Drone Society

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stand@desk
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Drone Society

Post by stand@desk »

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/drones-over ... 0-minutes/

Saw this video tonight on the present and future of drones. Drones seem like a new internet to me, a platform for a multitude of good and bad utilizations of this technology..my first thought is will it be safe to go outside anymore? Using drones seems like an easy way for someone to prey on others..and what happens when the drones have more than just a camera mounted on them?

stand@desk
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Re: Drone Society

Post by stand@desk »

http://qz.com/185945/drones-are-about-t ... 700-years/

Another article on "The Drone Age".. watching that video of a Quadrotor inflict carnage is quite "real." With a possible shortage of resources one day and the "Robot Lords" having thousands or more of these drone weapons at their disposal..seems like the future could be quite predictable..

jacob
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Re: Drone Society

Post by jacob »

It makes a lot of sense to me that the cost structure of military technology determines the governing form. Phalanx=>Direct democracy. Mounted knights=>Feudalism. Guns=>Representative democracy. Drones=> ...

I'm actually leaning more towards something like Neal Stephenson's Diamond Age. The book is about nanotechnology but it could just as easily be about drones. Drones seem to be a kind of dispersed "weapon of minor destruction". It all comes down to how much money can be raised for drone attacks and defences. Keep in mind that drones are (currently?) useless against any location that controls its own airspace.

The conclusion could be that rich organizations (corporations) take over from nation-states and agree to a form of cease-fire. To what extent humans (without money) are left out really depends on how self-sufficient the rich can become. If they are truly self-sufficient, they no longer need customers and redistribution (through taxes or higher wages) becomes void.

Maybe we'll see self-sufficient gated communities defended by drone armies in which the people on the inside live a rich life and the riffraff on the outside have become irrelevant. If voters are largely irrelevant and guns don't matter any more, masses of people have zero power... I don't see how current nation states can retain their relevance in such a scenario.

workathome
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Re: Drone Society

Post by workathome »

Ideal ERE job? Local drone repairman?

Dragline
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Dragline »

I think one of the next really bad terrorist events will involve a hijacked or stolen drone.

It's only a matter of time until drone technology becomes very widely dispersed and available. Then bomb shelter like structures and houses may become popular again.

But I'm wondering if it will look like Slim Pickens riding that bomb in Dr. Strangelove: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snTaSJk0n_Y at about 1:40.

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jennypenny
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Re: Drone Society

Post by jennypenny »

Dragline wrote:Then bomb shelter like structures and houses may become popular again.
There's all kinds of interesting talk about drones in the far reaches of the prepper world. Bunkers come up, as well as what kinds of ammo would be effective. Some of the ideas are quite clever. I've read several pieces discussing whether it's possible to generate a force field around a property that could disable drones that entered the air space.

May the force be with you ...

Riggerjack
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Riggerjack »

I don't get it, what's the big deal with drones? If they get weaponized, they are just platforms for the same weapons we already have. The operators still need training, and are still a 1:1 ratio. You are trading operator casualties for slower reaction times.
If they are a routine threat, they'll just be shot on site, out of politeness, like ranchers and coyotes.

Now if you wanna talk automated machines making automated drones, then may the best hacker win!

Chad
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Chad »

Riggerjack wrote:I don't get it, what's the big deal with drones? If they get weaponized, they are just platforms for the same weapons we already have. The operators still need training, and are still a 1:1 ratio. You are trading operator casualties for slower reaction times.
If they are a routine threat, they'll just be shot on site, out of politeness, like ranchers and coyotes.

Now if you wanna talk automated machines making automated drones, then may the best hacker win!
I agree completely. Everyone is so enamored with drones right now. I don't see the current or even the next gen iterations changing society significantly. As others have stated, current and probably the next gen (maybe not 3rd gen?) are rather useless on battlefields where one does not have air superiority (the squad level small recon drones being an exception to a certain extent). The drones we are currently using over Africa and the low end Middle Eastern countries would not survive on a battlefield between regional powers or between regional powers and the US.

Jacob's scenario is plausible, but not with current tech (which he states).

@jenny
What are the preppers concerned about?

workathome
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Re: Drone Society

Post by workathome »

Drones certainly are not limited by drone operators!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QcfZGDvHU8

Facial recognition technology is pretty good (try "Faces" in iPhoto) and the government has a national database of faces thanks to Facebook and everyone's exact GPS position thanks to cellphones. There's absolutely no technological limitation why someone couldn't send fully automated assassin ninja death drones.

Now that's far different from saying it *will* happen, but it's entirely technologically feasible for a small government or military agency to do it *right now*

A highly likely (guaranteed?) scenario is that drones will continue to be used for surveillance and attacking terrorists (already happening) on an increasingly larger scale. It's easy enough to imagine a war fought by simply targeting the leadership cadre of a group and "cutting it off at the head" - Oh wait! That's already happening too.

Chad
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Chad »

workathome wrote: Facial recognition technology is pretty good (try "Faces" in iPhoto) and the government has a national database of faces thanks to Facebook and everyone's exact GPS position thanks to cellphones. There's absolutely no technological limitation why someone couldn't send fully automated assassin ninja death drones.
A decent hat, because of the angle of the cameras on the drones (it would be steep), would defeat the facial recognition. While, the removal of a battery, not carrying the phone with you, or $10 sleeve for your phone would defeat this. I'm not sure they make the sleeve yet, but it would be cheap and easy to make if there were demand.

Not to mention more sophisticated jammers and spammers that would appear almost instantly and drop in price quickly.

workathome
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Re: Drone Society

Post by workathome »

Chad wrote:
workathome wrote: Facial recognition technology is pretty good (try "Faces" in iPhoto) and the government has a national database of faces thanks to Facebook and everyone's exact GPS position thanks to cellphones. There's absolutely no technological limitation why someone couldn't send fully automated assassin ninja death drones.
A decent hat, because of the angle of the cameras on the drones (it would be steep), would defeat the facial recognition. While, the removal of a battery, not carrying the phone with you, or $10 sleeve for your phone would defeat this. I'm not sure they make the sleeve yet, but it would be cheap and easy to make if there were demand.

Not to mention more sophisticated jammers and spammers that would appear almost instantly and drop in price quickly.
You're correct right now, but I think the technology will adapt quickly and efficiently through miniaturization. We are already successfully attacking leaders in Afghanistan (though with some "collateral damage" and other mistakes at the moment) and it seems unlikely the trend (improvements to technology, targeted killings) will stop or reverse.

Chad
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Chad »

workathome wrote: You're correct right now, but I think the technology will adapt quickly and efficiently through miniaturization. I mean, we are already successfully attacking leaders in Afghanistan (with some "collateral damage") and it seems unlikely the trend (improvements to technology, targeted killings) will stop or reverse.
We are successfully attacking them with what are basically remote control planes. While, I agree the tech will eventually make the pilot irrelevant, if we decide it's ok for computers to decide who to kill, but that's a big leap in tech from our current position.

The X-45 and x-47 are heading this direction, but they haven't released how they decide what to attack. I wouldn't be surprised if the main decisions (what to attack) are completely controlled by ground assets, while the drone just plots maneuvers and what weapon works best in the scenario. Closer, but still pretty dumb.

As a side note, the collateral damage is low compared to a B-52 dumb bomb strike, but way higher than we are led to believe.

In my mind, it's the fully autonomous process that could make drones "scary" and change society significantly. As long as the drones require a human then the amount of "work" the drones can do is limited, which directly impacts how significant they are.

Chad
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Chad »

Interesting that there was a fictional SF book written in the 80's about drones on a modern battlefield. It's been a while since I read it, but from what I remember it is a semi-plausible scenario.

http://www.amazon.com/Davids-Sling-Marc ... %27s+sling

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jennypenny
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Re: Drone Society

Post by jennypenny »

Chad wrote: @jenny
What are the preppers concerned about?
Does the airspace over your personal property belong to you? Obviously not infinitely, but how high? If (when) drones are equipped with recognition software, they could take over most police work and become robotic bounty hunters. What happens when they're armed? Drones could become the army of hackers, or corportations like jacob suggested. Millions of robotic mercs, basically.

Mostly that kind of thing.

George the original one
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Re: Drone Society

Post by George the original one »

In terms of surveillance, manned aircraft at 5,000-10,000 ft have already proven able to take high resolution images for decades... where do people think the google earth images come from? I don't know about you, but I can identify everything in my yard from those images.

Whether the image-taker is manned or unmanned, in my mind, makes no difference. Armed only makes a difference if they're attacking. Hezbollah (and anybody else) can already make dumb rockets that would be fully capable of being launched from an airborne platform and cause devastation.

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jennypenny
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Re: Drone Society

Post by jennypenny »

An aircraft isn't a constant threat/nuisance/intrusion. I think what bothers me is that a cheap piece of technology could be used in staggering numbers. What if drones were assigned to specific neighborhoods or blocks? It's one thing to think that a surveillance camera might take the occasional picture of me from overhead. It's another matter IMO if it's perpetually hovering around the neighborhood. I'm not comfortable with the idea of having all of my electronic communication recorded, but I really don't like the idea of something constantly outside my window with the ability record private conversations.

Personally, my biggest concern is that drones will be final death knell of privacy.

Chad
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Chad »

firefighterjeff wrote:http://m.wimp.com/nextsurveillance/

Here you go. It wouldn't be hard to abuse this.
Nope. Hard to predict when that becomes small enough and cheap enough for swarms.

George the original one
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Re: Drone Society

Post by George the original one »

> An aircraft isn't a constant threat/nuisance/intrusion.

I think you're missing that it could be a constant threat/nuisance/intrusion, but by being out of sight, it isn't. I don't know about you, but I have no idea at the time when those aerial photos are taken, but I can tell by the contents of the picture when it was.

After all, you're only aware of the publically available pictures... you have no knowledge of what footage exists in private collections.

In a high-end neighborhood like yours, I bet there are security cameras that have recorded activities in your yard.

workathome
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Re: Drone Society

Post by workathome »

I think my son's generation will grow up realizing they never have any privacy, anywhere. Everything that can technically be monitor is, and the technology is developing rapidly.

Felix
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Re: Drone Society

Post by Felix »

Not drones, but similar:
http://www.geek.com/news/military-robot ... p-1585374/

Jacob's scenario of rich people keeping the poor out of the loop completely in the future thanks to robotics is something I find plausible, too. :-(

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