Could AI Robots with Lasers Make Herbicides – and Farm Workers – Obsolete?
August 4th, 2024Via: Los Angeles Times:
The smell of burnt vegetation wafted through a lettuce field here one recent summer morning as nearly 200 farmers, academics and engineers gathered to witness the future of automated agriculture.
Thirteen hulking machines with names like “Weed Spider” and “Mantis” crawled through rows of romaine. One used artificial intelligence cameras to scan the crops and spray them with herbicides. Another zapped weeds with lasers. Yet another deployed robotic arms to cultivate and pick through the foliage.
…
The massive machine uses deep-learning AI models to scan fields and identify weeds in real time before vaporizing them with more than 30 high-powered lasers, all while protecting the crop. The company says it reduces farming costs, increases yields and improves soil health while avoiding the need for chemical herbicides.
“This is the future,” Mahoney said as the LaserWeeder moved through the lettuce, leaving small wisps of smoke in its wake.
What an excellent excuse for burning up acres of food crops! “Must have been a bug in the AI’s program that set the whole field on fire.” It’s mini-DEWs for the farmers to suicide themselves with, taking their customers along with them.
Wonder if the Greenies and climate scammers will have anything to say about all that smoke being added to the air? Or will breathing it be good for us, since weeds have lots of vitamins and minerals that cooking releases?
Now they just need one that will zap the harmful bugs.