SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “HJL”. Lethal autonomous weapons are a reality today. We already have the technology and some are leaning towards these as the next weapons. Slaughterbots or Skynet could be closer than you realize.
Slaughterbots
Reader G.P. sent in this video on Slaughterbots. It is fictitious, of course, but the principle is sound. Do we really want Artificial Intelligence making a life or death decision for humans? While all of the technology used in the video can be used for good, it can also be used for bad. You cannot program ethics into artificial intelligence.
Parental Rights
A proposed constitutional amendment for parental rights has been introduced into both the House and the Senate. This proposed amendment would protect the right of parents to direct the upbringing, education, and care of their children, including the right to homeschool. The supporting organization, ParentalRights.org is asking for help, both financial and in urging your representatives to support such an amendment. They are looking for grassroots support as they ramp up and increase their public reach and prepare for the House and Senate committees.
Police DNA Requests
Both 23andMe and Ancestry have confirmed that any DNA information that they may have can be disclosed to law enforcement if they have a warrant. Both companies report that they do notify potential customers of the risks before they accept them as customers. 23andMe has confirmed that DNA has been requested at least five times, but that they have not turned over any information yet due to warrant issues. Ancestry has confirmed that they have complied with a warrant in 2014 to identify a customer based on a DNA sample. It should be noted that both companies allow you to delete your DNA results. Thanks to reader KAA for the link.
Water Supply Contamination
We are all familiar with Flint, Michigan and the heavy metal contamination issues that have plagued their water supply. Reader H.L. sent in this article profiling reports from the CDC that show over 3800 water supplies in the U.S. that have contamination levels at least twice as high as Flint. Close to half of those listed had contamination levels of lead that were 400% higher than Flint. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that it could cost upwards of $1 trillion dollars to overhaul these systems. Considering that Flint (who doesn’t even rank among the worst offenders) is still waiting for clean water even after all of the media coverage, it is unlikely that help will be coming soon for the other contaminated water system.
Rifle Barrel from Rebar
While perusing YouTube videos on firearms related topics, I was surprised at how many videos there were to make your own firearms. Some videos were crude with the results little better than slam fire zip guns and some were high quality firearms with everything in between. One in particular caught my eye though. He has taken a piece of 7/8” rebar and created a rifle barrel out of it. While he did use tooling such as a lathe and milling machine, there was nothing “precision” about the manufacture and yet he ended up with a usable, if not unique, rifle barrel.
Saline Bag Shortage
As an EMT, I’ve seen a shortage in Saline since about 2014. When we order supplies, there is often a wait of up to six weeks on delivery as suppliers work through the backlog of orders, but this year it’s even worse. Reader P.S. sent in this article showing the the shortage has reached dangerous levels after the hurricane season this year. Smaller hospitals are unable to do rehydration therapies and are sending patients to the larger hospitals for such treatment and oncology departments are struggling to have enough to use for chemotherapy patients.
Reader M.M. reported to us that Facebook no longer allows you to remove posts from your timeline. You can hide them, but you can’t remove them. We actually think that this is a good idea as it makes you well aware of what Facebook’s policy has been for a very long time. They have never removed your posts from their servers, even though you had that “option”. The posts have always just been hidden. Bear in mind that they also keylog anything composed in their edit boxes as well. Just because you didn’t post a comment doesn’t mean that they don’t have that comment if you composed it in their editor.
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Please send your news tips to HJL. (Either via e-mail of via ourContact form.) These are often especially relevant, because they come from folks who watch news that is important to them. Due to their diligence and focus, we benefit from fresh “on target” news. We often “get the scoop” on news that is most likely ignored (or reported late) by mainstream American news outlets. Thanks!
There is no shortage of saline for iv. The government has lowered the reimbursement price to the point where no one will bother to make it. The idiots win again.
Excellent factoid about the federales interfering with saline prices and market forces.
Under every pile of manure, there’s a government pony waiting to be found.
Makes you wonder if getting a DNA sample from a transient and sending that in to 23andMe wouldn’t be such a bad idea for yourself…
Were you in the military from 1996 onwards? So sorry, the Clinton Administration started DNA typing military members in that time-frame. If you had “the swab”, then your DNA profile has been searched against countless crimes. Without your knowledge or consent.
With due respect to those trying to push this, I have a question. What makes you think that the same people who ignore the Constitution for the United States of America on a daily basis will comply with an amendment to that document? More importantly, an amendment would also have the effect of saying that we gave control of education to the government in the Constitution.
No control was delegated under the Constitution.
An update on Facebook… https://venturebeat.com/2017/11/17/facebook-removes-delete-post-option-from-the-desktop-web-version/
They have since pulled this change, for now…
Re: Slaugterbots: Do we really want Artificial Intelligence making a life or death decision for humans? – It’s already started happening with self-driving cars, and even some of the advanced ‘safety’ features on some current cars. Imagine you were driving your car down a city street and saw a terrorist pull out a rifle and start shooting into a crowd. You immediately turn your car towards him and accelerate to take him out, but at the last minute the car ‘senses’ a ‘pedestrian’ and applies the brakes. That’s an extreme example, but you can probably think of many others.
A test of dropping a swarm of over 100+ microbots:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqK0dzfqsqo
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/11/18/wwii-veteran-calls-for-help-and-dies-as-nurses-laugh-video-shows.html
I believe that the Slaughterbots are a very real threat. Far cheaper than almost any other tactical weapon and easier than most tactical weapons to create and deploy. My fear is this could catch us off guard and our ability to defend against it would be like when the Polish Army showed up on horseback to fight against the German tanks. I hope our government is actively looking into these both as a potential weapon and how we can defend against it.
Oh so very, very scary! Imagine grenades that can fly like flocks of birds with swarm technology. Then deploy with thermal sensing to connect to masses running around 98.6 degrees. It scares the cr-p out of me. Nothing very complicated and the technology already is on the shelf.
A rather sad statement of America when a constitutional amendment is proposed so that parents can parent…
Unless there is language within the proposed amendment that specifically blocks the supreme court from reinterpreting the original intent of the amendment, and that also blocks the states courts from doing the same thing, don’t waste your time. It would be better to propose amendments to the constitutions of the several states with language that blocks the state supreme courts from reinterpreting the original intent of those amendments.
There is always going to be some scumbag politician or some scumbag lawyer, prosecutor, or judge that will do everything in their power to seize parenting rights from parents and turn them over the government.
I’m with Donald Greene: “A rather sad statement of America when a constitutional amendment is proposed so that parents can parent…”
States rights matter!!!!
On saline, use large animal veterinary supplies. Gallon bags of saline.
On slaughterbots, the military has been working on cluster munitions with guiding sensors for quite some time. Not quite AI, but close enough.
Constitutional Ammendment – People seem to forget, or never knew in the first place, that the neither the Constitution nor the Bill of Rights BESTOWS a right on anyone. The language in them specifically states that our existing rights shall not be infringed upon.
Although I agree with the sentiment on several issues, it is a dangerous thing to start putting amendments in that define marriage or specify certain rights. If those amendments are repealed, then the “right” goes away. It also sets the precedent that the government has authority in a area that it doesn’t (or isn’t supposed to, anyway).
Of course, as a commenter said above, when the Constitution is blatantly ignored and defied without any repercussions, what difference does adding another amendment to it make anyway?