afford your education or you cant.
Theres no free hospital care, either you pay for it or you die.
Theres no social security, either you have a nest egg and stock, or you dont retire period.
Dont even think about buying a house either unless you can pay in cash.
Oh and the terrorist attacks? Rich individualist capitalist types likee you would only defend yourself, your own home using your money to do so, while the people with less money would have less defense and be victims of terrorist attacks.
Alot of people think socialism is wrong, but its required so that capitalism can work, absolute capitalism is a mistake, absolute socialism perhaps is also a mistake.
People must have some individuality, but sometimes people must work as a team for the greater good of the country, humanity, etc.
Capitalism is Individualism and thats a big problem when the Individuals arent very mature, dont forget its harder to enforce a democracy as well if you can even have one in an absolute Capitalist society.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Welcome to the H.E.V. mach 4 protective system, for use in hazardous environmental conditions.
High impact reactive armor - activated.
Atmospheric contaminant sensors - activated
Vital sign monitoring - activated
Automatic medical system - engaged
Weapon selection system - activated
Munition level monitoring - activated
Communications interface - on-line
Have a... very... safe day.
bouyancy ... for aquatic missions :P
Using electronics, you can have electronic camaflauge(sp?) which adapts to the enviornment you are in making you seem invisible. Its an illusion, a very very good illusion thats generated electronically, so if you go into the desert your suit will look like desert sand, it wouldnt be hard really, just take a snapshop of the enviornment and then take that snapshot and the suit displays it
or at least thats a very cheap simple way of doing it.
A more complex way would require alot more energy, and electronics. Bending light? thats not what it will do, but it will create the illusion of being invisible
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
The invisible army in the desert...what more can you say.
They are anime-inspired. If they were anime-based, the base technology would be anime, and the makes no sense.
The suits are nano-tech based.
Our armed-forces aren't exactly centered around infantry. And simple infrared goggles make the invisibility part useless (unless they incorporate a kick-ass insulation system, which would make the suits VERY hot (unless they incorporate a cooling system, which would be large, noisy, and a power-hog)).
If they want to dabble in nano-tech, I would go with injectable nano-bots, which could augment a lot of things (healing, sight, communication, muscle-power, etc) combined with next-gen body armor.
Hello, friendly fire!
"I didn't see him, I swear!"
If they make these suits detectable, so that your allies can see you but the enemy can't (maybe have them emit some frequency or something), they had better be SURE that the detection technology doesn't get in the wrong hands (which it probably would, unfortunately).
The one MOS that this would be extremely effective in is a sniping job. The snipers goal in life is to remain unseen and to shoot people. Having this suit would take care of half the battle.
-kwishot
Not that it's particularly relevant, but tanks are being phased out. (m1a1, etc)
Most things in the near future will be Infantry-type groups and planes with bombs.
-kwishot
*maybe* detectors on one side can replicate detectors from the other, but it can't be omnidirectional
Sure it can be omnidirectional. You have many, many detectors (sampling many directions) interleaved with many, many emitters (emitting in many directions) The only real problem is the size (hard to get high resolution) and power requirements (hard to match all lighting conditions). Oh, and the software to take into account the current shape of the suit.
Music speeds up when you yawn, but does not change pitch.
The rifle in at least one of the drawings is almost identical to the Heckler & Koch OICW that's meant to replace the aging M-16. It's nothing more than a bullpup design with an integrated grenade launcher. The technology behind it will be pretty cool if it makes it into production.
in fallout the only way you could win was with your power suit. Besides if you believe how they view the end of the world, by then we'll either be mtuants or still living in the vaults and everyone will need one of these suits just to survive radiation.
This exact concept was covered in a book by Jeff Rovin in 2000, called "Stealth War". The idea was this: Weave the "nanowires" into the fabric of the suit, along with the light processors. The processors alternate receiving and transmitting. The image received on one side, is transmitted on the exact opposite side. Thus anyone looking at the soldier would see the image of the background being transmitted by the suit. In addition, "nanowires" could carry data to wearables, etc. An impressive idea, while perhaps unfeasible. But, it will be interesting to see what the folks at MIT can come up with. It would seem that the limiting factor would be conductor size. Theory suggests that the optimum would be to get the electrons to line up single file. Much the same as chip designers are attempting. Of course, fiber optics may be another consideration. No clue on the size of a light wave, as compared to an electron... It is all theory, and there is no telling what MIT may come up with. But, if you are interested in this sort of idea, I highly recommend the book. I thought it was a great read, and one that fueled my "what if" side...
You used the words economic boom and Reagan in the same sentence. Heh.
You could use very fine fiber optic cables hooked up to a switcher that transports light from one side to another through the network of fiber optic cables. You would only have to power the switches and the computer, instead of a lot of leds(or something else) and light detectors. You would also need a system to monitor the position and angle of the fiber optic cables relative to each other and the body.
couldn't you simply have an insulated tank of liquid nitrogen, and use it at low pressure (so it won't freeze you :o)
just make sure the escaping gas is equal to the ambient atmospheric temperature.
that would make you invisible to infrared detection.
Why not have a few cameras pointing in all directions, flexible lcds (if there is such a thing) used as the fabric and just 'show' what the camera pointing behind the guy is seeing on the front of the guy. Maybe do some corrections on the shadows and what not.
"I do not fear computers. I fear lack of them." ~ Isaac Asimov
There are stupid people in France writing the kind of thing you mention. But it seems that there are even more stupid people in the USA (I mean you) believing it's the French general way of thinking.
You can be ashamed.
And as a French, I'm still wondering why USA have produced movies Jerry Lewis and called him a "humorist".
Actually, its not Shirow, its from an american comic book called Radix. But the fact remains that the gun does look like the Seburo: american comic books are just biting off manga again...
Basically attach a flexible display panel with a small camera to the front and back of a vehicle, and then output the rear camera to the front display, and so on for whatever sides you want to camouflage.
Perhaps with flexible display one could minimize ones targetable area.
More here
It's just fun to make fun of the french. Don't take it personally...unless you're french. I mean, you have the only culture in the western world that would conceive of this bullshit, then actually give it serious attention.
Oh, how true. I make fun of Slashdot idiots and get modded... REDUNDANT!!
Liberty in your lifetime
i just noticed that the graphic on the armies site for soldier nanotechnology closely resembles units from Command&Conquer. Notice the guns they hold and the VTOL ORCA Fighters in the background? Screw battle suits, Id rather see the Wolverines of C&C: Tiberium Sun on the field
Talk about holding fire until you see the lights of their eyes! Soldiers who only can be seen by their eyes, as that is the only spot where the 'light bending' isn't used. Interesting. :P
"Never, never suspect the dreams within the dreams of dreaming children." ~The Amazon Quartet
"We are at War, what I'd do is temperarly raise taxes for the period of a year, forget about the tax cut for a few years, make the military more modern by using the new surplus on the military, security and not just in airports but all highly popululated areas."
... it's now 2002, income tax is at 40% for most of the population.
.. well, the roads are sealed now, yet I'm still paying MORE in tax than I am in FEUL for each litre of petrol.
Yeah, australia put in a tax just for the war. World War 2, we introduced an income tax "just to pay for the war"
We introduced a petrol tax to "pay for the sealing of roads"
If it was me, I'd be asking myself "should I be blindly supporting my government in a war simply because it's patriodic, or should I be questioning the sence in honoring the 5000 dead by killing another million"