In a army(or any military) humans can have qualities that act as flaws in a military. Disregarding emotions, lets say that you had an android, similar to any other droid soldier in popular sci fiction, carrying orders for human commanders. Why make them in any way, physically, human-like at all? A transition period? Sentimental design team? Rule of cool, to appeal to the top brass? Why?
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$\begingroup$ The reason you'd make them human-like is if your weapon designers were totally unimaginative. If they couldn't fly you'd lose for sure. $\endgroup$– MitchCommented Dec 25, 2021 at 8:02
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$\begingroup$ The possible answers are too much dependent on world context. World context that we lack. That's surely why you have issues figuring out why androids are humanoids ^^. It's part of the reason I voted to close for opin-onion-based. Since you don't seem to know what you are looking for, you don't either have constraints to know what you are looking for or a way to properly scale answers, hence it's hard to give any appropriate answer :/. $\endgroup$– Tortliena - inactiveCommented Dec 28, 2021 at 10:42
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7 Answers
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Your androids are infiltrators - superhuman combat automatons wrapped in human flesh, designed to slip into enemy lines (for instance, by posing as a refugee) in order to assassinate leadership figures and destroy critical infrastructure.
They can't do this without being humanoid, and the reason androids are used instead of humans is because androids can be (a) mass-produced and (b) sent on one-way suicide missions without any ethical qualms.
A pre-existing fictional example of such an android:
answered Dec 24, 2021 at 2:03
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Because wars are fought over places people are:
Fundamentally, humans fight over places humans are. If you have human commanders, they are fighting human wars. They conquer cities and factories and space stations and submerged sea bases. All these places are places humans live. Humans are clever, troublesome creatures, and you could certainly just ELIMINATE them all together from the world. But that's a different question.
Those same places are adapted to the human form. Doors fit androids, equipment interfaces with android hands. Vehicles are designed to be operated by androids. Humanoid robots will be able to use the vast quantities of STUFF designed for human uses to carry out their needs. Otherwise, the robotic army needs to repurpose the whole human infrastructure to its own needs. Again, unless you plan to get rid of humans all together, that is problematic.
Those robots will need to interface with humans in an understandable way. Humans can relate to other humans, but they will know how to interact with androids. While my wife might get swayed to fall in love with her smartphone, I doubt it will win the hearts and minds of the populous.
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The android soldiers were drafted.
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2020-03-09-the-education-of-an-android-teacher
The android soldiers were not always soldiers. A lot of them were nursing home attendants, made to be humanlike and have human capabilities. Some androids were teachers, some were police.
When war broke out, unforeseen technical issues (and defensive tactics) made a lot of the modern war tech much less useful than had been anticipated. There was an acute need for actual soldiers but a scarcity of humans fit to be soldiers. The androids were pressed into service and fitted out with weapons and equipment from a generation previous.
Soldier programming was added atop whatever prior programming they had. On interacting with the soldierbots it does not take long to figure out what they used to do.
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$\begingroup$ "A lot of them were nursing home attendants, made to be humanlike and have human capabilities. Some androids were teachers, some were police." Some were...other things, too, I imagine... $\endgroup$ Commented Dec 24, 2021 at 20:46
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You can use them as decoy for protecting high poppies you can't afford being killed.
Instead of sending the original admiral Yamamoto on an inspection tour to Bouganville and having him killed, with the consequent impact on the proceeding of the war, you can send $n$ copies of Yamamoto on all the bases you want, wasting the efforts of the counterintelligence in chasing them down and not risking the good and original one.
answered Dec 24, 2021 at 12:07
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Survival and Esprit de Corps
They tried to send teams of androids on advanced missions in enemy territory. The first wave of androids had a primitive set of rules to decide whether to attack an obstacle or turn around it. But when they decided to attack they stubbornly carried on the attack until they were all destroyed and they could not complete their mission.
The second wave had a primitive survival instinct encoded in their behaviour, but in the most difficult situations they abandoned their mates and the teams quickly became too small to complete their mission.
The third wave had a more sophisticated set on instincts coded in their behavior. They tried to solve a complex balance between the survival of the single, the survival of the team and the goal they had to achieve. In the most difficult situation the balance was so difficult to solve that a routine making random choices had to kick in, but overall they were extremely effective as a team.
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It's not about the killing
Sure, armies have traditionally "fought" each other, when fighting is necessary for their purpose, but it is not the purpose in and of itself.
For a lot of the things that armies are used for, soldiers with humanoid form are very advantageous. Occupation, policing, interdiction, etc... These are about imposing your will or rules on people. They're all about communicating with people, which can be a lot more effective in human form, and operating where people live, which can also be a lot more effective in human form.
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Because of military bureaucracy.
The androids were designed to use existing materials that were made by real people who had jobs who voted for politicians. Cars, trucks, guns, armor, boots, lots of things. This prevented extra expense redesigning these things for a new shape, and gave lots of jobs and work to the people who manufactured these goods, and got the politicians re-elected.
