"A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm."
Kevin Brown
NT061428J
Isaac Asimov's first law of robotics [1] seems certain to be broken in the near future. Military applications of robotics have poured many millions of dollars into unmanned air and ground vehicles, as well as smaller, armed robots. Most of the armed unmanned vehicles, however, lie under the ultimate control of a human. With the most government military (except Korea) currently wary to give control of the trigger to silicon, the first 'First Law' transgressor may have been designed by an amateur just out of college.
In the summer of 2006 Aaron Rasmussen, freshly graduated from Boston University in the US, decided to do something to make him stand out to employers. He had a friend manning a turret in Iraq and it inspired him to design a sentry gun. “I thought, my friend is risking is life for no apparent reason,” he said. [2]
Image provided by http://www.thesentrygun.com/
The gun essentially tracks and aims for the heart (with no higher level choice of target beyond recognizing a human). Rasmussen programmed the vision systems using Microsoft's DirectShow technology and utilizing the OpenCV library. The camera is an everyday webcam. The gun is an FN P90 and it tracks with servo motors controlled by four bar linkage. The computing power is provided by an external computer.
There is commercial interest in the gun. USMechatronics has begun working toward production under the auspices of SEIS group.
The sentry gun he designed shoots 6 mm ball bearings, not bullets, and Rasmussen says he is of the dangers presented. The bottom of his site, which details how he built the gun, reads "Don't Die Disclaimer: Don't use these plans, derivations of the gun, or anything to hurt people. In fact, don't hurt people."
Citations:
[1] "Runaround" by Isaac Asimov
[2] http://www.bu.edu/phpbin/news-cms/news/?dept=4&id=37650
http://www.thesentrygun.com/
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsNum=502
NT061428J
Isaac Asimov's first law of robotics [1] seems certain to be broken in the near future. Military applications of robotics have poured many millions of dollars into unmanned air and ground vehicles, as well as smaller, armed robots. Most of the armed unmanned vehicles, however, lie under the ultimate control of a human. With the most government military (except Korea) currently wary to give control of the trigger to silicon, the first 'First Law' transgressor may have been designed by an amateur just out of college.
In the summer of 2006 Aaron Rasmussen, freshly graduated from Boston University in the US, decided to do something to make him stand out to employers. He had a friend manning a turret in Iraq and it inspired him to design a sentry gun. “I thought, my friend is risking is life for no apparent reason,” he said. [2]
Image provided by http://www.thesentrygun.com/The gun essentially tracks and aims for the heart (with no higher level choice of target beyond recognizing a human). Rasmussen programmed the vision systems using Microsoft's DirectShow technology and utilizing the OpenCV library. The camera is an everyday webcam. The gun is an FN P90 and it tracks with servo motors controlled by four bar linkage. The computing power is provided by an external computer.
There is commercial interest in the gun. USMechatronics has begun working toward production under the auspices of SEIS group.
The sentry gun he designed shoots 6 mm ball bearings, not bullets, and Rasmussen says he is of the dangers presented. The bottom of his site, which details how he built the gun, reads "Don't Die Disclaimer: Don't use these plans, derivations of the gun, or anything to hurt people. In fact, don't hurt people."
Citations:
[1] "Runaround" by Isaac Asimov
[2] http://www.bu.edu/phpbin/news-cms/news/?dept=4&id=37650
http://www.thesentrygun.com/
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsNum=502
