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Wall-E Lookalike Wins British War Robot Showdown
longacre writes "Following in the footsteps of DARPA's Urban Challenge, in which robotic vehicles had to navigate a complex obstacle course without human intervention, the UK upped the ante with its own Ministry of Defence Grand Challenge: within a mock enemy village, robots were instructed to find potential targets and make distinctions between armed troops, roadside bombs and snipers. The winning entry, Team Stellar's SATURN system, actually consists of three vehicles: a low level drone and a tracked ground vehicle transmit reconnaissance data to a high-altitude robotic relay aircraft, which proceeds to phone that data home to a central processing center. Upon announcing the winner yesterday, MoD said they are 'carefully considering if technologies demonstrated in the final can be incorporated into future frontline kit for the Armed Forces. It is possible that the winning team will have invented a product that can be developed rapidly for the front line.'"
I thought from the moment I saw the movie that he could be used for more than just making cubes of trash!
"Slapping lipstick on a pig does NOT make it Natalie Portman. Paris Hilton, maybe, but not Portman." - UncleTogie
Just what the world needs, a robotic killing machine that likes to hold hands.
Be you Admins? nay, we are but lusers!
Definitely not a Wall-E look-alike...
Better luck next time to hype an article with that headline :)
What I like is this:
Would it not, perhaps, be better to invest time and energy into robots which "make distinctions" between armed troops and unarmed civilians?
Read Pynchon.
Don't you know the 'hero' always wins? ;) Even if it is a robot...
... British robot enthusiasts are more likely to respond to this interesting challenge if the site of the "mock enemy village" was centred around, oh I don't know ... say 10 Downing Street?
Peace (!),
Andy.
p.s. or for 60's T.V. geeks, the real Village from the Prisoner ... dodge Rover for an extra 10 points ...
Did no one else see this movie? This is clearly a step towards Johnny 5, Wall-E be damned.
WALL-E, War Associate to Locate and Liquidate the Enemies.
Everything is possible. The impossible just takes longer.
is ALIVE!
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Or French.
Or lazy and French.
It's true I tell you, feller at work's next door neighbour read it in the paper.
welcome our new robotic ov... wait, hasn't this been done before?
Contrary to popular oppinion, London is not burning. It is, in fact, quite nippy.
well put. and note, if we're talking about armed battlefield robots, targetting the opposition with lethal force, false positives should NOT be acceptable.
Quote:
within a mock enemy village, robots were instructed to find potential targets and make distinctions between armed troops
This is obviously designed for use in "the war on terror" where most of the fighting is against mock enemies....
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
Just make sure that the robots have a preset kill limit. Then you can send wave after wave of your own men in, until they shut down.
DARPA and the MOD tried to have a joint challenge, however most of the British robots were shot or run over by the American robots during the exercise.
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
What else is a drone supposed to look like?
In any event, there is plenty of prior art.
With the possible side benefit of clearing the area of horses...
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
They were making robots that look like that way before Wall-E. If anything Wall-E was designed off of some other robot
Hence the clauses in the Geneva convention referring to carrying arms openly, and distinctive badges and insignia.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Just about any technology can be used to kill. At least with military hardware, the best weapon is one that never needs to be used.
Also, is there something intrinsically better about being mauled by an old fashioned cannonbal than a grenade? Or a crossbow bold instead of a sniper bullet? Ideally, if you could develop and maintain a sufficiently large enough technology gap you woulnd't need to fight. Military development is as much about saving lives through conflict deterrence as it is about winning wars by killing people.
Bottom line, guns don't kill people, people do. All I know is that I'd rather bring a gun to a knife fight than a knife to a gun fight. I'd also rather be the one wearing a bulletproof vest in a gunfight, and the one with the armour peircing bullets etc.
Yes it has binocular eyes and tracks but that is about it. I would say it would look more like Johny Five from "Short Circuit". As Johny Five had binocular eyes, tracks, and was silver and designed for warfare.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Shouldn't it be armed with a bayonet, have a red jacket and run on tea?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
make me cry like a little girl like the real Wall-E did?
You would think in a UK competition there would be at least one of those remote control Daleks running around hollering "EXTERMINATE!!!"
-When going for broke, go for Ithaca!
I have to say, the photo of the winner suggests to me that while it might be able to locate one sniper, roadside bomb, or armed troop it probably wouldn't last long enough to find a second one.
While the multi-layered approach sounds like a winner, I can only imagine that any land based robot is going to need to be small and fast to have a very high survival rate. Or, small and cheap so that several can be deployed.
I know what you did last summer. Just kidding, I don't work at the NSA.
Just about any technology can be used to kill.
I think there's a major difference between "any technology" and technology that is specifically designed for killing.
Also, is there something intrinsically better about being mauled by an old fashioned cannonbal than a grenade?
The people who made cannon balls faced essentially the same moral issues as those making high tech hardware today. Perhaps if everyone had considered their moral culpability in designing weapons of war, right back to the days of cannon balls and before, the world would be a better place.
Bottom line, guns don't kill people, people do.
The thing is, people developing military hardware are essentially palming off responsibility to unknown faceless future users. They don't know who and for what purposes their technology will ultimately be used. It might be used for wars of agression and much worse, but they just happily design it and let others use it how they will.
Just about any technology can be used to kill. At least with military hardware, the best weapon is one that never needs to be used.
You say the best weapon is one you never have to fire. I respectfully disagree.
I prefer the weapon you only need to fire once. That's how dad did it, that's how America does it, and it's worked out pretty well so far.
So we just rely on the huge military power to be benevolent?
Unchecked power is a pretty bad thing.
So maybe a few lives are saved, but are those lives worth living if they are lived in subjugation?
What doesn't kill you only delays the inevitable
It's johny 5 Zombie style
"I'm Wall-E"
"and I'm a PC"
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
Tap, tap. "Excuse me, are you an armed troop?"
not all of the J5, "Jackson 5" are that way after all.
I must say, mentioning distinction and honor when your armed forces are viewed as an aggressor in the large part of the rest of the world sounds rather... hollow.
I also won't take your claims at face value; they sound like way too much propaganda. Well, you sound like propaganda, to be more accurate.
Random capitalization doesn't help, either.
Ignore this signature. By order.
Why couldn't they just build a real one like this one they used on the publicity tour?
I disagree. I think the best weapon is the one you only have to use once.
chess
No "Skynet" tag?
mod parent up please