Big Dog

This video shows a developmental version of a military robot called "Big Dog" from Boston Dynamics. It's designed to accompany a soldier on the battlefield to provide a variety of support services.



The technology is incredible, but it's definitely in the uncanny valley as far as I'm concerned.

Technology derived from the Big Dog will certainly save American lives in the future. But I wonder what it will mean for us as a society if our natural distaste for war and the concomitant battlefield losses leads us eventually to delegate the commission of violence to machines. When we choose to commit violence, though the reasons may be justified, I think we are nevertheless due some of the wages of that violence -- or at least, it behooves us to accept them, if we are to remain a compassionate society.

A More Perfect Union

All day while I've been working, I've been hearing nothing on the radio except coverage of Barack Obama's speech in Philadelphia about his former pastor and race in America.

The guy is good. He's really good.

I  hear the man speak, and I can't help but want to get behind him. He's got the talent, he's got the vision, he seems to have the character, and he's got that Extra Savoir Faire. But does he have the judgment and experience to lead? Is he the new Jack Kennedy, or is he the left's George Bush -- the guy you vote for just because he seems like such a great guy, and then...?

I keep thinking of that scene from The American President:

Impassioned Michael J. Fox: "The people are so thirsty for leadership, they'll go out into the desert and drink the sand."

Full-of-Gravitas Michael Douglas: "They don't drink the sand because they're thirsty. They drink the sand because they don't know the difference."

And boy, am I thirsty.