Slashdot Mirror
China Using Troop of Trained Monkeys To Guard Air Base
samzenpus (5) writes "No, they don't have guns and they don't ride on top of drones. Instead the small troop of macaques have been trained to guard air bases from birds who often get caught in aircraft engines. Government sources say the monkeys have proven more effective than netting, scarecrows, firecrackers and soldiers with live ammunition in dealing with birds. From the article: 'The macaques are trained to respond to precise whistle commands from their handlers, according to the Chinese military, leaping into action, clambering up trees to destroy nests and scare away birds, according to an account on China's Air Force News Web site on Sunday. The particular air force base employing the monkeys was left unidentified, described simply as being in the Beijing military zone. Base commanders in the account said the monkeys have destroyed more than 180 nests, at a pace of six to eight nests per monkey per day.'"
they are 'evolutionarily challenged', that's all.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I, for one, welcome our new monkey overlords.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
Does this mean the Typing Shakespeare project is on hold?
Table-ized A.I.
with trained monkeys. That way we won't have to worry about human rights abuses.
I wonder if they have opportunities to teach these behaviors to wild monkeys who will someday destroy all the bird nests in China.
"they don't have guns and they don't ride on top of drones"
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
If they have one monkey doing this at 6 nests/monkey/day, they have been doing this for 30 days. With 10 monkeys they've been doing this for 3 days. The numbers don't add up...
Oh. Okay.
Wait, what?
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I'm curious if this is the same troupe of monkeys that were recently laid off from Microsoft, after they completed Windows 8.
The "headline" such that it is, is offensive. It's surprising that the Slashdot "editors" allowed it. It implies things that are not really happening and and suggests things about the Chinese that are not a reality.
Shame on Slashdot.
Definitely a new low.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
A troop of monkeys? That would make them Cavalry, implying the monkeys are intended to fight from a mount (horse or vehicle). These monkeys are on foot, and not artillery (a battery), so it should be a company of monkeys.
And if we are talking more like 10 monkeys, lets call it a squad. 30 or so to a platoon.
That half-buried Statue of Liberty in the corner back-lot is a bit unsettling for some reason.
Table-ized A.I.
I thought airports in the US (yeah, I know we're talking about the infinitely more important air bases here) were using dogs to scare birds away. If we're just worried about bird strikes then we mostly just need to keep flying birds away from aircraft flight paths, don't we?
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
lacist.
When not working, the Monkeys like to eat Bananas, Mate and write Shakespeare.
Slashdot has tanked in the last few years, but this is a new low and the anonymous comments...
I think I'm going to take a break from you for a while, Slashdot. *Maybe* I'll come back...
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
How is that any different from what we do in America?
Why is China using MSCEs to scare away birds? I can't imagine they'd be very good at tree climbing, surely they're better off running the network or something.
I stole this Sig
You ever try to clean monkeys out of a turbine before?
I could point you at several companies that are using them for IT and end user support. They schedule a deskside visit to fix your hardware and you end up covered in monkey shit and banana peels.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Oddly, this was on the local morning radio show today. Seemed like a decent idea. I'd love to see "this airspace is protected by trained monkeys", as it would likely provide more assurances than anything the current security theater could provide, with quantifiable results...
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
I thought it was going to say that China outsourced guarding of their base to America.. and that it was going to say something like this caused a rip in the fabric of the space time continuum, because you cant outsource to an outsourcer..
*Newsflash: A British sounding gentleman and a girl just stepped out of a blue box that appeared out of nowhere and told me that the punchline to the joke is "The crack in Kim Kardsashian's ass." and they both stepped back into the box which disappeared, before I could ask them what the joke was.. :(
Hope they don't learn to fly.
cheap...cheep..chepe..chEep..CHEEEEEP
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
n/t
HTTP/1.1 400
As I Chinese, I found the post title to be :-
1. Factually accurate
2. Hilarious
3. Quite brilliant actually, since for a wonder it actually fits the main story.
Lighten up.
I've seen blacks on guard duty in the west too.
We've had untrained monkeys in the US for President and Vice President for the last 13 years. And they've been used in Congress longer than that.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
you know its going to happen that a monkey will get sucked into a engine while its spooling up on the ground.
maybe then they need to train some other animal.. like tigers.
and the cycle continues
In other news, an increasing number of macaques are being caught in aircraft engines.
I thought the monkeys were actually helping the guards... like baboons in ancient Egypt were used as K9 patrols are today.
Are any of them named Caesar?
It is clear that the United States must mobilize its scientists and behavioral psychologists. We are facing a widening monkey-gap ith the Communists and we must be able to respond in kind should the need arise.
On a related topic, I would like to be the first to welcome our new Chinese monkey overlords.
How do you say "take your stinkin paws off me you damn dirty ape" in Chinese?
Very soon your jobs will be done by trained code monkeys!
Michael crichton, Congo.
They were sort of gorillas though.
Security guards today
Business executives and politicians tomorrow
Soon China will be just like the US!
Why not just use humans, they have a higher intellectual capacity and they can speak and carry weapons.
Wootdamonkey Whoot! Whoot!
Hartlepool a city in Northern England has one claim to fame. During the Napoleonic war they Hung a Monkey washed ashore after a storm because they suspected it was a French Spy.
Perhaps they were actually right after all.
Is this a sign of impending doom?
Danger 5 would infiltrate this base in less than 20 minutes and have a sexy party in the process.
---Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A START
The US has had trained monkeys working airport security for years.
...Detroiters get back some of the jobs China stole from them...
Plot twist: It's a nationalist art-piece from the late 1950s, when Mao was inspired by Khrushchev's "bury you" comment.
Back in 1996 there was a warehouse in Cam Ranh Bay that had large amounts of goods continually disappearing at night. AP patrols with dogs didn't stop the theft, so the K9 guys attack-trained a half dozen monkeys (about 30 lbs each). They would keep the monkeys in a CONEX container and back it up to the entry door in the eveneing, and when they opened the CONEX the monkeys would race into the warehouse. The next morning they would back the empty CONEX to the door and bang on the back wall; the monkeys would then race into the CONEX to get food. From that point on, nothing disappeared from the warehouse at night.
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
But my first thought was, "do they fly also?"
...they'll bring in some jaguars to eat the monkeys, and then...
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!