Tiny, flying robots are creepy

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2012/02/autonomous-quadrotors-fly-amazing-formations/

There is something so creepy about these little flying robots. But really cool too.

 

I'm confused what makes it creepy. They're like mini planes or helicopters flying around.

 

I guess just the idea that they are being engineered to be autonomous and imagining a Skynet-led squadron of thousands of them swarming across cities and laying waste to their human enemies.

Whaddya want, I watch a lot of science fiction movies!

 

At some point in the future, people will not believe that we drove cars on the ground. This is the start.

 

The U.S. government is already using small drones like these to spy on people.

And I think that's kind of creepy.

 

I think there are a lot of physical restraints that make this impossible (if we have a fuel crisis now, how does it get better when everyone is fighting past gravity to get into the air consistently?), but more importantly, why is flying in the air preferable to driving on the ground...?

 

Tons of logistical hurdles, too, such as how to direct traffic flow to prevent constant air disasters, but the obvious advantage of flying is you can take a direct route to your destination. Plus, flying is awesome.

 

And how are we going to fuel this utopian Jetson world? We're heading toward a worldwide crisis point when it comes to affordably fueling just our current ground vehicles, much less your imagined world where everyone gets a magical flying machine.

 

This is a pretty harsh tone to take on a fairly innocuous post. I don't think 93 implied it would happen in the next five years. I'd say it's fairly inevitable that personal aircraft will become the norm in the future. It's bound to become a more efficient mode of travel than driving on roads.

Doesn't mean it's going to happen anytime soon, but I don't see any reason to doubt it will happen.

 

If we are hovering around in the air, we have moved way past oil as a fuel source.

Two hundred years ago the horse was the #1 mode of transportation. The horse. It was also the best form of communication with the Pony Express. That was cutting edge 150 years ago.

Can you imagine what technology will look like in 200 years?

The only thing that will stop progress is if we kill each other in wars or we fuck up the environment so badly that the planet becomes toxic.

And we do not have a worldwide fuel crisis if you can think past the internal combustion engine.

 

These kids seem to have found the first step to directing traffic in the air.