The recent flurry of interest in the movie, Terminator Salvation, has generated an enormous flood of speculation and discussion about the future of humanoid technologies and whether or not the future is headed towards a showdown with a robot army–like the T-800 killers. The movie raises many fascinating questions about the military use and application of robots, i.e, is it ethical to have a machine hunt and kill a human? can such machines be programmed with a code of ethics? and the much darker question, will robotic devices be capable of turning on their human counterparts?
The United States is currently the global leader in the area of research and development on military applications of robots. Currently, the primary supplier of military robots to the U.S. military is iRobot, the Burlington, MA company, known primarily for it’s Roomba vacuum cleaner. While the primary focus of iRobot’s efforts is on smart traction-driven robotic devices (such as the Warrior) the U.S. Department of Defense aims for robotic military supremacy; it also continues to cherish the dream of a robot soldier that looks, thinks, and fights like a soldier.
According to a 2005 New York Times article:
The robot soldier has been a dream at the Pentagon for 30 years. And some involved in the work say it may take at least 30 more years to realize in full. Well before then, they say, the military will have to answer tough questions if it intends to trust robots with the responsibility of distinguishing friend from foe, combatant from bystander. Even the strongest advocates of automatons say war will always be a human endeavor, with death and disaster. And supporters like Robert Finkelstein, president of Robotic Technology in Potomac, Md., are telling the Pentagon it could take until 2035 to develop a robot that looks, thinks and fights like a soldier. The Pentagon’s “goal is there,” he said, “but the path is not totally clear.”
These considerations suggest that humanoid robots will likely someday form an integral part of military armies around the world. The prospects of robots fighting against other robots, not to mention human military subjects as well as civilians raises, raises a fascinating array of questions about the future.
How to Build a Robot Army – Wilson, Daniel H. New Book
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Tags: future of robotics, human robot interaction, iRobot, military robots, Terminator Salvation
