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$2 Million on the Table for DARPA Urban Challenge
coondoggie writes "The contestants: Thirty-five driverless vehicles. The goal: to navigate an intricate faux-urban environment quickly. The prize: $2 million for the fastest qualifying vehicle. 'The National Qualification Event will take place this weekend ... DARPA says its third-annual Urban Challenge program has the lofty goal of developing technology that will keep soldiers off the battlefield and out of harm's way. The Urban Challenge features autonomous ground vehicles maneuvering in a mock city environment, executing simulated military supply missions while merging into moving traffic, navigating traffic circles, negotiating busy intersections, and avoiding obstacles.'" I'll be cheering, as long as the creepy robot bear isn't participating.
DARPA says its third-annual Urban Challenge program has the lofty goal of developing technology that will keep soldiers off the battlefield and out of harm's way.
We already have that. It's called congress. It's just broken right now.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
God but I love technology! The old WWII vets are all worried about losing their mobility when the state determnes they're no longer fit to drive. By the time I'm that old (and I have gray hair and a white beard already) I'll have Sally.
Military implications? Pshaw, I want my car to drive me home when I'm too drunk to drive myself!
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I haven't checked the rules, but unless something's massively changed from last time, there's no reason to launch a UAV because for a start that would be massively more complicated and more expensive than required, and secondly DARPA are still providing GPS waypoints.
But I wouldn't have thought they'd want another UAV, there are other competitions for that. Navigating round the traffic is the tricky part. And recognising all the signs and speed limits and stuff.
Developing robots for urban warfare isn't exactly going to decrease civilian deaths or injuries. It's going to increase them. The only thing it will decrease is the reports of dead US soliders. A great example of the twisted focus on 'our' deaths came recently here in Australia. The 2nd Australian solider was killed in Afghanistan. Absolutely everyone on the mainstream media and 2-party political system is falling over themselves to declare our fallen solider a hero. But no-one ever talks about the thousands of hero is Afghanistan, such as men, women and children who 'soldier on' after having their loved ones killed and injured, and classified as 'collateral damage'. These are the real heroes - the innocent civilians who face incredible hardship precisely because of our military and economic meddling in their country. Instead of developing better killing systems, we should develop a more just society. To all those drones protest that we need to fight terrorism - get a grip - we're creating the terrorism. Remove the cause, and the symptom will disintegrate.