Life saving Dabbler contest details at the end of this article!

With a Ph.D in robotics, most will go on to dedicate their lives to the betterment of this science, offering up all the modern conveniences that you and I enjoy. Daniel H. Wilson had something more practical in mind however. As Hollywood has proven time and again, the fate of the human species hangs by a thread. You wash down the seemingly implausible plot lines with popcorn and coke, but take a moment and really think about it. What WILL you do when the aliens descend? Or for that matter when ninjas attack, or hordes of zombies begin their massacre. And don’t forget the vampires, werewolves, and even great white sharks.

In his first book, Wilson prepared us for the inevitable robot invasion with How To Survive a Robot Uprising (c’mon, if cars can park themselves now, is it really that far fetched?). While readers digested its critical content, he wrote Where’s My Jetpack? which outlined all the scientific advancements that were promised but failed to materialize, from flying cars, to ray guns and moon colonies, and even teleportation. He then obviously came to the realization that none of this mattered if the human race itself was in danger.

As our Dr. Wilson rationalizes in his latest book How to Build a Robot Army, “We all know that robots are bloodthirsty machines bent on wreaking havoc with humankind…[but] unlike our robotic creations, [aliens, ninjas, zombies and great white sharks] cannot be remote-controlled, reprogrammed, or shut down. Vampires lust for our blood, werewolves stalk our children, and rogue asteroids hurtle toward our defenseless planet. To survive, we must look beyond the human-killing potential of robots and see them for what they really are: humankind’s most powerful ally in the war against horror.”

Let’s face it, we can’t even defend ourselves from evil paper cuts. But “In stark contrast to puny people,” Wilson goes on to say, “robots are highly specialized metallic superheroes capable of delivering diesel-powered scissor kicks and launching rocket fists at any time. A well-balanced combination of robots, humans, and slightly robotic humans constitutes our best defense – no matter what monstrous foes those caffeine-addled Hollywood screenwriters concoct.”

So, “leading scientists in academia and industry contributed advice on every section of this book, whether it be mobilizing a team of metal-sheathed robots against zombies, staking out a werewolf-infested forest with auto-guns, or sending an autonomous underwater vehicle to hunt a man-killing great white shark. In this book you will learn about every aspect of assembling and deploying a devastating robot horde. From weaponizing robotic household appliances to controlling swarms of metallic minions, you will receive step-by-step instructions for selecting appropriate robots, training them to fight, and commanding them in battle. Read this book, gather an army of mechanical mercenaries, and join the fight to protect the human way of life.”

‘Nuf said. I don’t know about you, but I want to be around long enough to teleport to my fully-automated, self-contained skyscraper city in the germ-free utopia of tomorrow. And to that end, I offer you the chance to win a copy of this must-have one-of-a-kind guide to the survival of the human species.

For your chance to win a copy of Dr. Daniel H. Wilson’s How to Build a Robot Army, email me with your answer to the following question:

What would wreak more havoc, aliens or exponentially multipliable zombies? Why?

Contest ends Friday, January 11th, 2008. Creative responses will be published!