If you take some time and look at google images, you'll notice a certain amusing fact about US military uniforms over the last 220 years. At first, they were functional as hell...Nice solid colors that made units look bigger and more intimidating when they lined up to volley-fire (that being the only effective way to use unrifled muskets). Later on, they became dressier, as can be seen in the Spanish-American war, as weapons became more accurate. TR had style....And by World War II, infantrymen went into battle wearing ties. No shit. Ties.
Of course, the Nazis ruined the snappy uniform forever, and the Sam Brown belts had to go, along with the cool boots, and you had the olive drab sacks worn by the cannon fodder in Vietnam. I mean, if you're only going to give them 16 weeks of training, why bother putting any effort into a uniform that's going to get all bloody anyway?
By Operation Desert Storm, though, things got a little uglier than that. The first "stealth" uniform was issued, a sort of overcoat with a pattern that "offends" the eye, so that you don't look directly at it. Nowaways, the standard BDUs - Battle Dress Uniform - is made in a pattern that averts the eye far more effectively. In a way, that's far grimmer than any trench-coat Gestapo outfit. Not more evil, just grimmer.
And uniforms are just the beginning...aircraft went from fabric and string affairs that were more dangerous to the pilot than the enemy, to efficient monoplanes, to jets bearing missiles that can strike from up to 100 miles away, to unmanned stealth drones and space planes, piloted by some geek in Maryland with a Slurpee and a quarter taped to the top of his console like on a video game at the arcade. There's talk of building tanks using the same sort of technology. As above, there's a certain cold, detached grimness to all of this.
It seems that humans just aren't efficient enough at killing other humans, or so the designs coming out of the military-industrial complex would have us believe. Mass murder is mechanized, integrated, state of the art business, now. How long before we don't even need that smarmy, self-satisifed geek in Maryland? Do you really want to know? Will you even know when it happens?
History began with a monkey braining another monkey with a rock. It may very well end with a machine killing monkeys from 12 miles up...Oh, and here's a bit of horror for you: If this automation continues for a few more years, and then the US falls apart, what will become of these unmanned, automated spaceplanes, tanks, etc?
My guess is they'll keep following their programs, becoming angry Gods to our descendents.
Isn't that a hoot?
Okay for now,
Dok
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 28, 2010, 07:43:48 PM
If you take some time and look at google images, you'll notice a certain amusing fact about US military uniforms over the last 220 years. At first, they were functional as hell...Nice solid colors that made units look bigger and more intimidating when they lined up to volley-fire (that being the only effective way to use unrifled muskets). Later on, they became dressier, as can be seen in the Spanish-American war, as weapons became more accurate. TR had style....And by World War II, infantrymen went into battle wearing ties. No shit. Ties.
Of course, the Nazis ruined the snappy uniform forever, and the Sam Brown belts had to go, along with the cool boots, and you had the olive drab sacks worn by the cannon fodder in Vietnam. I mean, if you're only going to give them 16 weeks of training, why bother putting any effort into a uniform that's going to get all bloody anyway?
By Operation Desert Storm, though, things got a little uglier than that. The first "stealth" uniform was issued, a sort of overcoat with a pattern that "offends" the eye, so that you don't look directly at it. Nowaways, the standard BDUs - Battle Dress Uniform - is made in a pattern that averts the eye far more effectively. In a way, that's far grimmer than any trench-coat Gestapo outfit. Not more evil, just grimmer.
And uniforms are just the beginning...aircraft went from fabric and string affairs that were more dangerous to the pilot than the enemy, to efficient monoplanes, to jets bearing missiles that can strike from up to 100 miles away, to unmanned stealth drones and space planes, piloted by some geek in Maryland with a Slurpee and a quarter taped to the top of his console like on a video game at the arcade. There's talk of building tanks using the same sort of technology. As above, there's a certain cold, detached grimness to all of this.
It seems that humans just aren't efficient enough at killing other humans, or so the designs coming out of the military-industrial complex would have us believe. Mass murder is mechanized, integrated, state of the art business, now. How long before we don't even need that smarmy, self-satisifed geek in Maryland? Do you really want to know? Will you even know when it happens?
History began with a monkey braining another monkey with a rock. It may very well end with a machine killing monkeys from 12 miles up...Oh, and here's a bit of horror for you: If this automation continues for a few more years, and then the US falls apart, what will become of these unmanned, automated spaceplanes, tanks, etc?
My guess is they'll keep following their programs, becoming angry Gods to our descendents.
Isn't that a hoot?
:popcorn:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taste_of_Armageddon
Quote from: Zyzyx on July 28, 2010, 07:58:36 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taste_of_Armageddon
Um, no.
:mittens:
That's all for now, until I can wrap my head around an appropriate response.
Humans create gods rather than the inverse.
In this case the gods would act like something straight out of the Iliad, except less stupid and more dangerous.
Dok, I don't want you to think my popcorn response was flip. I know, as you said, that there isn't a damn thing I can do about it so I just want a front row seat.
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 28, 2010, 08:01:23 PM
Quote from: Zyzyx on July 28, 2010, 07:58:36 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taste_of_Armageddon
Um, no.
War has advanced among these people to the point where their weapons don't even kill anymore. They agree to step into the booth and be cleanly disassembled when the "bomb" hits their city.
Today drones kill from continents away, tomorrow they might not even need pilots. What next? If something like "A Taste of Armageddon" could come out of 50s sci-fi, all that's guaranteed is that the future's horrors will be far, far worse than anything our imaginations can produce. I fear for the sanctity of human life, or whatever remains of it.
There are a few ways to avoid this, but when you factor in other countries competing in the same field - such as the Chinese UAV variant - those few ways wither and what's left isn't worth mentioning. I don't think I'm going to sleep very well tonight.
I sometimes think that the military makes inventions out of what they hear from sci-fi stories. They take the wildest dream and conjure it up, so that most of the greatest inventions are either powered straight on from the military machine or turned into something that can be used for war, killing, domination, etc.
The monkey finds better, newer, faster ways of FUCK YEAH DESTROY KILL KILL KILL against his fellow monkey.
All very sad, given said monkey gets delight out of inventions that don't kill, maim and cripple as well.
Quote from: Jenne on July 28, 2010, 08:35:49 PM
I sometimes think that the military makes inventions out of what they hear from sci-fi stories. They take the wildest dream and conjure it up, so that most of the greatest inventions are either powered straight on from the military machine or turned into something that can be used for war, killing, domination, etc.
The monkey finds better, newer, faster ways of FUCK YEAH DESTROY KILL KILL KILL against his fellow monkey.
All very sad, given said monkey gets delight out of inventions that don't kill, maim and cripple as well.
I blame pot.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 28, 2010, 08:36:30 PM
Quote from: Jenne on July 28, 2010, 08:35:49 PM
I sometimes think that the military makes inventions out of what they hear from sci-fi stories. They take the wildest dream and conjure it up, so that most of the greatest inventions are either powered straight on from the military machine or turned into something that can be used for war, killing, domination, etc.
The monkey finds better, newer, faster ways of FUCK YEAH DESTROY KILL KILL KILL against his fellow monkey.
All very sad, given said monkey gets delight out of inventions that don't kill, maim and cripple as well.
I blame pot.
And OBAMA!!!!1!one :crankey:
Well, I blame my analysis/observation on the fact we were held hostage by Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea during our roadtrip last week.
The real terror in this is the killing from a safe distance issue. And that is certainly nothing new. It's just that everyone is getting better at it.
Ground troops will be nothing but mop up crews and the horror that is war and killing will be sanitized until all of the horror is hidden under a nice sterile blanket.
They are probably working on a first assault vehicle that is unmanned. Or already have it.
It seems things like this could make war more desirable socially acceptable since mothers won't be crying over the loss of sons and daughters.
Not ours, anyway.
An unmanned tank prototype exists.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 28, 2010, 08:47:40 PM
The real terror in this is the killing from a safe distance issue. And that is certainly nothing new. It's just that everyone is getting better at it.
Ground troops will be nothing but mop up crews and the horror that is war and killing will be sanitized until all of the horror is hidden under a nice sterile blanket.
They are probably working on a first assault vehicle that is unmanned. Or already have it.
It seems things like this could make war more desirable socially acceptable since mothers won't be crying over the loss of sons and daughters.
And that's the sad part. Essentially, the people fighting wars will be those people who are perfectly fine with wars, or killing, because it doesn't affect them personally and, as a result, are incapable of understanding the gravity of such subjects.
Dok, you're better set up to comment on it than I am, but military equipment seems like an exercise in hillarity to me. Trying to outfit a large group of mooks with somewhat simialr and standard equipment, not to emntion training them to use it effectively, is a weird thing. It almost epitomizes standardized hand - out mentality. I can't think of too many cases where the stuff being handed out had the QC it should have. Dad used to tell us how he had to go through a whole hutch full of parts to get a Colt worth a damn. Another buddy of mine (certifiable shit magnet) who's trained as a medic (Ho HO!) has a whole list of things he supposed to always have on hand, but has to acquire at his own expense. Then the more recent tales of families scrimping and saving to send their sons in Iraq better body armor. (Dave the Marine had some crazy stories about mail order fun too, but those are his to tell.)
Those remote jets and tanks, well...
For now, it's our new toy, and we use them to kill as needed. They've already been hacked, stolen, abd hocked on the black market though. (The right introductions and cash will get you ANYTHING from ANYWHERE, after all. Welcome to Uncle Sam's garage sale.) So soon enough the other assholes have them too, then what? Drone vs. Drone, dueling it out far and away from where anyone REAL can get hurt? Nope. Drone running from drone until they're close enough to shoot at somethign someone REALLY cares about.
Drone vs. AAC? Too bad, your 2nd hand gen. 1 "Predator" was shot up over that city before you could dump out any ordnance at any civilian or infrastructure target. (You DID pack ia dirty surprise into it first, right?)
Another layer of expensive fluff and attrition before it gets down to knives and sticks. Breaking each other's unmanned toys jsut won't have the same meaning.
I'm morbidly fascinated with the psychology of operating this kind of device though. Will there be comfy operators who, in quiet moments, struggle with the cognitive dissonance of what they've wrought? To my thinking, at least killing people in person makes it easy to say "if I didn't, I would have died." You can't tell yourself that kind of thing when you kill with robots.
Just makes it all the worse when the war finally shows up on our doorstep, complete with bloodthirsty opposition in the flesh. Or worse yet, drones in control of the other side. I for one have read too much sci-fi to ever trust placing my life in the hands of a machine.
I think we are all missing the point of the inevietability (I cannot spell this in my inebriated state) of the situation and the fallout on our offspring.
The Horror™ is very real and coming to a world near you.
Doomsday shelters making a comeback
By Keith Matheny, USA TODAY
Jason Hodge, father of four children from Barstow, Calif., says he's "not paranoid" but he is concerned, and that's why he bought space in what might be labeled a doomsday shelter.
Hodge bought into the first of a proposed nationwide group of 20 fortified, underground shelters — the Vivos shelter network — that are intended to protect those inside for up to a year from catastrophes such as a nuclear attack, killer asteroids or tsunamis, according to the project's developers.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-07-28-doomsday28_ST_N.htm
Like that will help.
:lulz: I was wondering when this would make a comeback. Awesome. :lulz:
Can't anyone take a hint from Dune, Fallout, Mad Max or even the last forty years of American warmongering? When the shit gets real you don't want to be pinned down in one location where you can't leave and everyone has mobility on you. I'd think these shelters would just be juicy targets for anyone with enough unhealthy chemicals.
Of course credit goes to Dok Howl for explaining this to me in the first place.
Quote from: Zyzyx on July 29, 2010, 03:19:26 PM
Can't anyone take a hint from Dune, Fallout, Mad Max or even the last forty years of American warmongering? When the shit gets real you don't want to be pinned down in one location where you can't leave and everyone has mobility on you. I'd think these shelters would just be juicy targets for anyone with enough unhealthy chemicals.
Of course credit goes to Dok Howl for explaining this to me in the first place.
Consider them fancy coffins.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 11:59:04 AM
Doomsday shelters making a comeback
By Keith Matheny, USA TODAY
Jason Hodge, father of four children from Barstow, Calif., says he's "not paranoid" but he is concerned, and that's why he bought space in what might be labeled a doomsday shelter.
Hodge bought into the first of a proposed nationwide group of 20 fortified, underground shelters — the Vivos shelter network — that are intended to protect those inside for up to a year from catastrophes such as a nuclear attack, killer asteroids or tsunamis, according to the project's developers.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-07-28-doomsday28_ST_N.htm
Like that will help.
"Bought space in?"
First family in locks the door. :lulz:
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 29, 2010, 05:36:37 PM
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 11:59:04 AM
Doomsday shelters making a comeback
By Keith Matheny, USA TODAY
Jason Hodge, father of four children from Barstow, Calif., says he's "not paranoid" but he is concerned, and that's why he bought space in what might be labeled a doomsday shelter.
Hodge bought into the first of a proposed nationwide group of 20 fortified, underground shelters — the Vivos shelter network — that are intended to protect those inside for up to a year from catastrophes such as a nuclear attack, killer asteroids or tsunamis, according to the project's developers.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-07-28-doomsday28_ST_N.htm
Like that will help.
"Bought space in?"
First family in locks the door. :lulz:
They are time shares. :lulz: Some of them can hold up to around 2000 people.
The Vivos network, which offers partial ownerships similar to a timeshare in underground shelter communities, is one of several ventures touting escape from a surface-level calamity.
Radius Engineering in Terrell, Texas, has built underground shelters for more than three decades, and business has never been better, says Walton McCarthy, company president.
The company sells fiberglass shelters that can accommodate 10 to 2,000 adults to live underground for one to five years with power, food, water and filtered air, McCarthy says.
The shelters range from $400,000 to a $41 million facility Radius built and installed underground that is suitable for 750 people, McCarthy says. He declined to disclose the client or location of the shelter.
Just a few years?
That will simply not do.
(http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f335/Yag44/Vault-tec.png)
An artists rendering of a common area in a shelter.
(http://i654.photobucket.com/albums/uu264/HawkShadowsoul/shelterx-topper-medium.jpg)
Needs more brushed aluminum.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 29, 2010, 05:44:30 PM
An artists rendering of a common area in a shelter.
(http://i654.photobucket.com/albums/uu264/HawkShadowsoul/shelterx-topper-medium.jpg)
Wow, much nicer than the ones in the movies....
70s wood paneling or GTFO.
Also: needs avocado and goldenrod as color scheme, complete with orange shag carpet!
Want to know the really funny part?
The company sells fiberglass shelters that can accommodate 10 to 2,000 adults to live underground for one to five years with power, food, water and filtered air, McCarthy says.
Also cameras and twisted social experimentation. If Vaults are going to become a reality, we at least need to start pumping hallucinogens into the air filtration systems.
But if post-apocalyptic survival fiction has taught me anything, it is to be competent, mobile, in a group and well-equipped. Don't know if I'll actually survive, or what I'll exactly do. Nor am I sure I'd live, even in a group.
But don't you think it'd take more than an economic collapse to do us in? Apparently Argentina's recent economic collapse didn't change much for them, and they kept using their currency. Let's get Cain in on this.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0124298/~~> Reminds me of this movie here.
This calls for a massive prank that would make them all run for the shelters and see how Lord of the Flies it would really get.
Quote from: Doktor Alphapance on July 29, 2010, 07:16:19 PM
This calls for a massive prank that would make them all run for the shelters and see how Lord of the Flies it would really get.
War of the Worlds.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 29, 2010, 05:40:28 PM
Just a few years?
That will simply not do.
2000 people in an underground shelter? I give them a few weeks, months tops.
So where do I sign up for the team that designs the horrible social experiments that will be run in these things once they close up. :lulz:
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Vault_43
Maybe, we've just gone done established a culture which favours efficiency over accountability. Because somebody has to be killing those people, they didn't just fall onto those bullets... They didn't fire the missiles at themselves.
But you know, the more detached we are from it all the better right? We can't go mistaking those person-shaped things for real people, they're on the other side of the glass! There's a whole wall of pixels between us and them, it's just like a game. It's ok to kill as long as there are no consequences, maybe that's why violent games and films are so popular. Maybe we're all a little bit Greek deep down.
It's so depressing when people die in real life
It wasn't my fault, the machine did it! I didn't expect it to actually go through with, I just programmed it after all. I thought they were more rational than this, they wouldn't jump off a cliff when I told them to, I thought they understood. But look, they must be intelligent, they're maiming the bodies are reclaiming the meat to use as an energy source. Ingenious isn't it? So perfect? So efficient? I'm building a better world, don't you see?
and there's arms races RACING
Science can save us, we recreate ourselves in our own image, gods of steel and titanium, a bright future for all who can afford the surgery. People need this! They need a higher power, who has not the moral obligation to keep things alive. We have become arrogant in our evolution, thinking we are the pinnacle of creation. How blind we are! We have created the future! But we still fear to embrace, still fear the joy of destruction.
AND WE ROCK WE ROCK WE ROCK TO THE NEW SENSATION
Science will save you.
Even if it kills you in the process.
This brings to mind several SF novels I have read in which a society develops taboos against using distance weapons or automation, however, I think humanity is just stupid enough to collectively continue the this cycle unless we destroy ourselves, or have our technological spawn do the do to us.
War should be nasty. It should be unpleasant, except when suddenly YOU have to be the dude getting shot at.
Quote from: Adios on July 29, 2010, 05:44:30 PM
An artists rendering of a common area in a shelter.
(http://i654.photobucket.com/albums/uu264/HawkShadowsoul/shelterx-topper-medium.jpg)
Pic is missing water dripping from the ceiling, and dessicated husks of people after, you know, the food ran low and everyone started knife fighting.