Evil cockroaches

[Doctor Q]

Many people already think cockroaches are evil. After all, they show up by surprise, scurry around where you don't want them, regularly frighten people, and can't easily be exterminated.

When I saw this quote in a tech news story, it got me thinking.

"The use of insects as platforms for small robots has an incredible number of useful applications, from search and rescue to national defense," says [Abhishek] Dutta, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering who specializes in control system optimization and cyber-physical systems.​

How are cockroaches going to help with national defense? If cockroaches turned into remote-controller robots can be used for DE-fense, why not OF-fense?

It's bad enough when cockroaches race across your kitchen floor, but what if they were actually programmed to do something really bad? How might they be used by one country to attack another?

 

[OLDCODGER]

Damnation Ally, from 1977, used this as a theme, after the world is knocked off its axis.

 

[Doctor Q]

Damnation Ally, from 1977, used this as a theme, after the world is knocked off its axis.

Are cockroaches what you see moving on the floor in a couple of frames of the trailer?

 

[OLDCODGER]

Are cockroaches what you see moving on the floor in a couple of frames of the trailer?

Yes. If I recall correctly, the idea was that only cockroaches would survive a worldwide catastrophe.

 

[Doctor Q]

The Discovery Channel reported that cockroaches can survive radiation doses that are 10 times higher than human-lethal doses. But if we humans are all incinerated, then we won't have to worry about the evil-programmed cockroaches that are still around. In any case, for the purpose of this thread, we're talking about roaches that coexist with us.

Scientists can already steer cockroaches remotely, as this article reported, but how exactly does that help in a national conflict?

 

[OLDCODGER]

The Discovery Channel reported that cockroaches can survive radiation doses that are 10 times higher than human-lethal doses. But if we humans are all incinerated, then we won't have to worry about the evil-programmed cockroaches that are still around. In any case, for the purpose of this thread, we're talking about roaches that coexist with us.

Scientists can already steer cockroaches remotely, as this article reported, but how exactly does that help in a national conflict?

I would think that an international conflict would be a more suitable arena for the manipulation of cockroaches.
Cockroaches are universally loathed/feared - just imagine if enough of them were directed towards a particular location/country!

I, for one, would NOT welcome our new overlords!

 

[velocityg4]

The Discovery Channel reported that cockroaches can survive radiation doses that are 10 times higher than human-lethal doses. But if we humans are all incinerated, then we won't have to worry about the evil-programmed cockroaches that are still around. In any case, for the purpose of this thread, we're talking about roaches that coexist with us.

Scientists can already steer cockroaches remotely, as this article reported, but how exactly does that help in a national conflict?

They could be used for espionage. As in "The Fifth Element". I wish the poster didn't ruin the scene by looping the video in slow motion. That is the best I found in a quick search.

 

[Tigger11]

The X-Files episode from Season 3, War of the Coprophages, has much of these elements.
-Tig

 

[ejb190]

Think about this. Fit a roach with a GPS and maneuver it into a shipment of equipment/supplies/food and see where it ends up. Now you know where the new base/lab/storage facility is. Track enough cockroaches and you can start to understand your enemy's logistics and command structure.

Or, perhaps, use the cockroaches as a carrier for a biological weapon? Maybe train/program the roaches to do something specific - like chew through only the pink wire (and make sure you don't use any pink wires!) or chew holes in every left sock they can find.

 

[posguy99]

Yes. If I recall correctly, the idea was that only cockroaches would survive a worldwide catastrophe.

And mutate into man-eating cockroaches that eat everything organic in Salt Lake City. What they're eating in the meantime until the characters from the movie arrive is not discussed.

 

[Doctor Q]

Maybe you could use them to "bug" another country's embassy. If their security people sweep the rooms for bugs, the cockroaches would scurry away to hide, escaping detection.

 

[satcomer]

The X-Files episode from Season 3, War of the Coprophages, has much of these elements.
-Tig

No. it was Jose Chungs From OuterSpace!

 

[decafjava]

Cockroaches are the necessary evil. In my opinion, they are the oldest population on our planet and have survived for billions of years.

Nearly 4 year old thread, congratulations.

Not really.

 

[jkcerda]

are we talking politics here now?...........................***ducks for cover**********

 

[Doctor Q]

It turns out that termites are a type of cockroach in the scientific taxonomy. So we have more cockroaches in the neighborhood that we thought. Ugh!

And check out the cockroaches (family "Blattidae") at OneZoom, a wonderful site for studying the connections between species. Click around to see how animals and other life forms are related to each other.

 

[DaveFromCampbelltown]

I have always felt that Blatta was a lovely, onomatopoeic name for a species that goes "Blatt!!!" when you step on one at 3am...

 

[VulchR]

Not just cockroaches have been proposed 'search and rescue' (spying) but rats with neural interfaces as well... Most of this kind of research was funded by DARPA.

 

[Huntn]

Not just cockroaches have been proposed 'search and rescue' (spying) but rats with neural interfaces as well... Most of this kind of research was funded by DARPA.

Watch Wanted (2008).