This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Dear technology under capitalism... We just want healthcare, housing, etc... We don't fucking need swarms of robot insects.
We all know where this is gonna end...
Surveillance drones everywhere.
Surveillance is the "nice" version of it.
Anal probes everywhere.
Exactly! Flying, they are flying everywheeeaaahhhh!
I've low-key started to think the only reason we haven't seen autonomous hunter-killer drones yet is that nobody's willing to break the seal, and I'm scared for what happens when somebody finally does.
My dear stranger, those already exist, and have been used in war to terminate key individuals.
We are living the dream.
key individuals
Such as Palestinian children
Point me towards systems that don't have a human in the loop, particularly any that utilize fully-autonomous swarms, and I'll agree. Scary as the former are, there's a world of difference between a handful of FPV suicide drones, and a cloud of HL2-Manhack-esque things operating on face-recogniton-guided autopilot.
Oh, that's what you mean... yeah, there are humans behind, but potato potato, swap one brain for another... anyway it is a killing machine that can get you anywhere in the planet.
The humans are using ai to pick the targets they kill anyway. They theoretically are supposed to parse out the bad targets, but we know from examples listed in the above, that for genocidal states like Israel, that review is intentionally ignored or minimized.
Horizon Zero Dawn looking more eminent any day now.
They are definitely super willing to break the seal, just nobody has built a good target ID system yet that won't fire on civilians.
If you just need everyone in a 10 mile radius dead, you could send in the hunter bots, or you could just shell the area with heavy artillery from three countries away. We already have that problem solved. Once we have a reliable target ID system I guarantee you'll start seeing unmanned equipment in war.
Anal
In the latest video about this by veritasium, he asked the researcher about ethics concern. the researcher insist that they dont care as humanity can decide for itself.
Meanwhile:
The new report also details the extent of MIT’s partnerships with Israeli military contractors like Elbit Systems, which supplies 85 percent of Israel’s killer drones, and Maersk, one of the world’s largest shipping companies, that has sent millions of pounds of military goods to Israel since the start of the war on Gaza. The Israeli military also sponsored several of the MIT projects with funds provided by the U.S. Defense Department.
https://theintercept.com/2025/01/16/mit-israel-military-funding-research-gaza/
“We are willing to ignore and downplay the ethical concerns as long as the money keeping coming in”
That researcher is a real life Dr. Hoenikker. Vonnegut is probably shrugging in his grave
-…his mother was completely consumed by robotic bees. So it goes.
MIT also (indirectly) killed Aaron Swartz.
MIT also (indirectly) killed Aaron Swartz.
I've seen this episode of Black Mirror.
Fall into me
And drown inside me
I know you will see
The beauty of me
Also, I've seen this episode of Tom Scott.
I'd rather just have bees.
But how can techbros get rich from bees? Bees just make themselves for free then serve the greater good, the little buzzing communists.
Even birds are starting to seem acceptable
oh so you think birds aren't already flying robots? robot bees are just the next step.
/s obviously
I’d rather not have robot bees. I’ve seen hated in the nation (black mirror episode).
The MIT engineers agree. They said something to the effect of "If you could make a robotic bee, it wouldn't replace bees. It would be a terrible idea to try to use them for pollination... Just put that same amount of finding into conservation and researching bees, you would have a much better result."
The new technology could increase crop yields dramatically without harming the environment.
That's a surprisingly benign use case, I was expecting far worse.
Plot twist: The crop is human misery.
Well then fucking harvest me and get it over with
I guess I'm the only one thinking about how it's inevitable that birds and other animals will mistake them for real insects and die from ingesting these things, god knows what kind of toxic materials they're made of but I'm willing to bet it's not safe to eat them
The public use case.
Without a doubt they will have those other use cases in mind too. Mentioning them is just not good for marketing in public.
Because developing a replacement for bees is certainly a better solution then saving the bees...
They think there will be more profit in it, especially since bees can't be repurposed as weapons.
bees can’t be repurposed as weapons.
Capitalism will find a way.
https://cherwell.org/2024/10/18/oxford-scientists-microchip-bees-with-smallest-radar-ever/
How's this for an obscure reference? This reminded me of an episode of Max Headroom in which the wunderkind Bryce invented a robotic fly with a spycam that could be used to literally bug a room. They send it on a mission to uncover an evil plot and everyone is excitedly crowded around the screen and heaping praise on it. Then it manages to sneak into the evil lair where it promptly gets swatted, leaving Bryce shocked and devastated.
They also did this in Spy Kids
It wont be long now before the nanobots exist and the Borg can finally take over. Resistance is futile.
the Borg
Sounds like communism...
I think there was an X-Files episode about this.
Nope, I’m out
Looks like they hovered for 1000 seconds. It was previously stress limited such that the joints would break after just a few seconds. I think they might still be tethered for a power source, I haven't seen any of these micro flapping bots include a battery yet, and they didn't mention that they did.
