The Glade 4.0

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -wars.html



Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Diamondeye once explain in detail why this wouldn't happen with tanks?

I remember him talking about why bipedal tanks (mechs) weren't ever going to be a thing, but I don't recall him ever saying tank-drones would never be a thing.

Of course, I stop reading threads after he posts in them about half a dozen times, because I just don't have the investment nor attention span to get dragged into his point-by-point novels where he seeks to win arguments via attrition, so it's entirely plausible that he did and I missed it.

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The discussion involved you scoffing at the problems involved with tanks being essentially drones because of something to do with the google car and the mars rover, and I explained what the problem with it would be. Coro explained a number of technical issues as well. Most of them revolve around the fact that A) the control link is vulnerable to jamming or hacking and B) there's no crew to do any maintenance.

According to the article, the crew is supposed to drive the tank from up to 3 miles away. I'm sure this can be done, but..

what happens when the tank has to advance more than 3 miles? Now you have to move the control station and the crew. So, you need another truck or armored vehicle and you need fuel and parts for that truck in addition to the supply you already need for the tank itself.

When you have a whole battalion of 41 (if I remember Russian organization correctly) where do all those control stations go? 3 miles is well within artillery or attack helicopter range of the front line. They throw out a lot of electronic energy.

There is a lot more to the problem than simply the ability to move the tank around and make it shoot remotely.

As for "arguments by attrition" and "novels", given that the rest of it is mainly thoughtless one-liners, snark, and cynicism masquerading as awareness there's no cause for complaint on your part.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

http://gladerebooted.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=10426&p=244549#p244549

It should be noted that many of the supposed technical hurdles that Diamondeye mentions are not significant barriers. It is important to remember that while drones are operated by humans, AI systems are not. Many tasks which are extremely difficult for humans, such as precision formations are quite trivial for machines due to the speed at which they communicate. Other strengths that AI systems offer is that their decision making gets logged and can be analyzed at a later date. This means that when one unit makes a mistake, you can identify what factors led to the mistake and then alter the decision making of the AI so that none of them ever make that mistake again. We have never found a reliable method for doing that with humans. You can also analyze the decision making process of an AI to determine what it would do in response to certain stimuli and prevent mistakes from ever occurring in the first place.

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If you read the pot you linked carefully, you will see that the vast majority of the issues I cited relate to maintenance, not to the ability of an AI to fight the vehicle, and who will physically do things like repair thrown tracks, clear jams in weapons, attach or detach mine ploughs and rollers, etc. Some tasks, like checking oil and other fluid levels can easily be automated but how will that oil get physically added? Moreover, if those tasks CAN be automated, is it COST EFFECTIVE to do so? You don't just need an AI to make the vehicle go, you need all-new mechanical systems to replace the soldiers and they need to be cheap and light enough to fit the money budget and the weight budget. An M1A2 is already a 70-ton plus vehicle; how much weight are you going to add with robotic systems to do these tasks?

Also, why do you think precision formations are important anywhere but in a parade?

And last.. why is the tank (not the M1-series, but the concept of a tank) worth this investment? Armor-defeating systems are becoming more and more prevalent. In particular, top-down attack warheads that used to be the province of truly advanced weapons are becoming more and more prevalent. After all, the smartest way to beat the armor on a tank is to circumvent it by attacking places that can't be armored as effectively.

There are signs that the tank may become like the land battleship, and infantry will regain its pre-tank prominence. What's the plan to replace them with an AI?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."