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Soldiers Bond with Bomb-Defusing Robots
hdtv writes "Reuters is running a story that talks about the emotional bonds that US soldiers develop with the robots in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. The company, most famous on the US market for its Roomba vacuum cleaner, provided '300 PackBot Tactical Mobile Robots deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan to open doors in urban combat, lay fiber-optic cable, defuse bombs and perform other hazardous duties previously done by humans alone.'"
Oh, why didn't you take me instead, oh why!?!?!?
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
As a Disabled American Veteran and member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, let me say Thank You! This technology is long over-due.
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
Film at 11.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Venkman: You're not sleeping with it, are you?
We humans are such bonding creatures aren't we? I actually realized this just last evening when I was playing the sims 2.
I had never played a sims game before, but all the excitement and buzz around spore made me decide to try out some of will wrights designs - so I picked up the highly reviewed sims 2.
I created a family and was amazed at how quickly I became attached to them. I feel so compelled to make sure that they are well fed and happy - and I have become extrememly preoccupied with making certain they all have positive relationships with each other.
Then I suddenly realized that these sims are programmed to age and eventually die! I then started another family which I care much less about and refuse to load my original family because I can't bear the thought not only of their permanent passing - but of the distress it will cause the other sims!
Someday I will take them out of this suspended "animation" when I discover how to make them live indefinitely - either through game methods or life-saving game modding!
Probably has been done many times.
Think about ships. In the West they are given a female gender. "She is a good ship". Airplanes often are named and given nose art. This isn't anything new. It is a machine you depend on. It is comforting to think that it some how cares for you and will try to do all that it can to keep you safe. Since it is so willing to help you it seems only natural that you would care for it back. All very human and emotional.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
but you can't love your battle bot.
From TFA:
"I've been ordered to disarm this IED. Here I am, brain the size of a planet and they ask me to disarm this IED. Call that job satisfaction? 'Cos I don't."
"You watch this IED," he muttered, "it's about to detonate. I can tell by the intolerable air of smugness it suddenly generates."
The IED exploded in a shower of parts.
"Thank you, IRobot CEO, Colin Angle. 'Let's build PackBot Tactical Mobile Robots with Genuine People Personalities,' he said. So they tried it out with me. I'm a personality prototype. You can tell can't you?"
"I hate that bomb," continued Scooby. "I'm not getting you down at all am I?"
"Er, excuse me," said the Soldier following after him, "which government owns this war?"
"No government owns it," snapped the robot, "it's been stolen."
"Stolen? By who?"
"Zaphod Beeblebush. You know. Galactic President. Did I mention we're going to see Disaster Area after we stop off at Milliway's? I probably didn't because we're already here and who'd know the difference. I think you ought to know I'm feeling very depressed."
To be fair, the modern M-16 doesn't suffer from these woes. But the only reason it works as advertised is because enough people bitched that the beaurocrats and contractors had to back down and deliver the gun as originally designed.
Think global, act loco
I was in OIF I and OIF III. I can tell you while I didn't have a robot at any point you do develop these odd co-dependant relationships with certain items, more-so with the clunky ones for certain reasons. In OIF I it was our truck, named "Jihad Joe".
The thing about Jihad Joe is it was a piece of crap, but it was our piece of crap retarded truck. We had to constantly work on it, we modified the hell out of it due to lack of parts and our special needs - spider webbing harnesses for storage, ghetto-rigged the cooling system, wired a DC converter to the battery and hooked a laptop into the SINGARS radio so we could do low-baudrate but secure data burst transmissions off of it (via hyper terminal, yes, very ghetto). The truck was constantly on the verge of death, got some bullet holes, took shrapnel, had a van friggin smash into the side of it, and it got a black eye (headlight busted out).
However the truck saved us many times, and always responded well to our on the fly fixes we had to do while we were out in the city. We limped it back home on many occasions, and we lived out of the vehicle sleeping on it or in it for about 4 straight months and off and on during other periods.
We became very attached to this, partially because we had to work on it so often and in so many ways. We had a co-dependant relationship, and we felt both sides recognized this. We wouldn't abandon it or scrap it, and in turn it would not leave us totally screwed, like some of the better vehicles that when they broke there was no getting them started again. Our truck was a member of our team.
So, parallel that with these robots, the things are high maintenance, and anyone who has had to PMCS anything in the military can tell you that. these guys sweat keeping it running, and it in turn serves a specific function which helps keep them safe. They become unit mascots, a member of the team, much more than a piece of equipment. You are around these things all the time for a long period, you screw around with it in the barracks and get it to fetch your lighter for you or pour water on your sleeping roommate. It becomes one of the guys and develops a personality.
In summary, just from personal experience, this is not surprising.
YouStockIt - Education through Unorthodox Methods
OK, but it's going to b uit ifficult communicating ffctivly without thos lttrs, particularly "". At last you in't pok out my "i"s.
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