Have you ever been pulled over by a police officer? It can be a nerve-wracking experience, especially if you don’t know why you’re being stopped. But what if the police officer was actually a robot? In this video, Reuben Brewer, Senior Robotics Research Engineer in SRI International’s Advanced Technologies and Sciences Department (ATSD), demonstrates a traffic stop police robot.
This police robot is designed to help law enforcement officers make traffic stops safely and efficiently. It’s impressive to see how far robotics technology has come. This police robot is just one example of how robots are being used to help humans in their everyday lives. What do you think about this concept, though?
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In the video description, Brewer writes, “I’m here to show you my robot for making traffic stops safer for both police officers and motorists. Every year 16,915,140 drivers are pulled over in traffic, 195,078 motorists have physical force used on them, 4,488 officers are assaulted, 89 of those motorists die, and 11 of those officers die. With such dangerous interactions between people, maybe it’s time to send a robot in between them, one that can’t hurt or be hurt. This prototype is a work in progress that I started in my garage and now work on at SRI International. It’s only part of the solution, but I hope one day it could save lives.”
Is this the future, or would you maybe be far more alienated by a robot than a human police officer doing the traffic stop? Or should we possibly try to solve the root cause of why traffic stops are dangerous for the police rather than deploying a robotic police force? Regardless of that, the demonstration video is certainly interesting to watch.
YouTube: GoBetween Robotics – A traffic stop robot to keep everyone safe (SRI International)
Photo credit: The feature image is a still frame of the video and has been done by Reuben Brewer from SRI International.
