[DennisR]

Really? Who is going to keep these little murderers plugged into the power line? Just another wacko author fomenting unrealistic fears.

[Mr. Mojo]

a robot capable of killing humans on its own volition will soon become a possibility

Yul Brynner in Westworld (1973) immediately comes to mind.

But so do those robot barmaids....

[Scrambler Bob]

unless there is a global agreement to ban them,
= = =

Kind of like that nuke deal with Iran???

[ETL]

[ETL]

[Billthedrill]

They set a slamhound on Turner's trail in New Delhi, slotted it to his pheromones and the color of his hair. It caught up with him on a street called Chandni Chaulk and came scrambling for his rented BMW through a forest of bare brown legs and pedicab tires. Its core was a kilogram of recrystallized hexogene and flaked TNT.

Opening lines of Count Zero by William Gibson, 1986

It's really hard to write hard science fiction these days. By the time you get it published, it's science reality.

[blueunicorn6]

We just need more Blade Runners to help retire robots.

[blueunicorn6]

That’s why you don’t make invincible robots.

You make cheap robots that destroy themselves if anything but a human tries to repair them.

[camle]

band them? works real well with crack don’t it.

[marron]

If “terminator” killer robots are outlawed, only outlaws will have “terminator” killer robots.

[struggle]

We need to start developing guns that can shoot close/mid range EMP pulses.

[Pajamajan]

I recall seeing a movie about this...It was not a Happily-Ever-After type movie.

[CurlyDave]

There will be countermeasures.

Plus, if they fly, ammunition will be heavy and in limited supply. On the ground, fuel and/or ammo will need resupply.

If want something really interesting, think about autonomous torpedoes that get launched, “go to sleep” on the ocean floor and wait for a passing ship. Maybe even a certain passing ship. then they wake up and kill it. They have a lumpy outer covering with real seaweed — go ahead and try to find that.

They are not invincible, but will certainly make life harder for humans...

[Samwell Tarly]

[Bellflower]

This is in the book of Joel as a prophesy about the future. I think it may be describing robot “people”. I think it is an amazing prophesy that in the time of Joel would have been so foreign to them, but now not so much.

Joel:
1 Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble : for the day of the LORD cometh , for it is nigh at hand;

2 A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations.

3 A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth : the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.

4 The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run .

5 Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap , like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array .

6 Before their face the people shall be much pained : all faces shall gather blackness.

7 They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks:

8 Neither shall one thrust another; they shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded .

9 They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief.

10 The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble : the sun and the moon shall be dark , and the stars shall withdraw their shining: