A world similar to the 2011 “Real Steel” movie is not as far as we thought it could be. In fact, China’s People Liberation Army has shown off a military robot that can mimic a soldier’s combat moves in real time.
However, unlike the movie where Charlie Kenton trains a discarded robot to the top of the boxing ring, the Chinese government only wanted to show off how the robot could capture every attack maneuver of a person thanks to a lightweight motion-sensing device they had.
This is a continuous effort of the Chinese government to develop autonomous combat systems for modern warfare; there’s even a video out there of a humanoid robot that was a martial arts pro, and even kicked the company’s CEO. That said, unlike this Chinese company which recorded several takes of this fight, China’s People Liberation Army hasn’t released footage of this robot in combat.
The event was for military eyes only
This showcase of the combat robot took place during the 12th International Army Cadets Week. This event, which happened in Nanjing, in the eastern province of Jiangsu, was held at the Army Engineering University of the People’s Liberation Army, and had cadets from eight PLA academies and more than 30 cadets from military academies in 13 countries.
A Moroccan cadet who tested the robot said it still has room for improvement, but AI applied to battlefield assault and reconnaissance could greatly improve the robot’s capabilities. (In addition to that, the exhibition actually had a mine-clearing robot using AI visual recognition to find buried explosives.)
Companies like XPENG are coming up with customizable humanoid robots, and Neura wants to bring humanoid robots to our everyday lives, but there’s also an ever growing desire to use robots for wars and demonstrations of strength. Whether we’re going to live in a “Real Steel”-like world from now on, is yet to be seen, but it might be what China’s People’s Liberation Army is envisioning.
