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Comment by lostlogin | Hacker News Reader

They need that tech tanks use to keep their gun level, that multi axis gyroscope thing. This is the sort of tech crossover that could make military spending more acceptable.

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To illustrate just how capable that tech was even back in 1986, look at 1:45 of this Bundeswehr video demonstrating a Leopard tank carry a keg of beer and not lose a drop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2mcO6l-0cY

It’s actually a stein of beer, carried on the end of the barrel of the tank’s main gun, for others that like me did not understand. It’s cool.

His cellphone uses GPS and connects to other computers over the internet using TCP/IP, but I guess you're waiting on pizza gyroscopes to see any valuable tech crossover relative to this project.

Imagine the things achieved if the money being spent wasn't focused on military applications.

I imagine military applications for "know where something is in world" and "have network of computers communicate in a damage resistant way" are no more costly to develop than non-military applications.

Hard to say. Would the research even have occurred if there weren't military applications? At the end of the day, there are only a few ways to get politicians to fund research:

* War (physics, chemistry, computer science, psychology)

* Fortune-telling (astronomy, economics, political science)

* Immortality (medicine, fine art, humanities)

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