Author P.W. Singer on military drones, etc.:

Some poignant quotes:

"What does it mean to go to war increasingly with soldiers whose hardware is made in China and software is written in India?"

"Just like software has gone open source, so has warfare. Unlike an aircraft carrier or an atomic bomb, you don't need a massive manufacturing system to build robotics—a lot of it is off-the-shelf; a lot of it is even do-it-yourself. For about $1000, you can build [a Raven drone, equivalent to what American soldiers use in Iraq] yourself."

"There's already a Jihadi web site that you can go on and remotely detonate an IED in Iraq while sitting at your home computer."

"You don't have to convince a robot that they're going to receive 72 virgins when they die to convince them to blow themselves up."


Also, the Big Dog is something from a nightmare. Discuss: