I discovered the concept of quadcopters this morning via a blog post on my reader. That led me to the video clip below:
From there I looked at a couple of other video clips on Youtube until I was lucky enough to stumble on this one:
The geek in me is thrilled by both the quadcopter and the Dragonfly, but the sci-fi writer sees a darker use for both these technologies. They may look like toys now, but the Dragonfly, in particular, is already being promoted as a serious tool for both offense and defence.
Can you imagine police procedurals in the future? How will the cops catch murderers when the murder weapon could be a weaponized Dragonfly?
I hope this lovely bit of technology is never used for such dark purposes, but the pragmatist in me can’t see how it would not be misused. Human beings never change. Give us a rock and we’ll use it to beat each other’s brains out. Give us a Dragonfly and heaven knows what we’ll do with it.
Definitely tech for thought.
Happy Sunday,
Meeks
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May 20th, 2015 at 10:13 pm
The tool and the user… isn’t that a classic science fiction premise? Anyway, I just love stumbling upon strange things on the internet, in newspapers, in overheard conversations AND discovering things second hand in your blog posts!
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May 21st, 2015 at 9:16 am
-grin- Does that make me the Geek Connection? [sorry, terrible joke, I really don’t do jokes…]
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May 20th, 2015 at 6:09 pm
I was only thinking today about how technology has gradually changed much of our life. We’re hooked in devices all of which are traceable. Most of us are more isolated than ever, to communicate we’re reliant on devices. If we only focus on the incremental changes and boons to society such as positive medical & scientific technology, we’re winners but some of the technology has alternative less positive possible applications. Look behind and ahead and the big picture, and what’s been lost, and it gets a little scary. That’s how come futuristic genre, like your Innerscape both fascinates and terrified me.
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May 20th, 2015 at 10:30 pm
I know what you’re saying, but I think I’m more optimist than anything. Innerscape is sort of dystopian, but I hope it also has a positive feel to it. We’ve managed to avoid so much horrible stuff – e.g. World War III and the Big Bang, I have this crazy belief that we aren’t all bad. 😀
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May 17th, 2015 at 7:41 pm
Yeah, like everything, its a tool and depends on how people use things.
It could deliver medical supplies, DVDs, stink bombs, or real harmful payloads or spy on people and invade their privacy for people to upload pics on the internet. With the last reason being the main focus i think of some of the opponents.
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May 17th, 2015 at 11:08 pm
Yeah, the privacy issue is big and set to become even bigger with these little beauties around. Imagine coming home and finding a whole flock of them by your front door. You’d have to shoo them away like flies!
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May 19th, 2015 at 3:48 am
And seriously, people will just be “heeey i wasn’t IN the house. it just as if i was casually flying outside the windows and saw inside”.
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May 19th, 2015 at 8:52 am
lmao – ‘casually flying outside the windows’! Makes me think of witches on broomsticks! The weird thing is, it’ll probably happen.
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May 17th, 2015 at 2:19 pm
It’s awesome to see such advances in technology. What I find disturbing is that money for the development of this ‘toy’ is given by the military and the first thought that enters the military mind is whether it can be developed as a weapon. Already we’re looking for new ways to kill instead of new ways not to have to.
If the money applied to promoting war was used to promote peace for a change there would be money annually available for getting water to the world’s driest areas so crops can be grown to end starvation.Money to invest in educating the young and caring for the elderly. Maybe even for developing ‘toys’ like this purely for pleasure.
xxx Massive Hugs xxx
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May 17th, 2015 at 7:21 pm
Absolutely right, David. My antennae quivered at the mention of the military as well. Sadly, the military was instrumental in the birth of the internet as well. Let’s just hope we can subvert these inventions to the side of the angels. 🙂
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May 17th, 2015 at 12:22 pm
Interesting thought for sure. And a bit scary.
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May 17th, 2015 at 7:22 pm
On a brighter side, I suspect that if the Dragonfly were being used by the military right now, we wouldn’t be hearing anything about it. So fingers crossed. 🙂
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