By Aaron Kesel
The motor and vehicle giant Ford has employed two of Boston Dynamics robot dogs onto its factory floor.
According to a report by Motor Trend, the car and truck maker is going to be utilizing Boston Dynamics robot dogs “Fluffy” and “Spot,” for scanning the factory with lasers. These robot canines will be utilized in the Van Dyke transmission plant near Detroit, Michigan.
“These robots can be deployed into tough-to-reach areas within the plant to scan the area with laser scanners and high-definition cameras, collecting data used to retool plants, saving Ford engineers time and money,” Ford wrote in a press release.
Ford says the robot dog duo can fit under conveyor belts and venture into areas with fumes to test the air and deem it safe for human habitation. The automaker also notes the droid dogs will help it speed up its process of scanning its factory. Apparently, the process of documenting the factory used to take upwards to two weeks. This process took an entire surveying crew with a tripod scanner to do the work. Which, ultimately, of course, cost Ford a lot of money. As such Ford came up with a solution using the “70-pound quadruped robots with distinctly dog-like mobility” would speed up that process a bit, while also reducing costs.
Translation: robots are going to take over your jobs and we warned you. Why pay a measly weak human being when you can just buy a robot to do all of the work? The answer for a business is, of course; a robot requires no health insurance, overtime pay, or a yearly salary. Oh, and these two each can move at speeds of up to 3 mph for as long as two hours at a time before needing a recharge. They’re also capable of maneuvering up steps and 30-degree inclines.
So the only downside here is the need to recharge, otherwise humans would be screwed. Oh, but you might think that’s a positive thing, but you would be wrong as Spot and Fluffy have removable batteries.
As if what Ford is doing wasn’t strange enough, they seriously took pictures of this robot monstrosity laying in a dog bed with a bone in its view.
credit: Motor Trend
It also seems that Boston Dynamics taught both these robo pups the ability to get up after a fall. Maybe something they will regret, as they previously bullied another model of their robots. Just wait until the A.I. starts communicating together and reach singularity as sentient beings. Then they will remember that single time that a Boston Dynamics employee pushed over their robot brethren. Well, let’s be honest he probably did it more than once just for fun. One man’s fun is another person’s future nightmare. Wait, no that’s not how that goes is it?
Although, Ford says the two robot dogs shouldn’t be kicked or touched, plastering stickers on them that say: “service dog, do not pet.” I mean really as if anyone is actually going to pet a robotic dog machine. Ford also adds that the bots are programmed to stay clear of humans and will cause no harm to its flesh-suit workers.
See: 177 Different Ways to Generate Extra Income
The “dogs,” and I use that term loosely, can also crouch, stretch, and sit. Because robots also had to steal fido’s jobs too. It’s important to note that robots have already started stealing man’s best friends’ work as well. Activist Post previously reported about robot dogs being used for social distancing with CV and for even herding sheep.
Last year, robots took a record number of human jobs in the U.S. according to the Robotic Industries Association (RIA) as Activist Post reported. Now, with the impetus of the coronavirus, the number of jobs occupied by robots could multiply quite rapidly. Oxford Economics also published its own report warning that accelerating technological advances in automation, engineering, energy storage, artificial intelligence, and machine learning have the potential to reshape the world in 2020 through 2030s, displacing at least 20 million workers.
With the coronavirus as a catalyst to speed up the deployment of automated machines, we can probably safely say that number will be much more severe. It seems I am not the only one to share that opinion; a recent MarketWatch article written by Johannes Moenius, a professor of global business and the director of the Institute for Spatial Economic Analysis at the University of Redlands, agrees with this author’s conclusion stating “at least 50 million jobs could be automated in just essential industries.”
In fact, the Brookings Institution said in a report last month that “any coronavirus-related recession is likely to bring about a spike in labor-replacing automation … Automation happens in bursts, concentrated especially in bad times such as in the wake of economic shocks, when humans become relatively more expensive as firms’ revenues rapidly decline.”
You can watch Spot in action in the view below, and there is even a creepy split few seconds of an apocalyptic scene. A potential preview of the robot apocalypse to come!
**By [@An0nkn0wledge](https://hive.blog/@an0nkn0wledge)**
Aaron Kesel writes for Activist Post.
Top image: Ford press release
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