RE: Robo-Cops & Six-Million $$ Soldiers

[Jackson Holly]

~ ROBO-COPS and SOLDIERS ~

Here are a couple of links - what have you found out about the "cop/soldier of the future"?


They look like Insectoid Michelin Men

"Well, I'm moving to Peru to join their anti-riot police. Just look at those outfits. This picture was taken during a parade celebrating Peru's independence day. Just look at those guys, most don't even need to have their eyes open to march. You just plow through whatever comes your way. Did I mention the uniforms really accentuate the area right below the belt? Because they do. Take that guy in front for instance. It looks like he’s packing a 5-pound sack of potatoes down there. He also gets +1 point for nonchalantly drawing attention to it when the picture was taken."

http://www.geekologie.com/fastsearch?tag=darth%20vader


http://bleex.me.berkeley.edu/bleex.htm
Berkeley Lower Extremity Exoskeleton


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

CHECK OUT THIS VIDEO!

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=109_1195663753
Exoskeleton Turns Humans Into Terminators

"Man mixed with machine. Strength you won't believe. A skeleton built of metal with a mind of it's own. "He can lift something as heavy as a missile, to load it into an airplane." Designed and built in Utah. "It magnifies his or her capabilities, becomes a super hero. We haven't found something he can't do."

[Jackson Holly]

~ Robot wars will be a reality within 10 years ~


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/02/27/scirobots127.xml

   

By Nic Fleming, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 27/02/2008

The world is sleepwalking into an international robot arms race, a leading expert will warn today.
    
The Foster-Miller Armed TALON Robot, used by the US army
US forces recently deployed remote-controlled robots equipped with automatic weapons in Iraq

Prof Noel Sharkey fears increased research and spending on unmanned military systems by countries including the US, Russia, China and Israel will lead to the use of autonomous battlefield robots that can decide when to kill within a decade.

In a keynote speech he will also predict it is only a matter of time before robots become a standard terrorist weapon to replace suicide bombers.

Prof Sharkey, of the University of Sheffield's Department of Computer Science, is best known as a judge in the BBC television series Robot Wars.

He will outline his fears in a speech at a conference on the ethics of unmanned military systems at the Royal United Services Institute, a respected defence think tank.


US forces recently deployed remote-controlled robots
 equipped with automatic weapons in Iraq

Prof Sharkey said yesterday: "There's a massive drive towards developing autonomous robots for more complex missions.

"We are rapidly moving towards robots that can make the decision to apply lethal force, when to apply it and who to apply it to. I think maybe we're taking about a 10-year time frame.
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"If one country develops autonomous robots, it is clear that other countries will follow suit. What worries me is real soldiers can use common sense in situations such as deciding whether a woman is pregnant or carrying explosives. Robots do not.

"Neither can they make decisions about the proportional use of force. Most soldiers would not for example blow up a school full of children if there is a sniper on its roof, but who knows what a robot would do."

The American Department of Defence (DoD) last year published a 25-year plan to spend as £12 billion on robotic air, land and sea systems.

US forces recently deployed the first battlefield robots equipped with automatic weapons in Iraq.

Talon Sword robots are versions of remote-controlled, track-wheeled bomb disposal devices that can be equipped with various weapons including machine guns and rocket launchers. Four are already in use by the 3rd Infantry Division and 80 more are on order.

Currently under international Laws of War humans must be part of any decision to use robots to kill, however the recent DoD programme outlined plans to make them increasingly autonomous.

Last year nine soldiers were killed in South Africa when an aircraft gun designed to target other aircraft, helicopters and cruise missiles automatically malfunctioned.

A trial at the Old Bailey two years ago heard how a gang of would-be terrorists discussed plans to strap bombs to remote controlled model aeroplanes.

Prof Sharkey warned that with the cost of components falling, military developments would inevitably be copied by terrorists.

He added it would cost around £250 for terrorists to improvise an unmanned aircraft to deliver explosives using a mobile phone with GPS technology and a model aeroplane.

"You could also make thousands of ground-based robots cheaply to replace suicide bombers. I have judged many robot competitions and I know how easy it is.

"Once the new weapons are out there, they will be fairly easy to copy. How long is it going to be before the terrorists get in on the act?

"There is an urgent need for national governments and the international community to assess the risks of these new weapons now rather than after they have crept their way into common use."

[Jackson Holly]

Here's a 'report' I ran across - I thought it would fit well under this banner. Anybody else found any new info on NWO SPY~GEAR and ROBO~SOLDIERS?

~ Report. Sub-lethal vision: varieties of military surveillance technology ~

http://www.surveillance-and-society.org/Articles4(1)/sublethal.pdf

EXCERPT:

by Steve Wright

"The military have always used surveillance devices of one form or another. What characterizes their procurement today is the wide variety of purposes to which they are deployed and the move towards semi-intelligent systems. The events of 9/11 and the so called revolution in military affairs (RMA) have merely accelerated an ongoing trend to build cybernetic military systems where weapons are simply the muscle deployed by a nervous system based upon an intelligent handling of data through communication, command and control (C3I).

However, the advent of nanotechnologies will inevitably change the way that such weapons and data are put together to achieve more effective target acquisition and destruction. Super
miniaturization will enable individual soldiers to become part of a more efficient battlefield where commanders use surveillance to actually see through the helmets of their men. Individual tagging will identify friend from foe and prevent friendly fire but increasingly, surveillance technology will change the nature of targets as information dependent societies are hit by electrons rather than hot metal.

Indeed, ‘information warfare’ is part of a variety of new forms of emergent attack strategies.
Most modern states are dependent on telecommunications infrastructure and many within military circles are asking why destroy civilian infrastructure if a country's nervous systems can be disabled instead. According to General Fogleman US Air Force Chief of Staff, ‘Dominating the information spectrum is as critical to conflict now as occupying the land or controlling the air has been in the past.’

Modern surveillance technology is becoming part of that infrastructure. Weapons now have in
built primitive surveillance algorithms but supposedly neutral telecommunications infrastructure such as the mobile phone network can be used not only for surveillance but for pinpointing and targeting specific individuals and groups. Since weapons work on a digital target plan then digital items carried by most of us such as phones or ID smart cards can be used to program target selection by other weapons.




"Other perimeter control systems had more lethal facilities – for example the TRAP T-2500D by Precision Remotes, featured a sub-machine gun operated by remote control via an attached CCTV system. The USAF Security Forces Centre was also fielding a Common Remote Operating Weapons System (CROWS) with daytime CCTV, night vision, FLIR and laser range finder. Conversely, Israeli company Rafel have developed the Spotlite sniper detection system which uses electro-optic systems to accurately locate snipers day or night."


Another complicating factor is actually separating out which elements of a weapon system are actually surveillance mechanisms. So many weapons now are vast arrays of components with no one manufacturer or even country being responsible for the manufacture of the whole weapon.

For example the Head up Displays used in US F16’s Fighter Aircraft are manufactured in the UK2 and then exported to America and subsequently used by Israelis to target Palestinians but are treated as non-lethal components in terms of export regulations.
A preliminary goal for this report was to explore how the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) is creating new technologies to both facilitate and to target surveillance infrastructure and how no hiding place military doctrines will begin to inhabit future urban living spaces as the dictates of a growing international crisis move away from just mass supervision to more prophylactic systemsof targeting.

The author is particularly interested in how some types of new border control
technologies can incorporate punishment with surveillance systems to become victim activated networks. However, it quickly became apparent that any deep questioning of where new doctrines of urban warfare will take future military surveillance capabilities could quickly become quite abstract.

For example, a recent presentation from the College of Aerospace, Doctrine Research and
Education in the US4, for example, listed quantum computers; intelligent software; virtual reality; intelligent materials; directed energy weapons, lasers; biotechnology; human/computer interfaces; mind control; micro-technology; millimetre wave cameras and video insertion amongst its emergent technologies. Many of these technologies have a surveillance dimension whether for targeting, for directed control, or for feedback on effectiveness.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The author is especially interested in the military’s use of surveillance technology for internal
control, counter revolutionary and anti-terrorist operations. After all, many of the hi-tech night vision surveillance cameras and flight stabilized helicopter mounted CCTV systems which are familiar today originated in US military operations in Vietnam and the subsequent transfer to US police. It would be quite a challenge to explore how such civilian systems had been readopted and ruggedized for military applications.

Yet in many senses the variety of possible themes is potentially too vast: from mechanical roboflies to act as military micro spies to global telecommunications surveillance operated by the NSA. In the end it seemed necessary to ground the material in what was currently on the market or being evaluated for future deployment."

* ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *




"Some very advanced products were on display at FPED V including American Science and
Engineering Inc.’s backscatter Xray products which can remotely scan buildings, vehicles and people."

* ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *


Mock-up of Handheld Microwave Weapon

Other novel sub-lethal target systems were also on display. Backed by the National Institute of Justice, mega corporation Raytheon was offering active denial using targeted directed energy beams. Versions were being prepared for Corrections, DoE, DoS, we were told. However if this system is ever allowed to be deployed in an algorithmic format as a self targeting pain beam, we are entering a new era of mass human rights violation."


* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

[Jackson Holly]

~~ Robobug goes to war ~~



Plans for a robot that can crawl like a spider are 'well developed'

By DANIEL COCHLIN - 4th May 2008

It may have seemed like just another improbable scene from a Hollywood sci-fi flick – Tom Cruise battling against an army of robotic spiders intent on hunting him down. But the storyline from Minority Report may not be quite as far fetched as it sounds.

British defence giant BAE Systems is creating a series of tiny electronic spiders, insects and snakes that could become the eyes and ears of soldiers on the battlefield, helping to save thousands of lives. Prototypes could be on the front line by the end of the year, scuttling into potential danger areas such as booby-trapped buildings or enemy hideouts to relay images back to troops safely positioned nearby.

~~~~~~~ O ~~~~~~

Soldiers will carry the robots into combat and use a small tracked vehicle to transport them closer to their targets.Then they would swarm into the building and relay images back to the soldiers' hand-held or wrist-mounted computers, warning them of any threats inside. BAE Systems has just signed a £19million contract to develop the robots for the US Army.


Researchers hope they will eventually create machines that can fly like a butterfly

~~~ O O O ~~~

Plans for a creature that can crawl like a spider are said to be well developed, and researchers eventually hope to be able to create creatures that can slither like a snake or fly like a dragonfly. While some of the creatures will be fitted with small cameras, others will be equipped with sensors that will be able to detect the presence of chemical, biological or radioactive weapons.

A computer-generated video from BAE Systems shows the tiny invaders being released by a soldier, before scouting out a suspect building, which is finally blown up by ground forces. BAE Systems scientists from the UK and America plan an army of the electronic bugs, and have ambitions to equip every front-line soldier with them. Programme manager Steve Scalera was inspired by the way creatures use their senses to detect danger.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=563786&in_page_id=1965

~~~~~ O ~~~~~ O ~~~~~

[trixi1]

Here's a 'report' I ran across - I thought it would fit well under this banner. Anybody else found any new info on NWO SPY~GEAR and ROBO~SOLDIERS?

I posted this earlier. I find it goes hand-in-hand with this type of thing because you're literally creating soldiers that are desensitized to the real world. Who in their right mind would use half of this equipment or wear body armor such as that and not be asking any real questions? Who? Only ones who have had programming done on them in one form or another. That's who.

http://forum.prisonplanet.com/index.php?topic=38638.msg168112#msg168112

[chris jones]

The dark side.

These freaks inventing this must be rolling in dough not conscience.

Imagine the amount of money used for the research , development and deployment of trhes weapons of murder for our military.

We do have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the planet and all life, 3 times over, however thats not enough.

Fook these people. LETS MARCH.

[Jackson Holly]

Chris:

No doubt ... sometimes it seems all of our energies and best minds are spent on ever more efficient ways to kill people and break things ... and I'm SICK of it!

Here's a couple links about the Future Combat Systems (FCS) program, headed up by the Illuminati War~Lords at Boeing:

$160 Billion Robotic Army Network Passes First Big Test. Kinda.

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2008/04/robots_army

 By David Axe
A van full of insurgents speeds through the desert. They do not notice a series of networked ground sensors that have begun tracking their every move. Hovering somewhere overhead, a tiny robot points its camera at the van and takes note of its color scheme and markings. An even bigger drone, thousands of feet above its hovering kin, maintains a God’s-eye vigil on the whole hunt.

Everything these robots see is radioed to monitors thousands of miles away -- and into the targeting systems of a B-52 bomber winging, silent and nearly invisible, several miles overhead.

~~~~~~~


Boeing Photo

~~~~~~~

This scenario, played out at a remote Nevada facility last week, was the first major test of the Army’s $160-billion, 20-year plan to build a high-tech family of networked robots and hybrid-electric armored vehicles. The “Future Combat Systems” program, co-managed by Boeing and consultants SAIC, aims to equip roughly a third of the Army with 14 new vehicle types that are connected constantly to a vast communications net.

The theory behind the FCS is that dispersed, intelligent robotic systems plugged into a universal communications network can help small numbers of U.S. troops riding in new vehicles to control huge swaths of terrain. Any ship, airplane or tank fitted with the FCS network devices will be able to see everything the others see.

The SkyNet-like network and dynamic coordination “is the most important thing,” Brigadier General James Terry says. This is “a big deal for joint fires,” Army spokesman Paul Mehney told Wired.com.

“Joint fires” is mil-speak for getting all the military services to share info and coordinate their attacks. That kind of teamwork is a big factor in the U.S. military’s combat prowess. And if FCS works out as planned, the five U.S. military branches will team up better than ever.Did the test work? Kinda.

The robots spotted the van; their targeting data bounced to a nearby unit of specially-equipped Humvees, then across the network to an Air Force intelligence cell in Langley, Virginia, then back to the B-52 -- all in just seconds. The bomber simulated dropping a guided bomb to “destroy” the van.

The Nevada test proved it was possible, according to Mehney. But one critic says the test essentially was rigged -- that the conditions were too easy.

“There is ‘works’ and then there is ‘works,’” John Pike, an analyst with Globalsecurity,org, told Wired.com.

“A considerable fraction of the FCS network hardware does not currently exist,” Pike said. And the integration of that hardware that does exist has been touch-and-go. In February, when testers “flipped the switch” for the first time on the network radios, there was a collective sigh of relief that the radios even worked -- this according to one FCS insider who spoke on background.

Last week’s desert test comes at a critical time for Future Combat Systems. Mounting criticism from the GAO plus the growing cost of fixing and upgrading the Army’s current war-weary vehicle fleet -- $120 billion over 10 years, according to the GAO -– has put the squeeze on the futuristic program. “It is not yet clear if or when the Army and [its contractors] can develop, build, and demonstrate the … network,” the Government Accountability Office reported in March.


~~~~~~~

One powerful congressman, nominally a supporter of FCS, has proposed injecting extra money into the program in order to rescue some of its technologies before canceling the rest. Rep. John Murtha (D-PA), chair of the defense appropriations subcommittee, promised an extra $20 billion this year for FCS, provided the Army could use the money to wrap up the program quickly. “We need to accelerate FCS if we ever want to see anything accomplished,” Matt Mazonkey, a Murtha staffer, told Wired.com.

The Army is still preparing its response to Murtha’s query, Mehney said. Regardless, the service’s position on FCS has never wavered. The Army says that FCS is on-budget, on-schedule, and with continued funding will deliver on its promises to connect the ground service to itself and to all the other military branches.

And to ensure smooth progress despite a combined $900 million budget cut last year, the Army this month asked Congress to “re-appropriate” $250 million of other Army funds into FCS coffers.

~~~~ O ~~~~

Read More ....

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/ic/fcs/bia/about.html

http://www.defensetech.org/archives/cat_fcs_watch.html

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/ic/fcs/bia/gallery.html

~~~~~~~


Boeing Photo
~~~~ O O O ~~~~

[TheGoodFight1984]

Discovery science did a 5-part series from last year called "Ultimate Machines - The New Technology of War"

1 of 5 - Air Power.avi
2 of 5 - Counter Terrorism.avi
3 of 5 - Ground Forces.avi
4 of 5 - Sea Power.avi
5 of 5 - The Future Of War.avi

It talks about RFID's, UAV's, NanoTech, Satellite warfare, Lasers, Star Wars etc etc etc, it's like a big war toy showcase in which the military get to gloat over their shiny new death rays and light sabers but it's interesting to watch just to see what the enemy are upto.
The opening 30 seconds of the 1st episode show one of the planes hitting the twin woers close up in slow-mo and you can blatantly see the missile fired from underneath it, found it really strange that they'd air that.

[larsonstdoc]

  Dr Deagle claims that these robo-soldiers will be ready by 2015.  Men won't die but evil men that control these soldiers will destroy us all.

[dystopia]

Yeah...march.

You march then they march.

See who gets lucky first.

[Jackson Holly]

Taser-Armed 'Bot Ready to Zap Pathetic Humans




 By Noah Shachtman 

 As if a network of remote-controlled, Taser-equipped sentry stations wasn't unnerving enough.  Ladies and gentlemen: your stun gun-packing robot.

iRobot Corporation -- maker of bomb-handling and floor-sweeping machines -- has teamed up with the shocketeers at Taser International "to develop new robots that can remotely engage, incapacitate and control dangerous suspects," a company statement pronounces.

The idea is to quip a PackBot with a X26 stun gun, giving "SWAT, law enforcement and military" types "a new ability to control dangerous suspects while keeping personnel, the suspect and bystanders out of harm's way."

For the last several years, robot-makers have been equipping their recon and bomb-disposal 'bots with weapons -- including rocket-launchers and machine guns.  But the military has been reluctant to take any of the machines into battlezones.  What one of 'em starts spazzing out, and accidentally shoots up a friendly squad?    But, armed with a Taser, there wouldn't be nearly as much risk.  Although the potential for stun gun abuse or mayhem would be, uh, considerable.

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/06/taser-armed-bot.html

~~~~~~~~~~ O O O ~~~~~~~~~~


Robot + Super Gun = 'Crowd Control'

What do you do with a robot armed with a million-round-per-minute gun? "Crowd control," naturally. For several months, Metal Storm, the troubled electronic gun developer, has been working with iRobot -- the makers of military machines and cute, semi-autonomous vacuum cleaners -- to arm some of their new, 250-pound unmanned ground vehicles. Last week, at a defense trade show, the two firms showed off the results of their joint venture.

~~~ O ~~~



~~~ O ~~~

Metal Storm's weapons fire bullets electronically, instead of with firing pins and primer. The ammunition is stacked, rather than mechanically reloaded. And the only moving parts in the weapon are the ammunition itself. Which means the weapon can fire at a rate of thousands of rounds per minute -- maybe even up to a million, theoretically.

Metal Storm's 40mm weapons mount, the company tells us, can deliver both high-explosive and less-lethal rounds. Which makes it perfect for everything from urban assaults to "border patrol" to "infrastructure protection" to "crowd control."

Ordinarily, iRobot's military bots have been used to look out for terrorists and their improvised bombs. But, in the last year, the company has made a push into armed robotics, signing deals with stun-gun maker Taser and with Metal Storm. Its rival, Foster-Miller, has already tried out its machines with Metal Storm weapons, and has three machine gun-toting 'bots in Iraq. Because of safety concerns, however, they're not seeing much action. Not even crowd control.

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/05/metal-storm-iro.html#more

~~~~~~~~~~ O O O ~~~~~~~~~~

MORE HERE from WIRED MAGAZINE:

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/06/us-military-get.html#more

~~~ O ~~~

[TheGoodFight1984]

it's beyond scary when the prospect of a film like terminator crosses over into reality. I'd hedge my bets that something along the lines of a T-1000 is already in the works, all this nano-tech plus self-correcting memory metals plus DNA manipulation = T1000.

[Jackson Holly]

Neuroscience, National Security & the "War on Terror"

by Tom Burghardt

Global Research, July 29, 2008

EXCERPT:

Operating with little ethical oversight, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has been tapping cutting-edge advances in neuroscience, computers and robotics in a quest to build the "perfect warfighter."

Dovetailing precisely with other projects to "dominate" the urban "battlespace" of global south and "homeland" cities, DARPA researchers are stretching moral boundaries where clear distinctions between "human" and "machine" are being consciously blurred. (see "Simulating Urban Warfare" and "America's Cyborg Warriors")

As the Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics warns,

    The right of a person to liberty, autonomy, and privacy over his or her own intellect is situated at the core of what it means to be a free person. This principle is what gives life to some of our most well-established and cherished rights. Today, as new drugs and other technologies are being developed for augmenting, monitoring, and manipulating mental processes, it is more important than ever to ensure that our legal system recognizes and protects cognitive liberty as a fundamental right. (CCLE, "Frequently Asked Questions," September 15, 2003)

Not only is the right to "liberty, autonomy, and privacy" being undermined by militarizing the life sciences, but the legal system itself is ill-equipped to deal with advances--and emerging threats--to "cognitive liberty" as America's corporatist surveillance state seek new means to elicit compliance and control over individuals as biological science is securitized under the rubric of "national security."

In Mind Wars: Brain Research and National Defense (Dana Press, 2006), bioethicist Jonathan Moreno lays out a frightening scenario where various Pentagon agencies with DARPA leading the charge, have been funding neuroscientific and biological research in the following areas:

Mind-machine interfaces, also called "neural prosthetics." Living robots" whose movements can be controlled via brain implants. Research has successfully been carried out on "roborats" and "robodogs" for mine clearing and other dubious purposes. "Cognitive feedback helmets" that provide commanders or their medical surrogates the ability to remotely view an individual soldiers' mental state. MRI and fMRI technologies for what has been called "brain fingerprinting" as an interrogation tool or airport screening for "terrorists." So-called "non-lethal" pulse weapons and other neurodisruptors for deployment in global south or "homeland" cities as "riot control" tools. "Neuroweapons" that use biological agents to stimulate the release of neurotoxins. Research into concocting new pharmaceuticals that inhibit the urge to eat, sleep, suppress fear, or repress psychological inhibitions against killing.

With a multibillion dollar budget and dozens of projects in the pipeline, DARPA's Defense Sciences Office (DSO) are looking for newer and ever-more insidious means "to harness biology" for military applications. A short list of DSO projects include the following:

    * Biological Sensory Structure Emulation (BioSenSE), a program "designed around the concept of understanding biological sensory structures through advanced characterization and emulating, or transferring, this knowledge to the creation of superior synthetic sensors." The majority of biological stimuli are deemed of "great military relevance" by Darpacrats.

    * Cognitive Technology Threat Warning System (CTTWS), the intent of which is to integrate "advances in technology and biology" for a "soldier-portable" visual threat detection device that will utilized "cognitive visual processing algorithms" and "operator neural signature detection."

    * Fundamental Laws of Biology (FLB), is described as a mathematical modeling program that "will impact DoD and national security by developing a rational and predictive basis for doing biological research to combat bioterrorism, maintain healthy personnel, and discover new vaccines and medicines"--or to facilitate the design of new biological weapons.

    * Nano Air Vehicle (NAV), described by program managers as as a project that "will develop and demonstrate an extremely small (less than 7.5 cm), ultra-lightweight (less than 10 grams) air vehicle system with the potential to perform indoor and outdoor military missions. The program will explore novel, bio-inspired, conventional and unconventional configurations to provide the warfighter with unprecedented capability for urban mission operations." Paging John Anderton, white courtesy telephone!

    * Neovision "will pursue an integrated approach to the object recognition pathway in the brain. This fundamental biological research will be accomplished using methods intentionally geared toward computational and modeling approaches that are amenable to hardware- and software-based implementations."

    * Peak Soldier Performance (PSP) is designed to "create technologies that allow the warfighter to maintain peak physical and cognitive performance despite the harsh battlefield environment." In other words, develop drugs and nutrients for a "more efficient" soldier.

    * Preventing Sleep Deprivation (PSD) is described as seeking to "enhance operational performance," under harsh conditions. Current approaches "under investigation" include "novel pharmaceuticals that enhance neural transmission, nutraceuticals that promote neurogenesis, cognitive training, and devices such as transcranial magnetic stimulation."

    * Training Superiority (DARWARS), a suite of programs directly tying the military-industrial and entertainment complexes together into a seamless web. DARWARS seeks to provide "continuously available, on-demand, mission-level training for all forces at all echelons. Specifically, the program is developing, in areas of high military importance, new kinds of cognitive training systems that include elements of human-tutor interactions and the emotional involvement of computer games coupled with the feedback of Combat Training Center learning." Continuous "on-demand training anywhere, anytime, for everyone."

As with all dual-use research conducted by the agency, military relevance trump all other considerations. One need only examine the use of psychological research in the "war on terror" for some very troubling analogies.

ARTICLE CONTINUES HERE: 
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=
BUR20080729&articleId=9701

[chris jones]

The MIC is having its day, can you imagine what we could do with this money spent on machines of death, for the betterment of mankind rather than the destruction.

Guys, its all about money. No war, no profit for the elite and their killing machines.

They feed o humanity, the power are but parasites sucking our blood, lives and money.

[Jackson Holly]

A hand holding a biological brain and a robot. Robots will be armies of the future in a case of science fact catching up to fiction, a researcher has told an elite TED gathering.

Merciless robots will fight future wars: researcher
February 5th, 2009 in Electronic Devices / Robotics

Robots will be armies of the future in a case of science fact catching up to fiction, a researcher told an elite TED gathering on Wednesday.

Peter Singer, who has authored books on the military, warned that while using robots for battle saves lives of military personnel, the move has the potential to exacerbate warfare by having heartless machines do the dirty work.

"We are at a point of revolution in war, like the invention of the atomic bomb," Singer said.

"What does it mean to go to war with US soldiers whose hardware is made in China and whose software is made in India?"

Singer predicts that US military units will be half machine, half human by 2015.

The US Army already recruits soldiers using a custom war videogame, and some real-world weapon controls copy designs of controllers for popular videogame consoles.

Attack drones and bomb-handling robots are already common in battle zones.

Robots not only have no compassion or mercy, they insulate living soldiers from horrors that humans might be moved to avoid.

"The United States is ahead in military robots, but in technology there is no such thing as a permanent advantage," Singer said. "You have Russia, China, Pakistan and Iran working on military robots."

There is a "disturbing" cross between robotics and terrorism, according to Singer, who told of a website that lets visitors detonate improvised explosive devices from home computers.

"You don't have to convince robots they are going to get 72 virgins when they die to get them to blow themselves up," Singer said.

Robots also record everything they see with built-in cameras, generating digital video that routinely gets posted online at YouTube in graphic clips that soldiers refer to as "war porn," according to Singer.

"It turns war into entertainment, sometimes set to music," Singer said. "The ability to watch more but experience less."

Robotics designer David Hanson offered hope when it comes to making robots a little more human.

Hanson builds robots that have synthetic flesh faces and read people's expressions in order to copy expressions.

"The goal here is not just to achieve sentience, but empathy," Hanson said.

"As machines are more capable of killing, implanting empathy could be the seeds of hope for our future."

Hanson demonstrated a lifelike robotic bust of late genius Albert Einstein that makes eye contact and mimics people's expressions.

"I smiled at that thing and jumped out of my skin when it smiled back," TED curator Chris Anderson quipped. "It's freaky."

(c) 2009 AFP

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

MORE LINKS:

Military use of robots increases
http://www.physorg.com/news137088476.html


Microrobots dance on something smaller than a pin's head
http://www.physorg.com/news131633365.html

Intel CTO Says Gap between Humans, Machines will Close by 2050
http://www.physorg.com/news138895755.html

[Jackson Holly]

The MAARS robot is used by the US military, but who would be responsible if anything went wrong with it? (Image: Qinetiq)

 Regulate armed robots before it's too late

    * 10 March 2009 by A. C. Grayling
    * Magazine issue 2698. Subscribe and get 4 free issues.
    * For similar stories, visit the Mindfields by A.C. Grayling , Weapons Technology and Robots Topic Guides

~~~~~~~~~~

IN THIS age of super-rapid technological advance, we do well to obey the Boy Scout injunction: "Be prepared". That requires nimbleness of mind, given that the ever accelerating power of computers is being applied across such a wide range of applications, making it hard to keep track of everything that is happening. The danger is that we only wake up to the need for forethought when in the midst of a storm created by innovations that have already overtaken us.

We are on the brink, and perhaps to some degree already over the edge, in one hugely important area: robotics. Robot sentries patrol the borders of South Korea and Israel. Remote-controlled aircraft mount missile attacks on enemy positions. Other military robots are already in service, and not just for defusing bombs or detecting landmines: a coming generation of autonomous combat robots capable of deep penetration into enemy territory raises questions about whether they will be able to discriminate between soldiers and innocent civilians. Police forces are looking to acquire miniature Taser-firing robot helicopters. In South Korea and Japan the development of robots for feeding and bathing the elderly and children is already advanced. Even in a robot-backward country like the UK, some vacuum cleaners sense their autonomous way around furniture. A driverless car has already negotiated its way through Los Angeles traffic.

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In the next decades, completely autonomous robots might be involved in many military, policing, transport and even caring roles. What if they malfunction? What if a programming glitch makes them kill, electrocute, demolish, drown and explode, or fail at the crucial moment? Whose insurance will pay for damage to furniture, other traffic or the baby, when things go wrong? The software company, the manufacturer, the owner?

Most thinking about the implications of robotics tends to take sci-fi forms: robots enslave humankind, or beautifully sculpted humanoid machines have sex with their owners and then post-coitally tidy the room and make coffee. But the real concern lies in the areas to which the money already flows: the military and the police.

A confused controversy arose in early 2008 over the deployment in Iraq of three SWORDS armed robotic vehicles carrying M249 machine guns. The manufacturer of these vehicles said the robots were never used in combat and that they were involved in no "uncommanded or unexpected movements". Rumours nevertheless abounded about the reason why funding for the SWORDS programme abruptly stopped. This case prompts one to prick up one's ears.

Media stories about Predator drones mounting missile attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan are now commonplace, and there are at least another dozen military robot projects in development. What are the rules governing their deployment? How reliable are they? One sees their advantages: they keep friendly troops out of harm's way, and can often fight more effectively than human combatants. But what are the limits, especially when these machines become autonomous?

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The civil liberties implications of robot devices capable of surveillance involving listening and photographing, conducting searches, entering premises through chimneys or pipes, and overpowering suspects are obvious. Such devices are already on the way. Even more frighteningly obvious is the threat posed by military or police-type robots in the hands of criminals and terrorists.
Military robots in the hands of criminals and terrorists would pose a frightening threat

There needs to be a considered debate about the rules and requirements governing all forms of robot devices, not a panic reaction when matters have gone too far. That is how bad law is made - and on this issue time is running out.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126986.300-regulate-armed-robots-before-its-too-late.html