The CDC is prepared for a zombie apocalypse. But the more realistic (still infinitesimal) threat may come from robots. In the video below, Daniel H. Wilson, author of Robopocalypse and Future Tense contributor, offers a quick-and-dirty guide to recognizing and responding to a robot apocalypse. How will we know a machine uprising is taking place? “You want to know what a robot’s designed for. And if it’s doing something outside the scope of what it’s made to do, you should be very suspicious,” Wilson says. Another “dead giveaway”: spinning buzzsaws as arms. Wilson should know: He has a Ph.D. in robotics from Carnegie Mellon.
Last week, Wilson discussed the prospect of humans marrying robots in Slate. So what would be scarier—a machine revolt or robots in the bedroom? Or perhaps they’ll use the latter to accomplish the former. They’re sneaky like that.
