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Exoskeletons For Rent In Japan
destinyland writes "Cyberdyne has started renting their exoskeleton body suits in Japan. The mind-controlled wearable machine increases strength and endurance, and rents for $2,300 a month. (Sensors on the skin detect traces of nerve signals from the brain, synchronizing the power suit's movements with the user's own limbs.) New video shows the suits in use on the streets of Tokyo, and the concept may be catching on. DARPA now has a program called Exoskeletons for Human Performance Augmentation 'to develop devices and machines that will increase the speed, strength and endurance of soldiers in combat environments.'"
Cyberdyne? HAL? Are we already this deep in the 'asking for it' business?
Keep on knockin'
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See title. I did not see anything in the video which could not be done by relying solely on your ordinary inner skeleton. Except of looking silly, which judging from western media's coverage of Japanese culture must be Japan's most popular pastime.
But I will give some props to the exoskeletons -- they did not keep that girl from swaying her ass so nicely. Maybe they even enhanced it.
Pay apartment rent, cable, internet, car insurance, student loans, and utilities... or live in a cardboard box and be a cyborg...?
I'm in!
Colour me paranoid, but I think the exoskeleton success stories won't be seen in Popular Mechanics until they're already obsolete.
*Yes, I've worked on robotics exoskeletons, and have spoken with other people who develop them.
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The military version might be able to lift 200lb weights, speed box, run, jump and other amazing things.
Nothing a cup of water wont put a stop to.
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From TFA, the exoskeleton from the Japanese is being made to help the disabled and the immobile. The US exoskeleton? It's for the soldier of tomorrow.
Interesting priorities, that tell a lot about each culture.
I wonder what the long term consequences are of wearing one of these things all the time. As it is we're lazy. Now we don't even have to use our own muscles?
The title of the original article says that these exoskeletons may soon become like bicycles. I doubt that and I'm sure that most governments will outlaw them. Whoever wears them could pose a serious threat to the people around him/her and why would anyone wear one for show if not for work (like construction) or fighting (which is illegal) ?
Seriously? They named their company after the company in Terminator? I'm not sure if I'm amused or concerned.
I'd hate to see what one of those things can do (to the user) if the sensors malfunction. Lets hope that the joints are desgined to not have a larger range of motion then the human wearing them.
read my mind at http://the-willows.blogspot.com/
The way I see it, this has a very scary natural progression.
Military use:
At first, it's only used to assist in very special cases. Eventually it's perfected and every infantryman has one! Well, that's great. But one day, some 'genius' general is going to say, "Hey, what if we had the suits continue working even AFTER the soldier has died? That'll scare the bejesus out of the enemy!" And he'll get a medal, and some room full of programmers will work on making the suit controllable remotely, with simple commands that allow to act somewhat autonomously. (Stuff like... "Is the soldier dead? Okay, rush the bad guys and scare them")
It works so well, that soon they don't even take the dead soldiers out of the suits until they start to smell pretty bad, which gives away their position. The suit would dig a grave, drop its soldier in it, and run back to base.
Eventually that autonomy will prove so effective, they start allowing portions of it to activate even if the soldier is still alive. ("Not moving fast enough? Here, I'll help." "Hey, orders said go down this street, not that one. Let me help!" "Why aren't you shooting the small people with things shaped like grenades? Let me take care of that for you.") The soldiers will follow orders MUCH more effectively. And even if the suits walk them into death, well, the suits are more durable, and the enemy is more scared of dead walking soldiers, so... yeah.
Corpse armies will soon become the norm, and instead of enlisted soldiers, we'll just start tossing criminals into the suits. Inevitably the criminals would disobey an order (probably given an impossible order right away) and lose 100% control, and just be slaves to the suit until they got shot in combat.
So now we have robot zombie armies fighting each other with reckless disregard, since nobody's really getting killed anyway.
Wow, I just had an awesome idea for a novel.
It speaks heavily about their needs. Japan is very concerned about lack of youth. They are currently regressing in terms of population size (of Japanese; illegal aliens are an issue for them). OTH, America has spent TONS of money on it for moving things. Simply the last investment is via DOD contractors. But, there has been active research into this for several decades. And up until recent times, it was concerned mostly with hazardous waste and/or moving large material.
Culture has NOTHING to do with this.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I watched the video of the three people walking the streets with leg exoskeletons.
Argh! It just abounds in wrongness! They are all in black, with white exoskeletons. There should be a red one, a blue one and a yellow one or some such! Don't these people watch Sentai shows?
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With the decrease in actual exercise performed while wearing one of these suits, soon everyone will be too fucking FAT to fit into them.
And another thing...
"Developing story! Epileptic in HAL suit has seizure on subway...18 reported dead. More at 11!"
Actually, outside of the espionage business, I'm not sure I can think of classified military tech that remained secret until obsolescence. Not saying it hasn't happened (we might never know after all), or that they don't do their best to keep stuff secret, but once the grunts get ahold of something, you can bet it'll become common knowledge very quickly.
The stuff that does get kept secret is the stuff that never enters widespread use, or only requires the knowledge of a few highly placed people to deploy. Spy planes and satellites, failed prototypes, software, bioweapons, strategic command and communication systems - those can be hidden. Anything destined for the front lines can't stay secret for long.
Of course, you could have meant the successful prototypes will remain hidden from the public, but you did say "until they're already obsolete", which suggests they've passed the prototype stage, entered production, and fallen behind the curve.
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Cyberdyne = the fictional company that built Skynet in the Terminator movies
HAL = the computer in "2001: A Space Odyssey"
You're obviously not a science fiction geek ;-)
And I'm surprised that a real company calls itself Cyberdyne and uses HAL as an acronym for a real product. While I appreciate the humor, most companies want reputable sounding rather than funny names. That way, Japanese Cyberdyne is a big exception.
C - the footgun of programming languages
I've posted a few times in this thread in an entirely joking manner, but something I couldn't quite put my finger on has been bothering me about this whole thing. It finally struck me.
I occasionally do a little demonstration to show how the body responds to certain stimuli. You can try it yourself. Stand in a doorway, place the outside of your wrists against the sides of the doorjamb (the door has to be open, idiot), and apply steady, yet heavy pressure outwards with both arms, as if you are trying to do a jumping-jack, but the doorjamb is preventing your arms from going all the way up. Push hard. Hold it, still applying outward pressure, for a count of 60 seconds, then step out of the doorway and just relax, with your arms hanging at your sides. Weird, huh?
Your arms will almost immediately begin raising back into the previous position, outwards, without any intentional effort, almost as if you are in a zero-G environment.
Astronauts experience the exact opposite of this. They do not require much effort to move around, so that when they are suddenly back on Earth, it is very difficult for them to move around. I am not talking about muscle atrophy. That takes much longer to happen. As the previous exercise demonstrates, it takes a mere 60 seconds to condition the body to changes in the environment, yet it takes just as long for it to re-adapt.
Now imagine a soldier in the field. Blastin' away, running hither and yon, jumpin' jack flash, for hours on end, his movements amplified by this crazy borg suit. Suddenly he takes a hit in the powerpack, or it just runs outta juice in the middle of a fire-fight. So what does he do? He takes the fucking thing off, otherwise he is a deadman (or simply laying there like one).
Here is the problem. He is so conditioned to the suit, now it is off, it takes a long time to readjust. He is STILL a sitting duck, blundering around like a 40oz drunk because his muscles/brain are still expecting the suit to be doing most of the work.
This is a bad scenario. He is the Terminator while the battery lasts, and Erkle-the-Wonder-Geek with no body armor when it goes dead.
I think I'd rather hump the 80lb pack around and be able to dump it (and float like a butterfly) when the shit really hit the fan.
How long before I get spam talking about these things being able to improve my performance in bed ... ? :-)
I'd recommend reading "Starship Troopers" by Robert Heinlein, which covers some interesting problems regarding exoskeletons used in combat. The solution of course is to not amplify the soldiers strength unless needed. The suit should simply move with the body in normal situations and only ampify in extreme situations, when the soldier exerts extreme force.
Are you saying there needs to be a high heel version?