

Black Hawk flies, lands and avoids threats - all without pilots - showerst
http://blog.al.com/breaking/2012/12/black_hawk_flies_lands_and_avo.html

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runjake
Just keep in mind, this is a science project. It's going to be a long, long
time (or never) before this is safe from enemy exploitation. I can think of
all kinds of wacky ways to crash one of these things.

Autonomy is fine for high-flying, loitering aircraft, not so fine for low-
altitude flight relying on easily-exploitable terrain avoidance & positioning
technologies.

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pixie_
Your right, and I think where this will end up is with 'super aware' pilots.
Where the plane does just about everything automatically, but there's a human
inside that basically 'thinks' and the vehicle does. Our brains are already
better at strategy than the most advanced computers, it makes sense that the
vehicle takes care of the easy stuff (like not hitting walls and landing) and
the human focuses on the enemy.

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hnriot
"Our brains are already better at strategy than the most advanced computers"

\--- for how much longer? and when taken at scale, is the human race really
all that great at strategy? We are so much at the mercy of emotions to ever be
truly great strategists. What if, for example, given food production and water
usage etc the math dictated that the population must reduce, do you really
think this strategy would be adopted? Of course not.

i don't really see the point of self-flying helicopters, it's not like there's
a shortage of bright young men and women who want to fly these things. The
real challenge isn't flying helicopters, but finding ways to resolve
situations without blowing shit up. As fun as that might be...

~~~
dfc
_"I don't really see the point of self-flying helicopters, it's not like
there's a shortage of bright young men and women who want to fly these
things."_

Fewer caskets arriving at Dover AFB for repatriation.

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lostlogin
While that may be an issue at higher political levels (deaths make wars less
popular), young people aren't put off by the risk of death, as armies have
know for thousands of years. And given the description of the US military as
being Americas social welfare system, is this for the greater good, or not?

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stephengillie
I think the Army's self-flying helicopter trumps Google's self-driving car.
This is the kind of competition where everyone wins!

Edit: For the people who are still alive...

~~~
DanBC
> the kind of competition where everyone wins!

I want to make a snarky comment about the dead (possibly innocent civilian)
people not being winners, but I guess a drone is less likely to kill innocent
people than shock & awe style bombing and cluster bombing, which tend to harm
a lot of children.

It's a weapon of war and so the US is unlikely to release any information for
many years. That's a shame, because they've probably got some neat tech which
could be used for self driving cars.

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Pkger
No autonomous vehicle made by the US has attack / strike capabilities yet. The
J-UCAS / J-UCAV was proposed and demo vehicles were made, but they are not
even close to operational. I would imagine the blackhawk will be a similar
situation where it starts out as a transport vehicle for the foreseeable
future.

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robotresearcher
Tomahawk cruise missiles are autonomous vehicles, as are stand-off anti-tank
weapons that loiter on parachutes after deployment and choose their own target
tanks.

~~~
drakeandrews
Israel have built an anti-radar missile that has cruise capability, allowing
it to loiter above a theatre waiting for something to make an active radar
lock. I think (but am not sure) that it can even land safely for reuse after a
set time frame if unused.

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philip1209
Would it be easier to build one of these systems for a Commanche or an Osprey?
I ask because I imagine that control systems are heavily utilized in these two
helicopters, meaning that all the necessary feedback loops / transfer
functions / frequency responses are already known. Thus, taking those systems
a step further into controlling position may be more efficient than starting
from pneumatic controls on a Black Hawk.

~~~
starpilot
Well, the Comanche was canceled a while ago and never entered service. The
Black Hawk is an ideal testbed for this tech because there are so many of them
in service and its handling and controls are well understood. It's a pretty
conventional design, and would benefit more from being unmanned due to
cruising lower and slower (more vulnerable) than the Osprey.

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atonse
Almost an hour and still no references to SkyNet. Am I just that old? :-)

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skynet_(Terminator)>

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TallGuyShort
Is it just me, or is SkyNet's rational intelligence less scary than the people
who will actually end up controlling these machines?

edit: I mean no disrespect to soldiers - I refer to the politicians.

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lostlogin
No disrespect to soldiers? Seen the Abu Ghraib photos? It isn't the fact it
was soldiers so much as the fact the people keep doing things like that, year
in year out. The problem as I see it is that people will make the machines
better at committing atrocities.

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e03179
_I can think of all kinds of wacky ways to crash one of these things._

Please do tell. Thanks.

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dmethvin
Instead, think of ways to hijack it like the Iranians (supposedly) did. After
all, you could sell it to the Chinese or Russians for a LOT of money. Go ahead
I dare you.

As a countermeasure, we would have a second-channel kill switch and self-
destruct mechanism. If you try to hijack it back to an unfriendly location, we
blow it up when you approach it with resulting casualties. If you try to use
it as an offensive weapon we use the kill switch and/or self-destruct in an
area of our choosing.

To overcome the possibility of an external self destruct signal reaching the
drone when you hijack it, you'll probably come up with tricks like bathing it
in strong spread-spectrum interference or dropping it into a Faraday cage.
Either can be detected and trigger the self destruct internally.

Perhaps you can disable the drone by hitting it with an EMP weapon but still
recover it. Good luck.

~~~
Jtsummers
> To overcome the possibility of an external self destruct signal reaching the
> drone when you hijack it, you'll probably come up with tricks like bathing
> it in strong spread-spectrum interference or dropping it into a Faraday
> cage. Either can be detected and trigger the self destruct internally.

That seems counterproductive. If you create a self destruct system that can
auto-enable based on conditions, the enemy just needs to create those
conditions. They may be deprived of the weapon system, but so are you.

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Nux
Fully Automated Killing, FTW!

~~~
theklub
Scary thought, also when armies can't think for themselves.

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stcredzero
In America, you think for the Army. In Soviet Russia...

But seriously, in the 80's the Soviet brass still treated tank battalions
somewhat like fire and forget weapons. Basically, they'd just mow down
everything in front of them until they broke.

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NateDad
I've seen this episode of Mythbusters...

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RaSoJo
he he....RASCAL...he he

