I hate reruns, don't you?
I posted this the other day on the other site, but then I buried it under a bunch of other shit, so I thought I'd post it here. This is one of the few things I've written in a while that I actually liked, so it seemed like kind of a shame to go to waste. So here it is. Enjoy the sloppy seconds.
I'm not going to lie to you people. Blogging is not easy. It's why I sometimes disappear for weeks on end, because I'm holed away in a burrow somewhere, desperately trying to think of something to talk about. But every now and then, the skies open up, and I am given a gift from the gods: a shiny, wonderful topic that begs, no, demands, no, threatens the well being of myself and my loved ones if I don't write about it. Today is one of those days, my lovelies. And I guarantee, after you read this next sentence, there's no way you'll be able to resist the siren's song of my blog today. Ready? Here it comes.
Mesa police want to add monkey to SWAT team
Associated Press
Apr. 16, 2005 03:10 PM
MESA, Ariz. - The Mesa Police Department is looking to add some primal instinct to its SWAT team. And to do that, it's looking to a monkey. (Maybe the best opening statement for a news article in, like, forever.)
"Everybody laughs about it until they really start thinking about it," said Mesa Officer Sean Truelove, who builds and operates tactical robots for the suburban Phoenix SWAT team. "It would change the way we do business." (You know, it's true, I laughed about it at first. But then, after I started thinking about it, started really thinking about it, I laughed even harder. Go on, just run the idea through your head for a little while. It just gets funnier and funnier.)
Truelove is spearheading the department's request to purchase and train a capuchin monkey, considered the second smartest primate to the chimpanzee. The department is seeking about $100,000 in federal grant money to put the idea to use in Mesa SWAT operations. (See, they sneak it in right there, the capuchin monkey is only the SECOND smartest primate. Why are we settling for second best? This is America, is it not? Get the damn chimpanzee. Better yet, get yourself one of those big ass gorillas, train him to hold a grenade launcher, and Unleash, The. Beast. Who is with me on this? Come on!!)
The monkey, which costs $15,000, is what Truelove envisions as the ultimate SWAT reconnaissance tool. (Don't you wish this guy was your friendly local neighborhood police officer? First of all, he's got a name straight out of a detective novel - Officer Truelove. Second, he builds robots for a living, which not a lot of people can claim without being full of crap. And then, you really just gotta love a guy who is so secure with his job that he can go in front of the public at large and say, "Hey, you know what, I need $15,000. It's for a monkey.")
Since 1979, capuchin monkeys have been trained to be companions for people who are quadriplegics by performing daily tasks, such as serving food, opening and closing doors, turning lights on and off, retrieving objects and brushing hair. (Because that's pretty much what SWAT agents do too, right? Opening and closing doors, turning lights on and off, retrieving objects from perps and then brushing their hair. Those are the kinds of things you want your specially-trained police monkey to be able to do.)
Truelove hopes the same training could prepare a monkey for special-ops intelligence. (I, in my lifetime, have daydreamed about all the different kinds of things I could do if I had a monkey for a friend. I could drive around town with him, take him out for ice cream, go for walks, maybe even train him to fight me with a little sword and shield. But, for all the thinking I've been doing, the one thing that I had never considered was special-ops intelligence. In the future, though, I'm going to keep that in mind, just in case my monkey permit goes through. God willing.)
Weighing only 3 to 8 pounds with tiny humanlike hands and puzzle-solving skills, Truelove said it could unlock doors, search buildings and find suicide victims on command. Dressed in a Kevlar vest, video camera and two-way radio, the small monkey would be able to get into places no officer or robot could go. (Well, first of all, I'm having a lot of fun picturing a kevlar vest small enough to fit on a monkey. But I just don't think it's fair to ask out brave men in blue to have to make the choice between using a monkey or a robot. Personally, I'd use both. That way, first the perp sees the monkey coming, then the robot, and then you can swoop in and make the arrest while the perps are attempting to figure out just what in the hell is going on.)
It has been a little over a year since Truelove filed a grant proposal with the U.S. Department of Defense under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and he is still waiting for word. (Can't imagine why it's taking so long. This should be top priority, you'd think.)
If the grant goes through, Truelove plans on learning how to train the monkey himself and keeping the sociable monkey at home, just like a K-9 officer would. He projects that $85,000 in grant money would outfit the monkey with gear and pay for veterinarian care, food and habitat for three years. (See, again, you just gotta admire this guy's gumption. If you walked into work tomorrow and told your boss that you can't possibly do your job anymore unless you had a monkey to help you, he'd probably laugh at you, and rightfully so. But then, by some miracle, if he stopped to really think about it and then actually agreed with your dumb ass, you'd probably stop right there, mission accomplished, right? Not this guy. Not only does he need a monkey to do his job for him, he wants to be able to take him home at night, just to hang out and stuff. And on top of it, he wants someone else to pick up the tab for feeding and clothing the little bastard. Goddammit, if this works out for this guy, I want the same damn deal. I really do.)
-END-
I really have no idea how I feel about this. Do you ever just feel like, when people talk about living in the real world, that there's really no such thing? It would seem to me that things like this would confirm that theory. How can I trust reality ever again when we're now training monkeys to be cops?
These are strange times we live in, my friends. But they told us, right from the beginning, if we're going to fight terrorism, we need to start thinking outside the box. And if any of you has a better idea than training monkeys, I'd like to hear it. So go grab your wallets. These super intelligent monkeys don't just pay for themselves, you know.
-Erik Hagen
/If for some reason this plan doesn't ever get off the ground, I think Disney should still make a movie about it. I would so pay to see something like this.
TheExpatriateAct@gmail.com
I'm not going to lie to you people. Blogging is not easy. It's why I sometimes disappear for weeks on end, because I'm holed away in a burrow somewhere, desperately trying to think of something to talk about. But every now and then, the skies open up, and I am given a gift from the gods: a shiny, wonderful topic that begs, no, demands, no, threatens the well being of myself and my loved ones if I don't write about it. Today is one of those days, my lovelies. And I guarantee, after you read this next sentence, there's no way you'll be able to resist the siren's song of my blog today. Ready? Here it comes.
Mesa police want to add monkey to SWAT team
Associated Press
Apr. 16, 2005 03:10 PM
MESA, Ariz. - The Mesa Police Department is looking to add some primal instinct to its SWAT team. And to do that, it's looking to a monkey. (Maybe the best opening statement for a news article in, like, forever.)
"Everybody laughs about it until they really start thinking about it," said Mesa Officer Sean Truelove, who builds and operates tactical robots for the suburban Phoenix SWAT team. "It would change the way we do business." (You know, it's true, I laughed about it at first. But then, after I started thinking about it, started really thinking about it, I laughed even harder. Go on, just run the idea through your head for a little while. It just gets funnier and funnier.)
Truelove is spearheading the department's request to purchase and train a capuchin monkey, considered the second smartest primate to the chimpanzee. The department is seeking about $100,000 in federal grant money to put the idea to use in Mesa SWAT operations. (See, they sneak it in right there, the capuchin monkey is only the SECOND smartest primate. Why are we settling for second best? This is America, is it not? Get the damn chimpanzee. Better yet, get yourself one of those big ass gorillas, train him to hold a grenade launcher, and Unleash, The. Beast. Who is with me on this? Come on!!)
The monkey, which costs $15,000, is what Truelove envisions as the ultimate SWAT reconnaissance tool. (Don't you wish this guy was your friendly local neighborhood police officer? First of all, he's got a name straight out of a detective novel - Officer Truelove. Second, he builds robots for a living, which not a lot of people can claim without being full of crap. And then, you really just gotta love a guy who is so secure with his job that he can go in front of the public at large and say, "Hey, you know what, I need $15,000. It's for a monkey.")
Since 1979, capuchin monkeys have been trained to be companions for people who are quadriplegics by performing daily tasks, such as serving food, opening and closing doors, turning lights on and off, retrieving objects and brushing hair. (Because that's pretty much what SWAT agents do too, right? Opening and closing doors, turning lights on and off, retrieving objects from perps and then brushing their hair. Those are the kinds of things you want your specially-trained police monkey to be able to do.)
Truelove hopes the same training could prepare a monkey for special-ops intelligence. (I, in my lifetime, have daydreamed about all the different kinds of things I could do if I had a monkey for a friend. I could drive around town with him, take him out for ice cream, go for walks, maybe even train him to fight me with a little sword and shield. But, for all the thinking I've been doing, the one thing that I had never considered was special-ops intelligence. In the future, though, I'm going to keep that in mind, just in case my monkey permit goes through. God willing.)
Weighing only 3 to 8 pounds with tiny humanlike hands and puzzle-solving skills, Truelove said it could unlock doors, search buildings and find suicide victims on command. Dressed in a Kevlar vest, video camera and two-way radio, the small monkey would be able to get into places no officer or robot could go. (Well, first of all, I'm having a lot of fun picturing a kevlar vest small enough to fit on a monkey. But I just don't think it's fair to ask out brave men in blue to have to make the choice between using a monkey or a robot. Personally, I'd use both. That way, first the perp sees the monkey coming, then the robot, and then you can swoop in and make the arrest while the perps are attempting to figure out just what in the hell is going on.)
It has been a little over a year since Truelove filed a grant proposal with the U.S. Department of Defense under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and he is still waiting for word. (Can't imagine why it's taking so long. This should be top priority, you'd think.)
If the grant goes through, Truelove plans on learning how to train the monkey himself and keeping the sociable monkey at home, just like a K-9 officer would. He projects that $85,000 in grant money would outfit the monkey with gear and pay for veterinarian care, food and habitat for three years. (See, again, you just gotta admire this guy's gumption. If you walked into work tomorrow and told your boss that you can't possibly do your job anymore unless you had a monkey to help you, he'd probably laugh at you, and rightfully so. But then, by some miracle, if he stopped to really think about it and then actually agreed with your dumb ass, you'd probably stop right there, mission accomplished, right? Not this guy. Not only does he need a monkey to do his job for him, he wants to be able to take him home at night, just to hang out and stuff. And on top of it, he wants someone else to pick up the tab for feeding and clothing the little bastard. Goddammit, if this works out for this guy, I want the same damn deal. I really do.)
-END-
I really have no idea how I feel about this. Do you ever just feel like, when people talk about living in the real world, that there's really no such thing? It would seem to me that things like this would confirm that theory. How can I trust reality ever again when we're now training monkeys to be cops?
These are strange times we live in, my friends. But they told us, right from the beginning, if we're going to fight terrorism, we need to start thinking outside the box. And if any of you has a better idea than training monkeys, I'd like to hear it. So go grab your wallets. These super intelligent monkeys don't just pay for themselves, you know.
-Erik Hagen
/If for some reason this plan doesn't ever get off the ground, I think Disney should still make a movie about it. I would so pay to see something like this.
TheExpatriateAct@gmail.com
posted by Erik Hagen at 7:39 PM
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