Masurigi
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Posted - 2010.07.13 22:54:00 -
[2]
 Originally by: Alexeph Stoekai
Originally by: Masurigi
Nowadays humans in space are considered a risk. They are also expensive to maintain.. Delicate fragile things... Take up ALLOT of space and add pointless mass. What job can they do that a capsuleer and a few machines can't?
It's funny. Every single point you make against human crew I can flip around.
Highly autonomous machine systems are considered a risk in the EVE universe, after the whole rogue drone debacle. Not only is there a ban against AI development and a significant widespread taboo surrounding advanced robotics in many parts of space, but an entirely automated ship would be vulnerable to things that human-crewed ships aren't - debilitating computer viruses for example.
A mechanised system designed to replace an entire crew would be ludicrously expensive to maintain. While it's true that it's technically possible to construct automated vessels (there's an example of a science vessel fitted like that in The Empyrean Age), the sheer complexity of the systems, and the astronomical costs of building and servicing a construction like that makes human crews a far better choice from a purely economical standpoint.
Delicate fragile things? Are you saying that a machine crew replacement would be less fragile? As pointed out above, machines have special weaknesses of their own, not to mention the cost that would be involved in creating maintenance devices that are as flexible, resourceful, intelligent, loyal, and durable as humans. The cost of making the inside of the hull habitable is negligible to the cost of developing, constructing and equipping a legion of self-repairing, reactive, creative, intelligent machines.
Humans take up pointless mass? Do you think the machines will be smaller? First of all you will instantly lose the space saved on quarters and food storage by having to house additional power nodes, repair and construction bases, AI relays, etc. And if all that stuff didn't take up all the space you saved, the machines built to replace humans will indubitably be much larger than their fleshy counterparts. And even if you manage to phase out three whole gunnery teams with a single machine that's technically smaller than the combined mass of the humans, you will still need repair machines and maintenance bots to attend to the hunk of metal to figure out what PC Load Letter means.
What job can machines do that a capsuleer and a couple of humans can't (cheaper)?
Clearly if you look at module prices its not that expensive to use technology. Same with drone price an if you consider it would be manufactured into a ship (would be cheaper still) and under the full control of the capsuleer as other drones i don't see a problem in maintaining a few drones to repair. They wouldn't be "autonomous" I am 100% sure that they could do the job more efficient then humans.
I would like to point out that for example most if not all stations use MEDICAL robots instead of real life doctors. And its not only (probably) more affordable to use it it can do the job as efficient as the real ones... Mind you i am assuming that but still.
If machines can do the gentle work of a surgeon (keeping in mind that every human is indeed slightly different so it has to be a complicated machine to work on a biological machine such as us) then why wouldn't they be able to do mechanics and maintenance with the help of the capsuleers mind at command?
Having a crew seems inefficient and a waste of human resources. And what i mean by a waste of space is that to keep a crew you need a living quarters, entertainment, dining area, sleeping area, storage for food and water, systems for cleaning up air and waste... Those would take a allot of space an create allot of useless mass.
Humans are also extremely unreliable. Morale is a factor, endurance is a factor,sickness is a factor,skill is a factor. Machines are less inventive but then as i said you have a capsuleer controling them.
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