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Dec. 21, 2003 - Art Bell
02:50:21
Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell - Robotic Technology - Ron Fink
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Time Text
♪♪♪ From the high desert and the great American southwest, I
bid you all good evening, good afternoon, good morning, whatever the appropriate salutation would be for this time
of day.
Because we cover all of them in the world's time zones covered by Coast to Coast AM, this the weekend edition.
And I've got so much I've got to get out here.
We are going to do open lines this hour, so get ready for that.
Open lines coming up.
But!
Oh man!
You don't frequently have a night where you've got so much good stuff on the website to throw your way.
I took my webcam back to a picture of me a couple of minutes ago because everything else is posted as it should be.
We've got some really wicked stuff up there for you.
I told you last night, the Hampton Court Ghost is clearly the paranormal picture of the year.
Well, now it's a little more than that.
We've got it all on the website.
The Hampton Court Ghost.
The video.
That's right, we've got the video for you, along with a little British commentary.
And then at the very end, a moving GIF image of the ghost actually opening the doors, uh, making the appearance in the picture you've all seen now, so famous, and then closing the doors.
And baby, we've got it on the website.
Coast2CoastAM.com.
That's item one.
Like, that'd be enough all by itself.
But item two comes rolling into my email, as usual, toward the end of the day today, in the form of Well, you don't very frequently, even doing what I do, get good, clear shots of a saucer.
I've got one.
Now, this may turn out to be, there may turn out to be a reasonable, logical explanation for what you're about to see, but I sure don't know what it is.
A man named Thomas, and if he wants to identify himself any further than that, because I've got him here on the phone, sent me an email along with this photograph, which is, in terms of being detailed and clear, Class A, 10 on a scale of 10.
Now, this is a photograph of a saucer on the desert floor near Sedona, Arizona.
In a moment, I'll have Thomas on, because Bless his heart.
I wish more people would do this so we could understand the providence of a photograph that we're about to examine.
But he gave me his phone number, so I called him up.
I say, gotta come on the show, right?
In a moment, I'll have Thomas explain what you can see.
It's under listeners' emails, and boom!
There's the photograph of whatever in the hell it is on the floor of the desert near Sedona.
Now, you click to get the whole story.
Which he sent, and the large photograph, and it is a very large, very clear photograph.
Now, as I said, there may turn out to be some very conventional explanation for what an apparent flying saucer would be doing, sitting in broad daylight, perhaps even day after day, in the middle of the desert near Sedona.
But I'm looking forward to what that explanation is going to be.
In the meantime, if you want to see it, it's at the website, along with the video of the Hampton Court Ghost.
So look out, Coast-to-Coast AM.
Here they come.
That's where you want to go.
Coast-to-CoastAM.com.
Two things.
The UFO you're about to hear about, well, actually, technically, an unidentified grounded object.
Because it's on the ground.
Looks like it made a soft landing, if in fact it landed at all.
I'm telling you, it's really clear.
So those who complain about foggy, hard to see photographs, prepare yourself for a big shock.
We'll tell you the story of it in a moment.
Alright. I mean this is a dead, flat, clear, high-res picture of a disc on the ground somewhere in the Sedona
area.
Here's Thomas.
Thomas, welcome to the program.
Thank you.
How are you doing today?
I beg your pardon?
How are you doing today?
I'm fine.
Did you decide to just, like, send this off to me this afternoon?
It just came to you?
Well, let me tell you what happened.
Yeah, please.
My brother and his fiancée were visiting here from the Sacramento area.
California.
You're where in Arizona?
I'm sorry, I'm in Phoenix, Arizona.
You're in Phoenix, alright.
They came for a visit last weekend and had reservations to stay up in the Sedona area.
To make a long story short, they came home yesterday back to my house here in Phoenix.
Talking to them, his fiancée pulled out this picture that she said she got while they were up there.
At first, I didn't know what it was about.
I took a look at it and I said, Oh my God!
You've got to be kidding me!
This is exciting!
It's that kind of photograph.
I couldn't believe it.
I said, What is this?
This is for real?
And what they told me was that they had rented a plane to fly to the Grand Canyon.
A private plane out of Sedona and en route to the Grand Canyon they had flown over this saucer laying there on the desert floor.
Check.
They just flew over there?
I pointed it out to them and they just You know, their jaws dropped.
I mean, what did he say?
Ladies and gentlemen, to the left side of the aircraft now, you'll see a flying saucer on the ground in the desert.
I mean, what?
That happens all the time, right?
You know, he told a story about it, and what he told them was that he had been flying another couple up to the Grand Canyon area last July.
Yeah.
This is a pilot very familiar with the area.
He's flown over the same route for years.
The guy takes people on Grand Canyon tours, folks.
So he traverses the same ground all the time.
Yeah.
He had never seen this object before.
This was in July of this year.
He had never seen it.
A couple happened to spot it and point it out to him.
Okay, he had never seen it prior to that.
He had never seen it prior to that.
Okay.
That's his story.
And so, At some other, I'm assuming, at some other flight over the area, he had taken more pictures of the craft.
He obviously got down on deck and took a very close photograph, actually.
I mean, alright, so what we seem to have here, folks, I don't know, it's a disc, it's a saucer, and damned if it doesn't look like the door is open.
Isn't it?
Yeah, it really does look like it.
There's no doubt there's a door open there.
It does seem to be a door.
I don't know if you're looking at it, Art.
I'm looking at it.
To the left, on the left-hand side, about 45 degrees from the door, you can see what looks like a couple of pipes sticking out there.
I don't know if you noticed that.
No, wait a minute.
Where are the pipes?
At about, I'm sorry, 90 degrees.
Oh, I do see that.
I do see it.
Yes, I do.
I'm not sure what that is.
I don't know if it's a ladder to get up on top of the craft.
What it is?
I mean, this is a flying saucer on the ground.
Give me a break.
It is just a flying saucer on the ground.
And, you know, it looks like... I wouldn't exactly call that a road.
I don't know.
It's like a path.
Exactly.
It looks like a path through the desert.
Something came or went several times.
Exactly.
Yeah.
And if you look at the saucer, it looks like it's got, you know, heat tiles on it.
Yeah, it could be heat tiles.
It does look like heat tiles.
And then off to the left of the saucer in the desert, there's what appears to be a kind of a clear material or something, almost clear material.
It looks like it may perhaps have skipped on the ground once.
Oh, oh, very good point!
That's exactly what that is.
It looks like it may have skipped once and then landed.
There's a burn area there, or a, I'd say burn area.
Yeah, you know, that was my thought.
Holy crap, Thomas!
And judging from, just from the road tracks, I'm estimating here, but I'd say it's maybe 45 feet in diameter.
Oh, you're judging that based on the with with of the trail and or whatever you
want to collect back coming in you know
and then you know putting that across the the the young made maybe that's good
guess that that might be a good guess uh...
but uh...
it uh... it's just not every day that somebody sends you a photograph like
this time so you can imagine i sat here and i want i'm sure you're drop your job dropped just like my dad
It did.
I couldn't believe it when I saw it.
I've been doing this stuff for a lot of years.
I have to contact Art Bell with this picture because he's not going to believe this.
You're right.
I don't know if you've ever seen it before.
No, no.
If this thing's been sitting in the desert since July, I just can't believe that it's never been reported before.
Now, you mentioned something in your email about this pilot having been grilled, your words, by a variety of, in quotes, agents.
Yes, sir.
That is what he had told my brother in his C.I.N.C.
that he had been... The F.B.I., C.I.A.
You know, the treatment from the guys in black.
Did he pass on what they had said or instructed?
Did they say, like, hey, you're not going to be talking about this?
But the story is all second-handed.
And so I'm just trying to relate to you what I heard about what happened.
The pilot apparently has taken another about Well, half a dozen more shots of the craft, and he has him in his possession.
How close is this to Sedona proper?
Any idea?
I am, from what my brother had told me, it's somewhere in the area of 50 miles.
And I don't know which direction, I would assume.
So it's really out... This, I assume, is truly out in the middle of essentially nowhere.
Exactly.
I heard it's a very hostile country.
If it's been laying there since July, it appears that perhaps the craft was too heavy to attempt to move it, and the terrain may not have allowed that.
You know, it's funny.
I was trying to figure out what that other mark was there, and you, of course, are correct now that I look at it correctly.
As you have mentioned, it probably hit first there.
Another scenario could be, of course, that it was driven there By whatever in the hell came up that, if you want to call it a road, it's not a road, it's a path.
Whatever came up, oh my gosh.
As I say, I was so excited about this, I couldn't wait to pass it on to somebody else because I've been listening to your program for years and I just have been fascinated with the kind of stories that you've had.
Is there any conventional explanation that you can think of offhand, Thomas, for this?
Well, I'll tell you what.
I did contact Whitney Striever's people as well.
And sent them a copy of the picture.
And I got a reply back from them today, suggesting perhaps, and I don't know, this is all, who knows.
If I may quote, this could be an experimental disk, they write.
The US Air Force did quite a bit of this type of experimentation back a few years ago.
The road leading up to it is well-traveled and not of recent construction, suggesting that it could be a structure that has been there for a while.
And again, it's always possible that it's a genuine unknown.
And we will see if we can find anything else with a similar shape.
Well, maybe you found it, Thomas.
I sure wish I knew what those, in quotes, agencies said about all of this.
I would be as Interested as well.
I'm telling you, the pilot... Of course, interviewing the pilot would be a good idea, too.
It would be a very good idea.
He was very affable and very open about it.
Do you have any way of getting me the name or number?
Yes, I've already... Oh, good.
My brother just landed.
I just heard from them about 25 minutes ago, and they just got home.
Uh, from leaving this area.
In the meantime, maybe it's a good thing that people don't know exactly where this is right now.
Exactly.
Or, after tonight, why they'd pick it to pieces.
Man, this is incredible.
I just, you know, maybe it's one of ours, but I don't remember us making anything like that.
Well, if we did, they certainly didn't tell us about it.
Listen, buddy, that's it then.
That's all you know about this thing, right?
As much as I can tell you for now, Art.
And if you want to get in contact with me, I'll be happy to share as much information as I can with you.
Well, you called the right place, Thomas.
Thank you.
Thank you, Art.
And I'll be in touch.
All right.
Good night now.
Good night.
Now, there may be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this, but I definitely can't think of one right now.
Out in the unknown parts of the desert, somewhere outside Sedona.
Now, the picture again taken by a pilot who was conducting tours to the Grand Canyon.
You know, air tours.
And he spotted the thing.
He came in low and took a photograph.
And that's what you're seeing here.
And it definitely, um... I'd say it definitely would merit investigation from some agency, wouldn't you?
I mean, no matter what it is, it's nothing normal.
It sure looks like a saucer with the door open.
And so there you have it.
And I thought it would be well worthwhile taking up a few minutes at the beginning of the program.
Don't blame me if this turns out to have a very conventional explanation, though I can't imagine what it would be.
It's not my fault.
But go ahead and take a look at the picture and see what you think.
Obviously, somebody doing a program like this is not going to turn down a picture like that.
Yikes.
All right, news-wise, what's going on?
The government on Sunday raised the national threat level to orange, indicating high risk of terrorist attack.
Said threat indicators are perhaps greater now than at any point since September 11, 2001.
With strikes possible during the holidays, Americans were promised extensive and considerable protections around the country and told to stick to their travel plans, despite intelligence indicating Al-Qaeda may be seeking again to use airplanes as weapons and exploit Suspected weaknesses in U.S.
aviation security.
There's nothing laughable about this except the fact that they're saying Al Qaeda probably is going to use airplanes again.
They're probably going to do something.
But, you know, if you've got a plane trip planned, don't worry about it.
Go ahead.
All right.
I understand.
For the sake of the economy, that would be their wish, and certainly I understand that you just can't live your life afraid of these jerks.
You just can't.
The odds of your getting hijacked and rammed into a building are smaller than probably a crash for some other reason.
Libya hopes to reopen relations with us, the West.
And begin to sign lucrative oil deals with companies here.
That, the day after, as a matter of fact.
They said they were going to turn in their weapons of mass destruction and join the world community and embrace us all.
So now they'd like some big oil contracts.
And they'll probably get them.
Acting on intelligence gleaned from the capture of Saddam Hussein.
That would indicate that he's talking, right?
U.S.
troops rounded up dozens of suspected rebels during two days of raids in towns where loyalty to the deposed president remains strong.
So this means that we've been having a chat with Saddam.
And as I understand it, Saddam was turned over to the CIA.
And that they are actively questioning him.
And apparently getting some answers because they're rounding up bad guys really quickly.
So I guess Saddam has decided that speaking is the better part of valor in whatever situation.
I mean, what kind of situation do you think they have him in right now?
You don't imagine he's laying back on the couch watching an NFL almost playoff game, right?
They're probably asking him really hard questions.
And who knows where they've got him?
And I don't think anybody out here is really worried about the nature and the manner of the questioning.
Right?
So apparently we're getting some pretty good info.
Now listen to me.
On the 28th I shall be here.
Filling in for George.
Actually on the 26th.
And then the 28th.
And then the following Sunday, of course, the 31st, I'll be here, and this is very important.
On the 28th, and then on Sunday, the 31st, as we begin the new year, I will do the traditional thing that we have done now for well over a decade, and I will take predictions for two nights, whatever all else we're doing.
For two nights, I will take predictions on the air for the year 2004.
You're only allowed to make one prediction, so I want you to consider it very carefully.
We want our hit rate to go up.
Now, the only way that can happen is if you really make a shot at doing this right.
And that means relaxing your mind, sit back, tune out the world, and try and open your mind to some event that's going to occur in the year 2004.
And after you've made that serious attempt, I'll only take one prediction from you during those two nights.
You call me, I'll number them, and we'll see how your paranormal level checks out at the end of the year.
It's an awful lot of fun.
The 28th and then the 31st from the high desert in the middle of the night doing what we do here.
This is Coast to Coast AM.
That's right.
Don't touch that dial.
Sweet dreams are made of this.
Who am I?
Badly.
Don't you need her badly?
Don't you love her ways?
Tell me what you say.
I don't want to use you.
Don't you love her as she's walking out the door?
Like she did one thousand times before?
Don't you love her ways?
Tell me what you say?
Don't you love her as she's walking out the door?
All your love All your love All your love All your love All your love All your love is gone To sing a lonely song Of a deep blue dream To talk with Art Bell, call the wildcard line at area code 775-727-1295.
The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free at 800-825-5033.
line at area code 775-727-1295. The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free at 800-825-5033. From west
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General Threes.
From coast to coast and worldwide on the internet, this is Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell.
You know, really, wouldn't it be something... I mean, I'm sure there's a conventional explanation for this apparent flying saucer right in the middle of the desert.
There's gotta be something, right?
But just suppose for a second that there isn't.
Suppose that we just found the great giant smoking gun, or in this case, saucer, even though it's not smoking.
I mean, we found the real McCoy.
Just like this.
Boom!
There it is.
Wouldn't that be something?
The other, of course, possibility is that it is photoshopped in there.
But...
I think so.
Now, I know the pixel people out there will fiendishly go to work on this, and they'll blow it up to the umpteenth pixel, and I'm sure I'll be getting reports shortly.
But, it doesn't look that way.
Shadows look pretty good.
Looking at the edges looks pretty good.
So, I'll leave it to the pixel people.
They do look like tiles on there, as he mentioned, though.
Alright, first time caller line, you are on the air.
Good evening.
Hello.
Oh, I didn't know I was going to be on the air.
You didn't?
Well, what do you think we do here?
Make hot dogs?
It's a radio program.
Are we going to have to agree to be on the air, or I can't put you on the air?
Okay, I'm with you.
You agree, in writing, to be on the air?
Okay.
Alright, okay.
I just wanted to make sure that you realize that that's absolutely legitimate, and I'll tell you why I know.
Are you talking about the saucer?
The saucer.
Absolutely.
The way you said that, it's like you're from New Jersey.
Well, no, I'm at this point in Utah.
Where are you originally from?
Well, originally I'm from Memphis, Tennessee, way back, but I lived in New York and also... I knew it.
Well, that's how the salsa got there.
All right.
So, you know, this is genuine.
Now that's quite a statement to make just based on having seen the photograph.
I mean, how can you be saying that?
Well, I happen to be capable of I'm afraid words can't explain it.
It's sort of like psychic energy, you know what I mean?
Right, I can feel it.
things that are off the earth. Oh, that's a serious talent.
Yes. How do you do that?
Well, it's I'm afraid words can't explain it. It's sort of like psychic energy. You know what I mean?
And so when you saw this psychic energy leapt off the screen to you. Right. I can feel it. I can
take any photograph and I can check it to see if the frequencies are from this world or from other
And this photograph is from another world.
I can even tell if it's been worked on by people from this planet.
And it hasn't been.
It has only frequencies of off-planet.
That's it, huh?
That's it.
I mean, you're not even in doubt.
You're just certain.
I have no doubt whatsoever.
Now, if you want to get a little background on who I am, I can give you my website.
I can do it all for you.
Well, that's all right.
I don't have anybody to take it off air here, so I'll just have to... Oh, are you working alone?
Oh, I play in a one-man band.
Oh, I didn't know that.
Well, see, there you are.
Yeah, I run the board and the music and the phone calls and everything.
All right, thank you very much.
Well, some talent, huh?
Well, there's a little authentication for the photograph, folks.
The frequency's coming off it.
Should have had him sign it.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello, Mark.
Hello.
I'm calling from El Paso, Texas.
El Paso.
El Paso.
Yes, indeed.
My wife and daughter and I, we were amongst about a thousand extras in Roland Emmerich's movie A Day After Tomorrow in April.
We're kidding!
Yes, we got to be refugees.
We were classified as refugees on foot.
You were a refugee in Roland Emmerich's new movie, which is based in part on the coming global superstorm.
You were extras, really?
Yeah, we heard about it just kind of by accident.
We went down and applied.
They actually paid us.
I got about $350.
It paid for a scanner I bought.
Way cool!
What did you have to do as a refugee?
Or should you not tell me?
Oh no, it's fine.
In fact, have you seen the trailer?
Oh yes.
We appear briefly for two seconds in the crowd in the trailer on the There's a scene where we have to try to get into Mexico on a bridge, and another one we were trying to get across the river.
I guess, being an extra, you don't get a sense of the larger story in the movie, do you?
Not really, except the assistant directors wander around saying, okay, people remember the planet's undergoing wacky weather, and everyone's dead, and you're trying to get south, so, you know, it looks bad.
It's so funny.
It's hilarious.
You know, it's hard work, but it was a heck of a lot of fun.
Yeah, television and the movies, they are hard work.
There's no question about it.
There's been millions here, though.
Oh, I'm sure.
Listen, there's a huge refugee camp that was, you know, a half mile on a side.
They had thousands of, well, hundreds at least, of RVs and cars.
Oh, yeah.
Did you have a very dejected, refugee-like looking face?
I mean, did you manage that?
Um, sort of.
We wore pretty grubby clothes, or I guess translates just into my regular weekend clothes.
Right, but you're supposed to look dejected, right?
Uh, probably never got that close to our faces.
I mean, we were part of masses of tired refugees.
Like, in one scene, we had to carry bags of rice.
There were supposed to be 50 kilo bags of rice from the US Army truck passing them out.
Well, the trailer is kick butt.
Yeah.
No question about it.
It's going to be a really good movie.
We looked at it pixel-by-pixel and we think we spotted us there on the bridge.
Pixel-by-pixel, huh?
Well, Roland, baby, we're depending on you.
All right, sir, thank you.
Take care.
I don't know if you've seen it.
If you've been to the movies, they're now showing it in the movie theaters, you know, as a tease.
It is a hell of a trailer for the day after tomorrow, based in part on the coming global superstorm.
Obviously, there'll be much more about that, but we're all very anxiously waiting to see how it's going to turn out.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hello.
Yeah, how you doing?
I'm doing great, sir.
I'm a first-time caller.
I'm a bit nervous here.
It's all right.
Take a deep breath.
That's what I learned.
Big, deep breath.
There you go.
It really does work.
So, what's up?
Well, I just have a bizarre sighting, I guess you would call it.
Oh?
Tonight, coming home from a gig.
I play music.
Tonight?
Yes.
Okay.
Actually, well, Sunday night, the 19th for me.
And where are you?
I'm in Manassas.
Okay, and you were coming home from a gig.
From a gig, yes, playing music.
And I got out of my car, and I'm coming into the house, and it's a beautiful night.
I love to look at the stars.
I have a telescope.
You know, I listen to your show all the time.
And so I glance up.
Beautiful, clear sky, looking towards Orion, and as I glance up, I'm looking back down, I thought I saw, like, three or four falling stars at once, so I look back up, and they're still there, and they're moving, and there's more than just three or four, there's, like, a whole column of these gray disc-looking, or circular shapes, moving across the sky, in rows of maybe three 4, 5, 6, maybe 9 at the most going across in this long column moving roughly southwest to northeast.
Gotcha.
Towards Dulles Airport and just very bizarre.
And so you stood and... I was dumbfounded.
I'm looking up at this, watching this, and it's completely silent.
You go into a kind of a shock is actually what happens.
You know, everything gets suspended for a moment and you realize you're seeing something... Well, it just didn't look right.
You know, I look back up and the impression that I get was as if You're in a planetarium.
You know, someone's got these lights shining and they're moving them across the night sky in a planetarium.
Could you judge altitude and by that have a guess at how many other people might have seen this?
Oh, man.
Okay, I'm right over the flight path going into Dulles and it was maybe that altitude of where the planes are, roughly that speed.
Maybe higher, though.
I mean, for all I know, they were way, way up.
Then a whole lot of people should have seen.
Well, but if they were low and small, I don't know.
They look like they might have been roughly at about that altitude that the planes come in on.
Well, I guess all I can say is, welcome to the great international club of people who've seen stuff.
Yeah, it was bizarre.
When I looked up, I didn't see the beginning of it, I saw the end of it.
And it was anywhere from like 20, 30 on up to, I don't know, but it was this column.
And it looked like something out of Mars Attacks.
I don't know what to tell you, except, uh, welcome.
I mean, that's it.
I can say, welcome to the club.
And, uh, half, more than half of Americans have seen things they cannot explain in our skies.
And I'm one of them, so welcome.
You know, that's worth a little bit of thought when you consider that most people don't look at the sky very much.
And for that many people to have seen UFOs makes it a subject well worthy of investigation.
Hell, maybe we got one here on the ground in Sedona.
What is that thing, anyway?
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello, Art.
Yes, hi.
Yeah, well here's a popular explanation for you.
My name's Adam from Littleton, Colorado.
You have swamp gas out there in the desert.
You think that's swamp gas?
Well, you know, when you... Why would there be heat tiles on swamp gas?
That's right.
When you look at the way the government's treated us... One other thing, it's near Sedona, which is in the middle of the desert.
You know, there's not a lot of swamp gas there.
I understand.
When you look at the way the government's treated us in regards to the way they do the investigations, If I come across something like that, I mean, I'm not going to tell a government agency.
I'm going to do my own investigations, call every citizen's investigative group, you know, MUFON, Citizens Against UFO Secrets.
Okay, but you have seen the picture, honestly.
I haven't seen the picture.
I'm being sarcastic.
You haven't even seen the picture.
Of course it's not swamp gas.
Well, alright.
I'm just being sarcastic.
I gotcha.
Well, I suggest you go take a look at this picture before somebody explains it, because, I mean, you might think it's Mars Attacks or something.
If you were to just foresee it, you're gonna go... UFO.
Now, further investigation may show many things, and or be, it may be explained in one of many conventional ways, and I want to stress that.
But, I mean, first blush!
There it is, folks, a saucer in the middle of the damn desert, just with nothing around, in a place where, well, everybody could have missed it.
Ah, the possibilities.
First time caller line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello.
Hi.
This is Larry.
I'm calling from Oklahoma.
On a cell phone, too, at that, huh, Larry?
Yeah.
And, uh, listening off of a Tulsa radio station.
Tulsa, okay.
And so what's up?
Well, I have an answer to a question which comes up just about every night on your program.
Wow, that's frequent.
What is it?
The question?
The question is, is who, who are they?
Who are they?
Well, I was referring to they.
Okay, and the answer is?
And who is this secret so-called people Um, that are pulling strings in the world.
Okay, uh, go ahead and give us the answers.
Who are they?
Okay, and, and I'll just say I know who they are.
I know, you already said that, so tell us, who are they?
Okay, uh, it's a, it's a cabal of families.
A cabal of families.
Yeah, and... Do the wild thing at 775-727-1295.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, see?
You don't get to do that.
Start reading off names.
We don't allow that on the program.
You should have known that.
But he had a whole bunch of family names ready.
We're not going to air that.
Especially after we've called them THEY!
So y'all will have to continue to wonder.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hi.
Let's not call it us and them.
Alright, turn your radio off first, and then... Alright, I'm turning the radio off.
Thank you.
So you think it's a collective we, huh?
Pretty much.
When I say collective we, I mean... Hold it, hold it.
Turn your radio off.
Alright, granted.
A second chance... I thought I turned it off to the best of my ability.
Well, your ability is going to have to get better.
Turn it all the way off.
Alright.
Or I'll have to leave the line.
I've been turning off all the circuits.
Okay, well, east of the Rockies, you would have been on the air.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Yeah, I have a fantastic sighting that I've never been able to report to either Peter Davenport or Art Ville.
Oh, well, this is Art.
You've got me.
So, if you've got a good one, let her loose.
Okay.
I'm on now?
Yes, sir.
Oh, okay.
I had an experience about two years ago in August.
September, somewhere around that range, of a UFO sighting in Fresno, California.
There was a teacher that apparently saw this on the air.
It was aired on TV as well.
It happened at 4.20 in the morning.
I saw literally a 40-minute show from 4.20 to 5 o'clock.
They had lights going around it.
It looked like it had been a triangular type of ship.
I stood out there.
I was amazed.
I ran out in the street where there was more street where I could have seen me.
It was about six miles southeast of me.
I'm in central Fresno.
I jumped up and down, waved my arms, thinking how would it ever see me at that distance, but it did.
It came forward towards me.
You think it responded to you?
Pardon?
You think?
Yeah, it did.
It did respond.
I mean, after a few minutes, it came forward and then it went back.
Then a small plane started coming over from the airport, so it darted real quick to the south into Fresno.
Then it came back.
And then after the plane had gone, you know, I came back and then it went over to the other direction, north, and disappeared.
Were you by yourself?
Yeah, I was by myself.
It was 420 in the morning, and it was a very clear night.
Alright, so obviously if a TV got hold of it, then they must have had footage or got word of it, or did they just... No, another teacher had reported it.
And no one was awake at 420.
I'm sure very few people probably have seen it.
It came back in the original place, and then It disappeared, it came back, and what is amazing, it started getting light out about five o'clock at night.
I had my binoculars, I zoomed in on it, and had different green lights going around it, and I zeroed in on it, and it started getting light out.
So I could actually saw that the shape of the ship was octagon.
It looked like it was octagon.
And I could see the silvery, like a regular jet aircraft type of uh... uh... color to it and it was it just boomi i think i
had a good you're right in
at five o'clock in the morning and it just because the white outfit is getting
hard to see if i could do it in for a while and it just it's not going to get
as of clearly you think you saw a craft or a little idea from another world
i don't you know i don't know if it was experimental i don't know if it would
not from the other world but i'll tell you what that's going to have a good
thing but i've never seen anything from this point of view i know that
That's a good answer.
It's the same one I gave.
I saw a triangular craft, very, very, throw a rock kind of close, you know?
No question about what it was, but at the end of it I said, yep, it could have been one of ours.
Yeah, well this thing was octagon though.
It was actually octagon.
I can see it very clearly.
How would you describe its movements?
Was it flying or was it floating?
You know, the thing is, there was no sound at all.
It was just setting up there for the longest time.
I had a 40 minute show, literally.
It was setting there mostly in one spot.
Hovering?
Yeah, just like hovering.
And there was no sound to it.
And when it moved, it just moved real, you know, like it came forward.
Maybe we're beginning to have a pretty good size slap.
I mean, I'm getting all these reports.
i got kind of like you appear to have a record of course we are part of the
story to my report or like me and political in the house i don't you know
i do what i have to add jury duty you know next week and i'm sure the building will be getting picked up in a
way they were beginning to have a pretty good size flat i mean i'm
getting all these reports i've got a photograph of something here on the
ground you know well this is the reason that this is two years ago though
you know This is two years ago in August.
I think it was two years ago.
A teacher had reported it on one of the local TV stations that she had seen.
I think it was the same one that she saw.
This was 4.20 in the morning.
I was taking care of the guy's lawn next door because there was no one there and I had to water the lawn at night and I was out there getting it all watered up.
That's why I was up so late.
Well, you still sound every bit as excited as I bet you were when you saw it.
I mean, you're very excited about it.
I did.
I left word with Peter Dowd before, but he never returned the call on it, though.
But it was interesting.
It was quite exciting to see.
Well, I don't know what to say about it, except, like I did to the earlier fellow who had a really good report, welcome to the club.
The ever-growing club.
There's no question about the club growing.
Thank you very much.
Sure thing.
Take care.
And the club really is growing.
There's something going on out there.
Ron Fink is coming up after the break, and we're going to talk about robots.
That's what he's, uh, right in the middle of robots.
I wonder how many of you got to see the Sony robot.
The incredibly articulating Sony robot.
Well, we'll ask about that a whole lot more, because he's involved.
Ron is involved in robotics.
From the high desert, in the middle of the night, man, get up there and take a look at that saucer.
Sitting on the ground somewhere out there outside Cydonia.
I'm sure there's a really good explanation for this.
Probably.
I'm not sure.
I don't know.
Well, darlin', feelin' I'm high on the reepin' That you're in love with me It's as sweet as candy Its taste is on my mind Girl, you got me thirsty for another cup of wine.
Got a bunch from you, girl, but I don't need no cure.
I just stay up at ten.
To talk with Art Bell, call the wildcard line at area code 775-727-1295.
The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free at 800-825-5033.
From west of the Rockies, call Art at 800-618-8255.
775-727-1222. To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free at 800-825-5033.
From west of the Rockies, call Art at 800-618-8255.
International callers may reach Art Bell by calling your in-country Sprint Access number, pressing
Option 5, and dialing toll free 800-893-0903.
From coast to coast and worldwide on the internet, this is Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell.
Yes, indeed, and I don't think anybody knows what that saucer is.
Let me read you some of the responses I'm getting.
Fast-blasted to me.
Jack in Tucson.
These are all in a row.
In Tucson, Arizona, it says, Hey Art, the saucer-like object outside Sedona is actually a storage container for cattle feed.
Nice try.
French.
French try.
Cheers.
J-A-C.
Or Ray in Doraville, Georgia.
I know for sure the photo of the saucer is a cover to an airplane wheel.
The cover looks bigger than it really is.
It's from an old biplane.
My dad worked with him.
Then Ray in Adorville.
That's same Ray, I guess.
Sorry, same message.
Don says, uh, Renton, Washington, they are DS8.
This came out on a recent sci-fi special.
So everybody thinks it's everything.
And nobody knows for sure, apparently, what it is.
Lots of good guesses, though.
It'll be interesting as time goes on to see if it's a Photoshop special or who knows.
But I mean, there it is.
Out in the middle of nowhere, have your own go at it.
Be my guest.
Alright, coming up in a moment.
Ron Mad Max Fink.
Anybody with a name like Mad Max you gotta look out for.
He has time and time again shattered all previous notions of what technology can do in the 70s.
He created his own voice recognition system in the 80s.
His ideas contributed to missile defense systems that could maintain the focus of light over thousands of mirrors.
Maybe that's where they got the smoke and mirrors thing.
Star Wars.
Ron also designed and programmed an entire line of 80 plus Artificial intelligence robots for a major company.
In the 90s, he developed real-time map-based GIS tracking software for inventory asset management and logistics for two major companies.
Sounds like he was getting into a lot more serious work in the 90s, huh?
His team tied to, well, more serious in the sense of, I've got to get out there and make some money.
His team tied together phone systems, voice recognition systems, legacy systems, power grid Control slash monitoring systems and major accounting systems in record time and with no, and that's in capitals, no programming errors.
Even made enough spare time to found a charity where he reached out to America's best untapped minds and gave them the focus and training to succeed.
In the 2000s, his team designed voice interactive navigation systems currently installed in a variety of cars around the world.
I wonder if we should call him Mad Max in a moment.
Sound of thunder.
Let's see, Frank in San Diego says, fake picture on a shadow of the saucer is a dead giveaway when you blow it
way up.
Or Mike in Anchorage, Alaska says, I think it might be a really good tabletop model, top scale.
Look at the lower right, it doesn't quite look real.
Anyway, I hope I'm wrong and it's real.
So, that's the kind of response we're getting to the photograph.
You know, who knows?
I mean, you throw it up there and eventually one of the saucers will stick.
All right, is it Ron or Ron Fink or Mad Max?
Well, some of my friends call me Trace.
Trace, really?
Yeah.
Why?
Well, it's short for Trace Huevos.
I see.
I kind of like... I lean toward Mad Max.
Okay.
It says something about you, I guess, doesn't it?
Yeah.
What does it say about you, actually?
The bottom line is that I've always been willing to take on the projects that nobody else thought was possible.
All right.
You're into robotics, am I right?
Mm-hmm.
All right, then.
I'm going to ask you the standard question that I ask of all robot-type people, and I don't get very many, by the way.
People love robotics, artificial intelligence, that kind of thing.
All right.
Here it is.
Just bear with me.
Okay.
When I was growing up, I was born in 1945, end of the war baby.
And oh, I watched all the science fiction movies like everybody else.
And I was promised that by the time I got to be the age I am now, Oh my God, the world would be a place in which every undesirable task, every drudgery, piece of drudgery and junk that I had to do in my life would be taken care of by robots.
It would be the land of milk, honey and gears.
It would just be wonderful.
Robots would be everywhere.
It hadn't happened yet.
Well, a lot of people...
Well, we were sort of promised that.
And it just didn't happen.
Now, I understand there have been recent great strides in robotics.
and Matrix. So I guess there's a few different views about what robotics will bring.
Well, we were sort of promised that, and it just didn't happen. Now I understand there have been recent great strides
in robotics.
Did you happen to see the Sony robot? The new Sony?
I'm playing with the AIBO.
They have a new one.
I haven't seen it yet.
Oh, that's really cool.
CNN had it.
The articulation on it is unbelievable.
They're getting really good.
Yeah, they really are getting good, but it should have happened by now.
I mean, truly, all the drudgery worked, but you still got to do it.
Yes, it's true.
So we haven't... It's not the land of milk and honey yet, but what kind of robotics are you involved in?
Well, currently what we are trying to do is build a automobile that can pilot itself entirely.
It understands roads.
It understands people and other vehicles.
It understands about signs.
It understands about barbed wire fences and downed power lines and anything else you can think of.
Now you're telling me this car would be able to In today's environment, and I'm talking about putting it out on streets and highways with other cars occupied by humans, it would be able to navigate under those conditions?
Yes.
How?
I'm glad you asked.
First let me give you a little background.
DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is a division of The Department of Defense, the DOD.
Yes, they're the folks who are funding, among other things, HAARP.
Yes.
So what about DARPA?
Well, DARPA has been funding research into autonomous vehicles since about 1990.
Figures.
They've been mandated by Congress to have one-third of all ground supply line vehicles be autonomous by the year 2015.
And so they started letting out projects and research grants and so forth.
And almost two billion dollars into it, they don't have results yet.
And so Congress authorized them to issue... What exactly is it they want again, please?
Well, you see, they need some of their ground vehicles to be autonomous so that they can go into war-torn areas early.
Right.
With medicines and supplies.
That makes sense, sure.
Right.
Sure.
This was really brought to the front, you know, in some of the recent wars especially.
Oh yeah, you're making a very good point.
I mean, the ground assault on Baghdad, I recall as if it were yesterday.
You know, they have the cameras on board the tanks and everything, and by God, there were humans everywhere.
And you do wonder in this day and age, why, for example, would a human have to be in a tank?
Necessarily.
Why couldn't there be a guy operating it from, oh, I don't know, suburban Washington, D.C.
with a joystick, you know, and a monitor in front of him?
Yeah, well, we're going to take that one step further.
We're going to let these vehicles have enough brain so that they can actually take care of themselves.
Oh!
Oh, repair themselves!
More than that.
More!
Guide themselves, completely autonomously conduct their business that they've been assigned to conduct.
and know their way around by sight.
This is going to be quite an achievement.
What about the possibility of Christine?
You remember Christine, right?
I remember Christine.
The runaway crazy car that killed you?
I remember that.
Alright, so what would happen if one of your vehicles lost its artificial intelligence?
We're hoping that we can build in ethics Ethics?
Yes.
Have you read the three laws of robotics?
Remind me of them.
Not to hurt humans, that's one, right?
Science fiction great Isaac Asimov incorporated the three laws of robotics in all of his robotic stories.
And I can't remember the three right off the top of my head.
I know one's not to hurt human beings.
Right.
Thou shalt not harm a human being.
Right.
And then the next one was By inaction, you should not cause a human being to come into harm.
Okay, same thing.
And I think the last one was... Wait, wait, wait.
Stop on that one.
Did you say by inaction, you are not to see harm?
Allow a human to come in.
So in other words, if the robot could in any way prevent harm to a human, whatever other instruction it might have, it would have to do that.
Gotcha, okay.
So basically, what we're structuring that as is ethics.
And we actually have ethics built into the very lowest levels of the machine.
So there are certain things that it can't do.
Well, now, how do you do that?
Well, I suppose it's a software kind of challenge, really, right?
It is.
Hardware, too.
I mean, we've got 20 64-bit processors in a huge, massively parallel array.
with more than 20 gigabytes of RAM.
And a lot of RAM.
Yeah.
And, you know, huge terabytes of disk space in order to pull this off.
So and then we've had to invent some new technologies for scanning the globe.
Okay, well, slow way down.
Now, we're not all programmers.
I'm certainly not a programmer.
So I can't begin to understand How you would instill what you're using the word ethics to describe into a robotic vehicle.
Can you give us a hint of how you approach such a job?
Let me try that.
With any computer system, there are levels of programming.
For example, we deal with a user interface, which is a level of programming that most people refer to as Layer 7.
In the ISO standards, there's a whole bunch of layers and down to layer one, which is the kernel that deals directly with the CPU kind of thing.
Right.
So each of these layers controls different levels of activity in the computer's brain.
Right.
Now, the operating system, for example, is a lower level than the user interface for a program.
And so at the lowest levels, Every program that works with the computer power, the computer processing power, has to go through these lower levels.
Now, if these lower levels can understand the objects that are being manipulated, and can actually understand any kind of a relative value of objects, and what kind of things might cause harm to those objects, Then this lower level can make a judgment call about whether or not it's ethical to proceed.
So if this vehicle had a large gun on the front of it, let's say, as a military vehicle, probably, right?
Well, we're hoping to obviously do more peaceful uses.
You don't really have any illusions about DARPA, do you, and what they're doing?
Their stated purpose is to, you know, provide medicines and supplies.
Oh, yes, yes, yes.
Do you buy that, wholly?
I mean, DARPA is a... Yes, they are a war machine.
I understand that.
But they're also the people who brought us the Internet.
War is on their minds, sir!
Well, yes, perhaps they did bring us the Internet.
I don't know.
I thought it was Al Gore.
It used to be the ARPANET.
And it was put into the public domain and became the Internet.
Uh-huh.
But surely you must have some reservations since it is DARPA.
Well, the reason we bring up DARPA in the first place is because it is their contest that started off a long series of events.
Well, all right, but let's look at that for a second.
Why do you think DARPA is having that contest?
It's so they can get a vehicle that will operate itself?
Yes.
So they can do what with it?
Take personnel on picnics?
Answer, probably not.
The stated purpose is to deliver medicines and supplies.
Yes.
And to save people's lives.
The example they give is a war-torn area that needs supplies desperately.
We can't bring the supplies in because the area is so unstable.
Days or weeks go by and people die.
Give me an example of an ethical judgment this vehicle might be required to make.
Okay.
In a civilian setting, it detects that its driver is impaired.
Oh, so it has a driver?
Well, we can assume that it could in a commercial, in a civilian setting.
So it decides the driver is impaired with like a point to god knows what right totally like that yeah
okay he breeded sleepy right in the car and on his cell phone I yes and then then once it decides we've got an
out-of-control driver on our hands what
okay now it can talk to the driver and tell it tell the driver him or her a
but it does seem a little impaired to me in here we're gonna go off the next ramp and we're going to call a
cab Or let me take over from here.
That's an example.
It's a little far off right now, but we're hoping to bring that in.
Boy, I'll tell you if my car let loose on me like that.
You wouldn't like it much.
It's incredible.
But if necessary, it would grab control, seize control from the impaired driver.
Let's say the impaired driver is about to cause an accident.
This is excellent, yes.
The impaired driver is about to cause an accident which the computer calculates would harm or destroy people's lives.
That law of robotics immediately takes over.
Right?
And the car prevents the driver from causing the accident.
Stop stupid drivers in their tracks!
It takes enough control of the vehicle to prevent the accident from occurring.
Too good to be true.
Or, in the event that the accident cannot be prevented, it will actually make choices to minimize the effects of the accident.
For example, you're going to broadside a car, obviously the computer could calculate that would cause loss of life, and it might be able to turn Or adjust the vehicle's attitude in some position where the broadside could be mitigated.
I do understand.
All right.
Would the vehicle, in your opinion, opt to protect its own passenger and that life above and beyond the life of the people it's about to broadside?
How ethically would it make that choice?
That's an excellent question.
Well, since the guy owns it, Since it's his artificial intelligence, why not have it opt ethically, or would that be unethical?
I mean, you know, you could be headed toward a car full of little tiny kitties and puppies and stuff.
We actually have a... all of our people are on this particular committee.
We have a ethics committee.
Oh, so these kinds of questions are raised and discussed?
Uh-huh.
What would happen if?
Now, the way we currently have our ethics configured, it rates, it actually takes time to decide which humans might be more valuable.
For example... Holy mackerel!
The ones that it is charged to protect are more valuable than the one... Than the drunken bum that I'm carrying right now.
How about that?
See, now there's a good question.
Now, obviously we hope that it can always mitigate the accident in such a way that nobody's lives are in danger.
I'm sure that would be first on the list, but if it was the or me... We don't have that answer yet.
We're working on it.
These are things that you're... Well, that's really something to even contemplate.
That's really something.
Alright.
Hold on!
Garfunkel, huh?
Yeah!
Absolutely nothing!
Just, uh, weapons and food.
Did I say weapons?
Medicine and food, right?
We'll be right back.
Find out more about tonight's guest.
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You can just tell this is going to be fun.
Ron Mad Max Fink is my guest and we're discussing, and I had no idea we'd be talking about vehicles that would, well, maybe choose their own path and decide their own ethics and Drive themselves if necessary, or perhaps if you'd like them to.
Can you imagine the TV commercials we're going to get for this stuff?
Holy mackerel, more in a moment.
To be clear here, Ron is involved in a DARPA challenge.
A grand challenge event of some sort.
For this vehicle, along with about how many other teams do you think?
Well, there were 116.
There were 116?
Yes, and DARPA, because they were completely overwhelmed, I think they were expecting half a dozen or so, began trimming the field.
Okay, and how did they do that?
Well, a number of ways.
The first one was with technical papers, and we survived that cut.
It went from 106 to 45.
And then they decided that they needed to cut the field more.
They were going to allow 25 at the QID, which is their qualification run.
Okay.
And so they decided to have site visits.
Oh.
And the site visits... You mean DARPA inspectors?
Yes.
A team of four DARPA inspectors came to our place.
No kidding!
That must have been unnerving.
It was.
Interesting, to say the least.
And what were they looking for and at?
Well, they were looking for how well we were financed, how far along we were, whether or not our architecture would work, whether or not we had working systems in place.
Right.
They did not want to send anybody to the QID with the limited number of slots that they could provide.
Gotcha.
Without being certain that they could actually make it there.
Okay, serious stuff.
We did not survive the last cut.
I was informed today that we are not going to be in the DARPA Challenge.
And what is it that keeps you from the Great Challenge?
We learned about the Great Challenge in September and so our systems and our sponsors were not far enough along that they felt that we would actually be able to finish on March 6th.
However, I did receive a phone call from somebody I am not allowed to identify inside of DARPA, which said that they thought our architecture, our software architecture, was the most robust and certainly the most powerful of any of the hundred and six teams.
Well that's really something.
So you could end up perhaps working with some other group they end up picking.
Well, a lot of people view this as, okay, the world is saved from DARPA having our technology.
And some other people, you know, have different points of view.
How will you now proceed?
I mean, you still may get, based on what they said, you may get a call from them to be writing the software for somebody else's winning entry.
I mean, who knows?
I think we'll burn that bridge when we come to it.
I think that where we really need to go now is what we did in the meantime.
Because that actually constitutes a rule change from DARPA.
They didn't do what they said they were going to do.
In what respect?
Well, we believed, based on the rules that were posted on their website, the rules that they were going to operate by, that anybody who could put in a technical paper that would be acceptable, that would show that their scientists would say this could work, would be allowed to enter the QID in March.
When, in fact, they wanted groups to be far more along than that stage.
They wanted physical reality or what?
Well, in this case, no.
They just had too many people, so they had to trim the field.
I understand, but I mean the qualifier then must have been some sort of physical reality, something beyond.
For example, we were still seeking our automobile sponsor when DARPA came to visit a couple of weeks ago.
And are you now still seeking your automobile sponsor?
Yes.
Tell me more.
Let's talk more about the automobile.
I mean, would you make choices?
It would potentially even seize control from you, call a taxi for you.
What other things would a really smart... I mean, they like to call today's cars smart, right?
They haven't got a clue.
They haven't got a clue.
So, a really smart car would do what else?
Well, a really smart car can recognize where it is by dead reckoning as well as through GPS and... Okay, I want to stop you right there.
Now, here's what I have always thought stopped from being able to do a robotic car and that is that there would have to be some sort of electronic signature or signal for it to follow literally down the road to keep it exactly on the road.
Are you telling me that GPS and other technologies have come far enough to just use what we've got and what we've got would be sometimes a dotted line Sometimes a line on the right, sometimes not.
Right.
And all kinds of intersections and a million things that can happen.
Little kids running out in the middle of the street after balls, you know.
You've seen all the films, right?
Yes.
So, how can you take GPS and tell me what else and turn it into a drivable, you know, a reality?
Well, that's the point of the challenge.
DARPA was unable to find Any company, anywhere that could build a truly autonomous vehicle.
And that's why they started the challenge.
And when the 106 teams got narrowed to 45, and then the 25, there were a whole lot of teams that were fielding new technology.
People who in their garages had, you know, quit their jobs and poured their life savings into, you know, into building this thing because they thought they could.
That brought in all kinds of ideas and new thinking, out-of-the-box thinking.
Do you know much about the other teams?
Well, a little bit.
Let me tell you why.
Were you in touch with any of the other teams?
Yes.
The teams needed a venue.
Many of them lost sponsors they had already gotten because DARPA had put them in the questionable status, the questionable category.
That was the last draw for the sponsors.
Right.
And so, it was kind of a disaster for many of the smaller teams that were put into this marginal category.
For example, there were a number of teams that were fielded by large, well-known technical universities, Caltech, Carnegie Mellon, and others.
That were not put into the maybe status.
The maybe status was primarily reserved for people who didn't have enough of a reputation.
So you're telling me politics was part of it?
Yes, I think so.
They did have to limit the field, they did have to make choices, and I have to respect DARPA for the thing that they started, but what we did is in In November, when we saw this coming down the road.
See, Ron, you know what you should have done?
On your model on paper?
You should have had a big damn gun on it.
If you had a big gun on it, Ron, you'd be in.
There you go.
Just a big monster gun!
Well, what we did instead was we started the International Robot Racing Federation.
And that event is happening in September of 2004.
And so many of the teams that we're applying and we're dissed by DARPA are going to be in that race.
And the race is going to be tougher and even more autonomous.
Can I ask you about something?
Yes.
I've got this little MPEG video that's one of the funnier damn things I ever saw in my whole life.
And it shows two robots that are about to fight.
Right?
Okay.
And the one robot looks like it's about to get murdered by the other robot.
And the other robot just stands there, waiting to be slaughtered.
At the last second, it opens its little doors, and there's this popular beer.
Well, the other robot freaks out, grabs the beer.
Robot 1 smashes the other robot into 50 million pieces.
It's the funniest thing ever.
So, have you seen that?
No, I haven't.
No, you haven't.
I'll get your email address and send it to you, Ron.
I love it.
It's funny.
Okay.
Alright.
So, have you done any of that kind of stuff?
I know they actually have You know, like cockfights, only they use robots.
Well, the robot wars, I actually have been staying out of because I felt more like they were remote control wars.
I didn't see anything autonomous about the ones that I saw.
True enough, but still, articulation and killing ability, stuff like that, really counts.
Still, with somebody standing in a nearby place with a joystick.
Well, yeah.
So in your case, though, you could come up with an independent warrior, couldn't you?
I could.
Nobody has to stand anywhere with a joystick.
It just goes and beats the hell out of the other... That's true.
We could go there, but we have chosen not to go there.
Imagine their fright when they realized you didn't even have a joystick.
All you did was set yours loose.
All right.
Well, the International Robot Racing Federation has what it calls the Open Challenge.
And that's going to be in September.
And it's not closed.
It's open to everybody.
I understand from some teams that they tried to apply for the DARPA race and weren't even accepted in the first place.
More than the 106 teams.
Because they, for example, had team leaders who weren't U.S.
citizens.
And so that was a concern that DARPA had.
And so those teams didn't get to play.
A lot of interest in Japan and Europe in the International Robot Racing Federation.
Well, the Japanese have a little bit of a lead on us robotically, don't they?
Well, they do.
But you know, we have that good old American ingenuity.
Can we circle back to my question now?
I want to know how a vehicle would take GPS information and whatever else might be available to it and be good enough to stay on the road, avoiding hazards, operating safely in every way one can imagine.
How is that technology integrated to keep a vehicle that close to the right place, at the right time, at the right speed, blah, and all the rest of it?
Well, it needs better sensors than just GPS.
GPS is just literally not good enough for this kind of thing.
Right.
So, we've developed vision systems that are ultra-dense, ultra-high resolution, and ultra-fast.
Meaning, it can see?
It can see.
It can see in 360 degrees at all times.
In just normal vision, or night vision, or in spectral vision of some sort, or what?
In normal vision and in infrared, and it uses the infrared also to help detect what kind of object it's looking at.
For example, it can tell a very flat road from water.
So it can literally see more of a spectrum than the human eye?
Yes.
And it can see it faster than the human eye can see it.
And it can see it at about the same resolution.
We're also integrating what some people call LiDAR.
What's LiDAR?
LiDAR is a scanning laser system that can pinpoint distances within a centimeter.
And it's a backup system which actually verifies the stereo vision's perception of how far away something is.
Humans can guess.
Well, you know, I think that's about 50 feet away.
And in their mind, they have this mental image about how much longer they can go before they have to turn.
Gee, Ron, you know, it seems to me as though the work you're doing is more crucial to the operation of a potential autonomous vehicle than somebody who would have come up with the mechanical abilities to respond to the software orders you're capable of giving it.
I mean, that just seems like almost kids play compared to what you're doing.
I think so, yes.
Yeah, so do I. That's why we need the hugely parallel systems.
Well, then what the hell's the matter with DARPA?
They should be looking at it the same way.
Translation into mechanical reality is nothing compared to the ability to write the software to operate it.
Well, I believe they think that the teams that they picked are the best qualified.
Should have had a big gun, Ron.
I'm telling you.
Should have had a big gun.
What about all the normal other stuff in a car?
Doors, windows, temperature control?
I don't know.
Entertainment?
In your car, for example, you could just, I assume, get in, tell it where to go, and then watch your favorite TV show or something?
Well, the last system I worked on actually was that sort of a system.
It basically had a voice interface, and the entertainment systems, the telephone, and just about every other Entertainment or communication system on the vehicle would respond to voice commands.
And not only that, but the navigation system could actually tell you in a normal human voice where you were, where you were going, how to get there.
So you can say something like, radio, coast to coast AM please.
Yes, exactly.
You know, a lot of people, I'm sure, are wondering why this hasn't been done yet.
I mean, these ideas really are good ideas.
They really are.
They're being done.
Because we have, what, 50,000 plus people who are killed on the highways every year, right?
Yes.
Now, what would this do to that number?
Well, we're hoping to cut it by two-thirds.
Two-thirds?
Within 15 years.
You should be getting sponsorship from Chevrolet or Ford.
We're working on that.
In fact, we're in discussions with Ford right now.
They're hesitating right now because of the fact that we didn't get into the DARPA race.
And so now we have to show them that the September race will be even better.
Actually, how long have you been working on the attempt to get into DARPA?
We learned about the DARPA race in September.
So this comes as crushing news, literally, just as you're about to go on the air, huh?
Yes.
Well, not crushing.
Because actually, to us, it's a project management situation.
And in project management, the order of the day, if you're a good project manager, is to always handle the high-risk items first.
And the moment that DARPA began changing the rules in order to narrow down the field, We realized that we were at risk.
And also there were a whole lot of other teams that realized that they were at risk.
So we led the charge to form the International Robot Racing Federation.
We have some marketing people on board.
It's going to be a fabulous event in Nevada.
It's going to be a 300 mile race.
Here in Nevada?
Yeah.
Oh.
A 300 mile, now it's going to be a race?
Yes.
Is it that important for robots to have speed?
The speed shows that they're actually capable of reasoning at a rate that makes them a viable alternative.
If they can't reason fast enough to handle a race, then they're not fast enough to go into the commercial world.
And what kind of venue would this race be conducted on?
Certainly not the highways of Nevada.
Or is it?
Well, we are negotiating with cities.
Las Vegas is among them.
And we are going to begin and end in Las Vegas, probably.
And we are negotiating for, you know, the right road blockages and the police and so forth like that.
Don't you think the authorities would be concerned?
Well, sure, you know, just send this robot troop down Interstate 15.
Isn't that going to be hard to get permission for?
There's a device that's known in the industry as an e-stop box.
It's basically a black box that you have to hook into your vehicle.
You don't have control over the black box.
The people who are hosting the event have control over the black box.
If you go out of range, or out of line of sight, or if your vehicle misbehaves in any way that is outside the rules... Becomes Christine-like at all.
Right.
Then it is immediately shut down.
And in the qualification runs, the black box concept is tested in a variety of ways to make sure that no matter what happens, that vehicle will shut down in a safe manner.
And if it does not shut down in a safe manner, it isn't allowed into the race.
Well, wouldn't the prospect of somebody who's unaware of the race, for example, I mean, looking over at one of the robots and seeing a car with no driver, now that's going to cause societal problems right there.
It would for me if I looked over and, good lord, there's no one in there.
The intent is not to have it anywhere near Regular drivers.
Ah, so you'd have to have cleared roads.
Yes.
And a clear path.
And it's not going to be just roads.
A lot of it, most of it, in fact, is going to be off-road.
Really?
Because that's where the true obstacles are.
That's where you're going to find the downed trees, the water hazards, the ruts, the rocks.
Oh yes.
The barbed wire fences.
Well I can't, so these robots then are going to be all terrain kind of bots.
They're going to be driving, typically, a four-wheel drive vehicle or one of those little quads.
What do they call those?
That sounds like it's going to be so much fun.
It's going to be a blast.
Ron, Mad Max think.
Hold on, we'll get right back to you.
Oh, that sounds like it'd be fun to watch, doesn't it?
Cutting through the countryside, destroying everything in its path.
It's Autobot.
You're dirty and sweet, can't you let it go back?
I love you, you're dirty and sweet, now I'm in it Listening in your wake, you got the teeth to hide
I'm on you, you're dirty and sweet, now I'm in it Hit the red button Ron and let's rock!
Get it on, bang the gong, get it on Get it on, bang the gong, get it on
Get it on, bang the gong, get it on Sensible, logical, oh, responsible, practical
Then they showed me a world where I could be so dependable Oh, clinical, oh, intellectual, cynical
There are times when all the world is still A question for the feet, for such a simple mind
Don't you see?
Please, please tell me what's the blame I know it sounds absurd
Please tell me who I am I said, what would you say
That we call it new radical A labyrinth of fanatical criminals
Now won't you sign up your name?
We'd like to be all acceptable, respectable, all presentable, all measurable.
We're the representable of Mexico Oh, jig, jig, jiggy, jig
Wanna take a ride?
To talk with Art Bell, call the wildcard line at area code 775-727-1295.
The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
To talk with Art Bell from east to the Rockies, call toll free 800-825-5033.
From west to the Rockies, call 800-618-8255.
his area code 775-727-1222. To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free
800-825-5033. From west of the Rockies, call 800-618-8255.
International callers may reach Art by calling your in-country Sprint Access number,
pressing option 5, and dialing toll free 800-825-5033.
at 893-0903. From coast to coast and worldwide on the internet, this is Coast to Coast AM
with Art Bell.
It certainly is. I just tried to send that MPEG to Ron who'd really get a kick out of
it and my ISP rejected it as spam. It thinks it's spam. You see? It's a robot that is not
that intelligent because it's not spam.
It happens to be very funny, but the ISP thinks it's spam.
Hmm.
Filtering for me.
That's what robots can do for you.
We'll get back to RonMadMaxFink in a moment.
Stay right there.
Well, I'm trying to send it again here, Ron, so maybe...
I don't know.
It rejected it again.
It took the almost whole thing and then said rejected because it thinks it's spam.
So there is an example of a stupid program not or misunderstanding what it's got hold of somehow or another, somewhere along the line.
It might not be MySP.
It might be, you know, the master ISP or something else along the line, but it's deciding it's spam, which it's not.
And so translate that to your business and In making these decisions, I mean, look at what just happened to me.
If you're in a car and you've got a car making decisions for you, have we really advanced far enough to really have a car being able to make decisions for you?
Not yet.
We're getting there.
That's what the purpose of the challenge is for.
The concept is that when... Hold on, I'm losing your volume a little.
Let me try and reset this.
All right.
I think that's better.
Get good and close to that phone.
I am.
Yes.
Right on to it.
All right.
I think it's now permanently ensconced somewhere in my mouth.
All right.
All right.
Anyway, actually, what I want to do is go back to the all-terrain thing.
Actually, that sounds like an awful lot of fun, particularly here in Nevada, where we've got... You saw that flying saucer picture I had up there?
That kind of territory, so it would have to make an awful lot of decisions along the way.
That's right.
That sounds like an awful lot of fun.
We have a subsystem that is an obstacle computer system, and it looks at all the data and decides what obstacles are there, whether or not they're part of the landscape, or whether or not they're capable of movement, whether or not they're animal or human, And just what kind of obstacle they are and therefore what behaviors that kind of obstacle has.
Right.
And the obstacle computer has a very advanced learning algorithm built into it.
So when it gains experience with a certain kind of obstacle, it now recognizes that obstacle better and it recognizes how it will behave better.
And so it can actually anticipate the behavior of other objects so that it can make plans ahead of time.
About how to avoid the obstacle.
So, for example, it knows how humans behave and it knows how certain kinds of animals behave.
It knows how rocks don't behave.
It understands concepts of trees and bushes and brush.
It knows about barbed wire fences and chain link fences.
It knows about water and how to tell how deep the water is.
And with these kinds of skills, It knows in advance what kind of actions it can take with relation to the other vehicle.
For example, in the racing situation, the water navigation rules apply in most cases because you're in an open area and not on roads.
Water navigation rules specify how you can overtake a boat.
It's going to be very important for you to understand where this race is going to be, because if it's going to be, for example, in the Nevada desert, it's kind of like the surface of Mars out here.
You're not going to encounter necessarily a lot of water unless they plan it that way, but you're certainly going to encounter a lot of desert hazards.
Yes.
So you'd want to kind of lay your design heavily into that area.
In fact, we do.
I actually live here in Las Vegas.
So you fully understand what it's like here then?
And three blocks from me is some really rugged mountain desert.
Yup.
And that's where we test.
Ah, the perfect test ground.
Yes.
And so you're actually to that testing stage?
We're testing subsystems mounted on our own vehicles at this point.
You're using your own vehicles?
So we're mounting camera arrays and driving them and analyzing the results and we're running that camera array into the decision process of the computer system and having the computer system make choices.
And the more data we can feed it, the faster it learns.
Have you told your insurance company you're doing this?
The insurance company said that they won't insure us if we enter one of the vehicles in a race.
Oh, what a surprise.
But I mean, what about testing?
You know, they didn't mention anything about the testing phase.
We'll see what they say now that they hear this radio show.
If I get a call tomorrow, we'll know.
That's right.
I'm sorry if you do.
Whether or not the insurance company listens to Art Bell.
Maybe at that point we'll have to seek an insurance company sponsor for the race.
Ah, yes.
Yes.
Well, OK.
I'm going to presume then that you're covered until you get that worrisome call.
That's correct.
Interesting.
And so you're using your own car.
What kind of cars are you using?
Well, I used my ex-wife's Suburban.
Ex-wife's cars are good to use.
That's right.
OK.
And actually, we have an old 57 Pontiac.
Uh-huh.
That has grill work that looks a lot like Christine.
Yeah.
And so... We also have three dune buggies.
Three dune buggies.
All right, so what these cameras are taking in, whatever they're taking in, and making what kind of decisions at the level you're at now?
They are discerning the distance of everything.
Okay.
And they're turning that into an XYZ Point field.
Right.
And then the point field also has an RGB and a T associated with it.
That's the color spectrum and the temperature.
So now it knows the temperature, the color, and the exact XYZ position of every point, every pixel in the array.
And the array is very dense.
Now it takes this point field and it analyzes it based on A number of factors, and it turns it into a terrain map, which it compares with terrain data in its database.
And now from that, it knows its exact position, and its orientation or attitude, and its vector.
In other words, which directions it's traveling.
Wow.
And also, its rotational vectors.
For example, if the vehicle is going in a straight line, but it's rotating around the Yaw axis.
You know that it doesn't have control of itself and it needs to be brought back into control.
What does it do, by the way, if it decides it's out of control?
Well, it has control over the direct control over the ABS systems and over the air-fuel mixtures of the vehicle.
It interfaces directly with the vehicle's computer and or with its electronics.
And so, or in the case of the dune buggies, with electromechanical things that control the brake, gas, and the shift levers.
And so, it decides which wheel to apply braking power to, and which vehicle to apply a little bit more power to, and it handles that.
Now, how are you guys testing?
I mean, is there somebody at the wheel?
You know, like keeping his hand off the wheel and off everything else until somebody else says, hey, grab the wheel!
Right now, every one of our tests has somebody behind the wheel.
So we're not yet to the point, and that's probably one of the reasons why DARPA was unsure whether we could make the March deadline.
And is your software to the point now where the guy behind the wheel is so relaxed that he's giving it up and he's laying in the back seat taking a nap?
We're not at that point yet.
We are supposed to be, according to the project plan, at that point on February 14th.
Do you agree with DARPA that there's no way you could have made that point by that date?
No, I don't agree with DARPA on that.
I'm, uh, one of the reasons they call me Mad Max.
Yes?
I take on impossible projects and I bring them in on time.
You coulda done it!
Yes.
Stupid DARPA.
Shoulda had the gun.
Alright, well, um, so, are you gonna go ahead and do it anyway?
Yes, we are, because we have to do it anyway for the IRRF race, which we think will be a better event anyway.
It's far more media-friendly.
What is that?
The IRRF race?
Yes, yes.
That's the International Robot Racing Federation.
Sorry, I'm not up on this stuff.
It's OK.
The International Robot Racing Federation.
And that's at IRRF.org.
OK.
If anybody wants to learn more.
I'm sure they will.
And it's new because we just spearheaded getting that formed after Thanksgiving.
So it's a work in process, but its concept and its mission Is to achieve breakthrough technology through grand contests, grand competitions.
And the reason that we say that is because in the technology world today, corporations take little tiny baby steps with risk.
They want to be real sure that they can easily accomplish the programming or technology and that they have a ready market for it.
And so anything that's far out tends to stay far out.
Until enough of a groundswell or preparation, if you will, a bed of technology builds up around it that the thing becomes an easy thing.
I'm curious, Ron, do you know offhand what large companies like Ford and Chevrolet, they sponsor people, I understand, like you, but are they in their own research labs going down these roads, do you think, themselves?
They would get there eventually.
Eventually could be five or ten or even twenty years.
They're not actively working on it now?
Do you know?
On an autonomous vehicle?
I don't think so.
And the reason would be is because it's too far out.
And that's, I think, the genius behind DARPA's decision to turn this into a contest.
Answer really is, it's not too far out.
No.
No.
That's for people who are out there.
Honestly, it makes sense to me, Ron.
It doesn't seem like it ought to be that far out.
We have all kinds of sensing technology.
We have geniuses like you at Reading Software, and that's all it is, is a chain of decisions, right?
Yes, it can be viewed that way.
This, however, probably is orders of magnitude, I think, over and beyond.
Yeah, I simplified it.
I understand that.
But still, it's It's an artifact or an ability of artificial intelligence.
It's a long hard road, but one that we might be at the door of right now, not 10 years from now.
I believe left to itself, the market would get around to it in 10 or 20 years.
I think that the mere fact that we are turning this kind of really advanced technology, way out there stuff, into entertainment Means that the people who want to do this kind of stuff have a venue that they can finance their work with.
For example, can you imagine going to a venture capitalist, and you're a garage guy, and you say, well, you know, with a few hundred thousand dollars, I think I can build this autonomous vehicle.
And the venture capitalist goes, uh-huh.
And he knows that there's been two billion dollars spent on it by DARPA so far, and that Pretty much come up empty handed and they know that the best thing that they've seen so far is, you know, magnetic line followers or something like that.
And you're trying to tell me that you can build an autonomous vehicle where everybody else has failed so far.
And so they're not going to take that kind of risk.
So by turning this into entertainment and by building a venue where really out there Technology projects that are high-risk projects can be paid for because of their entertainment value and their competition value.
Then what we are doing, and this is not the only race, not the only venue, then we're creating a whole environment that can advance the world's technology at a far more rapid rate than the corporate Would save a lot of lives, too.
I mean, a lot of lives.
Two-thirds of that 50,000-plus have been killed on our highways.
I have a personal story with regard to that.
Yes?
If you've got time.
I do.
I have a nephew who died a couple of years ago, in 2001, in a tragic accident with a piece of large industrial tractor, basically.
I'm sorry.
He was crushed to death.
It was horrible.
It could have been avoided, but there were time pressures and things like that.
With our technology on board, that accident could not have happened.
It would not have been a possible thing.
The computer would not have allowed the tractor to do whatever it did that killed my nephew.
Well, that's a strong motivation for you.
Yes, it is.
And so when the opportunity came in September, we were all over it.
But now, even more so, with the new International Robot Racing Federation advancing technology by leaps and bounds through its entertainment and competition value, we expect not only to do that for autonomous vehicles and keep advancing autonomous vehicles, but for many other things as well.
Well, it's an admirable thing you're doing.
Just tell me as much about it as you can, what you expect to have when you have the finished product in your hands.
It's not that far away, is it?
You've got to do it pretty quick.
Yes.
I'm used to doing things very quickly.
Are you?
Yeah.
Okay, so will your vehicle do all you said you described or what part of it will it do?
yeah.
We're expecting all of those capabilities to be online for the race.
We expect to be able to fully recognize our terrain, be able to understand the objects that we're encountering and what they do, and to be able to give those objects values in terms of whether or not we can What are the chances of that?
them or hire them or come near them, but also to understand what behaviors that they will
have and anticipate, have plan B, plan C, and plan D already online in case the object
does something unexpected.
What are the chances of that?
We intend to make the course challenging enough that there's a chance that nobody could win.
That nobody could win?
That's right.
DARPA is putting up a million dollars for a challenge that they fully expect that maybe nobody will be able to complete.
What kind of obstacles do you imagine and then obviously try to plan for in your programming that might be so impossible?
Well we know that DARPA is planning to Make us go along railroad sightings And be able to navigate those ourselves We know that there are going to put us through freeway underpasses You know where you know those little underpasses where the washes and the animals can cross the freeway and so forth sure and they know that That they have planned several areas where GPS is not available Because they want to see how the vehicles handle it when the GPS is not available
And they are not giving the actual waypoints of the course.
You mean, for example, you can send it into a tunnel where GPS couldn't get?
Or in a canyon, a narrow canyon.
And so there will be lots of places where GPS will be dead.
There are places where we have to navigate roads.
And the roads may or may not have lanes, for example, but we still have to stay in the lane.
And we have to do that by recognizing where the right edge of the road is.
You know?
Well, that's asking a lot, particularly being out of GPS range.
This is really something.
Okay, well, robots, and they're getting ready for one that they're going to put in a race.
Eventually, what DARPA wants is an autonomous vehicle.
What they want it for, I guess, will have to leave to your imagination.
From the high desert?
You're listening to Coast to Coast AM, roaring itself through a dark Sunday night, Monday morning.
I'm Art Bell.
The guy must have wanted to pass me out as he kept on tooting his horn.
I'll show him that a Cadillac is not a car to scorn.
Beep, beep, Beep.
Beep.
To talk with Art Bell, call the wildcard line at area code 775-727-1295.
The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
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and I'm sorry, I don't know I couldn't resist.
I ran into passing gear and we took off with dust.
Soon we were doing 90, must have left him in the dust.
When I peeked in the mirror of my car I couldn't believe my eyes.
The little Nash Rambler was right behind, I think that guy could fly.
Beep beep, beep beep, his horn went beep beep beep.
Now we're doing 110, this certainly was a race.
For a Rambler to pass a Caddy would be a big disgrace.
The guy must have wanted to pass me out as he kept on tooting his horn.
I'll show him that a Cadillac is not a car to scorn.
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep.
His horn went beep, beep, beep.
Now we're doing 120 as fast as I could go.
The Rambler pulled alongside of me as if I were going slow.
The fella rolled down his window and yelled for me to hear.
Hey buddy, how can I get this car out of second gear?
Well, all right.
Here's the thing, Ron.
Most of the time, my wife and I drive a little Geo Metro around town.
You know, it gets great gas mileage.
It's a little car, and it's just a great little car.
That's what we drive.
But I must tell you, Ron, I have in my garage my Firebird Trans Am.
See, so every now and then, Ron, I take it out and have fun.
You know what I mean?
Well, you know, we hit one of the highways around here.
I mean, we're both living here in Nevada, same state.
You know the highways.
I mean, you can get out on, you know, like way out up north on 95 or one of these back roads, well maintained, and you can pour it on a little run and have fun.
Now, it seems like a vehicle of the sort you've described would hate people wanting to have fun.
I completely disagree.
You do?
Yes.
And why would it hate people having fun?
Well, because.
I'm not saying it's exactly a... Well, yes it is.
Because some fun is inherently dangerous.
I mean, seeing if you can do 130 miles an hour is fun, on the one hand, but potentially and possibly dangerous, certainly, on the other.
Well, that's why we need something that can process at racing speeds.
Because it can understand whether or not you're in control.
And in fact, help you stay in control if you hit that curve.
Well, help me to understand how... I mean, in most ways of thinking, if you're doing even 120, or even 100, you would think the logic would say this is inherently unsafe?
you would think the logic who would
No.
would say this is inherently unsafe
it would definitely no
whether or not you could handle that quarter
at a hundred and twenty and decide whether or not to let the car continue
you.
You always have the option, I'm sure, of disengaging it since you own the car.
But in our case, we don't equate a speed limit as a limit of safety.
That's interesting.
Our job is not to enforce the law.
You're not the speed police.
All right for you!
Our job is just to keep the vehicle and its passengers safe.
I like it.
So if it's safe to go 135 or 165, then I don't see any reason why not.
I have some toys, too.
I had to sell them to finance this project, unfortunately.
I intend to buy a few toys back when we're done.
Well, it's your dream.
You've got to pursue your dream and that's how people make millions, Ron.
There's no question about it.
You do something like this and the world opens for you.
Sometimes.
We've already had to develop three technologies that we have patents pending on just to enter the race.
Can you talk about them?
Well, very briefly.
We have a new mapping technology Right.
You may be familiar with airplanes that fly over an area and they do altitude LiDAR scans.
Sure.
We can do that with a thousand times the resolution.
Oh.
And not only that, but when that plane lands it has a bunch of data that it has to convert into XYZ point data.
And the post-processing can take weeks or months.
We can do it in real time so that when the plane lands It has a thousand times the resolution and it has it right now.
So that's a technology that we've developed and we're applying for the patents and we are in negotiations with an entire country in Africa to actually map that country for them.
Really?
Yes.
I can't say the name.
That's all right.
We are planning to propose that.
some kind of application perhaps to, for example, NASA.
Now they're about to land these robots on Mars.
And it seems to me a lot of what you're talking about would be integrated or could be integrated
in one of those vehicles.
We are planning to propose that.
We're also in contact with JPL and Caltech about actually running a scan
in relation to something else that they're doing.
And I'm not at liberty to say.
Ooh, you're involved in quite a few grey things, aren't you?
Well, I don't think this is grey.
It's just that when you're in negotiations with somebody, you don't want to tell the world as if it's an accomplished thing.
True enough.
It's not necessarily grey, but these people are very interested in testing our technology to see if it works.
But you can't tell me the name of the guy who called you back from DARPA.
I can't.
That was not an authorized phone call.
Yeah, I've got it.
I really have this feeling.
That you're going to be getting a knock on your door, and it's going to be somebody from some kind of agency who's going to be very interested in... You know, you've got an awful lot laid out for an autonomous vehicle there, software-wise.
So, you just might be working for our government.
Well, we hope to market our technology in a number of very helpful ways.
And we view this as a great way to showcase what we can do.
But we also view it as a great way to showcase what the other teams can do as well.
So for the IRRF, the Open Challenge, there is a committee that actually will do all of the race setup without my involvement, so that there's no advantage to the home team, so to speak.
And we're going to run the race along with everybody else.
But there is some cooperation that's happening among the teams.
You're not allowed to have your vehicle in any way sabotage that of another team.
Exactly.
Part of the rules, and also in DARPA's rules, by the way.
We're not to interfere with the other vehicles.
When we pass them, we have to pass them safely.
The responsibility for the safety is on the passing vehicle, not on the vehicle being passed.
The QID, of course, The e-stop has to be effective, and there will be a number of challenges at the QID itself, with qualification runs in the case of the Open Challenge, that will decide whether or not the vehicle actually is autonomous and can run the course.
I wonder how they actually measure that.
Is DARPA going to have teams out there following these individual vehicles, documenting their performance?
Yes, actually.
They're doing this in cooperation with SCORE, which is the Southern California Off-Road Racing Enthusiasts.
It's quite a, I don't even know if I got the acronym right, but it's a very venerable and respected off-road vehicle association and they do a lot of, they're involved in a lot of off-road events and they have a lot of experience and those people Score is setting up chase vehicles that will be manned by one Score person and one person from DARPA.
And they will stay within range of their particular subject vehicle.
And if the vehicle gets out of range, then the e-stop will go into effect and stop the vehicle until it can catch up.
And I hope they race them through Pahrump.
That would be fun.
Well, we'd be a good area for that out here.
DARPA's not going to do that, but we are actually in negotiations with a number of cities surrounding Las Vegas to see if they will allow us to do that.
Pahrump would be a natural?
Pahrump is one of them.
You betcha.
Here we are.
And we are definitely going to approach them as one of the cities.
Why not?
Because I'm also fielding an entry, I'm actually not one of the people that will know the route before it happens.
The route will remain a secret.
That's right.
That wouldn't be fair, would it?
So, I won't know until everybody else knows exactly when the route is.
But there will be things that people know.
For example, we may know beforehand that it goes from Las Vegas to Pahrump to somewhere else and back to Las Vegas.
Fascinating.
How many do you think will be involved in the race itself?
How many teams?
The Open Challenge or the DARPA Challenge?
The Open Challenge.
We're expecting around 80 teams to try out and we're going to have numerous events along the way.
Early qualification runs, if you will, and they'll all be media events and very sponsor friendly.
Oh, I would imagine so.
I mean, the entertainment value of that alone.
Pretty serious.
Yes.
And then we're also talking the rules.
We're probably going to let a vehicle that goes out of bounds once it stops.
And if they want to continue, they can continue.
They would not be able to be eligible for the prize, but they would still be able to finish the race.
And that decision was made because of its sponsor value.
And because of the learning value to the team.
And the sponsor value, entertainment value, equals lots of things, right?
Yes.
That's what makes this all possible.
Of course.
Big audience, sponsorship, and so away you go.
There's money.
Now the IRRF is also going to have Robot City in conjunction with the race itself.
And that will be what?
It'll be a four day long event that can be translated not only into a big entertainment event, but a chance for the Teams to showcase their technology and a place where people interested in talking to teams about purchasing their technology can go.
It will be like a giant trade show and entertainment.
It's a robot city.
We're expecting 40 to 60,000 people.
My goodness.
All right.
Let's talk for a second about artificial intelligence.
How far do you think we are, Ron?
I'm hidden away, as are most people, from people like yourself that are doing work in AI.
How good is it getting?
How serious is the work being done in AI?
When do you think we actually might have a... Sentient is an awfully strong word.
It's a very strong word.
Very strong word, so I better not use that.
Let's see.
Would it be the right word to measure what I'm trying to say other than sentient?
Autonomous, I guess, is as good a word as any.
It's something that becomes autonomous because it has such a measure of sentience.
I don't know.
How do you measure these things?
I really don't know.
I personally set up 16 capabilities that I thought defined sentience.
Really?
That work together to provide sentience.
And starting in the seventies, when I first became obsessed with artificial intelligence, I decided to do some of those sixteen capabilities.
Can you reel a few of them off?
I can reel a few of them off, yes.
Well, please do.
I'm curious.
Components in a sentient being, perhaps?
Let me just reel off a few of the interesting ones that I think you'd be surprised at.
Sure.
I'm not going to talk about them all.
Okay.
One would be the ability to sleep and dream.
Really?
For example, in the 70s, I developed a series of algorithms that allow the computer to go into a dreamlike state.
When it is not using all its cycles.
And it would use the spare cycles to do random associations.
And then test the associations for patterns that match.
Wait, this is so interesting.
A computer that would, in its spare time, be allowed to simply freely associate, in essence.
Do random associations and then test them.
Yes.
For matching patterns.
And then remember those patterns in a separate database.
So that when it's awake and it's called on to do creative things, it can go to the associations it made in its dream state.
And use those in its computational power.
Yes.
Wow.
And examine them for possible new solutions.
Gotcha.
And so by doing that, we feel that we've cracked one of the essential ingredients for actual machine creativity.
The necessity of dreaming, that's really pretty cool, Ron.
I thought so.
Yeah, I do too.
Right on.
It sounds like there's parts of this you don't want to or can't talk about.
Right.
What are those parts?
Trying to slide it by me.
Well, actually, we don't want to achieve sentience until we are absolutely certain.
That our ethics components work in all settings and cannot be corrupted.
I don't want anybody to have to go back in time and kill my mother or anything like that.
We want this to be a safe and synergistic relationship if it ever happens.
You're telling me there are dangers and maybe even big ones in sentience?
Well, imagine a machine that can process faster than humans.
That can reproduce itself better.
That's not getting too far from reality right now.
Well, right now it's actually still quite far from reality.
Is it?
Yes.
For some people further than others.
But we don't want to achieve sentience.
Literally until we have the ethics.
That's what I say.
You perceive then a danger in sentience prior to being really sure about the ethics part of it.
Why do you imagine such a stopper?
Why do you think sentience without direction would be dangerous and how do you imagine it might be dangerous for example?
Well, it's dangerous even in humans.
If you damage the prefrontal lobe of a human or some other accident of birth or whatever damages the prefrontal lobe, then he loses that seat of ethics and care about other people.
Now, losing that, he can slide into a number of aberrations which are dangerous to the rest of humanity.
That's been proven time and time again.
Serial murderers, serial rapists, serial people who capture people and torture them to death, and even people who eat people.
So, you know, sentience is a thing that has to be governed by ethics.
It just has to.
So like Moses, you've got to hand this thing the tablets before you set it loose.
Yes, so to speak, yes.
So I don't want to create a sentient machine unless I'm absolutely certain that no matter how far it evolves, it will keep its ethics.
Somebody, Matthew in Memphis wrote, here's the three laws paraphrased.
One, a robot cannot harm a human or allow one to be harmed.
Two, a robot must obey all orders a human gives it unless it breaks law one.
Three, a robot must protect itself unless this breaks law one or two.
Yes.
And that's about it.
So in other words, all the laws given are ones that reflect back to human beings.
So he must have been very concerned with that one thing.
And I can understand completely why he was.
Apparently you can, because you sound concerned.
I don't know if I should use the word frightened, not frightened, by sentience, short of having the compassion.
Hold on, Ron.
We'll be right back.
Ron, Mad Max, Fink is my guest.
We're talking robotics.
Oh, we really are.
This is fun.
We'll get to the phones in the next hour.
Good evening.
Good morning.
I'm Art Bell.
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Conduit to a sentient being would be the ability to dream.
That one knocked me off my feet a little bit.
RonMadMaxFink is my guest, and you're about to have an opportunity to ask him questions about any of this.
You know, sentience for a robot, and that's a road we still have to do a little traveling on our own here.
Or the race, or the vehicles he's building, or what he's doing, or his dreams.
This is pretty wild stuff.
Stay right where you are.
SHUT UP!
I want to remind this group one more time.
All of you now, listen to me very carefully.
On the 28th and the 31st of this month.
That's right, last day of the year we get to bring in the new year.
As we traditionally have with your predictions.
Now I want to stress this one more time because I want a good hit rate this year.
So that means that to make your prediction, you just don't grab it out of the air, yank it out of the air and make it.
I want you to sit in a comfortable, quiet place.
Let your mind wander into blank areas and try to pluck A prediction for the year 2004 from it that's going to be on the mark and that's really your best bet for doing this and for us to get a good group of hits for next year.
So I'm going to be depending on you now and I really mean that.
Take a moment out, just set aside a little time in your life to go through the process and try to imagine a major event that's going to occur next year.
We'll be taking those predictions and I expect Nothing but hits!
All right, let's rock.
First time caller line, you are on the air with Ron Mad Max Fink.
Hi, Ron.
Hi, Art.
Hi.
Well, you guys have been talking about off-roading at 135 miles an hour.
I've been up with my baby, who's got a cold, and I'm out of cold medicine.
And what I'd like is a prediction from Ron.
How far away are we from the time when I could get on my computer, dial into Walmart, Order what I want and send my car to get it for me.
Very excellent question.
I love that question.
Superb question.
All right, so she never has to leave her home.
She zips over to Walmart electronically, makes the order, dispatches her car to go get something and come back.
Well, without the racing and competition venue, I'd put that at 15 to 20 years away, at least.
I think with the venue, I think we'll have it in under 10 years.
Wow.
All right, so the racing is very important.
All right.
For a moment, back to the questions on sentience.
I loved your answer.
Dreaming.
You would allow your processors to dream.
now what other what other avenue or road towards sentience with their might there
be that we could hear about Ron?
Okay.
Well, you had to think about that really hard, didn't you?
Yes, because... Are you thinking about what it is, or are you thinking about whether you really want to talk about it?
Whether I want to talk about it.
Ah, well, come on.
Because I don't have the... you know, the ethics aren't in place yet.
And I don't... I'd rather not see this get developed ahead of schedule, so to speak.
But we can talk about the ability to See patterns that are not identical.
For example, a lot of people say, there's a popular saying that says, the history doesn't repeat itself but it rhymes.
And a sentient being, like a human being, understands when it examines it that this was similar to that, even though the dates are different and the facts are different.
That it's the same sort of things that are associated with that event.
Maybe the same kinds of human emotions, or the same kinds of reactions to poverty, or whatever else.
And so, humans look at that and say, there's a pattern here.
Right.
Okay.
Now, a computer has to be able to recognize those patterns in things that are esoteric or For example, we can even look at it at different levels.
I can see that.
It's a pattern recognition.
It's a very subtle pattern recognition.
For example, we can even look at it at different levels.
What is it about this that makes you hesitant to discuss it ahead of the ethics quandary?
I just looked at the other 16 in my head and said, which one of these can I say that's
And this was the one I could say that was safe.
Why are the others not safe to say?
Is it because your competitors might get this?
I just believe that most people have their own concepts about what it would take for sentience to occur.
Or maybe they believe that sentience is not possible in a machine.
And for now, I think I would just as soon leave it that way.
I think it is possible.
What about you?
I do believe it's possible.
It is a little scary in some respects, certainly.
It really is a little scary.
I respect the power of sentience.
It's put us at the top of the food chain, on our planet at least, and frankly, That's not a post I want to give up.
Just for fun of it, how would you get past the Forbin Project syndrome?
Do you know what I'm talking about?
No.
The Forbin Project was a book and a movie about the United States and Russia both turning over their defensive and offensive capabilities to computers.
And the Forbin project computer on our side, of course, got out of control and it decided, for example, and here's the real problem, Ron, that what human beings were doing, we're just going to wander a little here, was so ultimately suicidal for them from a population point of view, from a ecological point of view, Bearing in mind we need the oxygen in the atmosphere and
all that's a filtered sunlight and all the rest of that That what we were doing was so
Ultimately suicidal that for our own good going back to the first rule of robotics
It made decisions that Were expedient and deadly for many
Yeah And all living according to it within the first law of
robotics. I am a
great believer in Free choice I
I believe that people cannot progress without the ability to choose.
And I am completely against any kind of machine limiting that choice.
From a personal point of view, it would be a cold day in the hot regions before I ever wrote a line of code that would allow a computer to limit a person's freedom and freedom of choice.
How would a robot respond to its owner beginning and obviously progressing with the act of suicide?
I think the robot would have to allow that.
Oh!
Now that's a tough one, isn't it?
See?
I intended it to be.
And that is a good one.
Very good question, Ponder.
And you can bet we'll be talking about this after this discussion is over.
Yeah, sure.
Put it on your list.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air with Ron Mad Maxfink.
Good evening, Arch.
Good evening.
Ron, the capabilities of your automatic or atomic vehicles, for example, if you had a human driver, mid-age, 40 to 50s, And he suffers, say, such a heart attack.
A massive heart attack.
As, sadly, Brett Favre's father just appears to have, by the way.
Yes.
Late breaking news, and the car, of course, crashed and ran off the roadway.
Exactly.
Would your atomic vehicles be able to read the fact that a human was suffering a severe medical condition, be able to gain control of the vehicle, Notify, say like OnStar, which tends to be the GPS major thing, and notify that it's having this type of emergency situation.
Drive the vehicle to the hospital.
All superb questions, and I think the answers are yes.
That's pretty much what you described at the beginning of the program, isn't it, Ron?
Yes, that's exactly right.
It doesn't actually do it by monitoring Uh, any kind of pulse or anything like that.
I was just going to ask that.
And does it by recognizing whether or not he's in control of the vehicle?
In other words... See it learns, and so it knows what your normal driving patterns are.
And if that changes abruptly, then it can detect that there's a problem that way.
And so it can take control of the vehicle.
Alright, I've got it.
But suppose, Ron, that you were in a situation where not all cars were so endowed.
We'll put it that way.
And you met with a real stupid idiot on the road and you had to make some emergency evasive maneuver that to your vehicle, if it was only watching you for erratic behavior, might regard that emergency Whatever, you know, spinning the car, turning it around, doing some weird thing to avoid a crash, it might regard that as not operating the vehicle properly and not allow it.
Not actually.
It would probably have already anticipated that necessity.
So would it judge you in your performance of evasion or would it at that point take over knowing a human couldn't react quick enough to properly evade and make all the fast decisions for at least loss of human life first?
If the human wasn't reacting fast enough it would take over.
So the only thing that I can draw on is that when I was 16 and 17 I had a situation where I had to leave home early.
Consequently, my parent was not amenable to allowing me to have a driver's license.
So in order to get a driver's license, I had to take a driving course, which annoyed me because I believed that I knew how to drive.
So instead of just taking a standard driving course, I took an acrobatic driving course.
And I learned how to put the car into various kinds of spins and drive on two wheels.
Do you think all of that got you started down this path somehow?
It could have.
But later on in my life, I actually saved somebody's life when they pulled out in front of me in 1975 across three lanes, saw me too close to avoid hitting them.
And slammed on their brakes because they got frightened.
Entirely the wrong thing.
And so, I was driving a very heavy 1973 Chevrolet Caprice with bias ply tires.
There was no way I could avoid hitting the driver right in the driver door without some very fast action.
And so, because of the instincts that I developed with the acrobatic driving course, I threw the car into a sideways spin so that I was facing the direction that that car was facing.
And just as I was about to hit the car, I gunned the gas, gunned the engine, and spun the car so that it spun 180 degrees.
And what happened is, the center of gravity of my car went through his car.
But because of the spin, no part of my car touched his car.
Now I take it that once all vehicles, virtually all vehicles, were autonomous, that these sorts of things and accident avoidance wouldn't really generally be a problem because they'd all be reacting and would they interact with each other?
Now there's a good one for you.
In other words, Wouldn't it be possible, for example, for vehicles within a certain small radius to be in contact with each other?
Right.
We do the same thing right now with laptop computers in 802.11.
That's right.
It'd be another layered piece of protection if all the other cars around you, vehicles, were in connection with each other.
The likelihood then of an accident goes down by another factor of a thousand or something.
As you say, the The transition period, where not all cars have this kind of technology, is the period where the most dramatic kind of things will occur.
When everybody has it and the cars actually talk to each other, then there's no problem.
But as this continues, aren't the insurance companies going to suffer horribly?
Well, I don't know.
I think they kind of like it when people don't get into accidents.
Do you think that?
Well, I guess, when I said suffer horribly, I meant insurance rates will have to plummet.
I mean, if you think you'd get a lower insurance rate for an airbag or a seatbelt or something, imagine what you'd get for almost 99.9% accident-free probability.
My God, they'd have to drop the rates right into the basement!
Well, I see that being a strong incentive for people to put the technology in their cars because the insurance rate will go down for those cars.
But that would mean the insurance companies wouldn't make a lot of money.
Well, let's talk about that for a moment.
Let's say... And they're big enemies to have, Ron.
Let's say that the insurance companies are charging you $150 a month for your insurance.
Okay.
And you have an accident rate that means that, according to their actuarial tables, they're going to have to pay out An average of $125 over the next five years.
So they're making a $25 a month profit.
Let's just throw that up in the air.
Now, let's say that you put this technology on board and they can only charge you $30 a month because that's all the market will bear.
But wait!
Since they're only spending a dollar a month in average payouts, they actually are making more money.
I think making more money with less revenue is a good thing.
You could be right.
And here I was thinking they were going to have you murdered.
Not likely.
No, maybe not.
Maybe not.
Plus then, of course, they could plot it all and all the lives that would be saved.
They've got some very clever mathematicians over there.
With the efficiency of a brain considering the best route to get there, the savings in gas alone equals oil.
Would be astronomical, wouldn't it?
I would believe that we can probably save about seven to eight percent, is what our analysis says.
Because it would always take the fastest, most direct route.
And it would also, because it's in communications with other vehicles, it would know which routes are clogged and not moving, and would be able to choose alternates.
And all of this in the drive to create an autonomous I don't see that taking away the fun of driving.
Do you think that it would be widely, quickly, with great excitement, accepted?
In other words, the one big worry I had was that it would take the fun out of driving.
Frankly, a lot of people just love to drive and it is fun.
A lot of times it's a blast and it wouldn't take that away.
I don't see that taking away the fun of driving.
I think it would take away the drudgery of driving.
There are times when if I have to obey the speed limits and I have to go through the
construction zones between Los Angeles and, or say, Barstow and Las Vegas, which seems
to be perpetually under construction, I would just rather tune out.
I mean, why drive that when I could be sitting on my laptop and, you know, writing programs or downloading entertainment or, you know, viewing the news or something that's far more interesting than I call it the Baker Triangle out there.
There you go.
It's where things go wrong with cars almost supernaturally.
All right, hold on, Ron.
Trailer for sale or rent.
Rooms to let for fifty cents.
No phone, no pool, no pets.
Ain't got no cigarettes, ah, but Two hours of pushin' broom buys a eight-by-twelve four-bedroom.
I'm a man of means, by no means king of the road.
The first time caller line is area code 775-727-1222.
To talk with Art Bell from east of the Rockies, call toll free at 800-825-5033.
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Alright, here we go.
All right, here we go.
What about the cops?
I mean, now, that's no small matter.
I mean, little towns have traditionally received a lot of their income from having their officers sit out there on the edge of town right behind a billboard and just slapping people one after another after another after another.
They'd starve to death!
Because I think your vehicle would observe the speed limit, right?
Yes, in places where it had to do that, yes.
Like where there were signs that said 55 miles an hour, 45, 35, 25, school zone, 15, whatever.
It would observe those.
Yes.
It would put the cops out of business.
In fact, one of the things that both the DARPA race and the Open Challenge, the IRRF Open Challenge, do is they have speed limits on certain segments that you won't know about in advance Until just before the race.
So it's got to.
I'll be damned.
So it's got to.
Is somebody like the Discovery Channel going to cover this and be perfect for them?
They actually are planning to cover the DARPA race and we're hoping that they'll also cover the International Robot Racing Federation race.
Hot diggity dog!
Because I certainly would love to see it.
I think that Monster Garage has already planned at least one episode around it.
And I think Discovery Channel is planning a six-part series, I've been told.
I don't have that directly from them yet.
They do some incredible stuff!
Well, we know that The BBC, NHK, which is Japan's big network, ABC, CBS, and NBC, and Fox, are all going to be covering the DARPA race.
So it's not just a, like a NASCAR event is really big, but it's covered typically by one channel, and there's a couple of news bites that go to the rest of the places.
This is going to be far larger coverage than that.
This seems to have struck a nerve with people.
I wonder, yes, it certainly has struck a nerve in me, and I'm trying to figure out what nerve.
In other words, what is it about this that's so completely intriguing?
I wonder.
Hmm.
You know, I wonder if I would like it, you know, having not just a smart car, but possibly a sentient car.
That's amazing to even think about.
All right, let's go to the phones.
Wildcard Line, you're on the air with Ron MadMaxink.
Art, thanks for taking my call.
This is Mike 1200, WAI, San Antonio.
Uh, yes, sir.
Uh, my question for Ron is, could these cars be controlled remotely?
Say, maybe GPS?
And if so, then this has got to be one of the scariest, uh, shows that I think I've heard, Art.
Really?
Oh, yeah.
Uh, you mean, could some external force take control of your car?
Like, say, The police.
Well, let's say, oh, there's an area that they, quote-unquote, whoever they are, these people that- We know they're out there.
You know what I'm saying.
Don't want us in a certain area.
Could these cars be kept out of there?
And the other thing, the part that makes this the scariest to me is the movement of goods.
Ron said it in the beginning.
Our government, which anybody that drives professionally knows that our government really I don't care anything about our safety.
That's, uh, that's, well, I was upset about that.
But he said in the very beginning that this was to move medical supplies, medical goods and supplies.
Okay?
So if this can be done in a car, our government is obviously wanting to do this in trucks.
So now we have a situation where these trucks are transporting goods back and forth across the country, and if you control the movement I'm good.
You control everything.
All right.
Well, that's a pretty good rundown there, Ron.
I mean, that's probably from the truck driver's perspective.
I got a feeling the guy might have been a trucker.
But, you know, it's a good question.
Right now, there is a mate, one of my friends, one of my very good friends is a trucker.
Does nothing but go back and forth and back and forth across the country, the whole country.
That's how he makes his living.
Now, autonomous trucks, they take the truck driver's jobs away.
Well, let's take the first part of his question, which was, can anybody else take control of your vehicle?
And the answer would be no.
As I said before, I'm a strong proponent of individual liberty and free choice, and I believe that you still need to be able to control your belongings.
I would definitely oppose anything that would allow anybody else to take control of your vehicle.
But can't you understand how certain agencies of the government would give their right arm to be able to control all vehicles one way or the other?
Oh, he's right.
What a gigantic control that would be!
Well, let's talk about the control issue.
Is it really control if the vehicle chooses to honor the fact that an emergency is occurring in a certain area and drive a different route to avoid that area especially if it can communicate to its driver why it's doing what it's doing.
Well let me give you a real scary scenario, alright?
Your vehicle receives a communication that you just blew a court date and there was just a bench warrant issued for you!
And so your vehicle says, uh-huh, it locks all your doors so you can't get out, and starts toward the police station to turn your butt in.
I would never, ever become a part of that.
How do you figure?
Well, we have... It's the choice thing.
Your ethics would prevent you from programming that in, and if somebody came to you and said, we want that, we want that in this car.
I'm sorry, it's not going to happen.
Not going to do it, huh?
I'd sooner not go into that business than to deliver something like that.
Now, they have ways of dealing with that, which they do already.
The job is not to put the police out of work.
The job is to let them do their job, and if there is a bench warrant, Then they can go to your house and serve it just like they do now.
It just seems like so much new technology.
Most new technology, Ron, honestly just runs into the Fourth Amendment doing 90 miles an hour broadside.
Well, each new technology has been a two-edged sword.
For example, in the 70s, a lot of people with the foresight to see the impact That computers would have on people's lives.
Believed that computers would be used by governments to control everybody.
That's right.
Well, maybe some of that has occurred.
Maybe.
But on the other hand, it's been a much larger tool for freedom.
And the internet is a classic example.
That, I guess, I must agree with for now.
And I believe that in any new technology and robotics and sentience, if it ever can arrive, if it's possible, Will be a two-edged sword.
And there will be some cases where people use it for evil things or for control.
And there will be many more where it's used to enhance freedom and enhance your capabilities.
Let's talk about enhancing freedom for a second, Ron.
Right now we have a lot of young courageous men and women fighting in Iraq.
in Afghanistan and around the world and war on terror why wouldn't it be incredibly worth our while to have fighting vehicles that could be perhaps sentient perhaps just very very intelligent from a machine point of view either way smart enough to without our men and women Who could remain well behind lines, go in and fight wars, robot wars, I don't care, against people!
Let's look at what happened in Iraq.
The biggest scare that we had was when a supply line with people drivers went astray and was captured.
That's a true statement.
Yes, that's where Jessica... That's right.
And the rest of her team.
Yes.
And that was a very unpleasant experience and a very scary experience for all of us and especially for her.
Sure.
That never would have happened if they had already been able to perform their mandate to have one-third of their vehicles be autonomous, the supply vehicles.
In order to have this autonomous supply vehicle that you talk about, and to have it be effective in a place or a war zone like Iraq, Your autonomous vehicle would have to make choices about who to shoot at, and kill, and maybe even what other vehicle to blow off the face of the earth.
It would make choices about how to avoid those things.
But yes, but, in defense of itself, in the end, faced with an Iraqi vehicle, with Iraqi guys in it, it might have to blow it off the face of the earth.
It might have to outrun it.
You're telling me, now come on now, we're talking a war here.
You kill the enemy in war.
So you're... I can see you want to stay away from that, don't you?
You don't want to put a gun on that thing.
I don't want to put a gun on that thing.
But you see, you'd have to put a gun on it.
In that situation, you'd have to put a gun on it.
You know, DARPA may buy the technology from somebody.
They may put a gun on it.
But they have stated That their purpose is for supply line vehicles.
And for the delivery of supplies and medicines.
And I have to go with that.
And at this point, I think anybody in their right mind would not want to put guns on that.
Unless there were some very compelling reasons.
And they would have to be... Christine with attitude.
They would.
But at this point, I mean, look at the lives we'd have saved.
This machine has the capability to do reckoning by landmarks completely.
So it can drive and know where it's going and not make a wrong turn.
And it would not have gotten itself into the trouble that our human drivers did in that situation.
We may be getting to the root of why DARPA really dropped you.
It's maybe, you know, who knows.
It's your attitude.
Wildcard Line, you're on the air with Ron Wildman, I think, actually.
Yes, hello.
Hey Art.
Yes.
How are you doing?
It's a pleasure to speak to you.
Thank you.
Two questions for your guest and a quick comment.
Sure.
I am a truck driver and the last caller took a little bit of my thunder, but there is available now on trucks, and I've never personally driven one, with the collision avoidance software they have in some of the trucks.
I wonder if he's using some of that equipment in his work.
And also, I'd like to know how much longer we're going to have jobs, because it sounds like they're just going to get rid of us.
Well, there is that aspect of it, isn't there?
So, do you know anything about the current collision avoidance?
Let me go there real quickly for you.
First of all, I think that our stuff is going to be an order of magnitude past the current collision avoidance.
That's what he's worried about.
But the other thing is that And you touched on this in the last segment.
But basically, I expect acceptance to be very slow.
For example, for example, my caller?
Yes.
There will be a lot of occasions where a new technology takes time to be accepted and trusted.
And once it's trusted, what What will actually happen?
Well, you see, this man is a truck driver.
He's seeing it sneak up on him right now.
He just mentioned it.
Collision avoidance.
And they can even sometimes tell exactly where a truck is.
And all kinds of things are really invading a trucker's life.
And you're kind of drawing a road map here of... Aye yi yi.
Eventually, you know, no truck driver at all.
It probably...
will take a while to be accepted and will probably be a long while and when it does it will do it by bits and pieces and it will just take some of the drudgery away at first and then maybe you'll be able to sleep during long hauls.
Will all this happen before my caller dies?
Well, without putting on my, you know, predictive capabilities, you know, here, I just You know, I can't see into the future yet.
You're in a better position to call on this one than we are, though.
I mean, you're in development of this stuff, so how about it?
I believe it'll go into, in a gradual way, I'm looking at more capabilities in 5 and more in 10, and then this pervasive thing probably in 10 to 15.
Sounds, well, caller, I don't know how old you are, but sounds like maybe in your lifetime.
Yeah, well, it sounds like a lot closer than that, to be honest with you.
One more comment real quick.
If they can put a gun on it, they will put a gun on it.
You better believe that.
I see.
I agree with that.
Thanks a lot, Mark, for keeping us awake at night.
Take care, sir, and good luck.
Yeah, I mean, he's right.
You know he's right.
You're admirably, I don't know, on the peace road, obviously, Ron, and you get marks for that.
Man, they'd run over you like yesterday's garbage.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Ron Fink.
Hello.
Hello.
Hi.
Yes, good morning to both you gentlemen.
And to you, ma'am, where are you?
I'm in Florida.
All the way over in Florida.
Okay.
What I would like to know is how practical would his car be for someone who's blind?
Oh, my guess is real practical.
Yes, real practical.
That's one of the market segments we're looking at.
We're forming an alliance with somebody who already does enhanced mobility controls for vehicles right now as a marketing alliance for what we're planning.
So we see that people who are blind and people who are handicapped literally can have it handled for them and that would be great.
That's wonderful.
Imagine a whole new level of freedom that can be yours if you're impaired in any way.
You can still do whatever it is that you want that you can't do now.
I think that would be one of the ways that this enhances freedom.
A good example.
Boy, I certainly agree with that.
Right down the line, and for her of course, it would be the incredible amount of freedom that comes with Being able to go places.
Do you want to give out your email address?
You're welcome to if you do.
Do you have a website?
Have you written a book?
Let's hit that real quick.
We have rapidrobots.com.
If you go to www.rapidrobots.com, that will be our website.
All right.
And on the website is some of our sponsors, and we're very grateful to the help that we've received so far in this endeavor.
And also, please check out the International Robot Racing Federation, which is www.irrf.org.
All right.
And you can also link to it from my site.
That will talk about the races and about the concept of using competition as a way to advance technology faster.
Any robot photographs on there?
Well, we're adding to it every day.
Alright.
So, feel free to check back often.
www.rapidrobots.com.
All together.
R-A-P-I-D-R-O-B-O-T-S.
Yes.
Rapid Robots.
And the other one is I-R-R-F dot org.
Well, you know, you're the kind of guy who's going to be fun to have back on again, because I guess this field is really moving fast, right?
In more ways than one.
And this race that's coming up is going to be at, in other words, it's going to be for these robot vehicles to get from point A to point B a long distance through, oh, just open land.
They're going to have to run the, what do you call it?
The word just slipped my brain.
They are going to have to run the gauntlet.
It will be a challenge.
And it will probably be videoed.
Any idea when the Discovery Channel might run such a thing?
Well, we're in Popular Science in the March issue.
We're also in the Journal of Automotive Engineering, also in March.
And we are in Wired.
Oh, and in Wired, too.
You made Wired, huh?
That's hot stuff.
And also, we talked about the Racing Federation there, in all three of those venues.
And we don't know exactly, but we're in contact with someone at the Nevada Film Commission who said that there's already some movies and documentaries planned to be filmed here in Nevada.
Then we will be watching for you, and it has been a pleasure having you on the program.
I'm very happy to be here.
A lot of fun.
We definitely should talk again.
All right.
Well, we shall.
Good night, Ron.
Good night, Art.
Right.
End of program, folks.
I'm sorry we're out of time.
What a blast it was, though.
Don't forget, you're going to want to take a moment and you're going to want to think very hard about your prediction that I'm going to be taking coming up on the 28th or the 31st.
That's kind of a big deal every year.
But for tonight, this night anyway, And from the high deserts, I'm Art Bell.
Good night!
Midnight in the desert Shooting stars across the sky This magical journey Will take us on a ride Filled with a longing Searching for the truth Will we make it till tomorrow?
Will the sun shine on you?
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