Time to worry.

[pasithea]

Want to take any bets on the first use for this device?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=482560&in_page_id=1965

And remember kids. If no one can see it and it doesn't leave any marks, it's not torture, is it?

Comments

[sci.livejournal.com]

I'm curious if the degree of pain is at all variable. Surely they have to crank up the power to do the half-mile projection. What if someone close-by walks in front of the beam while aimed at someone at maximum range? Or could you perhaps leave it set at a low intensity and broad-focus outside a government building, making people just subconsciously uncomfortable or ache enough to discourage them away without being obvious they're being shepherded?

I also can't help but wonder how long it will be until someone in the public domain reverse-engineers the "simple technology". It seems feasible to create a battery-run device able to do a brief flash-bulb or short duration burst of the right frequency of radiation. Same goes for the optical puke-sticks that've been developed.

[dv-girl.livejournal.com]

Actually, this technology has been around for years. It's called thermolysis electrolisys. Kills hair, also hurts like all f***.

More seriously though. I remember a book I checked out from the library repeatedly that had schematics for how to build a microwave pain device (as well as a lot of other cool gadgets)

That was late 80s though and all of them required very expensive custom chips and I suspect the results would have been less than impressive and the power consumption nearly unusable. But it's been known you could do this for a long time.

This stuff is around. It's going to get used.. A lot. :/

On the marginally more positive side, maybe there are some potential uses for it that aren't full of suck. With a 1/2 mile range, you could use it to drive insects an animals from crops without using pesticides. Or at least maybe it'd finally be a working solution to keeping pigeons off your door jam. Surely torturing pigeons is okay. :/

Umm.. Hmm. Okay. How about this. For all the poor bastards coming back from Iraq minus limbs, you could set up sensors in their prosthetics so that they could trigger this kind of thing and warn them when they're touching something too hot or too cold.

Also... AS qdot suggests.... Where there is pain, there's also pleasure.... What if it could be re-tuned to be a full-body orgasm machine?

[sci.livejournal.com]

Problem with that last one is there any nerve can report pain. Pain is just damage. Pleasure is a much more complex combination. If they can isolate different nerve receptor types, instead of (what I suspect) is simply overloading the most common one, then yes perhaps an orgasmatron is possible by correctly modulating stimulation of the right types based on biometric feedback.
If it can be focused on set nerve types.
Otherwise it'd be no more pleasurable than having someone bite you in the clit.

Still, maybe a combination of this ray for heat, ultrasonics for tactile, magnetic fields for mind effects..

Interesting question: Which would people be more outraged at? A pain ray or an orgasm ray? Pain's well accepted in public, but pleasure is far more personal. I suspect people at large would be more upset about the idea of a gun that incapacitated you by sudden uncontrollable orgasm. Being hurt in public is fine, but being pleasured is just embaracing..?

And would the beam work on insects and birds? I'm sure in a past article they said the ray only works on exposed skin, and birds have feathers. No idea if flys can feel pain in the same way.

[yetanotherbob.livejournal.com]

No problem! Crank it up, and hey, free meal. McDonalds could save so much money with this. Mmm. McNuggets...

[yetanotherbob.livejournal.com]

Oooh. Unintended consequences. I wonder who we contact to point out flaws. Course, it'll do no good, but...

Metal shielding doesn't even have to be solid, a la microwave oven doors. Of course, you know what they say about putting metal in the microwave...

It'd be "perfect" for improvised passive bombs. Place a bunch of these on buildings or cars, and as soon as the metal gets a spark from the phaser, boom. No batteries needed. This is the best reason for the US not to use it militarily.

Wouldn't the heat of the microwave fry crops as well? As it is, there's easier ways to get pigeons off of things, called bird spikes plastic shapes that are awkward to sit on, and can deter without causing pain.

Also also: It looks like it uses a lot of energy (Note the cooling fan on the side). So it wouldn't be useful for prosthetics, but those could use a direct electrode more easily anyways.

I also remember, which is odd because I don't read comics, the use of lethal microwave guns in Punisher 2099.

Well, at least for sadomasochists, it'd need no retuning. But then again, they'd probably use clamps or something.

Let's face it, this thing has no beneficial value as is. The only possible nonevil use would be to leverage the R&D of cheap microwave manufacture to make cheaper kitchen appliances and more efficient water heaters. But given defense companies...

Actually, ooh, hey. A great way to completely nuke, if you'll excuse the phrase, a CD beyond shredding.