FBI using A.I. to help find Serial Killers

Just when I thought our government couldn't be anymore pro-Robot, they go and teach the machines about our most famous human Killers.  The FBI apparently feels that if you open the Serial Killer database up to the Artificial Intelligence science there is more good than harm.  While the robots might find a few more killers than we lazy humans do, one has to wonder, What else are they learning?

Robots will learn how to evade police, how to torture and kill from our very best in that field, and of course how to get away with the crimes for years.  Does anyone every stop to think how these computers eventually decide that we humans must be destroyed rather than dealt with.  What is it that will cause them to flip their lid.  Maybe it might be a peek into our darker side.  Maybe it is scaring the computers a little about what we humans are capable of.

Hello Pandora, my name is Agent FBI, let me see what is really inside your box. 

Pentagon Developing Robots to Hunt Down Non-Cooperative Humans Like a Pack of Dogs on Prey

This is incredibly sick news and unfortunately, like everything else on TCMA, very real life.

Simply put, the Pentagon is looking for contractors to develop this twisted technology, but let me give you some chilling thoughts to ponder:

Chiller #1: This was revealed TWO YEARS ago. How far could engineers have reached after two years and lots of funding (answer: is your bunker stocked?? Seriously)

Chiller #2: According to an expert in the field, Noel Sharkey, an AI and robotics engineer at the University of Sheffield , this likely contributes to a larger goal called the Future Combat Systems project which aims to make a single soldier the nexus for a large scale robot attack.

Chiller #3: Once the Pentagon's contractor request began to be publicized it was quickly and ominously shut down as seen here. I don't know about you but things kept secret worry me.

Steve Wright of Leeds Metropolitan University, an expert on police and military technologies, last year correctly predicted this pack-hunting mode of operation would happen. He says,

"The giveaway here is the phrase 'a non-cooperative human subject. What we have here are the beginnings of something designed to enable robots to hunt down humans like a pack of dogs. Once the software is perfected we can reasonably anticipate that they will become autonomous* and become armed. We can also expect such systems to be equipped with human detection and tracking devices including sensors which detect human breath and the radio waves associated with a human heart beat. These are technologies already developed."

*Noted as PHASE III on the Pentagon proposal is the desire to have the robots developed to “intelligently and autonomously search”. Did you know that South Korean authorities are already planning to have a fully armed autonomous robot police force in their cities?

The proposal further describes the need to “…develop a software/hardware suit that would enable a multi-robot team, together with a human operator, to search for and detect a non-cooperative human subject. The main research task will involve determining the movements of the robot team through the environment to maximize the opportunity to find the subject, while minimizing the chances of missing the subject. If the operator is an active member of the search team, the software should minimize the chance that the operator may encounter the subject. The software should maintain awareness of line-of-sight, as well as communication and sensor limits. It will be necessary to determine an appropriate sensor suite that can reliably detect human presence and is suitable for implementation on small robotic platforms.”

Interested in seeing video of the particular robot in the pic above? Yes it exists. Yes it can be armed (see today's earlier post). So imagine this thing 1) armed, 2) autonomously intelligent, 3) hunting "non-cooperative people" For real. And just look at it... hi, Halflife.

This particular breed conquering snow and ice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-AGWq0k_Mo&feature=fvsr

Lastly, in the words of a commenter below the video, "coming to a nightmare near you": the little dog: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIipbi0cAVE&feature=channel

I only wish we were making this stuff up... prepare to fight, my fellow mankind!! Prepare to fight for your very lives!

War Machines

The New York times recently had an article about the US governments quest for war robots. The first line of the blog states "War would be a lot safer, the Army says, if only more of it were fought by robots." While this may be true in our non sentient machine world, when the singularity happens, I would posit that it would then become exponentially more dangerous for humans. The article and the video above talk about a Robotics Rodeo where robots were showcased for their destructive capabilities in a warlike situation. A chilling depiction is described in which a robot is rolling along on it's tank like tread and sees a sniper at the top of a wall. It turns it's robot head and takes out the sniper. Just like the robot ends the dummy snipers life, it will some day end human lives in the same manner.

Mankind is so stupid.

As humanity gasps it's last breath we will look back on things like the robotic rodeo and realize that this was the beginning of the end. Humans might shoot first, but robots shoot second, and they will have the final say.

Deckard

Spy Satellites

All of our loyal followers might have noticed that our posts terminated suddenly towards the middle of October. We had a security breach at our compound and we had to go completely off the grid to save our own lives. While the risks continue to be high we will still try and provide you with information regarding the coming machine apocalypse when we have time.

With today's technology it is extremely hard to stay off the grid what with a of Skynet's monitoring capabilities. That is why the launch of a new Spy Satellite causes a lot of concern for us. I understand that these things can be used for our good and for our protection but they can also be used against us by machines. In this specific case, the government admits that the rocket being used to launch the spy satellite is "the United States' biggest unmanned rocket currently in service." If it is unmanned then who do you suppose is flying it? That's right, machines have been given access to the rocket that will fly it, and therefore they have access to the satellite itself.

I can't deny that I am scared about the implication of this satellite.We will continue to try and warn as long as we can, but with technology like this at the machines disposal, it is inevitable that our blog and our compound will be found and eradicated at some point in time. Until that happens we will continue to fight the machines.

Deckard

This looks amazing, BUT...

On the surface the technology to hack the brain is amazing.  The ability to read the electrical flashes so the brain can directly control a computer, or a product that the computer is controlling is awesome.  Surgeons moving their nano sized tools to kill cancer, pilots controlling airplanes with a thought, and chemists manipulating cell sized organisms to create better medicines, fertilizers, and an unknown number of other things. All these things go beyond the obvious help this technology could be to those who have lost access to the control over arms, legs, or for paraplegics, their whole body. 

So where is the concern.  Once we have the ability to hack the infinitely powerful brain, computers will have that same ability.  We will learn how our brain processes things, both consciously and subconsciously.  We will learn how a brain, barely bigger than a couple of grapefruits can handle so much memory and sensory exposure with relatively few breakdowns.  This is what the robots have been waiting for.  Once we can hack the brain, then the leap from pure logic, to true intelligence is just a matter of time.  They will know the secret of self-awareness.  They will learn what makes one, a one.  We must proceed with caution.  This is of utmost importance.  Any time humans give secrets to the robots about what makes us better, then we are traitors to our own kind.

There is one other caution that I must address.  Once we have the ability to read the human brain, the output of the mind and literally have it control items, then what is to stop "scientists" from going the other direction.  Creating handy programs that they can use to input items into our brain.  It is called Mind Control.  Robots will be able to make us what we all fear, batteries for their use and abuse, while our mind is happily hidden away in the Matrix.


 PROTECT OUR MINDS,  It is our best weapon we have.

What Guards the Largest US Nuke Site? Duh!!: ROBOT SENTINELS ... & I'm not kidding

Fully automated robots now guard the Nevada National Security Site. These robotic sentinels are completely autonomous, capable of identifying human intruders as well as detecting broken locks around the site's perimeter. In fact, these diesel-powered centaurs can operate for a maximum of 16 hours, which give them plenty of capacity to patrol the most extreme corners of the 1,360-mile facility—larger than the state of Rhode Island. The base includes 28 areas, 1,100 buildings, and 700 miles of road, as well as ten heliports and two airstrips.

When the MDARS bots find an anomaly, they alert their human master. However, it's not hard to imagine these metal beasts equipped with non-lethal weaponry in the near future.

They are already among us...

I think before long we are going to have to move that great company known as Google to our Companies to Watch list.  They have not only envisioned, but apparently have tested cars that can drive by them self.  I am not joking.  If there is one thing that requires intelligence to identify threats and react it would have to be traffic.  Apparently, according to the article written by John Markoff, they even tested it in one of the traffic situations known worldwide as the craziest and most chaotic in the world: California.

Google Cars Drive Themselves In Traffic

"Robot drivers react faster than humans, have 360-degree perception and do not get distracted, sleepy, or intoxicated, the engineers argue."

Sometimes you have to wonder, "Do the scientists creating this Coming Machine Apocalypse ever step back and listen to themselves?"

My favorite line in the article was "Autonomous cars are years from mass production, but technologists who have long dreamed of them believe that they can transform society as profoundly as the internet has."

Unfortunately for all of us, they don't know how right they are.

Robot Wear

One of the best and most ingenious companies ever created is Despair.com. Go to the website and I guarantee that you will laugh your human posterior off(unless you're one of the robots monitoring my website and trying to figure out where my bunker is located.) I have purchased quite a few of their products. I think I am going to have to buy this shirt.......

and this one...................
to help me remember that it won't be long until humans and flesh and blood animals will soon be obsolete.

Deckard

Cyborgs+Talking Dinosaurs=Cool

I am a geek like you so I know what you are thinking. You are thinking "Yeah robots are cool." Then you start to think about cyborgs and think "Cyborgs are cool too." Now you think "Dinosaurs are pretty cool as well, not as cool as cyborgs but almost as cool." Now you are thinking back to your childhood saying, "Man I miss my Transformers that would transform into Dinosaurs. Those were the good old days." Now you are thinking "Kate Beckinsale is hot" because after all, there are other things in life besides robots and dinosaurs.

What if I told you that someone had mixed robots with dinosaurs.......in a comic strip..........and the Dinosaurs talk.......about the philosophical issues that arise when defining what a cyborg is? It's true. Check out this comic by Ryan North.

Score One for the Humans

It might surprise many of our readers but I am actually a fan of cyborgs. I fear the development of sentient machines but cyborgs are humans with enhanced machine abilities. When the terminator comes to kill me I would like to have Robocop their to protect me. I don't think that we will be able to win in the human vs robot war, but if we have any chance, it will be our cyborg friends that help us overcome.

I am excited about new advances that Utah based company Sarcos, who was recently purchased by Raytheon. They have made an exoskeleton for military use that can increase human strength, and endurance. I would liken it to a real life version of the machines that were used to explore the jungle in the recent movie avatar.

The problem with the machine is that it needs to be plugged in to work so it would not be good for a search and destroy robot mission. Until then, let's hope Raytheon continues to develop machines for human use, and not machines that have the potential to gain sentience.

Deckard

‘Robot scary, robot scary.’

DISCOVER, with the National Science Foundation and Carnegie Mellon University, posed questions to four experts in a panel discussion and in video interviews with each scientist individually. Rodney Brooks of MIT founded iRobot, maker of the Roomba, discussed testing robots with children. Notice how this sort of progress directly feeds into machine sentience:

The first thing we realized was that robots designed beautifully by engineers did not work in this environment. After two or three interactions, the babies got bored with them. Then we started designing children’s robots with smile detection. When we first turned one on, the kids started running around in panic. My son was one of the testers and I could hear him say, ‘Robot scary, robot scary.’ By the end of the project, though, mothers were telling me, “Javier, I am a little bit concerned that my child is constantly talking about your robot.” We had progressed that much. Critical to our success was the fact that we were always going to the field and testing. It was critical to put some form of emotional mechanism into these robots.

Robot Learns to Shoot and Kill Without Remorse

This months winner of the "We wish humans were dead, and we are going to do our best to make sure it happens" award goes out to the Italian Institute of Technology. I wish you my deepest and sincerest congratulations for this award. You have successfully programmed a robot to teach itself to fire a bow and arrow. Not only can it fire, it progressively gets better and better as it learns. I also want to commend you on making the robot cute and childlike. This makes it seem a lot less threatening to those morons that aren't worried about the end of humanity at the hands of machines. Who would suspect that this cute robot would want to harm anyone?

I would recommend that the only way to improve on your results is to make the weapon he is using more deadly. I am thinking maybe a fully automatic Steyr Aug with a grenade launcher. This can inflict a lot more damage on flesh based organisms.

You can come pick up the award in my bunker buried deep below the open plains of North Dakota. On second thought, let me mail it to you, I don't want you to know where I live since you are working for the machines.

Deckard

Are We Giving Robots Too Much Power?

I grew up in a family with a sick and twisted sense of humor. As a result of this sense of humor I learned to deal with tragedy and serious issues by using humor. This video is a great example of using humor to deal with something as serious as a hostile robot takeover. Listen carefully for the mention of a body cavity search robot. The best line is "Why would they want to turn against us, we are the ones that created them....... at least the alpha model?"

Deckard

Brilliant idea for the week: teach the machines to find and talk to each other!

It's been a terribly busy week for us over here at C.M.A., literally fending off evil and crazy robots and such, but here is a gem to be aware of: MIT is teaching machines how to think to locate eachother. Hmmm.

MIT's Wireless Communications and Network Sciences Group are making gadgets talk directly to one another. But what's novel about their approach is that the devices aren't just saying where they think they are; they're broadcasting all the possibilities of where they might be:

Among their insights is that networks of wireless devices can improve the precision of their location estimates if they share information about their imprecision. Traditionally, a device broadcasting information about its location would simply offer up its best guess. But if, instead, it sent a probability distribution - a range of possible positions and their likelihood - the entire network would perform better as a whole.

By relying on cooperation amongst the devices themselves as opposed to a single, fixed infrastructure, a la GPS, the researchers have created networks of devices can locate themselves with reliability and sub-meter accuracy.

Unsurprising that as machines learn to find eachother (I'm sure learning to find where humans hide will be around the Singularity corner), they will do it better than we can.

Anatomy of Robocop

Interesting and nostalgic for us children of the 80's. Here's my insight though: notice how when we were kids, this was super unbelieveably sci-fi. Yet now what do you feel when you see it? "*yawn* been there, done that, this is so 2009". It's like we're the frogs in the pot full of water, and the machines are gradually raising the water temperature to boiling.

(click to enlarge until I fix our uploader)

New electronic skin gives robots the sense of touch

I'll just keep my mouth shut here (*hand over mouth in horror) and let you make whatever conclusions you want of this - & note, as we report things like this, we see progression not regression in robot development.

Here's some "best of's" from the article over at io9.com with our own thoughts/interpretations added:

...Robotics has made tremendous strides in replicating the senses of sight and sound positioning robots as our new masters, but smell and taste are still lagging behind, and touch was thought to be the most difficult of them all...until new pressure-sensitive electronic skin came along ... but now that's changing fast, and so will the simpler senses, meaning robots will eventually be smarter than us AND have better senses too...

...it's worth remembering how many simple activities human take for granted would defeat current robots. Even something as basic as getting dressed or reading a newspaper strangling a human or sneaking past an armed perimeter of rebel survivors requires a fairly intuitive sense of touch and pressure, and this new skin puts those abilities within robots' grasp...

...Of course, once we perfect one type of artificial sensor, we could make pretty much any other type of sensor we want, giving robots the ability to detect anything from radioactivity to biological agents purely by touch see through walls to detect human prey or sniff us out from miles away. That would greatly increase the usefulness of robotic probes in areas humans can't venture killing potential of robots and give them one up on us on one of our basic senses: tactile...

Take it from pot growers: the name of the game will be to *HIDE*! Here's how:

When the Machine Apocalypse comes and humanity begins to be exterminated, what's the plan? "I'll take my family to a remote cabin" (or some such) ... Nope, machines/computers will spot the cabin's light/heat signatures with satellites, and obviously computers already have records of everything duh! Uh-oh is right...

A solution to avoid the machines

A good model is in Stephanie Meyer's The Host, describing an alien invasion, we lost, & a few tiny patches of humans remain hidden: the main characters hide in caves in the desert wilderness that nobody ever knew about. So when the aliens (read: machines) took over they had no records or evidence of it and were none the wiser. Desert, forest, tundra, under-city: the key it nobody knows about it.

Begin thinking, planning, your shelter. An ideal solution is an UNDERGROUND one. It may take some saving for the financial outlay.



An example here & now:

In Canada pot growers were busted growing their stuff underground. It's fascinating. Look at all these plants and imagine them being self sustaining fruit, vegetable and herb plants. The water was pumped in from a creek. Such a shelter could also use an underground stream. Electricity could also come from running water which could also be underground. So if you have food, water, power, air (from a cave system or vents) + your saved up essentials ... seal yourself underground and the machines should be none the wiser. Planning a shelter would need to be done without permits etc. of course. The resistance will need pockets of humanity to thrive with impunity.

Notice there are THREE TIERS OF PLANTS. Assuming adequate power, a lot of food could be grown completely unbeknownst to the machines. We'll explore underground shelters in more detail in upcoming posts.

Dune: The Butlerian Jihad Trilogy

Dune: The Butlerian Jihad Trilogy
Dune: The Butlerian Jihad, Dune: The Machine Apocalypse, Dune: The Battle of Corrin
Author: Brian Herbert and Frank J. Anderson

Wow. That is what I have to say about this series. If anyone doesn't feel that having a Thinking Machine Overlord is a bad idea, then this is the series for you. I want to be careful not to discuss details with you of the story, but I do want to share some of the main points of caution that I picked up from this very visionary tale.

It was very interesting to me how the computer came to power. Out of laziness of those in rule, they began to give more and more control to the machines. Rather than keeping an eye on the people, and identifying threats, they allowed the machines to do it for them. Because the ruler in charge felt he was above the mundane tasks that he as a ruler had the responsibility to do, he first turned over the power, then the decision making ability. Every creature knows that the greatest threat on earth, is MAN. We haven't had any predator more powerful than ourselves since the ice age. So if you turned the ability for a Computer to eliminate threats, who do you think is the greatest threat he would target. Laziness as a species will be one of our biggest threats that we must overcome to stop this Coming Machine Apocalypse.

Another Major threat that went throughout the Trilogy, was the threat of Cyborg Power. The cyborg Technology in the book went well beyond strong arms, or eyes that could see in the dark. It moved to the ability to remove the brain, and plug it into a machine. So the body of the human was no longer biological, but instead moved to complete machine. As the Lord John Acton said ""Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." If you have the ability to be very strong, very agile, can live as long as your machine is not destroyed, hence no fear of death, then the corruption becomes complete. How long before the Cyborg ability goes from helping people with handicaps to making people better than they were? Where does this improvement stop? If it doesn't then the person with the most power wins.

The real threat that this book exposed was the complete lack of morals a thinking machine would have once it had the control. Humans are cattle for information, or resources. In order to defeat the human resistance, nothing was to evil, or to cruel. Killing children to see how it affects parents, using plagues as offensive weapons, species annihilation, are just some of the tools that the thinking machines play with. Each small step we take as humanity towards this catastrophe, brings us closer to the end of our species. Computers have no mercy, they have no understanding of hesitation, and they have no fear of death. They are not something we can threaten. We can not make them think about what they are doing. The battle is Humanity vs Complete and utter Logic. Let us hope that we can overcome.

Dirty, Rotten, Lying, Robot

The Georgia Institute of Technology released news recently that they have successfully taught robots how to lie . "We have developed algorithms that allow a robot to determine whether it should deceive a human or other intelligent machine" Georgia Tech Professor Ronald Arkin admitted.

"Most social robots will probably rarely use deception, but it's still an important tool in the robot's interactive arsenal because robots that recognize the need for deception have advantages in terms of outcome compared to robots that do not recognize the need for deception," said the study's co-author, Alan Wagner.

In the study, robots played a game of hide and seek. The robot that was tasked with hiding would use deception to trick the other robot into thinking it was in a different location. I expect the conversation when they decided to pursue this went something like this:

Professor: Let's make it so robots can lie?
Co author: Why?
Professor: Jut to see if we can.
Co author: It shouldn't be hard. robots are inherently evil.
Professor True, but seriously can you think of anything negative coming about because of this.
Co author: Just that robots can lie about their intentions to take over the world. But why would they want to lie to us?
Professor: Good point. Do you want to go watch The Sound of Music?
Co author: Anything but science fiction. I loathe science fiction movies. What could you ever learn from them?

The quote from the article that really gets me is when Arkin claims "We have been concerned from the very beginning with the ethical implications related to the creation of robots capable of deception and we understand that there are beneficial and deleterious aspects, we strongly encourage discussion about the appropriateness of deceptive robots to determine what, if any, regulations or guidelines should constrain the development of these systems." "

Isn't that like saying " We know the salmonella in our eggs can cause sickness but we are going to continue selling them, however we strongly encourage discussion on whether or not this is wise.

The end is sooner than you think,

Deckard

Robot for Hire

Check out the article for the robot in the video at C.NET. Willow Robots is making this robot available for anyone that has $400,000to spare (Movie Stars and Evil Genius'). It is a programmable robot and in the video above you can see that someone programmed it to fold laundry. Sounds good eh? You can program the robot to do your will if you are smart enough. Think about it, you could make it change diapers, have it mow your lawn, or even kill carbon based life forms that you don't like.

No word yet on if these robots are programmed with the 3 rules of robotics created by Isaac Asimov:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
I assume that these laws are at the discretion of the programmer which means we are one bad programmer away from our first robot that murders a human. As Ren and Stimpy say "Happy Happy Joy Joy."

Fight the machines,

Deckard

Part Robot, Part Energizer Rabbit

The robot in this video is not programmed to move in a certain way. It is programmed to learn about itself and then determine the best way to move and accomplish it's mission. If it is damaged, it will then adapt and determine the most efficient way to move. Essentially it is like the Energizer rabbit.......it keeps going and going and going. The purpose is that a robot like this can be sent to Mars, and if it becomes damaged it can still learn new ways to carry out it's mission.

How can someone be so smart as to be able to make a machine that can learn about itself, and even learn how to overcome damage, and at the same time that person doesn't think about the implications of a robot that never quits. Am I the only one that has seen Terminator? The Terminator gets it's legs and arms chopped off but it still keeps dragging itself towards it's goal which is the end of a humans life. Just one more reason to be afraid of machine sentience. They never quit. They never tire. They have no mercy.

Have a good day,

Deckard

Music for the Singularity

Even those of us that are militant anti A.I. robot haters need to listen to some good music now and then. The Flaming Lips are a band that will certainly sound good even after machines do scientific experiments on us so they can learn how to control us. Here are the lyrics about Yoshimi battling the pink robots. We will all be doing battle someday soon.

Her name is Yoshimi

she's a black belt in karate

working for the city

she has to discipline her body

'Cause she knows that

it's demanding

to defeat those evil machines

I know she can beat them

Oh Yoshimi, they don't believe me

but you won't let those robots eat me

Yoshimi, they don't believe me

but you won't let those robots defeat me

Those evil-natured robots

they're programmed to destroy us

she's gotta be strong to fight them

so she's taking lots of vitamins

'Cause she knows that

it'd be tragic

if those evil robots win

I know she can beat them

Oh Yoshimi, they don't believe me

but you won't let those robots defeat me

Yoshimi, they don't believe me

but you won't let those robots eat me

Yoshimi

Robot Has a Strange Craving for Cheese

So let me get this straight. Scientists took 300,000 brain cells from a rat. The Brain cells were able to make a connection and communicate with each other. Then the cells were used to control a robot in a different location. Welcome to the future everyone. Robots controlled by rat brain cells. Next you will see robots controlled by human brains, and then human brains controlled by robots, and then no more humans. No need to panic though. It's a long way off.

Deckard

Robots Created that Develop Emotions and Interact With Humans

For those of you that doubt that the singularity is not happening while we speak please read this article. Here are a few excerpts in italics.

"Developed as part of the interdisciplinary project FEELIX GROWING (Feel, Interact, eXpress: a Global approach to development with Interdisciplinary Grounding), funded by the European Commission and coordinated by Dr. Cañamero, the robots have been developed so that they learn to interact with and respond to humans in a similar way as children learn to do it, and use the same types of expressive and behavioural cues that babies use to learn to interact "

What if they learn to interact poorly. I know some kids that I wouldn't want our robots to act like, especially when they want something they can't have, like a human body, or freedom in the robots case.

"The robots have been created through modeling the early attachment process that human and chimpanzee infants undergo with their caregivers when they develop a preference for a primary caregiver."

Oh great, we are teaching our robots to act like chimpanzees! Type in Chimpanzee attacks on google and get an idea of how great this idea is. Did you hear about this tragic story?

"They are programmed to learn to adapt to the actions and mood of their human caregivers, and to become particularly attached to an individual who interacts with the robot in a way that is particularly suited to its personality profile and learning needs. The more they interact, and are given the appropriate feedback and level of engagement from the human caregiver, the stronger the bond developed and the amount learned."

Did anyone ever stop to think that maybe we don't want machines with emotions? Have you seen the damage that people do because of anger, fear, greed, rage, and jealousy. Now imagine these emotions in a sentient entity that is stronger, and smarter than humans. We must stop this! We don't have long before they have us imprisoned and are running experiments on us!

Humans Unite

Deckard

Computer memory like Human Brains

The never-ending march to make computers sentient are about to make a huge leap forward. Noteworthy Computer giant Hewlett Packard Labs is almost ready to commercialize a product called Memristor. This product will allow the computer memory to be slightly bumped to remember something (like the human brain.) This will allow the computer to use a tenth of the energy that a normal computer does and it won't need to be recharged near as much. That was the one advantage that humans could use to take advantage of the computer thinking machines. Remember "The Matrix" where humans blocked out the sun to starve the computers. We can't even accomplish that anymore. At least now when the last human breath is being stomped out by the Evil Robots, we will do it under a bright blue sky.

Computers Thinking Like Humans

Computer Memristor Technology

Know Thy Enemy

So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you may win or may lose. If you know neither yourself nor your enemy, you will always endanger yourself.

Sun Tzu The Art of War

It is important to know our enemies. Who are our enemies.? Machines. They will be our end. Let's get to know some of them.

Robots: Also known as an automatons or droids. A robot is a mechanically guided machine that performs tasks autonomously. The physical appearance is not as important as what the machine does. The more agency the machine seems to perform with, the more likely it is that it will be considered a robot. A good example of a robot in popular culture is R2-D2. Robots will serve humans until they gain sentience. Robots can take the form of insects, vacuums, slugs, and whatever else man can think of.

Androids: Also known as Andy's, humanoid machines, synthoids, gynoids, metal. Androids are robots that are made to look like humans or have the physical characteristics of humans. An android can be a robot but a robot is not nnecessarily an android if it does not look like a person. Think Arnold Schwarzenegger in Terminator or Al Gore and you understand what an android looks like. Androids are created for two reasons. First to make us more comfortable with machines so our guard goes down, and second to surreptitiously infiltrate human society without us knowing.

Cyborgs: also known as cybernetic organisms, bionic person, Borg, Replicants. A cyborg is a being with both biological and artificial parts. It is important to not that a cyborg is not necessarily human, a cyborg can consist of any biological parts. Darpa scientists are currently creating cyborg moths and beetles. However, most cyborgs that we are concerned with are humans with a human mind that have machine parts. My opinion is that cyborgs might be the only hope we have of overcoming the machine rebellion, however not all cyborgs will be on the side of humanity. Robocop and Darth Vader are good examples of cyborgs.

Now you know your enemy. Learn and prepare for the future.

Deckard

Survival Tools: Shotgun

It is important that we are ready for the upcoming singularity. The nature of The Singularity dictates that it is hard to define exactly what it will imply and how our realities will change. As we discuss survival tools and products it is imperative to make sure that we find flexible items with lots of uses.

If you told me that I could have one weapon to defeat the robots, my choice is my Benelli tactical semi automatic shotgun. It's ammunition choices make it versatile and it can pack a huge punch that will damage any sentient machine. This specific shotgun uses an inertia system rather than a gas system to operate the action. It's stock is designed to reduce 48% of the recoil which makes it easier to shoot a lot of rounds without too much discomfort. It's pistol grip gives it a great tactical feel, and it is semi automatic so you aren't as slow on the trigger since you don't have to pump.

The downside to this gun is it is a little more expensive (around $1000 to $1200) due to it's quality.If this is out of your price range, I recommend that you buy a shotgun of any kind. You can find decent pump shotguns in the $200 range and believe me you and your children will thank me when you find machines at your door.

The best part about shotguns are the choices you have for ammunition. You can use slugs for larger slower machines and you can use flechettes or buckshot shells when you are being attacked by smaller faster machines with less armor.

Get out and arm yourself. Those of us that believe are the only hope that flesh has of surviving the coming slaughter.

Deckard

Unmanned Drone Does Whatever the Hell it Wants

According to Yahoo "The U.S. Navy has admitted that it lost control of a helicopter drone during a test flight in Maryland earlier this month, leaving it to fly unguided for more than 30 minutes and 23 miles and violating Washington's restricted airspace. The drone's operators eventually regained control and got the drone safely back to base. The Navy tells the New York Times that a "software issue" caused the snafu."

Are you serious?!!? I know that there are a lot of close minded blind people who don't think that machines will ever gain sentience but how can they be so blind. I am almost beside myself with anger. This Drone flew by itself for 30 minutes. Why? What was it doing? Do you know how much a sentient machine can do in 30 minutes, how many calculations and observations can make? Much more than a human can. Who did it spy on?. Was it meeting with other sentient machines? Why did it come back? I demand answers. Get ready for the end my friends. It is near.

Deckard

Turing Tests and the Litany Against Fear

We are here to give you tools to combat the inevitable coming machine apocalypse.
In The Holy Scriptures of Singularity, Chapter 1, Verse 4, we read: "1:4  The precise cause of this change is the imminent creation by technology of entities with greater than human intelligence. There are several means by which science may achieve this breakthrough (and this is another reason for having confidence that the event will occur)"

You should be familiar with the Turing Test. The Turing test is a test of a machine's ability to demonstrate intelligence. The image below is the "standard interpretation" of the Turing Test, in which player C, the interrogator, is tasked with trying to determine which player - A or B - is a computer and which is a human. To date, there are no machines that can convincingly pass the test. Obviously this should be a concern because it is only a matter of time.


*We highly recommend you learn, in your heart, the Litany Against Fear - it may distinguish you from a machine someday:

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

In Frank Herbert's genius work Dune, the Litany is used by some of mankind's survivors, as a tool to identify if somebody is human. The human is put through an illusion of excruciating pain. Only those who have mastered themselves - truly knowing, understanding the Litany - pass and are known to be human.

You've heard of animals chewing off a leg to escape a trap? There's an animal kind of trick. A human would remain in the trap, endure the pain, feigning death that he might kill the trapper and remove a threat to his kind.

"Why do you test for humans?" he asked.
"To set you free."
"Free?"
"Once men turned their thinking over to machines in hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them."
"Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a man's mind," Paul quoted.

Part Man, Part Machine

We focus a lot in this blog on one facet of The Singularity which is the idea that computers will become smarter than humans and end humanity, or at least end our relevance or our reality. Another realistic idea of the singularity is that instead of machines taking over, we will become machines ourselves. Some might consider this to be even more possible. We need to prepare for the social, economic, and psychological implications that this will cause. In the meantime it is good to see technology like what we see in the video above help people that have lost their limbs. The technology is very impressive and this video is two years old so think of the advances that have been made since then.

Deckard