Please, Thank You

In these uncertain times, it's nice to know that the U.S. military has a goal: that it's 30% robotic in twelve years. Why? Because robots don't feel pain, and when they die you just solder them back together or build a bitchin' chair out of the scrap metal.

"While advances in robot technology will probably result in more radical
robot designs and allow for the military's goal of a 30-percent robotic force,
there will always be human involvement in the control process. Researcher Bill
Smart had this to say about our future robot army: 'It's a chain of
command thing. You don't want to give autonomy to a weapons delivery system. You don't want the robot to make the wrong decision.' "

Wow, somebody actually talking some sense for once. Clever, Bill. Or should I say smart? Get it? Because that's your last name. No, I'm not making fun of you. Jesus, it was a compliment you jackass.

Anyway, this whole human vs. robot for control of weapons systems is a real Catch 22 (love you, Joseph). On the one hand, you don't want robots to have any control over anything, because all they want to do is kill us all and have oily robotic orgies. But on the other hand, you put a man in front of a giant red button that reads "DO NOT PUSH, THE WORLD WILL END" and 9 times out of 10 -- as soon as nobody's watching -- he's got his pants around his ankles and is mashing that thing like candy's gonna' rain from the sky.