Why so few robot armys?

[Shroom Man 777]

It occurs to me that some, like Red and Shroomy, hit on some important points which boil down to "depends on" - as in, "depends on the semantics you use", "depends on the technology you have", "depends on how your culture/government/universe is structured," etc. I mean you can't even generalize that "robot armies are rare because people care about characters" and it is quite possible to have robot characters that are a product of mass-production (Star Wars and WALL-E come to mind.) Its all in HOW it happens.

If a person must have a "reason" for so few robot armies, the only possible answer is an out of universe one: Most authors, directors. scriptrwiters, and audiences in general probably neither care nor think too deeply about it, or give much thought to the consequences. In universe... you can pretty much contrive any number of explanations that are plausible (if not logical or rational.) as I think the thread demonstrates. Its probably along the same lines of why people often don't wonder why the sci fi weapons always fire slow moving glowy bolts, or wonder at why a handgun (or any sort of firearm or cannon or whatnot) in the hero's hand in any movie doesn't quite behave like they would in real life because they're firing blanks. Or the appearance of explosions, for that matter.

This. Seriously, this.

The attempts to justify and give in-verse reasons as to why there are no robot armies just sound stupid. That's like making up a reason why the Empire uses dumb gundamechanimu scum like AT-ATs when tanks would be better ( ), using some reason like something-something contractors, or something-something intimidiation weapon or something-something unreasonable compromise between direct line-of-site energy weapon blaster platform and troop carrier, to try and explain away why they had to use molasses-slow mechanimus to quickly capture a base before the enemy escapes.

The limitations of robots and AIs, or their dangers, are just arbitrary made-up stuff that people in this thread make up, and may totally not apply to any of the sci-fi franchises we're talking about. We could come up with a list of good reasons why robot armies may be prohibited, good reasons that explain the limits of AIs or robotoids, and then someone writes/makes sci-fi that has robot armies totally ignoring these reasons because he just says that his robots do not suffer these limitations. Or, on the other hand, he might actually prohibit AIs and robotoids, but NOT because of any of the listed "realistic" or reasonable rasons we've listed, but because in his sci-fi there are evil spirits and robots are susceptible to demonic possession - and training a robot technician who also knows how to perform exorcisms is impractical and expensive!

Some of the reasons just come off as friggin' contrived. Why the hell are people bringing up sodomy and assfucking? What the hell does this have to do with unmanned autonomous mechanical killing machines that may or may not be humanoid, used as military weapons systems? What?

Man, did these implications and argumentations of AIs and robot armies even come up when George Lucas went "hey, I think the enemies of my awesome prequels should be robotoids, for my clown army to fight... yes, just like how I planned it all those years ago! it was my vision!" ?

Also. I remember that argument someone brought up:

People don't want to use robot armies because robot armies cannot be sympathized, prompting the enemy to not hesitate to shoot at the robot army where they would've hesitated to shoot at a human/non-robot army. Lol.

THIS SUDDENLY MAKES SO MUCH SENSE!

Now I know why in animus, fighter jets, helicopters, tractor trailers and all other conventional war machines TRANSMORPH into humanoid robots! Because in their humanoid forms, they will be sympathized by the enemy who will hesitate to shoot at humans or humanoid-shaped targets! If we don't want to use robot armies because they cannot be sympathized with, because they aren't humans... this same problem exists with tanks, with helicopters, with fighter jets! The obvious solution is to have these tanks, helicopters and fighter jets transform into humanoid forms!

First there were the Terminators... and then the Transformers came. Now we just call them Transforminators. They used to shoot at us, but now they also turn into really sweet cars and they're eating all our sand!

I mean, Jesus Christ, what a terrible reason to "justify" the lack of robot armies in sci-fi. Robots aren't "sympathetic" and soldiers won't hesitate to shoot them - unlike how they shoot at people??? Seriously?

[someone_else]

Why the hell are people bringing up sodomy and assfucking?

Read guest's post (Posted: 2010-12-28 04:50am). He said that by making the bots wanting to be "good bots" with the same system that dictates that humans want to reproduce, they will be reliable. It was wrong and i disproved it.

I mean, Jesus Christ, what a terrible reason to "justify" the lack of robot armies in sci-fi. Robots aren't "sympathetic" and soldiers won't hesitate to shoot them - unlike how they shoot at people??? Seriously?

You sure you haven't misinterpreted something?

Most people here seem to agree that realistic robots aren't simpathetic to the audience of the book/movie, not to the ones shooting at them.

Unless proper handwavium to humanize them is applied, of course. Like having a personality even if it is unnecessary for their function (R2D2 or most battle bots for that matter), and maybe having them "want" to do something that is not ther design purpose, rising the need to override their supposedly "primary" function.

The reason is the same why Microcosmos (while a pretty nice documentary I love) has not earned anywhere close the money earned by Saving Private Ryan, or Full Metal Jacket, or even Top Gun, or Apocalypse Now.

[Shroom Man 777]

You sure you haven't misinterpreted something?

Noes

There's also the consideration that human beings, generally, are extremely reluctant to kill other human beings, even when their own lives are threatened. This is why modern militaries spend huge amounts of effort to overcome this inherent disdain for taking human life, mainly through dehumanizing the enemy(whoever the enemy is).

An all-robot army, while being able to be programmed to be a remorseless juggernaut of slaughter, will not trigger this reluctance in its human opponents. By deploying a robot army, you automatically increase the effectiveness of your opponents. How much remorse are they going feel, say, deploying a massive EMP against 100,000 toasters? You've done the job of dehumanizing your army for your enemy. He can now direct resources he previously used for this purpose elsewhere. To make it worth your while, you need to take this into consideration and hope your robots are that much more effective...or, perhaps make them look human enough to make the enemy think twice.

An all-vehicle army, while being able to be programmed to be a remorseless juggernaut of slaughter, will not trigger this reluctance in its human opponents. By deploying a vehicle army, you automatically increase the effectiveness of your opponents. How much remorse are they going feel, say, deploying a massive EMP against 100,000 tractor trailors? You've done the job of dehumanizing your army for your enemy. He can now direct resources he previously used for this purpose elsewhere. To make it worth your while, you need to take this into consideration and hope your vehicles are that much more effective...or, perhaps make them transform into humanoid robots to make the enemy think twice.



By giving your vehicles legs, you make them look more human, and by making them look human you will trigger this reluctance in human opponents and automatically decrease your opponentsand make them feel remorse and humanize your army for your enemy and make the enemy think twice.

*gets nuked by the HAB*

Maybe the gundamechanimus were also an attempted design compromise when Emperor Palpatine wanted a walking behemoth to intimidate the rebels, combined with a direct line of sight laser platform, and a jet fighter plane.

[someone_else]

Ah, I see, you dug up a random guy from page 3.

Then I agree. It's trivial to dehumanize the enemy even if it is human (just say it is a nazi-equivalent inhuman beast and everyone will be eager to shoot on them), for a bot army it's a fucking breeze.

That will make your internal front much stonger though, since "your boys" aren't dying no matter how high the war casualities are.

In short, noone on either side will give a fuck for a war between bots, apart from whining about the costs (that would whine about costs anyway, even for human-fought wars). A definite improvement imho.

perhaps make them transform into humanoid robots to make the enemy think twice

Nah, just keep the crew on top of them, in a glass canopy so that everyone can see them dying horribly when hit.


And, btw, EMP's "ZOMG ALL TECH DIE NOOOOWWWWWW!!!!!!" effect is vastly overrated.
Most military equipment is already immune due to using faraday cages and surge protectors and other simple gimmicks like that that discharge the overload harmlessly to the ground or compensate.

Only civilian stuff will suck it up and die in flames when a "EMP spell" is cast (or solar storm, that causes a similar effect among other things), since adding such protection would add a few dozen bucks to the product's price and noone needs that anyway.