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from the Sit!-Stay!-Aim!-Shoot!-Good(?)-doggie! dept.
Uh Oh, They Strapped a Sniper Rifle to a Robot Dog:
For years, we've been warning that it was only a matter of time — and now, the inevitable has happened.
Somebody strapped an honest-to-god sniper rifle to the back of a quadrupedal robot dog.
An image shared on Twitter by military robot maker Ghost Robotics shows the terrifying contraption in all its dystopian glory.
Latest lethality 6.5 #creedmoor sniper payload from @SWORDINT. Check out the latest partner payloads @AUSAorg Wash DC. Keeping US and allied #sof #warfighter equipped with the latest innovations. @USSOCOM #defense #defence #NationalSecurity #drone #robotics pic.twitter.com/Dvk6OvL3Bu
— Ghost Robotics (@Ghost_Robotics) October 11, 2021
[...] There's a lot we don't know about the machine, but according to an Instagram post by Sword International, a gun manufacturer, the machine is called the SPUR or Special Purpose Unmanned Rifle.
More at the Sword's website [Ed Comment: Link is sometimes giving 404 since this story was released--JR].
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:10AM (23 children)
The guy is having a dystopian moment over a robot dog with a 6.5mm rifle on top of it, but he's just going to reach for another beer in the cooler while watching flying drones shoot missiles at civilians in the middle east in the evening news...
In short, he's having a problem because the killing machine looks like a friendly pooch instead of looking like an airplane.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:39AM (8 children)
A robot on the ground with a sniper rifle is more discriminating that a drone 3 or 5 miles up in the sky. A single bullet is also more discriminating than a drone missile that blows up the whole wedding, instead of the "terrorist" intended. With or without the sniper rifle, the doggie robot on the ground might chase an individual through a crowd, tracking him to his home, or his underground lair, or whatever. Sans sniper rifle, the robot pooch might stomp a mud hole in the wanted person's arse. Depending on speed and range, it might just keep up with a suspect after he gets in a car and speeds off.
In short, robotic warfare has just got up close and personal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @04:43AM (2 children)
You're dreaming, yet somehow still typing. Neat trick.
It is still a remote operated killing platform, no better than the young soldier hopped up and out of their minds on speed and junk and sleep deprivation running it. When this thing is deployed with a rifel on it, the victim on the other end is not a "wanted person". Stop presenting fantasies as truth. And if police are operating it, the target (maybe you!) is as good as dead because soldiers at least understand the concept of trigger discipline.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 14 2021, @04:53AM
You filled up a reply box, and managed to make a post. Too bad you didn't actually say anything. What a wasted opportunity! Maybe you were trying to imply that war is bad? Many soldiers have already observed that fact, and far more succinctly.
War is hell. - William Tecumseh Sherman
(Score: 3, Insightful) by HiThere on Thursday October 14 2021, @01:58PM
It probably is remotely operated. I'd give long odds that that's correct, even though we don't know for sure. We also don't know its capabilities. How does it identify its target? Web cam? How hard is it to jam? to subvert? (My guess is easy to jam, hard to subvert, but you've got to know it's there before you start jamming.)
IOW, this is an incremental "advance". It adds another layer of insulation between the killer and the victim. It's a very bad direction to head, from the viewpoint of preserving freedoms, but is not, in and of itself, anything spectacular, except that it may turn out to be spectacularly useless. (But what about the next model?)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @06:35AM
Runaway, fantasizing about kills, again. Perhaps, Runaway, you should go kill some more of the neighbor's sheep, or the rats, of whatever blood gives you power as a Republican of the Night.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 14 2021, @06:16PM (3 children)
Which then calls the question: what is it we really want? Do we really want to kill that terrorist, or do we actually want the "inevitable" collateral damage?
While we don't (yet) allow police helicopters to fire AGMs in urban areas, we do tolerate small arms fire by sworn officers of the law in just about any setting imaginable. Since the new dog rifle tech is so selective, can we then expect to see them roaming the Detroit streets RoboCop style "for the common good?"
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday October 15 2021, @12:00AM (2 children)
Yes, we can expect to see that. Especially if you do nothing. Edmund Burke may or may not have said “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing,”, but it is pretty true. We already see the police departments deploying "surplus" military gear, all around the nation. And, few people object. You can bet everything you've got that the police will want this too. Especially if the Department of Defense will foot the bill for them.
Write your representatives, and demand that they outlaw police use of military tech that civilians don't have access to. Keep writing to them, and recruit a few dozen friends to do the same.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday October 15 2021, @02:13AM (1 child)
Around here they mostly use that gear to serve "no knock" warrants on drug dealers. Something about "only using it on really bad people" seems to get the majority of the locals cheering for it instead of telling them to stop. The delusion that "that would never happen to me, I'm not 'one of those' people" is strong in these parts. Kind of like Rush Limbaugh ragging on drug addicts.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday October 15 2021, @03:48AM
They came for the Jews, and I said nothing . . .
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:51AM (2 children)
If killing humans is wrong, why does it feel so right?
(Score: 3, Touché) by cmdrklarg on Thursday October 14 2021, @02:50PM (1 child)
Perhaps you are psychotic?
Don't get me wrong, I enjoy mowing down enemies in video games like most, but that's make believe.
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:39PM
Humans enjoy violence, it's just a fact. Nothing psychotic about it, all too much perfectly normal. "Othering" these things is how they keep happening, and why we never learn.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday October 14 2021, @04:41AM (10 children)
And probably because he realized robot murder just fell economically within the budget of the Soylentil population.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @07:16AM (3 children)
The obvious rebuttal is, killing is a good thing for Republicans. Killing terrorists. Killing Iranian Generals. Killing immigrants. Killing women, like Gabby. Killing infrastructure funding. Killing Mike Pence. Killing people of color that get in the way of your bullets. Killing khallow. Seems like a waste of lead, or a good rope, or some Strychnine we could have used for a coyote death trap.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday October 14 2021, @01:50PM (2 children)
Because infrastructure is an unalloyed good, right? Build that bridge [wikipedia.org], no matter where it goes.
Islands with 50 people need their $400 million bridges too! Terrible Republicans killing that infrastructure!
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday October 14 2021, @02:09PM (1 child)
Islands with 50 people need their US Postal service too!
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @04:05PM
Stop eating lead paint chips.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14 2021, @11:42AM (5 children)
It's been a legitimate concern with RC vehicles and drones for years, any idiot could rig them with explosives and remote detonators. Unfortunately, it's no longer a matter of "if" but "when?".
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday October 14 2021, @02:00PM (3 children)
Recoil is probably a problem limiting the device/weapon combinations that would be useful. But yes.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 14 2021, @06:20PM
Recoil would indeed limit the weapons that such a platform could practically fire (more than once), but not the size nor power of the projectiles fired. Recoil-less weapons can fire some impressively large and destructive shells.
Of course, the unsuspecting public would never know if/when half the fuel cell has been replaced with C4... sure, you can only use it once, but if it can get close enough to a high value target? And if "officer friendly" dogs regularly patrol all the time...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday October 15 2021, @11:49AM (1 child)
Or if you want something with even greater effect, try something like an inertial mass damper, but of course that would reduce the mobility of the bot due to the extra weight. Real world big guns have already solved this problem, there's no reason such technology can't be shrunk, it's just that previously there was little need for it to be shrunk. Of course, the bot itself is an intertial mass, and its legs can act as dampers, there's no reason for the bot itself to not have a "prepare to fire" stance and post-firing recovery programmed into it. If we're making these things smart, why stop at just stair climing and door opening?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2, Disagree) by HiThere on Friday October 15 2021, @01:59PM
But what you're postulating is a highly modified "robot dog", to the extent that it's actually a mini-tank. (And I don't believe the intelligence controlling it resides if the vehicle...this has both significant effects, but among other things to me it means that calling it a robot is incorrect. But we do need a better name than "telefactor".
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:42PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves