Seen here practicing its pews , an unmanned robotic death & destruction copter went rogue while flying around Washington DC . I suspect it was coming to my old apartment. Thank God I never forwarded my mail! A software error, combined with an unfortunate user action, led to a US military robot helicopter - developed from a manned version and capable of carrying a fearsome arsenal of weapons - straying into restricted airspace near Washington DC, according to reports. Losses of communications between unmanned aircraft and ground operators are a routine event, but seldom have serious consequences. Robot planes and choppers lacking instructions from their human masters will normally circle where they are when comms go down, and control is almost always restored shortly thereafter… The difference here is that the MQ-8 failed to follow its built-in failure protocol, instead continuing on course. Unmanned aircraft are generally restricted to operations in special military-controlled airspace and are forbidden to enter areas governed by normal civil rules. Did you read that? It failed to follow its built-in failure protocol. Try to explain that, robot-apocalypse naysayers! It’s coming. And when it does, oh boy, when it does . I’m gonna shit bricks! Hopefully gold ones . ROBOT KILL-CHOPPER GOES ROGUE above Washington DC! [theregister] (who may or may not have learned they know about headline writing from yours truly) Thanks to Tracy, spotisfocus, Mikey D., alan, Tareek, Chris, Mesnard, Matt and APOCALYPSE PAUL, who would have shot that beast out of the sky and made a laptop out of its guts. You, uh, sure that’s safe?

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DEFCON 1! — We Have A Situation!: Robotic Death-Chopper Goes Rogue Over DC

Because even God shines his starlight favorably on me for my birthday, the Perseid meteor shower will reach its peak tonight, possibly signaling the apocalypse . Did I mention Mars, Venus, Saturn and the crescent moon will all be clustered together as well? We’re as good as dead. Suck it 2012, you don’t have shit on my 2010 birthday! Across the Northern Hemisphere, the best time to watch the Perseid meteor shower will be tonight through the pre-dawn hours local time Friday, regardless of where you live. Weather permitting, patient skywatchers could see a shooting star every minute or so. Meanwhile, Venus, Mars and Saturn are clustered in the evening sky and will be joined tonight and Friday by the graceful crescent moon. Anyone with clear skies can easily spot the foursome looming above the western horizon as soon as darkness falls. While the planets and our moon are all very far apart in space, they appear lined up this week thanks to a special circumstance of orbital mechanics. The outer planets, Mars and Saturn, take much longer to go around the sun than the inner planet Venus. Venus “laps” the outer planets frequently, and it never strays far from the sun from our vantage point. Now I’m not suggesting you all walk out of work right now and start birthday partying with me until the Meteor Shower of the Apocalypse arrives, but you and I both know it’s the right thing to do. Seriously — how do you want to spend your final hours: working for the man OR GETTING BELLIGERENT WITH THE GW AND SKIPPING OUT ON OUR TAB? Balls are gross in your court. Spectacular Meteor Shower and Rare Planet Alignment Coincide [yahoonews]

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Star Gazing!: Meteor Shower Peaks Tonight

Wonderful news: apparently my only remaining love in life might be slowly killing me. That’s right — box-springs may act as giant radiation-spewing antennas, filling our bodies with the nasty while we sleep . And all this from trying to figure out why breast cancer is 10% more likely to appear in the left boobie than the right. GOD, JUST TAKE ME NOW! *eying margarita on nightstand* Whoa whoa whoa, not so fast big guy — I’ve been saved. The research, carried out by Hallberg Independent Research and the Karolinska Institute, both in Sweden, attempts to correlate the fact that most people tend to sleep on their right side and that the length of a box spring mattress in America is exactly the right length to make it act as an amplifier for FM and TV waves. “Thus, as we sleep on our coil-spring mattresses, we are in effect sleeping on an antenna that amplifies the intensity of the broadcast FM/TV radiation,” writes Scientific American. “Asleep on these antennas, our bodies are exposed to the amplified electromagnetic radiation for a third of our life spans.” The radiation would be the strongest almost a meter above the surface of the box spring, which would mean that the side of your body that you’re not sleeping on would get hit the hardest. In most cases, that’d be your left. Sounds pretty convincing, doesn’t it? Too bad it’s all fake research. I’ve got two words for you: Tempur-Pedic conspiracy . Kidding, I’m not really one of those crazy conspiracy theorists (It’s those asshats over at Sleep Number and I know it!). Great, even our beds could be causing cancer [dvice] and Your Boxspring Could Be Acting as a Gigantic, Cancer-Causing Radiation Antenna [gizmodo]

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Of Course, The One Thing I Love Is Killing Me: Beds May Emit Raditation, Cause Cancer

This is a video documenting the location and country responsible for all 2,053 known nuclear explosions between 1945-1998. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? If you answered, “Jesus, how are we all not dead ?” you are! You know the Ruskies were experimenting with blowing up the earth’s core and destroying the planet, right? Because I didn’t just make that up. It came to me in a dream. The same one where I had sex with a lava monster! Although the map and graphics are almost comically low-res, the minimalist presentation is so effective you can’t look away. Every explosion produces a musical chime, and every time a new nation goes nuclear, it gets a different note. We were particularly struck by the Cold War musical duel between the U.S. and U.S.S.R., as each responds to the other’s nuclear testing, resulting in a darkly impressive light show on the map. Neat idea. So neat I’ve been inspired to make a world map with the chronology of my sexual experiences from 1995-2010. Hold on to your hats, folks, you’re about to see some real fireworks! Idaho, 2004: looked at another man’s wiener while peeing. Hit it for the long-ass video (and a sped-up Youtube version), but feel free to skip around.

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Video Shows Location/Country Responsible For All Nuclear Explosions From 1948-1998

Note: Video is after the jump because I’d prefer all the shitted-pants on the second page for easier cleanup. Q : What’s cooler than an autonomous quadrocopter that can fly through windows and perch on vertical surfaces? A : Everything, including drowning. We don’t know whether we should be terrified or overjoyed. We’ve just come across a video demo from the University of Pennsylvania’s GRASP Lab that shows an autonomous quadrotor helicopter performing “precise aggressive maneuvers.” You’ve got to watch the video to see just how amazingly this thing moves, it’s 100% terrifying. And speaking of terrifying: my face in the mirror when I woke up this morning. Joking — I’M THE FAIREST BITCH THIS SIDE OF FAIRYTALE LAND. Suck it, Snow White! … … Haha, what do you mean, “after all the dwarfs”? Hit it for the aerial acrobatics.

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Autonomous Quadrocopter Can Fly Through Windows, Perch, Murder You In Your Sleep

Before a major news outlet misspelled Large Hadron Collider . Thankfully, it was the Telegraph and not a really respectable news source like Geekologie. Because boy would I have been red in the face ! No, no I wouldn’t have been. I would have worn that shit like a badge . A badge of awesome. Now collide those wieners! The Typo We’ve Been Waiting For [gizmodo] Thanks to Liz, who doesn’t even want to know what happens when two giant blimpies collide. Magic, Liz, magic.

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It Was Only A Matter Of Time….

I don’t want to ruin the premise of this little video for you but basically the infamous Star Wars word crawl from the beginning of all the movies starts falling to earth and the Enterprise has to come save us. Woops . I’m not good at keeping secrets either. Youtube Thanks to bowzee, who may or may not be Bowser’s feminine brother.

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We’re All Gonna Die!: Star Wars Vs. Star Trek

Okay so maybe the asteroid isn’t actually earth bound, but it could be. You see, nobody can agree on how serious a threat the rock poses. I say laser the shit out of it. Then laser all the little pieces. Then blast me in the eyes. If I can’t see the end of the world I don’t wanna see anything! Russia’s space agency chief said Wednesday a spacecraft may be dispatched to knock a large asteroid off course and reduce the chances of earth impact, even though U.S. scientists say such a scenario is unlikely. When the 270-meter (885-foot) asteroid was first discovered in 2004, astronomers estimated its chances of smashing into Earth in its first flyby, in 2029, at 1-in-37. Further studies have ruled out the possibility of an impact in 2029, when the asteroid is expected to come no closer than 18,300 miles (29,450 kilometers) from Earth’s surface, but they indicated a small possibility of a hit on subsequent encounters. NASA had put the chances that Apophis could hit Earth in 2036 as 1-in-45,000. In October, after researchers recalculated the asteroid’s path, the agency changed its estimate to 1-in-250,000. What is this, football? Why do the odds keep changing? Because this shit’s all fun and games until the day the asteroid’s supposed to hit and the odds drop to 1-in-0.5. Then what? We all bone till we burn up, that’s what. *high-five* Going out like the dinosaurs! Russia may send spacecraft to knock away asteroid [yahoonews]

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Russia To Blow Up Earth-Bound Asteroid

This is a video of a bunch of different robotic hands showing how dexterous they are at bouncing balls , gripping things, throwing things, catching things and a bunch of other fun stuff robots shouldn’t be allowed to do. I mean, what is this, robot gym class? Next thing you know they’re gonna be whipping your ass with a wet towel in the locker room. WHICH IS ONLY FUN WHEN TWO GROWN MEN DO IT. Am I right guys? Love that game. Youtube Thanks to Chris and Aroinak, who once shot a bot in Reno and didn’t even stick around. Way to go guys, there could have been more.

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Robotic Arms Have Come A Long Way. A Long, Much More Deadly Way (Hold Me)

How would you like to wake up to this guy staring at you? You wouldn’t, would you? Okay, how about the guy with the phone? I give him a maybe. Anyway, some scientists (the smart ones) fear that robot intelligence is going too far and we must do something to stop them before they stop (read: kill ) us. Impressed and alarmed by advances in artificial intelligence, a group of computer scientists is debating whether there should be limits on research that might lead to loss of human control over computer-based systems that carry a growing share of society’s workload, from waging war to chatting with customers on the phone. [They] generally discounted the possibility of highly centralized superintelligences and the idea that intelligence might spring spontaneously from the Internet. But they agreed that robots that can kill autonomously are either already here or will be soon . That’s right, AUTONOMOUS KILLER ROBOTS. You remember Twiki from Buck Rogers? He was one. Bidi-bidi-bidi! Thanks to joe, Red, Daniel, Carmen, jabberw0ck, Rogue Cheddar, Retroprofile, Sarah, Princess Padme’s Masturbation Fantasy and Patrick, who all help me fight the good fight. Fight first, pizza party second.

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Scientists Fear Robots Are Getting Too Smart