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Human Exoskeletons Getting Closer
ColdWetDog writes "It's not Sigourney Weaver tossing aliens about, but The Register has an interesting blurb about a real human-capable exoskeleton that looks pretty cool (Lockheed-Martin press release). Runs for three hours at 3 mph on internal batteries; max speed is 7 mph. Of course, no price is listed but I suppose if you have to ask you can't afford it. Team this up with a Big Dog and you've got the ultimate high-tech cross-country team. Bring your own batteries. Or just wait for your jetpack to arrive."
Projects like this are always limited by a single factor: energy density.
Loads of heavy batteries that only seem to last an hour or so, or loud, smelly, fault-prone ICEs are par for the course. See, millions of years of evolution have resulted in bodies that are surprisingly efficient in a wide variety of circumstances and pack loads of energy into a very little weight. When your body truly runs out of energy in sustained exhaustion, it can even burn its own motor (muscle tissue) for a last bit of energy!
The problems are many and severe. It will be a while before exoskeletons are worth much.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
No, I'm suggesting that in a time where much of the country has been stirred into anti-immigrant sentiment, anti-intellectual sentiment, an all or nothing mindset, a with us or against mindset, and a government with policies to match, that people were able to elect someone who speaks clearly in full sentences instead of jingos and soundbites, who has a background living in many different parts of this great country and experiences exceeding that of most Americans, and who is progressive thinking, inclusionist, and open-minded.
Maybe you think he's special because he's black. I don't know what that says about you. You can figure that out yourself.
But it says a lot about the American people at that one brief moment in time to have chosen someone so at odds with the general zeitgeist. I'm not talking about Obama as President here. I'm talking about the opportunity to change and grow as Americans. The article and video showing off this technology as a military tool leaves me less hopeful.
I don't hate America, I love it. I wish only the best things for this country.
But I hate articles like this, and I hate the truly American values it reveals.
Why is it that when Americans think of powered exoskeletons, the first thing they think of is soldiers?
War and military industry just tend to do that: invent things to help you win the battles easier. It's always been like that.
War (even the one now in Iraq) is a quite good accelerator for military industry research and the industry creates a variety of products during a war. The bigger the war the bigger the influence on technology.
Even though it's bad that the things are developed for the military, the research eventually helps normal people: when the war ends, the military companies start selling licenses for the products or continue researching to create a product for consumer markets.
War so far has been a huge boost in techonology, if you think inventions like nuclear power, radar, V2 missiles, which later on lead to the Saturn V, medical breakthroughs (especially in first aid) etc.
Impact of the war on technology is just something you just can't deny.