Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot Com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.
Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas. In
Speaker 1: our last episode, the Science of Tattooing, The Sammy's the Tattoos,
Speaker 1: we discussed the history of the culture of tattoos a
Speaker 1: little bit kind of an overview, and then we broke
Speaker 1: down the science of getting that that symbol, that name,
Speaker 1: that deity, that dolphin put into your flesh in a
Speaker 1: this semi permanent way. Indeed, and we even talked about
Speaker 1: some of the more unusual tattooing practices, like having your
Speaker 1: medical condition tattooed on you. Um. We didn't talk about
Speaker 1: scleral tattooing. We did not, yeah, which is tattooing the
Speaker 1: whites of your eyes. Yeah, which is doable, not necessarily advised,
Speaker 1: but it is possible, just to show you just how
Speaker 1: how extreme your tattooing can go. Uh And and indeed,
Speaker 1: uh we also didn't get into some of the ways
Speaker 1: that individuals augment their tattoos, uh, such as by adding
Speaker 1: additional implants. We were looking at an example, uh of
Speaker 1: an individual who gave breast implants to his tattoo back
Speaker 1: in two thousand seven. Um, yeah, on his on his
Speaker 1: leg to be specific, mermaid. Yeah, yeah, or it was
Speaker 1: I can't tell when the picture was a mermaid or
Speaker 1: possibly just a cowgirl. Can I see again? Oh, you're right,
Speaker 1: it as a cowgirl. I don't know why I thought
Speaker 1: that was a mermaid with like a cowboy hat. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, there are a lot of mermaid tattoos, and
Speaker 1: essentially it's a mermaid tattoo. It's very much in that
Speaker 1: same genre. But yeah, he apparently decided it needs implants
Speaker 1: and uh apparently there's not a lot of specifics on
Speaker 1: what he used, but uh, Canadian body art enthusiast Lane
Speaker 1: Jensen had the implants done too in hants the chest
Speaker 1: of this particular emblem. So our topographical tattoo, if you will. Yeah. Now,
Speaker 1: we bring all of this up because as long as
Speaker 1: there have been humans with access to a needle in
Speaker 1: some dye, there have been tattoos. So the question now
Speaker 1: becomes what are some of the more cutting edge technologies
Speaker 1: available and what will the future hold, because in general,
Speaker 1: we're gonna keep getting them for the same reasons we
Speaker 1: thought we've always gotten tattoos. We want to express ourselves
Speaker 1: in darker areas. We want to dehumanize people. Hopefully we
Speaker 1: won't go as much to that route in the future,
Speaker 1: but who knows. Uh. We want to treat the illness
Speaker 1: illnesses so somehow improve the functioning of our bodies. And
Speaker 1: uh we see all of these energies in our in
Speaker 1: our future and emerging. Uh tattooing technology. Now, the maker
Speaker 1: movement has a foothold in tattoo technology. Parish design studio
Speaker 1: Appropriate Audiences combined a three D printer with a tattoo
Speaker 1: with needle to form an automated tattoo printer that can
Speaker 1: create tattoos. They adapted software produced by something or by
Speaker 1: a company called Autodesk to turn tattoo designs into digital
Speaker 1: files that can be downloaded to the machine. And then
Speaker 1: the user inserts his or her limb into the printer
Speaker 1: and the needle draws the design into their skin. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh, apparently the needle replaces the part of the
Speaker 1: printer that would usually extrude melted plastic to make objects interesting.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's very much in keeping with the origins
Speaker 1: of the tattoo gun itself, which was based on a
Speaker 1: believe Edison's model for the electric pencil type device. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the electric pen um And this is I mean, this
Speaker 1: is fairly nuanced for just being a hacked three D printer,
Speaker 1: because what they did is they made some bespoke three
Speaker 1: D printed parts to work with it, and then they
Speaker 1: have a sensor that reads the surface of the skin
Speaker 1: of the user, meaning that the needle can respond to
Speaker 1: changes in skin texture and the dimensions of the limb.
Speaker 1: So it makes me think, you know, who knows, this
Speaker 1: could be more of a d I O Y endeavor
Speaker 1: in the future with three D printers. I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm just looking beyond do it yourself. And as I
Speaker 1: say this, I certainly hope that the human tattoo artist
Speaker 1: never goes away, because I feel like it's a vital part.
Speaker 1: You know, it's the ritual, that's the thing, and you need.
Speaker 1: You don't want a machine, you want a high priest.
Speaker 1: It's taking care of your your semi religious ritual of
Speaker 1: pain and so that human touch. But maybe we little
Speaker 1: reach the top of the day when instead of a
Speaker 1: cigarette machine in the back of your local bar, there's
Speaker 1: a tattoo machine. And that would be the perfect place
Speaker 1: for it. You just go back there and you suddenly
Speaker 1: have an idea. Yes, I want the name of this
Speaker 1: individual I just met put into my skin. Yes I
Speaker 1: want that football team on my shin, and you just
Speaker 1: stick your arm or leg or what have you into
Speaker 1: the machine. It clamps down and then just prints that
Speaker 1: sucker right into your skin. Okay. The problem with that
Speaker 1: is that you would have a bunch of sort of
Speaker 1: well would you call like clip art designs available, So
Speaker 1: that will any tattoo place, So you're gonna have a
Speaker 1: lot of clip art available, although some tattoo artists will
Speaker 1: create their own designs, right, so it's not necessarily from
Speaker 1: the clip art available. So what I'm saying is that
Speaker 1: I think that the artistry there could be lost in
Speaker 1: a three D machine. Oh oh indeed, I mean unless
Speaker 1: you you're really looking far into the future and you're
Speaker 1: looking at at the possibilities of artificial intelligence being a
Speaker 1: part of that machine. Oh yeah, And if you want
Speaker 1: to look more into that, you should check out our
Speaker 1: episode on I think we titled it can Machines Be Creative? Yes,
Speaker 1: I will make sure to include a link to that
Speaker 1: podcast episode on the landing page for this episode at
Speaker 1: stuff to Blow your mind dot com. Now, as we
Speaker 1: discussed this, we're gonna inevitably hit on ideas that really
Speaker 1: resonate with sci fi fans out there. And I was
Speaker 1: trying to think of some really great examples of science
Speaker 1: fiction tattoos, and two came to mind. First, Uh, dr
Speaker 1: Amy Wong from Futurama, because she has several tattoos um
Speaker 1: that come up throughout the course of the show. But
Speaker 1: a particularly note, there's there's one episode where she has this, uh,
Speaker 1: really obscene tattoo, but we can't see it because our
Speaker 1: TVs in the past aka the current the modern age. Uh,
Speaker 1: we we don't have high enough deaf to see what's
Speaker 1: going on in this obscene tattoo. And uh and then
Speaker 1: there there seemed to be at least four talking tattoos
Speaker 1: that pop up throughout the course of the show, including
Speaker 1: a devil that on her shoulder that that says also
Speaker 1: sorts of obnoxious things. But it's essentially an animated tattoo,
Speaker 1: which actually kind of exists kind of in a kind
Speaker 1: of very sketchy sense. But but yeah, it's certainly something
Speaker 1: that is already on the minds of tattoo enthusiasts and
Speaker 1: uh and and and anyone that's looking into the future
Speaker 1: is like, what what else can we do with the
Speaker 1: tattooing medium? What can we do with our current and
Speaker 1: emerging technology to change the shape of what it does?
Speaker 1: Is um. Another example that comes to mind in Ian M.
Speaker 1: Bank's Surface Detail, which is one of his culture novels,
Speaker 1: which I've talked about those before, wonderful books. UM. In
Speaker 1: that particular book, there's a character who's covered with congenitally
Speaker 1: administered tattoos uh and it had there's a kind of
Speaker 1: a complex plot with her where she's essentially born into
Speaker 1: a kind of an indentured service kind of environment, and
Speaker 1: so she's kind of like tattooed at a genetic level
Speaker 1: to show that she property. But yeah, in the book,
Speaker 1: she eventually acquires this uh, this kind of nanotechnology uh
Speaker 1: thin layer that covers her body and it serves as
Speaker 1: like a space suit, but it also allows sort of
Speaker 1: like customized animated tattoos to pop up. Now it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's not under the skin, so it's not technically a tattoo,
Speaker 1: but it's very much in the in the spirit of
Speaker 1: augmenting your body with with high technology, which which kind
Speaker 1: of brings us back to now out and what we
Speaker 1: can do in terms of animated tattoos. In two thousand eleven,
Speaker 1: a Paris based tattoo artist who goes by the name
Speaker 1: of Carl K A R L like all initials, uh
Speaker 1: ink at QR code on a willing participant named Marco.
Speaker 1: I think you just we should say willing um. And
Speaker 1: what happens is that QR code When you put an
Speaker 1: iPhone over it, the phone plays an animated tattoo design
Speaker 1: of a top head hatted kind of character. Yeah, with
Speaker 1: a thin, long mustache, almost like the Monopoly dude. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's kind of a rudimentary idea of what an
Speaker 1: animated tattoo can be, because we think animated tattoo, that's
Speaker 1: like independently animated. But no, it has to interact with technology. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's that's really the I think the cool part
Speaker 1: about this particular tattoo is that it is a tattoo
Speaker 1: that interacts with technology. And we'll discuss some more examples
Speaker 1: of that as we move forward. Now, I would do
Speaker 1: want to point out that how stuff works. Do us
Speaker 1: have an article how animated tattoos? Work. There'll there will
Speaker 1: be a link to that on the landing page for
Speaker 1: this episode. But that one deals with a particular individual, uh,
Speaker 1: a pair of individuals, J. Shawn Singer and carl A.
Speaker 1: Pinter who back in two thousand six, we're working with
Speaker 1: the idea of a programmable subcutaneous visible implant, which is
Speaker 1: essentially an l c D under the skin like sin. Yeah, so,
Speaker 1: and there's like a control model power supply. The article
Speaker 1: goes into more depth about how this supposedly worked. Uh,
Speaker 1: but it's not something you can get at your local
Speaker 1: tattoo parliament, and it's very much uh some do it
Speaker 1: yourself cybernetic tinkering in the flesh. Um, it's interesting. It's
Speaker 1: not completely out of keeping with the idea of the tattoo,
Speaker 1: but it's uh, it's certainly a very crude example of
Speaker 1: where we may be going in the future and thinks novel, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like it's basically the do it yourself two thousand six
Speaker 1: version of that under the skin. Now. Um, the next
Speaker 1: example we're gonna bring up is based in biometric recognition. Okay,
Speaker 1: and we know what that is, right, That's been around
Speaker 1: for a while, this idea that you can plug information
Speaker 1: in you can identify people based on physical characteristics like fingerprints,
Speaker 1: the iris of an eye, or a face. Facebook facial
Speaker 1: recognition uses something similar and attempt to try to semi
Speaker 1: automate their photo tagging system. But we've got an upgrade
Speaker 1: to that, and it comes by way of Aneil Jane
Speaker 1: at Michigan State University, professor of computers. Yeah, back in
Speaker 1: two thousand he created an automatic image retrieval system whereby
Speaker 1: law enforcement agencies would be able to unmatch scars, marks,
Speaker 1: and of course tattoos to identify suspects and victims. H
Speaker 1: And as if you've ever seen a cop show, you
Speaker 1: know that like tattoos always come up. You know, are
Speaker 1: there any tattoos or just singuishing marks, right, that's always
Speaker 1: a key part of it and find somebody. So it
Speaker 1: makes sense that you'd want to uh incorporate that into
Speaker 1: your biometric information. And so this is the idea behind
Speaker 1: tattoo i D. And this identification tool would be then
Speaker 1: be made available to law enforcement, government, military agencies. And
Speaker 1: in fact, in two thousand ten, Michigan State University licensed
Speaker 1: tattoo i D technology to morphoe track the world's quote
Speaker 1: unquote top provider of biometric and identity management systems. So
Speaker 1: we see this not just as a sort of cutting
Speaker 1: edge technology, but a technology that's being adopted on a
Speaker 1: wide scale. Yeah, I mean it makes perfect sense. Right now,
Speaker 1: you have an individual with the distinguishing marked, distinguishing tattoo,
Speaker 1: you want that to be a part of your record keeping.
Speaker 1: So yeah, you want to bump that up against the database,
Speaker 1: right and see what comes out. And it turns out
Speaker 1: that it determines the suspect's identity with a really high
Speaker 1: accuracy rate. And while you know this identifying mark, whether
Speaker 1: it be a scar or tattoo, can't uniquely identify a person,
Speaker 1: that can help authorities narrow down the list of potential identities,
Speaker 1: and it can indicate membership in a gang, social and
Speaker 1: religious group, or a military unit. Of course, this wouldn't
Speaker 1: stop savvy criminals with means, right because even in a
Speaker 1: d I Y since we've seen criminals obscure their fingerprints
Speaker 1: by slicing them off, so obviously tattoo removal or you know,
Speaker 1: even covering up would change those marks are identifying marks. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you just change the tattoo every time you commit a crime,
Speaker 1: like the first time it's a rabbit, the second time
Speaker 1: it's a rabbit on a donkey. Then it's jousting with
Speaker 1: a with a windmill or something, you know, and just
Speaker 1: add some new element to it, and just and just
Speaker 1: keep the the tattoo I D system ever, you know,
Speaker 1: on its on its feet, trying to catch up with you.
Speaker 1: I hope interpoll isn't listening, right, because that's sort of
Speaker 1: your m O. Right, you just revealed it to the world.
Speaker 1: I know now they know, now they know. All right,
Speaker 1: we're gonna take a quick break, and when we come back,
Speaker 1: we will discuss more about the future in near future
Speaker 1: of crazy high tech tattooks. We're back in this uh
Speaker 1: this next entry. I guess we could say that the
Speaker 1: nineties rave scene helped to spawn it. Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: because you're if you're going to a rave of it's,
Speaker 1: particularly in the nineties, you know, what are you gonna encounter.
Speaker 1: You're gonna go into a room with some some hopefully
Speaker 1: really awesome electronic music going on, really fierce. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's likely going to be dark, except with some crazy
Speaker 1: lighting something glow sticks, glow sticks, perhaps some ultra violet
Speaker 1: lighting going on as well, and that ultraviolet light will
Speaker 1: be illuminating certain colors, certain tones, and really changing the
Speaker 1: the visual world that you're that you're taking part in.
Speaker 1: And if you have ultra violet die pumped into you
Speaker 1: into a tattoo, it will reveal itself under this black light. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you essentially have a black light tattoo that that under
Speaker 1: normal normals from stances doesn't even show up, is essentially invisible.
Speaker 1: But then when you enter the rave environment, you were
Speaker 1: a different person, not only because you took that ecstasy,
Speaker 1: but also because you have this tattoo. Indeed, now, um,
Speaker 1: it's not clear if using ultra violet ink poses any
Speaker 1: health risks. Um, so we should you know, throw that
Speaker 1: out there. Um. But it does kind of make some
Speaker 1: very cool tattoos, even cool. I saw one tattoo of
Speaker 1: Yoda poised for battle in regular light, but then you
Speaker 1: put the black light over him, and his eyes glow
Speaker 1: and you know he's his lightsaber is blue and menacing looking.
Speaker 1: I like I like it. I mean I like the
Speaker 1: idea of it because it's it's the idea that you
Speaker 1: could have a tattoo that that changes it's uh, it's
Speaker 1: essential form, depending them on your environment. And if you
Speaker 1: enter into an environment with black lights, such as a
Speaker 1: rave or a um, yeah, I guess a rave such
Speaker 1: as well, only a rave mainly mainly raves or puppet
Speaker 1: shows that use black live or ironically like some of
Speaker 1: these kids joints, you know, these jumpy houses. Goodness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you show up there and you just think, you know,
Speaker 1: you think you're just another mom and other dad taking
Speaker 1: your kid there to the bounce place, and then lo
Speaker 1: and behold the black lights reveal your your alternate persona. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there you go. Oops. Now we talked about radiation tattoos
Speaker 1: in the last podcast. This is the practice of inking
Speaker 1: for freckled sized dots in a configuration usually a square
Speaker 1: on a patch of skin, usually impressed cancer radiology, and
Speaker 1: that helps the radiologists to better line up the area
Speaker 1: to be treated. And we bring this up again because, um,
Speaker 1: having those tattoos, as discreet as they are for some people,
Speaker 1: can be troubling because it's a reminder of the cancer
Speaker 1: or this feeling that you know, the cancer come back
Speaker 1: and this you know, you know, a lot of magical
Speaker 1: thinking happens. Um as well, it should with something that
Speaker 1: is this weighty of a subject. Yeah, indeed, so I mean,
Speaker 1: you can just basically understand why someone in this situation
Speaker 1: might choose to have less permanent marks on their body
Speaker 1: if it were at all possible, and this style of
Speaker 1: tattooing makes that possible. You could get essentially an invisible
Speaker 1: tattoo that only shows up under black light. That when
Speaker 1: you're receiving the treatment, they use a black light to
Speaker 1: identify where the marks are so that they can they
Speaker 1: can aim everything correctly. But then the rest of the
Speaker 1: time it's not an issue. Yeah. Researchers based at the
Speaker 1: Royal Marston Hospital in London asked forty two brust cancer
Speaker 1: patients undergoing radiotherapy to rate how they felt about their
Speaker 1: body before the treatment, and then one month later and
Speaker 1: half the women were offered fluorescent tattoos, again only visible
Speaker 1: under the UV light, while the other half had conventional
Speaker 1: dark ink tattoos. And the researchers found that fifty of
Speaker 1: the women who had those fluorescent tattoos felt better about
Speaker 1: their bodies one month after treatment, compared to only four
Speaker 1: percent among those who have the traditional black dye tattoos. Interesting, alright,
Speaker 1: we're gonna take a quick break and when we get back,
Speaker 1: more future and more tattoos. So you probably want where
Speaker 1: do we go from here? We've already talked about a
Speaker 1: tattoo that it essentially is invisible, that only comes to
Speaker 1: life during a mid nineties rave. So so so what's
Speaker 1: next on the list? Well, how about Pharaoh magnetic ink
Speaker 1: in your tattoo? Yeah, because think about regular inc just
Speaker 1: sits so quietly deposited into those specialized cells called macro
Speaker 1: fishes and fibroblasts sitting in your dermis, just trapped there.
Speaker 1: But if you're ink was enriched with metallic compounds, your
Speaker 1: tattoo might tingle if say, your phone rings. Shall we explain? Yeah? Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean, well, you don't have to explain why someone
Speaker 1: would want this. Obviously, we all wish that our cell
Speaker 1: phones would actually have an even more bodily effect on us,
Speaker 1: that we would actually feel it in our bodies. Uh.
Speaker 1: I say this because I do have a hard time
Speaker 1: imagining why you would want that. Like the just yesterday
Speaker 1: I was working at a coffee shop and everybody who
Speaker 1: was a head their laptop on a single bar, and
Speaker 1: like multiple people had their cell phones out on the table.
Speaker 1: And so if if one person's cell phone would vibrate
Speaker 1: we'd all feel it, and we'd all have that momentary
Speaker 1: bodily reaction to a phone going off, and then you're wondering,
Speaker 1: who's trying to get in touch with me? Is it
Speaker 1: good news? Is it bad news? And you just go
Speaker 1: through all of that. So, yes, if you want that
Speaker 1: feeling to actually be a part of your anenemy on
Speaker 1: some level, then farromagnetic inc is is what you need
Speaker 1: to look into. Yeah. So once that ink is enriched
Speaker 1: with metallic compounds and sort of skin, it's demagnetized. But
Speaker 1: when the tattoo is healed, it's remagnetized without side magnets
Speaker 1: right exterior ones, and it becomes responsive to magnetic pulses,
Speaker 1: which theoretically can be emitted by a cell phone. Right.
Speaker 1: And Nokia submitted a patent for this in two thousand
Speaker 1: and twelve as part of of their haptic technology to
Speaker 1: interact with their products. And whether they intend to actually
Speaker 1: produce and market this technology or whether it was just
Speaker 1: sort of a pre emptive move to prevent others from
Speaker 1: developing the technology is not known. Um, I can't imagine
Speaker 1: a big corporation would be of the mindset. No, No,
Speaker 1: we don't want people to have this, so we getting
Speaker 1: I imagine it was more in line with people might
Speaker 1: want this eventually. So if they're going to do it,
Speaker 1: we're gonna make money off of it. Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: especially when you consider all the brain and body technological
Speaker 1: interfaces that are being developed already. Yeah, I mean, you
Speaker 1: know it as repugnant as the idea of my my
Speaker 1: phone reaching into my body is. As we inevitably merge
Speaker 1: with the machine, we we want it to be as
Speaker 1: h as painless the process as possible. We want we
Speaker 1: want to be able to to feel our machines on
Speaker 1: some levels. So well, you guys know this to be true.
Speaker 1: And this is why I bet all of you at
Speaker 1: some point have been reaching for a memory or a
Speaker 1: fact and you're just sitting there without the benefit of Google,
Speaker 1: and you think to yourself, if only I had that
Speaker 1: Google implant right now, I could keyword this mother and
Speaker 1: it would be done. I would I would retrieve the
Speaker 1: information that I'm looking for. So um, speaking of Google,
Speaker 1: they're Motorola Division patent at a device that looks like
Speaker 1: a neck tattoo. And uh, this device is attached directly
Speaker 1: to the skin, where it picks up vibrations from the
Speaker 1: vocal cords, creating a microphone with virtually no interference. And
Speaker 1: again it's not known if this is like a preemptive
Speaker 1: patent they really are going to create this, or if
Speaker 1: it's just maybe even an attempt to get some attention
Speaker 1: by Google. So again it brings to mind the animated
Speaker 1: tattoo that we discussed earlier. We see sort of the
Speaker 1: early do it yourself um rumblings of what what is
Speaker 1: present in these patents, The idea that we can take
Speaker 1: technology that that is emerging and place it underneath the skin,
Speaker 1: make it, you know, part of our body and and
Speaker 1: allow us to better interface with our technology, which when
Speaker 1: you consider the fitbit right and what it does for us,
Speaker 1: and then sort of making that sub cutaneous thing, makes
Speaker 1: you realize that this may very well be in the
Speaker 1: future and you have one of these. I don't have
Speaker 1: a fit bit, but Holly has one, Holly fry of
Speaker 1: history stuff and she loves it because it shows her
Speaker 1: sleeping patterns, like how much she wakes up during the
Speaker 1: night and um, you know she's she's a runner, so
Speaker 1: it calculates all of that good stuff. But she normally
Speaker 1: she just has a clip to her right like not's
Speaker 1: not attached to her skin. Well, you know, she's a
Speaker 1: costume designer, so she may have already inserted this subcutaneo.
Speaker 1: She likes to hack things. Um. But people behind fitbit
Speaker 1: have drafted a concept called Project under Skin. And again,
Speaker 1: this is a digital tattoo that would be implanted in
Speaker 1: your hand and allow you to try trade data with handshake,
Speaker 1: monitor your vital signs, or even unlock a door. Yes,
Speaker 1: this is this is pretty pretty pretty amazing, especially when
Speaker 1: you get into some of the even crazier details like
Speaker 1: the even more high tech details for instance, which which
Speaker 1: seems kind of remarkable that there would be more details
Speaker 1: to this that that are stunning. But the team actually
Speaker 1: envisions that the device will run off the body's own
Speaker 1: electrochemical energy, so it's it's on all the time, Uh,
Speaker 1: so you don't have to to worry about charging your
Speaker 1: hand at night or anything of that nature. Like it's
Speaker 1: essentially a cybernetic part of your body and a very
Speaker 1: real and meaningful way, and and then allowing you to
Speaker 1: interact with the cybernetic bodies of others. Like you you
Speaker 1: shake somebody's hand, you end up exchanging the data. But
Speaker 1: if it's just a fist pump. You might exchange different
Speaker 1: data because they talk about it being there being a
Speaker 1: sensor on the outer part of the hand and then
Speaker 1: on the inner part because the idea of the inner
Speaker 1: part of the hand is more more personal UM and
Speaker 1: so that would be maybe be the connection point more
Speaker 1: personal data for UH for the unlocking of doors, etcetera.
Speaker 1: It's very odd to me because the implications of that
Speaker 1: are pretty far reaching. You can extrapolate that out and
Speaker 1: you could even sort of you could look at someone's
Speaker 1: microbial colony on their hands, which could kind of give
Speaker 1: you some sort of profile on them, especially since we
Speaker 1: are beginning to know more and more about the micro biome.
Speaker 1: But anyway, you know how I love that. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean this technology plays directly into some of the the
Speaker 1: technology who've discussed before for real time health monitoring and
Speaker 1: how important that would be to h to just to
Speaker 1: the overall health of the individual, being able to just
Speaker 1: check in on in a real time basis to see
Speaker 1: what's going on with conditions of the body and not
Speaker 1: depending upon um annual or semi annual checkups to see
Speaker 1: how much damage has been done by a condition. Right now,
Speaker 1: Project underscan again this is more of an abstracognition of
Speaker 1: what could be. Uh. There is an actual concrete device
Speaker 1: in the works by material scientists On Rogers, who created
Speaker 1: something called Epidural Electronics lovely um only because epidural and
Speaker 1: you seem to associate with procedures that are medical. Um.
Speaker 1: It sticks to your skin like a temporary tattoo, and
Speaker 1: it can do anything from monitor your body's vital signals
Speaker 1: to alerting you when you're starting to get a sunburn.
Speaker 1: And Rogers and his company m C tent are currently
Speaker 1: trying to figure out ways to get the electronics to
Speaker 1: to communicate with other devices like smartphones, so that they
Speaker 1: can start building apps for this. Yeah. I want to
Speaker 1: also point out that New Deal Design people behind Underskin,
Speaker 1: they believe that they can actually build this within the
Speaker 1: next five years given the state of current electronics. And
Speaker 1: they say that the the hard part is actually going
Speaker 1: to be the flexible display that would be involved here,
Speaker 1: rather than the sensor communication and implantation, or even that
Speaker 1: that the means by which would siphon off your own
Speaker 1: bodily energy. You know the thing I'm thinking about this
Speaker 1: beyond like personal security risks here or that, what about
Speaker 1: the inflammation site. And was this due to your immune
Speaker 1: system to have this thing that's that's semi permanent in
Speaker 1: your body? Yeah? And then can you overdo it? Do
Speaker 1: you end up with you have to worry about having
Speaker 1: too many um dermal or epidermal implants in your body?
Speaker 1: Can you go too far with this? Yeah? And I
Speaker 1: mean I really I keep thinking about this. It's gotta
Speaker 1: be probably at the Nanni less scale really for your
Speaker 1: body to give it a path. Yeah, and it and
Speaker 1: it also comes down to the the power of the
Speaker 1: tattoo itself. You know that you're making something a permanent
Speaker 1: or at least semipermanent part of your body. And do
Speaker 1: we really want to forge a permanent bond with our electronics?
Speaker 1: Do you want to form a permanent bond with with
Speaker 1: your iPhone? I mean, because even the iPhone is exciting
Speaker 1: as that new iPhone is, you know, it's it's it's
Speaker 1: gonna be obsolete and a number of years it's not
Speaker 1: going to be the cutting edge thing. And this is
Speaker 1: just a thing that goes in your pocket, not something
Speaker 1: that is implanted in your skin. Moreover, if this really
Speaker 1: takes off and and it's out there everywhere as ubiquitous.
Speaker 1: Everybody has some sort of interactive tattoo. Does it make
Speaker 1: tattoos less special? Does it make it kind of like
Speaker 1: this boogie uh consumer driven thing that everybody is now using.
Speaker 1: Is it's sort of like the I don't want to
Speaker 1: say the Google glasses that have nothing against them, but
Speaker 1: you know, eventually, if everybody wears those and everybody has
Speaker 1: this interactive tattoo, it loses some of the magic. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's it's gonna be interesting to see
Speaker 1: how it how it goes. Maybe it'll just be something
Speaker 1: we all get used to and we're all cool with. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's so cool because it offers lots of stuff, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Or maybe it'll you know, it'll be the mark of
Speaker 1: the Beast. I kept running across that when I was
Speaker 1: reading these articles. Inevitably, somebody in the comics would say
Speaker 1: that sounds like the mark of the Beast to make
Speaker 1: you know what we know, what we need is an
Speaker 1: interactive mark of the Beast tattoo. Right when that's animated, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then you can uh, and then it'll also there'll
Speaker 1: be an app for it. You can actually you can
Speaker 1: pull up on your phone to see who in your
Speaker 1: area is uh the tune to the Anti Christ uh.
Speaker 1: So you know you'll know who to hang out with.
Speaker 1: Sore you go a sort of crash course and where
Speaker 1: the technology is right now and where conceivably tattoos will
Speaker 1: take us in the future. Indeed, all right, if you
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