Already regretting assigning Cormac McCarthy to report on the video of an entire pack of Boston Dynamics robot dogs

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/17/entire-pack-of-boston-dynamics.html

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I don’t think they are ready for the Iditarod yet.

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Nice work, Rob. There’s a whole subgenre of SF set in the Metalhead universe (which is likely our own):

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But can you pet them??

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Because everyday life in 2019 isn’t nightmare fuel enough on its own…

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If The Road had robot dogs in it, I probably would have liked it a whole lot more.

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Dah, that was what I was going to ask…

I liked that episode very much, but I couldn’t help but think, “This couldn’t take place in the US. We’d just blast the robot dogs.”

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Now they need a human brain enclosed in glass, a la Sandman Slim’s hell hounds.

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Is that quote from Fahrenheit 451? Because that’s what I thought of first.

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Bah. Deepfake CGI. Humbug.

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For some reason it all became slightly disturbing when I realized they were pulling a truck. I’m not sure why…

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It’s based on scenes from Cormac McCarthy’s The Road.

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I was a bit disappointed to learn that the recent Michael B. Jordan version apparently features no mechanical hound at all. But it seems its critical reception fared poorly for other reasons.

Mush! Or the robot equivalent!

Even though they are dog shaped, they are certainly not doggy in motion. I’m not sure if it qualifies (for me) as creepy, or just odd.

If they were coming toward me, I would try to puzzle them out rather than run. At least the first time…

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Who picks up their poo poo?

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They cut the really disturbing scene, where the driverless truck overtakes all the dogs on the downhill.

Hy fluid and lithium grease everywhere…

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It’s that or Rat Things

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I’m more concerned about the need to pick up the human poo the passing of this pack will assuredly inspire.

@agies: As noted by @TobinL, they’re not fast enough for a sled race yet. Let’s not provide another challenge for Boston Dynamics to accept as they march merrily down the road to SkyNet.

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Needs a fat jolly man in a red suit. Maybe a red light on the lead ‘dog’.

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