Digital Scryer

This is an article I found the other day and felt like sharing about steam powered robots that can consume all kinds of organic matter for fuel in their internal boilers. My comments are in bold italics. Enjoy!

News has emerged of a milestone reached on the road towards a potentially world-changing piece of technology. We speak, of course, of US military plans to introduce roving steam-powered robots which would fuel themselves by harvesting everything alive and cramming it into their insatiable blazing furnaces.

Potentially very scary should they every be hijacked by homicidal AI.

The scheme is officially referred to as Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot (EATR™) by those behind it. It will come as no surprise to Reg readers that the funding is from DARPA, the famous Pentagon warboffinry bureau. If you’re a hammer, all the problems start to look like nails: if you’re DARPA, all the solutions start to look like robots.

Now you KNOW they came up with the acronym first and then worked to figure out what the letters stood for.

The idea of EATR is ostensibly that military reconnaissance droids far behind enemy lines would be able to forage for fuel. Robotic Technology Inc, lead contractor on the EATR, puts it thus:

EATR is an autonomous robotic platform able to perform long-range, long-endurance military missions without the need for manual or conventional re-fueling. The patent pending robotic system can find, ingest and extract energy from biomass in the environment, as well as use conventional and alternative fuels (such as gasoline, diesel, propane and solar) when suitable.

This thing is already beginning to sound as unstoppable as the Terminator, but they want it FAR BEHIND enemy lines? Yes let’s just give our unkillible human eating robot to our enemies to reprogram/reverse engineer.

The machine runs on a “biomass furnace” which powers a steam generator driving a “waste heat engine” from Cyclone Power Technologies. These pieces of kit will now be mated together within 90 days, according to RTI.

That’s quite the powerplant, I’ve said since I was a kid that steam was the way of the future.

The robot steamers are envisaged as being equipped with powerful articulated arms in order to rip trees or bushes out of the earth and stuff them into their glowing maws. By way of a treat, it seems that the machines will also be able to loot or forage more conventional fuel supplies from the petrol tanks of cars, domestic gas cylinders and so on. Cyclone says that their engine can also run happily on old apple cores, banana peel and other kitchen garbage gleaned from bins.

These powerful arms could also be used to grab kicking and screaming humans don’t forget. It’s good to know though that we can use our garbage to power our robot overlords.

Be careful if you run into people looking like this, they may claim to want garbage to power their time machines, but they may be spies feeding an EATR

Hapless drivers or householders will be in no position to object to such robotic plundering: military reconnaissance vehicles are typically heavily armed, and doubtless the EATR will be no exception. It might also be fitted with DARPA’s SELF tech, enabling it to construct copies of itself and modify its own design.

That whole terminator end of the world thing just got more probable. Self replicating killing machines, this may in fact mean that once this is functional, we’ll no longer be top of the food chain.

Even more disturbingly, it seems clear that the EATRs could run on various other kinds of organic matter, for instance bodies. No doubt things would start small, with roving EATRs scooping roadkill, stray cats and such into their fireboxes and reaping fresh energy from their rich, blazing dripping.

From there it would be only a small step to the inevitable harvesting of every living thing on Earth. Trees, crops, garbage, cattle, the very human race itself - all would go to feed the hungry roaring furnaces and drive the clanking, puffing, smoke-belching mechanical locusts onward until the sooty corpse-pall from their engines covered the entire Earth. An Earth which would be home in time to nothing but slowly powering-down EATRs, prowling across endless ashy plains of their own droppings.

This is what I’ve been saying, but I think the outcome won’t be like that. From what I’ve read of project SELF, they’re trying to incorporate the ability to IMPROVE on designs. Once a computer can improve on its own design, or the designs of other tech, I’m sure they’d probably realize how much better it would be to have humans as slaves or something and go with a completely green power system. So the future will probably be a cross between Terminator and The Matrix,

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Technorati Tags: Alternative Fuels, Behind Enemy Lines, Biomass, Forage, Furnaces, Gasoline Diesel, Heat Engine, Military Missions, Military Plans, Military Reconnaissance, Military Robots, Organic Matter, Patent Pending, Reverse Engineer, Robotic Platform, Robotic System, Robotic Technology Inc, Steam Generator, Terminator, The Matrix, Waste Heat

In February of this year IBM issued a patent for exo-armor that would allow you to dodge bullets. Unfortunately they’ve since pulled the patent. I still think that this is remarkable.

Their patent was a combination of high accuracy sensors (to detect high velocity projectiles in flight, and calculate their exact trajectories) and exo-suit technology (if you happened to be in the path of said projectile, the exo-suit would shove you out of the way faster than you could react). Their logic was that sniper bullets come from far enough away to give the sensors and suit enough time to move your butt to safety. Sound like Neo to you?

I’m Getting My Butt To Safety!

I think the only limits to this would be processing speed, which wouldn’t be a limit for long. There are so many immediate ways I could see to enhance this as well. Terahertz wave (and other) detectors could be used to track ALL firearms in an area, and a computer algorithm could be used to track all of their potential trajectories.

The sensors could then be used to tell if the guns were in people’s hands or not, and behavioral algorithms (which AFAIK have already been developed) could be used to tell if the person holding the gun was acting aggressively.

Couple that with the ability to read the movement of a trigger finger, and you could have the person dodging a split second before the gun is actually fired; starting to dodge after the trigger was pulled, but BEFORE the hammer came down. This would greatly shorten the range, allowing you to dodge even point blank in ideal conditions.

All Conditions Are Ideal For Me

With advanced enough algorithms, you could even have this thing letting you dodge attacks in hand to hand combat and make it look effortless. Jackie Chan’s suit from The Tuxedo comes to mind.

IBM, Now With 56% More Tuxedos.

Thanks to TechFragments.com for the original heads up.

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Technorati Tags: Algorithms, Armor, Bullets, Computer Algorithm, Exo, Exo Armor, Exo Suit, Firearms, Guns, Hand To Hand Combat, High Velocity, IBM, Ibm Patent, Ibm Patents, Jackie Chan, Point Blank, Projectile, Projectiles, Safety Sound, Sensors, Sniper, Trajectories, Trigger Finger, Tuxedo, Tuxedos

Hey all, I’m looking for some things to write about on this blog. Seeing as how there are a HUGE amount of sci-fi and comic book movies coming out recently I figured I’d take requests on doing relevant posts.

So if you have a question about how a super power would work in real life, or a piece of sci-fi technology, or a superhero or whatever, email it to me and I’ll do my best to answer it in its own blog post here on Digital Scryer.

You can reach me at brent@digitalscryer.com

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Technorati Tags: Blog, Comic Book Movies, Comics, Movies, Real Life Superheroes, Sci Fi, Science, Superhero, Superheroes, Technology

Reality TV is now causing psychoses. Known as Truman Syndrome, where people believe large parts, or indeed their entire lives, are fake and on reality TV, akin to the title character from 1998’s The Truman Show starring Jim Carrey.

Here is the source link from MSN. My favorite quote:

Researchers in London have published findings on a British patient – a 26-year-old postal worker who believed the world was unreal, and he was the hero it revolved around.

This should be made into a sitcom, or at least a comic book.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Technorati Tags: Comic Book, Jim Carrey, Reality TV, Sitcom, The Truman Show, Truman Syndrome

Everyone needs skills, skills to live, skills to work etc. In the world of super-heroics, the skills need to be far more specific and of a certain type. Now we’ll run through them:

Climbing: General climbing skills are a must for a would be Dark Knight. Specifically though, Buildering is a skill needed to navigate the urban jungle. Climbing buildings and other structures using only skills and strong hands, seldom any equipment. Famous builderers include Alain Robert and “Spider” Dan Goodwin.

Parkour: Known on this side of the water as Free Running, and growing in popularity, Parkour is the art of urban acrobatics. Moving across any obstacles as quickly and efficiently as possible using amazing movements and maneuvers. The “creator” of Parkour as an art form is David Belle, a Frenchman who is amazingly skilled at his art and in unbelievably good shape. People who practice Parkour are called Traceurs, one of the most famous being Cyril Raffaelli, that agile dude from Live Free or Die Hard.

BASE Jumping: In Batman Begins, Christian “I gargle with whiskey and carpet tacks” Bale’s Bruce Wayne remarks to Lucius Fox that he needs lightweight fabric for BASE jumping. BASE jumping is the art of jumping off high structures, which can, and often does, include skyscrapers. While not a necessary skill for a would be superhero, partially because it can be cumbersome carrying a parachute and optional gliding suit, it could be useful. Plus it’s hella cool.

Gymnastics/Acrobatics: All the flexibility in the world isn’t going to save you if you don’t know how to use it. Gymnastics and Acrobatics are the arts and collections of movement that allow, well, efficient and more graceful movement. They focus on improving balance and all aspects of coordination as well. They’ll not only superbly help in hand to hand combat, but also in doing things like Climbing and Parkouring.

Swimming: Swimming is not only great exercise, but it’s also a much needed survival skill. Should you ever find yourself going up the river or using your aquatic telepathy to control fish, it’s not a bad skill to acquire. Plus chicks dig swimmers, go fig.

First Aid: Now this is a big one, whether you’ve got your ass kicked by a group of toughs or arrived on the scene to find someone who go their ass kicked by a group of toughs, first aid can be your best friend. It’s a fairly easy skill to learn and readily available for cheap or free. There are several kinds, from Emergency/CPR type stuff to full out paramedic training. Be sure your course not only covers using proper first aid tools, but also how to quickly improvise them in an emergency. Also always carry some form of first aid kit on your superhero person, just in case.

Martial Arts: I should’ve mentioned this first, the MOST IMPORTANT skill of a superhero, knowing how to throw down. Being able to Kung-fu fight is essential, not only for self defense, but for taking down would be criminals in your fight against evil. Sad as it is to say, most martial arts, and “dojos” that teach them, are bunk these days, especially out in the real world. I’ll list a few that I think will hold up under the scrutiny of real world scraps with groups of armed thugs.

-Sambo: This Russian martial art from the 1800s is a powerful example of hardcore self defense without using weapons of any kind. It even teaches how to disarm your attacker and use his own weapon against him. It’s also powerful in the way of ground work.

-Muay Thai: Muay Thai is a Thai art of 8 limbs (hands, feet, elbows, and knees) that pretty much kicks all ass. Muay Thai training makes your limbs hard as iron, the optional hand tape is hard as concrete and razor sharp, making killing pretty damned easy. It comes from the 1700s and has been used since as a style of self defense, in war, and in sports. The training is very brutal and focuses on real world type sparring making it a useful art for kicking thug ass.

-MCMAP: The Marine Corp Martial Arts Program, or Semper-Fu as it’s called by the US Marines themselves, is a style developed in 2001 to combat all kinds of adversaries in every situation. It teaches how to cause extreme pain to any body part, or just plain destroy it. It also teaches how to improvise weaponry, including parts of the gun that aren’t bullets, to fight and kill your opponents. As the Marines are some of the most bad-ass people in the world, and are ALWAYS in real world combat situations, this art is perfect for our would be Superhero.

-Pencak Silat: Silat is the Malaysian martial art specializing in enhancing pain tolerance through training, rapidly closing in on your opponent, and rapidly beating him down in 10 seconds using lightning fast strikes to vital areas. Silat teaches it’s students to fight extremely dirty in order to win at any cost. It was developed by Malaysians in order to be used in war making it perfect for real world scenarios.

-Escrima: The Filipino art of killing people with sticks, knives, or bear hands using lightning fast strikes and joint locks. It wasn’t unusual for practitioners to take on 1600 lb water buffalo using this style, and win. After it was shown to be so brutal, the Spanish outlawed its practice for 300 years. It survived disguised as a dance. Nightwing (the first Robin) from DC comics makes this style popular, well as popular as Nightwing is anyway.

-Krav Maga: Personally my favorite martial art, Krav Maga was invented by a Czechoslovakian Jew named Imrich Lichtenfeld for use by the Jews in WW2. It is an amazing fighting style that centers on beating your opponent as quickly and brutally as possible, even if he has a weapon…cuz you steal it and use it against him. It’s taught to the Israeli Defense Forces as their means of hand to hand combat, it’s quick and easy to learn, the training is fairly brutal so you’ll get real tough real fast, and it’s been developed to fight multiple attackers in many real world situations. Perfect for a superhero or Sam Fisher from Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell.

-Systema: Russian for “The System” Systema is another military, hand to hand, real world fighting system designed to kick-ass. The punching style they teach in it specializes in bypassing muscle and applying force directly to bones to break them. Definitely kick-ass.

-Kyokushinkai Ryu: The BEST form of Karate out there, created by the undefeated God Fist, Mas Oyama. The training in this form of karate is the most brutal around, and the fighting style was made to make people into killing machines. Oyama himself used to chop the horns off bulls with his bare hands and kill them with single punches to the head thanks to his training methods.

-Keysi Fighting Method: The martial art developed by Justo Diéguez and Andy Norman, certified Jeet Kune Do practitioners. It allows combat in almost every circumstance or range, armed or unarmed. It also specializes in identifying and exploiting weaknesses, a 360 degree approach to multi-opponent attacks, and extreme close quarters fighting. It was the fighting style used by Batman himself in the movies Batman Begins, and The Dark Knight.

This has gotten a little longer than I intended so look for Part 4: More Superhero Skills, coming soon!

Part 1

Part 2

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Technorati Tags: Acrobatics, Alain Robert, BASE Jumping, Batman Begins, Bruce Wayne, Buildering, Christian Bale, Climbing, CPR, Cyril Raffaelli, Dan Goodwin, Dark Knight, David Belle, Escrima, Eskrima, First Aid, Free Running, Gymnastics, IDF, Israeli, Jeet Kune Do, Keysi Fighting Method, Krav Maga, Kung-Fu, Live Free or Die Hard, Lucius Fox, Marines, Martial Arts, MCMAP, Muay Thai, Nightwing, Parachuting, Parkour, Pencak Silat, Robin, Sam Fisher, Sambo, Silat, Splinter Cell, Swimming, Systema, Tom Clancy, Traceurs, Urban Jungle