This advertisement's typo began the tradition of NORAD's Santa tracking initiative. The added '1' at the end of the telephone number led callers to the Continental Air Defense Command.
The origins of NORAD tracking Santa Claus dates back to 1955, when a Sears advertisement mistakenly listed a typo for a Sears Santa wish-list telephone number that turned out to be the emergency 'red line' for the Continental Air Defense Command (which later became the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD). U.S. Air Force Col. Harry Shoup and his men began fielding waves of calls from young children across the U.S. wishing to speak to Santa, and the servicemen would tell the children where they were 'tracking' Santa on their radar.
The US and Canadian military now collaborate in monitoring Santa's flight via radar on a yearly basis.
Decades later, the tradition continues as a full orchestration involving GPS live-map tracking of the red sleigh, thousands of servicemen and women volunteers on Christmas Eve, and the NORAD Tracks Santa website (NORADSanta.org) attracts an audience of over 22 million visitors. Unfortunately, in an attempt to make the magic even more immersive, NORAD produced an animated video with some imagery that was disconcerting for some viewers.
This is the image that drew criticism from viewers who claimed this year's NORAD tracking promoted more militarism than years past.
Parents and families who criticized this year's NORAD video stated that the two fighter jets accompanying Santa implied more 'militarism' than previous years of NORAD Santa tracking. A professor at the University of Washington commented, "If the military wants to keep its ranks stocked, it needs to appeal to children. The military knows it can't appeal to adults to volunteer. It is like the ad industry." (Fox, December 2013) Personnel at NORAD responded by calling the criticism "a media-manufactured controversy," even going so far as to insist that the fighter jets in the video are "unarmed." Closer examination of the text in the NORADSanta website shows the organization's jolly interpretation of their fighter jets' relationship with this Christmas character. NORADSanta.org explains the technical differences between the fighter jets Canadian and US pilots used in the escort mission, and then reassures readers that "Santa flies faster than any jet fighter" and that he "actually slows down for us to escort him... [to create] a very good continuous picture of his whereabouts." The site claims that he's never crashed, and "must be a great pilot!"
Santa's sleigh 'technical data' measures the vehicle's weight at takeoff to be "75,000 gd (gumdrops)" and measures its dimensions in candy cane and lollipop units.
A still shot from the NORAD Tracks Santa video depicting Santa being tracked over the ocean by a surveillance plane.
SantaCams are surveillance cameras in every city around the globe that take "video and still image recordings" of Santa. They are only turned on every December 24th, and remain turned off the rest of the year.
Interestingly, viewers concerned with the fighter jets have not criticized the other military technology (radar, cameras, satellites) being used to track the flight, which NORAD describes in great detail. According to NORAD's Santa website, they utilize "the same satellites used in providing air warning of possible missile launches aimed at North America." The organization also claims to have cameras in every city around the world that they "only turn on December 24th" to track Santa, leaving it to the reader's imagination what they're doing the rest of the year. NORAD gets more cheeky with other explanations, saying that the same satellites they use to pick up the heat from rockets and missiles can pick up Rudolph's nose because it shines (burns?) so brightly. Overall, the employees at NORAD make a strong effort to explain their methodology for escorting and tracking Santa's worldwide progress to help reinforce the Christmas spirit, but also to bring some lightheartedness into their very serious workplace. "The thrill of flying with Santa and the famous Reindeer" is described as a major perk for pilots who volunteer to fly escort on Christmas eve.
The 10th year commemorative record sold in 1964 mixed holiday music with tracking reports from NORAD personnel. Note the US Air Force symbol on Santa's sleigh.
It would appear that NORAD has always had a great deal of fun with the program, and the tradition brings holiday cheer to an organization that has to be ready to defend the continent from missile strikes and aerial conflict year-round. "It's exciting to have children and parents call in from so many other countries and to hear how excited they get when we give them the details about Santa - it's an indescribable feeling," said eight-year Santa tracking veteran Susan Alexander. Seeing the thousands of military personnel and civilians who volunteer their efforts on Christmas eve for the program, including the First Lady, makes one believe that the initiative is really meant to help military families with young children cope with their loved ones who must fight overseas or work during the holidays. As General Jacoby stated in an interview about this year's tracking effort, "Christmas is a family holiday and to be able to spend this time with my NORAD family and my son is just a terrific experience."
Mother-daughter team Susan and Cara Alexander working at 4 a.m. on Christmas eve. Susan's husband is a retired Marine who works as a contractor at Schriever Air Force Base in Colorado.
The whole controversy does raise one question: wouldn't it be easier to track Santa if he would just check in on Foursquare?
He is GOING to find out who's been naught and nice, and NORAD's going to help make a very detailed list.
"You don't want someone to hesitate using one of these robots if they have feelings toward the robot that goes beyond a tool... If you feel emotionally attached to something, it will affect your decision making." Julie Carpenter, University of Washington Researcher, cnet News
iRobot's Packbot bomb disposal robot was one identified in Carpenter's research as the object of soldiers' emotional attachment. They regarded their Packbot as something of a 'pet'.
Julie Carpenter, a graduate student at the University of Washington, released research on the attachment soldiers form with their bomb disposal robots. Two of the robots cited were the Packbot and the TALON bomb disposal units. These allow soldiers to control a bomb-defusing robot from a safe distance with a video game controller or computer setup. As the video above demonstrates, it can be used in many life-threatening situations. Carpenter found that soldiers cared deeply for their robot comrades, and would even host funerals for fallen bomb-defusing robots to help mitigate a range of real emotions experienced during grieving and loss. She even found that soldiers would take the robots fishing and 'let them hold the pole,' and they gave the bots nicknames like 'Scooby Doo' and 'Danny De Vito' to fit their distinct perceived personalities.
Humans have been shown to form emotional bonds with inanimate objects and technology in a variety of ways. Children exhibit these behaviors frequently, as they form emotional attachments to blankets, dolls, stuffed animals, and other toys. Adults also form emotional bonds to a host of technologies, giving pet names to cars, ships, musical instruments, guns, and other tools and vehicles on which they rely. We can even form emotional bonds with digital pets and characters inside of video games, and experience sadness and frustration when breaking a cherished phone or electronic device. There is even a rare sexual fetish called agalmatophilia, in which people become romantically attached to human-shaped statues and life-sized dolls. For the majority of people, the emotional bonds we form with inanimate objects are not the same as those we would feel for a living creature, but these bonds can have a significant impact on our lives. It is with this in mind that we must review Julie Carpenter's research on soldiers' formed attachments to small battlefield robots like the Packbot.
Can we understand a soldier's attachment to a bomb-defusing UGV by looking at our own attachments to inanimate objects and virtual creatures such as the Weighted Companion Cube (above)?
The video game "Portal" pokes fun at man's ability to become emotionally attached to something as mundane as a box with a pink heart painted on it. This totally silent and inanimate box, named the 'Weighted Companion Cube', accompanies the player through many difficult challenges until the main villain of the game forces the player to destroy it in order to advance. By this point in the game, most players feel a vague emotional attachment to the cube and a slight sense of guilt in disposing of it. This, paired with the game's continued insistence that it cannot talk and even if it could, we should 'disregard its advice', gives it a comic 'personality' in the game that is similar to the 'personality' soldiers attribute to their robot companions. The cube's emotional significance to gamers has made it a permanent icon of modern gaming, and the Companion Cube now makes cameos in many games beyond Portal. If we can understand the attachment one can form with a gray box inside of a video game, it should come as no surprise that modern-day soldiers form emotional attachments to the bomb-defusing UGVs to which they entrust their lives.
The similarities between Portal's Weighted Companion Cube and a bomb-defusing UGV are obviously separated by the fact that the UGV saves real lives while the Cube helps players beat a video game, yet they both provide the user with a certain feeling of ownership that extends beyond their material being. Carpenter's research showed that soldiers would anthropomorphize the UGVs and view them as kinds of 'pets' for which they must care and protect. There are a wide variety of technological pets with which people form real bonds, and they sell in large quantities. The vast sales figures of these games would indicate that man's ability to emotionally bond with 'theoretical pets' has already been identified by major figures in the technology industry.
Nintendogs, a handheld dog simulator for the Nintendo DS Handheld electronics system, has sold over 23 million copies worldwide. This puts it in the second best-selling DS game of all time, just behind New Super Mario Bros.
Aibo was a brand of robotic dog that was sold up until 2006, when Sony decided to cut the program to conserve costs. Since then, robotic dogs have been produced by a wide variety of electronics companies.
Soldiers begin to refer to UGVs in conversation almost as if they are pets, saying 'poor little guy' when they get injured or holding a 'funeral' if it is damaged beyond repair, according to Carpenter. She indicates that the soldiers impose human characteristics on their robots, even suggesting that they have particular genders and personality traits, and experience real feelings of loss and sadness at losing their robotic companions. Returning to our comparison with Portal, the main villain mocks the player's unwillingness to separate from his or her Companion Cube at its last moments before throwing it down the disposal furnace.
"If [the cube] could talk - and the Enrichment Center takes this opportunity to remind you that it cannot - it would tell you to go on without it, because it would rather die in a fire than become a burden to you." - GLaDOS, Portal
Both the gamer and the soldier control their inanimate 'companions' to solve 'puzzles' of sorts, and any harm that may come to their companions is responded to in an inherently protective, human way. We tend to perceive them as selfless accomplices in our pursuits, filling their inanimate nature with imagined personalities of loyalty and dedication that is similar to a pet dog. We find comedy in their actions and mishaps, and this can cause people to become emotionally invested in their well-being. It is unsurprising in these ways that soldiers become attached to their robots, and we need more research to determine the positive and negative attributes of this emotional connection.
iRobot corporation, which manufactures a great deal of UGV bomb-defusing technologies, features the remains of Packbot #129 in its corporate museum. It was destroyed in an IED blast in the line of duty.
Unfortunately, as Carpenter points out, she and many in the military see emotional attachment to tools and devices only through the dimension of affected judgment, and therefore not beneficial. She and others have suggested that future robots should have less "personality" in their design to avoid attachment formation. There is certainly validity to this concern, but there could be benefits to soldiers caring about the well-being of battlefield UGVs and other technologies that have not yet been researched. Caring deeply about the safety and use of these robotics could, for example, cause soldiers to become technology innovators, eventually improving upon existing models to solve functionality or usability issues. Soldiers who care about their bomb-defusing robots might also take more precautions in their usage, not throwing caution to the wind during procedures simply because they are not in physical harm. Finally, having an emotional attachment to the robots being used may increase unit morale, as we can see that losing these robots decreases it significantly. Overall, further studies must be conducted to identify what, if any, usefulness emotional attachment to battlefield UGVs may have for soldiers, and we must consider ways we can minimize the decision-making effects of robot loss on the battlefield. Simply ignoring emotional attachment in highly emotionally-charged situations seems a dangerous proposition.
Soldiers mourned the bomb-defusing robot they had nicknamed 'Scooby Doo' after it was 'fatally' damaged in a blast. The robot had disarmed 19 explosive devices in its lifespan, practically making it a war-hero and certainly making it an invaluable member of US Infantry in war zones. Photo from DailyMail.
"To the United States, a drone strike seems to have very little risk and very little pain. At the receiving end, it feels like war. Americans have got to understand that. If we were to use our technological capabilities carelessly - I don't think we do, but there's always the danger that you will - then we should not be upset when someone responds with their equivalent, which is a suicide bomb in Central Park, because that's what they can respond with." - Retired General Stanley McChrystal, 2/15/13
Unmanned vehicles, commonly referred to as drones, have tremendous implications for the future on both personal and global levels which will be discussed in great detail in future posts. This post is simply meant to inform the reader of the general types of unmanned devices available today so that future discussions of drone technologies can be better informed.
What is a "drone"?
A drone is any unmanned vehicle that operates either on its own or from a remote control. The easiest way to think about drones is by comparing them to RC cars and helicopters. In essence, these are drones. What separates drones from RC cars, etc. is quite thin; if one were to attach a camera to an RC helicopter, you'd have the equivalent of the DARPA-created "Hummingbird Drone."
This is actually a flying video camera called "Hawk Eye" designed for children ages 8+. It is manufactured by "Air Hogs" and sells for under $70.
This is the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency's "Hummingbird Drone." It is very similar to the "Hawk Eye" seen above, yet it cost this government agency roughly $4 million to develop. It was created in conjunction with AeroVironment (AVAV).
Unmanned vehicles can be flown with a wide variety of controllers, ranging from smartphones and tablets to large computer setups and full scale cockpit simulators. Depending on altitude, distance, speed, environmental conditions, and a number of other factors, piloting drones can range from being simple enough for a child to fly to as complex as piloting a fighter jet or submarine. This reflects the true nature of modern drones, as being devices that remove human pilots from the cockpit but do not fully remove human pilots from operation or decision making. There are some unmanned vehicles that are truly 'drones' without any human piloting (i.e. a Roomba vacuum cleaner) but the vast majority of those used today, and all of those referenced in media reports about 'drone strikes', are not fully autonomous vehicles. "Drones" can be broken up into a few general categories (with exceptions that will be mentioned later). The three main categories can be most simply broken down into land, sea, and air.
Unmanned Ground Vehicles
UGVs, or unmanned ground vehicles, are like the RC car in our example. These vehicles usually have wheels or treads and can vary tremendously in size, from the size of a shoe to the size of a tank.
The "Talon" UGV is a bomb-defusing drone. The operator uses a remote controller to move the arm of the robot to defuse the bomb. Bomb-defusing drones have saved lives in modern warfare where terrorists leave improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in public areas.
Three UGVs that have gained a great deal of public attention recently are Cheetah, Big Dog, and Petman. All three are manufactured by Boston Dynamics, recently acquired by Google.
This video demonstrates the acceleration capabilities of Cheetah, a robotic quadraped that can reach up to 28.3 mph.
Big Dog is an incredibly steady quadrapedal UGV. It is unique in that it walks on four legs and has an amazing sense of balance. It weighs 240 lbs, is 2.5 feet tall, and 3 feet long. It can move at 4mph, and carry 340 lbs.
This video demonstrates Boston Dynamic's progress in manufacturing human-like unmanned devices. Nicknamed "Petman", it demonstrates the potential for humanoid robots in the very near future.
The nature of UGVs is rapidly changing, and future posts will illuminate the ways in which these systems can manage without human assistance as well as enable human controllers in a variety of situations.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
Unmanned aerial vehicles are what are most commonly referred to as 'drones.' A UAV is any flying device which operates without a human pilot in the cockpit of the device. Thus, even the commercially available flying toys could be technically counted as UAVs. UAVs, like UGVs, vary tremendously in size and can be divided into 'planes', 'helicopters', and 'blimps.'
The Northrop-Grumman MQ-8 Fire Scout UAV helicopter has been utilized by the US Navy since 2002. It weighs about one ton, is 24 feet long, has infrared optics, and can carry almost a thousand pounds of payload.
This unmanned airship, the 71M Aerostat Test Balloon, took off in 1996 and was able to track aircraft and cruise missile up to 150 nautical miles away. Since then, China, Israel, and many other nations have developed their own 'spy blimps'. The US is currently manufacturing a blimp that can lift over 500 tons of payload in conjunction with Northrop-Grumman.
Quadcopters have most recently been in the news because of Jeff Bezos's claim that Amazon Prime would begin delivering via quadcopter in the near future. Other companies, such as Dominos, have also suggested the use of quadcopter for fast delivery. Quadcopters can be purchased online or built with hobby kits for only a few hundred dollars, and have GPS navigation capabilities. They can be flown via smartphones, tablets, computers, and a variety of handheld controllers. These devices will be explored in much greater detail in the following posts.
Many contracting companies have taken to exploring handheld planes that can be operated in the field by military and police personnel. These devices come in a few separated pieces, are put together and then thrown when the motors are operational. They can then be flown via smartphone, tablet, computer, or alternate controller.
Both unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) are aquatic 'drones', the main difference being that unmanned surface vehicles are boats and UUVs are submarines.
An example of a USV, called the "Stingray" by its creators at Elbit Systems. It has a top speed of 40 knots and an endurance (ability to be away from charge station) of eight hours.
Beyond Land, Sea, and Air
The most commonly known drone outside of the land, sea, and air categories are space exploration devices. These 'rovers' are in the same family as our 'Earth' drones, but operate at vast distances (i.e. other planets!) and in incredibly harsh conditions. Due to the rarity of their production, the cost of their deployment, and the scientific importance of their exploration, they are far more sophisticated than common drones. They can conduct scientific observations of climate and soil samples, relaying that information from Mars back to Earth. Many of their functions are completely autonomous, while others are sent from NASA into space, sometimes with a delay of over 30 minutes.
Another area of unmanned technologies, known as nanorobotics, focuses solely on the miniaturization of robots. Scientists have already designed prototype aerial robots as small as flies, and nanorobots that can flow through the bloodstream. The National Nanotechnology Initiative encourages these developments for medical and scientific purposes.
Mars Rover "Curiosity" is one of several unmanned space exploration vehicles.
Nano quadrotors were developed at University of Pennsylvania and demonstrate the potential for miniaturization of drones in general.
Nanomedicine is a rapidly evolving field in which microscopic robots are programmed to autonomously deliver medicine and conduct medical procedures within the human body.
