WEBVTT - Cyborg Slugs and Synthetic Stingrays 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.160 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.360 --> 0:00:15.080 Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the 0:00:15.120 --> 0:00:17.799 podcast that looks the future and says, you know, I 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:22.560 hate to ask, but our friends electric. I'm Jonathan Strickland 0:00:22.680 --> 0:00:24.960 and I'm Joe McCormick. And of course they are all 0:00:25.079 --> 0:00:28.360 organisms are electric? Actually is that true? I'm not sure. 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:34.960 Maybe electro chemical. Are they all electric? Maybe not viruses? 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:37.400 That might be one of the weird virus definition issue. 0:00:37.440 --> 0:00:40.159 I don't think they're all electric. I think some are hybrids. 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:43.400 That was a terrible joke. All right, Well, let's actually 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:48.479 transition into the introduction for our podcast that doesn't involve 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:52.680 weird word play that doesn't get us anywhere. We're gonna 0:00:52.720 --> 0:00:56.360 be talking about, uh, something that we've touched on in 0:00:56.400 --> 0:01:00.360 previous episodes, right, cyborgs. No way, we haven't touched on that. 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:05.800 And I've never personally touched us like cyborg. Yeah, but 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:08.560 I would. And furthermore, we have talked a little bit 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:12.560 about cyborgs in the past, or rather about upgrading organisms. 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:16.000 Um back into scemberteen, we did a whole episode about 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:19.360 cyborg cockroaches. It's called biobots. If you want to look 0:01:19.360 --> 0:01:23.080 it up. Uh. And we also talked about the possibility 0:01:23.120 --> 0:01:26.160 and the ethics of human upgrades way way way back 0:01:26.360 --> 0:01:29.960 in March. I wonder what that's like. I can't even 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:32.679 believe anyone was alive. Then it seems so long ago. 0:01:33.040 --> 0:01:36.960 Um that one's called cyborg's ethics and you, um, it 0:01:37.040 --> 0:01:38.959 just occurred to me. Did we even talk about the 0:01:39.000 --> 0:01:41.880 amazing X Files episode were of the cop cop copper phages? 0:01:41.880 --> 0:01:44.600 Am I saying that right? Copper pages? I don't know 0:01:44.640 --> 0:01:46.800 if we did the Christian and I did in a 0:01:46.880 --> 0:01:48.920 stuff to blow your mind episode that we did about 0:01:48.960 --> 0:01:51.360 the science of the X Files. I want to say 0:01:51.400 --> 0:01:54.760 that at that point, none of us were rewatching the 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:58.000 series and so we probably weren't talking about it, okay, 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:00.440 And then once it all hit Netflix and we started 0:02:00.520 --> 0:02:03.600 kind of binge watching X Files episodes, I was kind 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:07.520 of hate watching it. Well, hey, if you have Netflix 0:02:07.560 --> 0:02:10.640 and you can go back and watch War the Copper Fadges, 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:12.760 that's like a top five episodes. Yeah, yeah, totally. It's 0:02:12.760 --> 0:02:14.639 one of the four that was written by Darren Morrigan. 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:17.000 I might be a huge X Files nerd uh. And 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:19.680 those four that he wrote I think are the best Uh, 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.680 he starred or co starred in one of the others 0:02:22.680 --> 0:02:24.880 that I really like, called Small Potatoes at any rate, 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:27.480 So we're not talking about Darren Morgan in this episode 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:31.440 X Files that much. But but yes, uh, cybernetic life forms, 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.760 life forms that have some extra bits kind of worked in, 0:02:35.040 --> 0:02:37.920 and or synthetic life because we also touched on synthetic 0:02:38.000 --> 0:02:42.239 life relatively recently. Uh, I don't know, scroll down, see 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:45.560 what you find. Yeah, it's like it's like maybe from 0:02:45.600 --> 0:02:48.320 maybe a month back or something. It's pretty recent that 0:02:48.360 --> 0:02:51.040 we talked about synthetic life forms. You know, it sounds 0:02:51.120 --> 0:02:53.239 no offense to you all. It sounds like we are 0:02:53.320 --> 0:02:56.880 already getting a little mushy with the terminology here, Like 0:02:56.960 --> 0:02:59.800 what it what is the category distinction we're trying to 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:04.000 create eight about these uh, the joining at the edges 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:07.880 of of technology and life. Let's let's let's clear that 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:11.600 up a little bit. Okay. Uh, this term cyborg, you 0:03:11.720 --> 0:03:14.680 probably know it most from the Genclaude van Damme movie 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:19.119 Cyborg directed by Albert Pune, or maybe not. You probably 0:03:19.160 --> 0:03:22.280 know it from culture. Cyborg is a term that has 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:24.799 generally come to be understood as some sort of union 0:03:25.280 --> 0:03:29.600 between the biological organism and the machine in some way 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:32.520 or another. And I say that generally because there is 0:03:32.560 --> 0:03:36.640 a gap between the specialized definition of cyborg and the 0:03:36.640 --> 0:03:39.240 common use of the term in culture, right, Like, he's 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:44.120 more a machine now than C slug, twisted and evil. Yeah, 0:03:44.160 --> 0:03:48.360 So the term cyborg is a shortening of cybernetic organism. 0:03:48.440 --> 0:03:51.080 You might know that much. And it was coined back 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:55.640 in nineteen sixty by Manfred Klein's and Nathan Klein. Their 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:58.360 names sounds similar, but they're not the same, spelled different. 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:01.160 And that that article in nineteen sixty was in the 0:04:01.240 --> 0:04:05.400 journal Astronautics and it was called Cyborgs and Space. So 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:07.240 I want to read a quote for you. Go ahead. 0:04:08.080 --> 0:04:11.240 If a fish wish to live on land, it could 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:14.240 not readily do. So they're off to a good start, 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:16.799 I think, starting to sell very susical at the very beginning. 0:04:17.600 --> 0:04:21.640 If a fish wished to live on land. Uh, If, however, 0:04:21.720 --> 0:04:26.000 a particularly intelligent and resourceful fish could be found who 0:04:26.000 --> 0:04:29.800 had studied a good deal of biochemistry and physiology, was 0:04:29.839 --> 0:04:34.680 a master engineer and cyberneticist, and had excellent lab facilities 0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:38.520 available to him, this fish could conceivably have the ability 0:04:38.560 --> 0:04:41.800 to design an instrument which would allow him to live 0:04:41.839 --> 0:04:45.680 on land and breathe air quite easily in the same manner. 0:04:45.760 --> 0:04:48.039 It is becoming apparent that we will in the not 0:04:48.200 --> 0:04:52.560 too distant future have sufficient knowledge to design instrumental control 0:04:52.680 --> 0:04:55.800 systems which will make it possible for our bodies to 0:04:55.839 --> 0:04:59.320 do things which are no less difficult. So specifically, in 0:04:59.320 --> 0:05:02.200 this human analogy that they make, they were talking about 0:05:02.360 --> 0:05:06.880 space clients in client argue that as humans venture into space, 0:05:07.240 --> 0:05:10.560 it's going to be easier to change the human animal 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:13.800 to be better suited to space conditions than it will 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:20.080 be to create earthlike conditions in space for the unaltered human. Interesting, 0:05:20.160 --> 0:05:25.000 so they're talking about actually changing human beings in some 0:05:25.080 --> 0:05:30.359 form or function, not necessarily, you know, using technology to 0:05:30.560 --> 0:05:34.159 compensate for the things we would encounter in space, but 0:05:34.200 --> 0:05:37.200 to actually change humans. So that well, yeah, they are 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:40.479 talking about using technology to compensate, but the compensation wouldn't 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:44.479 be external in our environment, integrated into humans as opposed 0:05:44.480 --> 0:05:47.720 to like a space suit, right right, and and I'll 0:05:47.760 --> 0:05:50.480 be it. This is before space suits existed, right, this 0:05:50.560 --> 0:05:53.400 was before there was any human space exploration. Published in 0:05:53.480 --> 0:05:56.479 nineteen sixty, the first human space flight. Your Garrands in 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:59.640 nineteen sixty one, so this is before we had any 0:05:59.640 --> 0:06:03.600 experien rants whatsoever in this field. But by their definition quote, 0:06:03.680 --> 0:06:10.520 the cyborg deliberately incorporates exogynous meaning coming from outside exogenous components, 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:15.599 extending the self regulatory control function of the organism in 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:19.080 order to adapt it to new environments. And this means 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:22.760 that the cyborg is not enslaved to his or her 0:06:22.839 --> 0:06:27.880 survival machinery. Uh, the the incorporated survival machinery operates quote 0:06:27.920 --> 0:06:33.120 automatically and unconsciously, leaving man free to explore, to create, 0:06:33.320 --> 0:06:36.839 to think, and to feel. So in in an interesting 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:39.560 kind of way. I think the emphasis here because people 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:42.479 always think about human cyborgs and the human context is 0:06:42.560 --> 0:06:47.720 changing our nature. But the way Clines and Incline here 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:51.080 envisioned it, it it was almost as if it was enabling 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:55.240 us to be more like the kind of creature we 0:06:55.320 --> 0:06:58.640 wish to be, you know, the ideal, yeah, trans humanism, 0:06:58.800 --> 0:07:02.479 rather than cybern netics the way that we consider maybe 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:05.839 cyborg netics. Yes, well yeah, I mean the emphasis is 0:07:05.920 --> 0:07:09.200 on is on not making us different fundamentally, but just 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.840 sort of like getting all of the rudimentary survival junk 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:15.680 out of the way, so that our existence can be 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:19.400 focused on the things that really matter. This gets right 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:21.320 to the heart of a lot of different issues we've 0:07:21.320 --> 0:07:24.560 talked about on this show that aren't necessarily directly related 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:28.480 to technology. The general basic income, one could argue, is 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:31.679 covering very much the same ground, the idea that once 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:36.640 you have accounted for the necessities, the basic needs of survival, 0:07:36.960 --> 0:07:39.680 you free people up to pursue the things that they 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:44.240 value and thus can become better contributors to society overall. 0:07:44.520 --> 0:07:48.040 It's the same similar ideas, just a very different kind 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:51.160 of approach to it. Yeah, so in their vision, they'll 0:07:51.200 --> 0:07:53.920 remember that this is talking about trying to adapt us 0:07:53.960 --> 0:07:58.800 to other environments very specifically, and cyborg came to mean 0:07:58.920 --> 0:08:02.280 something much more general role in the parlance of our times. 0:08:02.320 --> 0:08:05.400 But originally they were talking very much about space. And 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:08.520 one example to give of modifying the human to live 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:12.920 in space is breathing. So you know, breathing is required 0:08:12.960 --> 0:08:16.080 to purge CO two and replenish oxygen. There's no oxygen 0:08:16.280 --> 0:08:19.960 in space, you might have heard before, and so clients 0:08:21.520 --> 0:08:25.400 clients incline right quote an inverse fuel cell and no, 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:28.520 we we would probably call this a regenerative fuel cell today. 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:30.520 The idea of an inverse fuel cell is it does 0:08:30.560 --> 0:08:33.319 the opposite of what a normal fuel cell does, instead 0:08:33.400 --> 0:08:36.440 generating electricity through this chemical reaction that you put in 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:42.199 electricity and you get chemicals out. Um, they say, Uh, 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:45.080 an inverse fuel cell capable of reducing CO two to 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:49.520 its components with removal of of the carbon and recirculation 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:53.200 of the oxygen would eliminate the necessity for lung breathing. 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:57.640 Such a system operating either on solar or nuclear energy 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:02.760 would replace the lung make breathing as we know it unnecessary. 0:09:02.800 --> 0:09:06.960 Conventional breathing would still be possible should the environment permit it, 0:09:07.160 --> 0:09:12.280 discontinuing the fuel cell operation. Also, for quote fluid balance, 0:09:12.360 --> 0:09:18.720 they basically recommend a sort of catheter filter IVY circuit. Pleasant. Okay, 0:09:20.920 --> 0:09:23.880 what what book does that It's gonna remind me of 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:26.640 like Catch twenty two or something with one tube going 0:09:26.640 --> 0:09:28.720 in and one tube going out and the character convinced 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:30.400 that the two tubes are essentially all part of the 0:09:30.440 --> 0:09:35.640 same system. Um, yeah, that's so well. Anyway, given this 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:39.040 stricter understanding in the light of the original definition, that 0:09:39.120 --> 0:09:42.960 there is really a distinction between cyborgs like as they're 0:09:42.960 --> 0:09:45.800 defined here, and other terms you might use like bio 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:50.560 hybrids or bio robots or something like that. So cyborgs 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:55.120 are technically augmented organisms, and these augmentations are designed to 0:09:55.160 --> 0:09:58.560 expand the self regulatory control function. As they said a 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:04.320 lot like technological equivalence of homeostasis systems and humans. That said, 0:10:04.960 --> 0:10:07.040 I think for the purpose of this episode, we should 0:10:07.040 --> 0:10:10.400 probably just accept that most people use cyborg to mean 0:10:10.520 --> 0:10:14.440 any kind of hybrid of an organism or robot or machine. Right, 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:18.440 So you could either start from the the perspective of 0:10:18.840 --> 0:10:22.880 an organism that you have modified technologically in some way, 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:28.120 or technology that has has uh biological material incorporated into 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:30.959 it in some way exactly. Yeah, So that that brings 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:33.559 up the question of like, what are the what's the 0:10:33.640 --> 0:10:37.440 necessary constituent nature of an object that we think of 0:10:37.480 --> 0:10:41.120 as a cyborg. So imagine a space pig. Okay, Yeah, 0:10:41.160 --> 0:10:43.440 you've got a space pig with an inverse fuel cell 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:47.800 that facilitates lungless respiration. It's a cyborg. This is cyberpig 0:10:48.360 --> 0:10:51.800 um and it can use electricity to oxygenate its tissues 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:54.520 and purge c O two in a vacuum without lung breathing. 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:57.040 Isn't that great? Pretty sure? That's the definition of link 0:10:57.120 --> 0:11:01.320 hogthrob in pigs and space and keep on. I like 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:04.160 where you're going with this, Okay, But what if hypothetically 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:07.040 you had something sort of coming from the opposite end 0:11:07.040 --> 0:11:10.880 of the spectrum. There's a mechanical fuel cell that uses 0:11:11.000 --> 0:11:15.640 a disembodied pig lung to facilitate the generation of electrical current. 0:11:15.880 --> 0:11:17.400 Now I'm not sure if you could really do that, 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:20.840 but I'm just saying hypothetically, by the more common understanding, 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:25.280 would this be a cyborg too? Technically yes, yeah, I 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:28.320 mean the original definition probably not. But and we've also 0:11:28.360 --> 0:11:31.040 moved from the Muppets to David Cronenberg kind of territory. 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:34.640 But I'm willing to roll with it. Okay. So does 0:11:34.720 --> 0:11:38.720 the organic synthetic hybrid system in some sense need to 0:11:38.720 --> 0:11:41.199 have a brain or nervous system to be a cyborg? 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:46.040 It seems like, yeah, yeah, it depends. Like like I 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:48.880 would argue that if you were to go back in 0:11:49.000 --> 0:11:53.559 time thirty years and talk about the concept of cyborg, 0:11:53.640 --> 0:11:57.079 I think a lot of people would would in all fields, 0:11:57.080 --> 0:12:00.240 would generally agree that they think of it as as 0:12:00.320 --> 0:12:03.080 largely an autonomous sort of thing, that whether it's a 0:12:03.120 --> 0:12:09.480 computer brain or an organic brain, that the robotic biological 0:12:09.559 --> 0:12:13.240 thing itself would have some form of autonomy. I would 0:12:13.280 --> 0:12:18.240 argue today that's not that's no longer a necessary criterion 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:23.320 that you could argue. You could have a cyborg organism. 0:12:23.360 --> 0:12:25.520 I guess that's that's being redundant. You could have a 0:12:25.520 --> 0:12:30.920 cyborg that the machine exactly and your pin number. You 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:36.400 could have the decisions quote unquote that the cyborg is 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:40.760 making come completely externally through external controls. That I think 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:46.000 would be an acceptable idea today, The idea that that 0:12:46.520 --> 0:12:52.320 you've got this organic slash technological thing, but it's under 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:56.600 external control, it has no agency of its own. I 0:12:56.640 --> 0:12:59.360 think people would still say, like, well, for lack of 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:01.600 a better unless you're going to go with something like 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:05.520 bio hybrid, or we might as well call it a 0:13:05.520 --> 0:13:08.600 cyborg and is so much more fun. It is also 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:10.559 just like you immediately sit there like we're gonna be 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:13.680 talking about ce slug cyborgs very shortly. And when you 0:13:13.720 --> 0:13:16.080 sit there and think CE slug cyborg, first thing I 0:13:16.120 --> 0:13:18.679 think is that there's like a terminator version of a 0:13:18.800 --> 0:13:22.520 sea slug out there. That's not what is actually happening, 0:13:23.240 --> 0:13:26.280 but it's way more fun to think of it that 0:13:26.320 --> 0:13:29.160 way though. Well, let's get to the slugs. Then we're 0:13:29.200 --> 0:13:31.840 gonna come back to some sort of theoretical discussions at 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:33.800 the end. But Jonathan, do you have something to tell 0:13:33.880 --> 0:13:38.320 me about slugs? I't. I didn't want it to come 0:13:38.320 --> 0:13:41.720 out this way on the podcast. I have a complicated 0:13:41.760 --> 0:13:45.680 relationship with slugs. I admit. When I was young, I 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:51.720 had an occasional uh foray into sadism by placing the 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:55.840 salt upon the slugs. I regret those actions. Now as 0:13:55.840 --> 0:13:59.160 an adult, I think I did it too. I'm sorry, 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:02.240 but dogs, but these slugs are different. These are sea slugs. 0:14:02.280 --> 0:14:05.240 These are not not land based slugs that are gnawing 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:08.679 on the various things you have in your garden. Different 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:12.080 kind of animal, different kind of animal entirely, and can 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:13.920 at you for what you did when you were a kid, 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:16.160 one would hope. I mean, if it holds a grudge, 0:14:16.160 --> 0:14:19.040 then they they are far more united than I gave 0:14:19.080 --> 0:14:22.680 them credit for. Hopefully we can upgrade their mental powers 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:27.040 through extra computing add ons CA so that way they 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:30.920 don't Yeah, well, the whole thing we're talking about here 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:33.840 is actually a research project done with a team working 0:14:33.840 --> 0:14:39.680 with Case Western Reserves Biologically Inspired Robotics Laboratory, which is 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:44.320 a real thing that exists. It's incredible. Uh. They've developed 0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:48.680 an organic robot bio hybrid, or if we prefer our 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:53.320 our other nomenclature, a cyborg that consists of three D 0:14:53.400 --> 0:14:57.320 printed parts, very very tiny three D printed parts, and 0:14:57.360 --> 0:15:00.720 the mouth muscle from a sea slug. Just the mouth 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:04.200 must just the mouth muscle. They they first started practicing 0:15:04.400 --> 0:15:08.560 with muscle cells. They tried to grow muscle cells on 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:13.040 kind of an organic scaffold, but they found that the 0:15:13.080 --> 0:15:16.520 actual structure of the mouth muscle from this particular sea 0:15:16.560 --> 0:15:19.640 slug was already pretty much exactly what they needed in 0:15:19.720 --> 0:15:22.680 order to accomplish the movements they had in mind with 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:25.000 this this three D print material. So, as we talked 0:15:25.040 --> 0:15:27.760 about earlier in that analogy, this would be kind of 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:30.920 like the pig lung that facilitates the fuel cell. Yeah, 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:34.280 that in this case, the muscle is there in order 0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:39.280 to provide the locomotion of this little robot. It doesn't 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:42.520 have any you know, other anima to it. That's that's 0:15:42.520 --> 0:15:45.320 what they're using. The muscle. For it's it's a pusher, 0:15:45.680 --> 0:15:49.120 it's a binder. I guess because I think of it 0:15:49.120 --> 0:15:52.520 that you've connected two ends of a muscle. This is oversimplifying, 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:55.160 but you've connected two ends of a muscle to two 0:15:55.840 --> 0:16:00.880 anchor points on a bendable, flexible three D inted material. 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:04.840 And then when you apply an external electric field. We 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:08.320 know that when you stimulate muscle tissue with low levels 0:16:08.320 --> 0:16:12.240 of electricity, you cause it to contract so or or spasm, 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:16.160 depending upon the way to series of contractions. Exactly so, 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:19.840 doing that they can make the muscle contract and thus 0:16:20.440 --> 0:16:24.400 bend the bendy three D printed parts, and then you know, 0:16:24.440 --> 0:16:28.520 through pulses, they can make the actual robot move forward. 0:16:29.120 --> 0:16:31.200 But just to be clear, I mean we sort have 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:33.080 already said this, but I do want to specify there. 0:16:33.080 --> 0:16:37.240 We're not talking about like a mechanical thing inspired by 0:16:37.360 --> 0:16:41.120 the way the cea slug muscle works, literally just a 0:16:41.160 --> 0:16:44.040 CE slug muscle. Yeah, we're talking about, well, why would 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:46.360 you choose a CE slug muscle in the first place, Like, 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:51.280 why not do some other means of propulsion? What's what 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:53.480 did the sea slug ever do to you that you 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:56.920 required to remove the muscle from its mouth and paste 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:59.480 it onto a three D printed robot. Well, let's get 0:16:59.520 --> 0:17:02.200 some details first. Uh, the type of sea slug we're 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:07.520 talking about is specifically the Eplesia californica sea slug, and 0:17:08.040 --> 0:17:13.320 it is apparently ideal for this particular application, and they 0:17:13.520 --> 0:17:17.359 the team plans on using robots like this one. I 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:19.760 would argue that the ones they produced so far are 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:22.840 kind of in that prototype range, but they expect to 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:26.320 use robots like this one in specific environments that would 0:17:26.320 --> 0:17:31.080 be hazardous or impossible for humans to explore. An example 0:17:31.119 --> 0:17:36.080 would be let's say a plane has gone down over 0:17:36.119 --> 0:17:38.639 the ocean, and perhaps it's a deep part of the ocean. 0:17:38.680 --> 0:17:40.840 It's very difficult for us to get down there and 0:17:40.880 --> 0:17:44.720 search for the black box to determine what exactly happened. 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:48.560 You could deploy a swarm of these robots that could 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:50.760 explore the bottom of the sea floor. Keep in mind 0:17:50.800 --> 0:17:55.480 that sea slug muscles, they're they're made made, it's probably 0:17:55.480 --> 0:18:00.760 the wrong word. They've evolved to inhabit various ocean environments, 0:18:00.800 --> 0:18:04.200 and they're incredibly hardy. The the muscle tissue and sea 0:18:04.240 --> 0:18:08.879 slugs they are able to survive in various conditions of 0:18:08.880 --> 0:18:12.720 ocean water, different levels of salinity and temperature. So they're 0:18:12.760 --> 0:18:15.959 ideal for going into these kind of situations because you 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:18.560 can have them survived through all the different depths of 0:18:18.560 --> 0:18:20.159 the ocean as they make their way to where you 0:18:20.200 --> 0:18:22.920 want them to go. Then they explore the ocean floor 0:18:23.080 --> 0:18:26.199 looking for this black box. When they find it, you know, 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:28.359 you get the signal and then you can actually send 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:31.919 in something to retrieve the box. That's one example. Another 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:33.680 one that they gave is imagine that you have a 0:18:34.119 --> 0:18:38.719 pond and you know that there's some toxic material leaching 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:41.480 into the pond. You do not know what the source 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:46.840 is or where it is, but you are observing ecological 0:18:46.920 --> 0:18:50.120 changes around the pond. So you don't want to send 0:18:50.119 --> 0:18:52.320 a person in there because it could be the levels 0:18:52.359 --> 0:18:55.199 of toxicity could be dangerous to the human beings. So 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:57.600 you put in these robots that are capable of moving 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:01.080 through the water to seek out the sore and then 0:19:01.119 --> 0:19:03.119 maybe you can do something about it. Those are some 0:19:03.160 --> 0:19:07.159 of the examples they've given. Well. Uh the interesting thing 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.480 about using a ce slug muscle as opposed to a 0:19:10.600 --> 0:19:17.440 three D printed um uh or or traditional type of that. Yeah, 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:19.840 it's using something like that. Well, for one thing, like 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:23.880 if you're using actuators, they tend to be stiff and inflexible. 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:28.240 They they aren't good at adapting to various environments, and 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:30.840 that also means that they have limited range of motion, right, 0:19:30.920 --> 0:19:33.439 Like they might have a very simple action like a 0:19:33.480 --> 0:19:36.720 piston would be a very simple action in or out right. 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:41.400 So if you want to create a limb that has 0:19:41.440 --> 0:19:43.440 a lot of flexibility to it, you end up having 0:19:43.440 --> 0:19:46.280 to use a lot of actuators, which ends up adding 0:19:46.359 --> 0:19:49.560 to the complexity of the robot itself. It increases the 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:53.159 number of potential points of failure. It also increases the 0:19:53.200 --> 0:19:57.560 cost of developing and building those robots. And it's not 0:19:57.680 --> 0:20:00.680 easy to create something that's very adaptive to its environment, 0:20:00.680 --> 0:20:04.119 whereas using a muscle or from a creature that lived 0:20:04.119 --> 0:20:07.919 in that environment gets around those problems. Muscles are much 0:20:07.960 --> 0:20:12.200 more flexible. Uh, they're very this particular sea slug, it's 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:14.520 very resilient, like I mentioned before, so you don't have 0:20:14.560 --> 0:20:18.000 to worry so much about failure In that case, um 0:20:18.040 --> 0:20:23.040 and the muscle tissue itself can get nutrients from the 0:20:23.080 --> 0:20:26.840 ocean water around it to keep the muscle alive. Now 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:30.360 that doesn't power the muscle, as in, it doesn't generate 0:20:30.400 --> 0:20:32.600 the ability for the muscle to contract. You still have 0:20:32.680 --> 0:20:36.280 to at the moment anyway stimulate it with an external 0:20:36.320 --> 0:20:41.440 electric field. They do hope to eventually develop other organic 0:20:41.520 --> 0:20:46.800 based robots using this uh the sea slugs muscularture, but 0:20:46.880 --> 0:20:50.240 also including other parts of the sea slugs nervous system 0:20:50.359 --> 0:20:54.040 like anglia and stuff. In order for it to be 0:20:54.200 --> 0:20:58.760 able to move without using an external electric field, you 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:01.560 would have some other control mechanism to make the robot 0:21:01.760 --> 0:21:05.280 move when you want it to move, which would be 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:10.680 important because trying to stimulate a swarm of robots deep 0:21:10.760 --> 0:21:14.000 under the ocean with an electric field would present its 0:21:14.040 --> 0:21:17.160 own challenges, right You that that it's not a practical 0:21:17.200 --> 0:21:20.400 solution to the problems that we're actually talking about these 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:25.640 robots potentially tackling in the future. And uh, I love 0:21:25.720 --> 0:21:30.560 the idea that they eventually want to create essentially an 0:21:30.800 --> 0:21:38.320 entirely organic robot, so no inorganic parts. It's all yeah 0:21:38.480 --> 0:21:41.640 meat robot, which by the way, is is pretty much 0:21:41.680 --> 0:21:45.400 the way Catereral Capec envisioned robots and Rossum's universal robots. 0:21:45.760 --> 0:21:51.360 They were synthetic beings but they were not necessarily electronic beings. 0:21:52.280 --> 0:21:56.119 The robots and Carol Capex play were closer to the 0:21:57.280 --> 0:22:00.800 like the replicants in uh In Blade Run or and 0:22:00.880 --> 0:22:04.800 even more organic than they were, at least in most 0:22:04.800 --> 0:22:07.080 of the variations I've read of the play. I've never 0:22:07.119 --> 0:22:09.600 read it in the original because I can't I don't 0:22:09.640 --> 0:22:14.360 have that linguistic ability. But they at any rate, they 0:22:14.400 --> 0:22:18.280 wanted to do a fully organic robot, the idea being 0:22:18.320 --> 0:22:21.280 that if you lose them, like if they if through 0:22:21.320 --> 0:22:23.760 whatever means, like they're going through a hazardous area and 0:22:23.800 --> 0:22:28.520 eventually they break down, they would decompose naturally, or they 0:22:28.520 --> 0:22:32.040 could even be eaten by stuff in the environment, that is, 0:22:32.480 --> 0:22:35.879 and not cause harm. This almost reminds me in some 0:22:35.960 --> 0:22:39.520 ways of when we talked about edible electronics, like wanting 0:22:39.560 --> 0:22:42.639 to make electronic devices entirely out of components that you 0:22:42.680 --> 0:22:46.520 could digest safely. Sure, because yeah, if you're gonna accidentally 0:22:46.560 --> 0:22:49.560 pollute a waterway, it's nicer to do it with a good, 0:22:49.600 --> 0:22:54.760 friendly corpse than with electronics which have batteries that can 0:22:55.000 --> 0:22:58.080 you know it's bad times of battery leaks into your water, right, 0:22:58.119 --> 0:23:01.240 just making the problem worse. I hope fully, the synthetic 0:23:02.080 --> 0:23:06.639 organic what are the terms completely organic robots would be 0:23:06.680 --> 0:23:10.520 sterile correct, Well, I mean they from what I understand, 0:23:10.560 --> 0:23:15.320 they would be still completely controlled. Externally, they would have 0:23:15.359 --> 0:23:19.960 they would have no uh autonomous function whatsoever, so they 0:23:20.000 --> 0:23:23.600 wouldn't contain the reproductive bits. Yeah, you would essentially just 0:23:23.640 --> 0:23:26.159 have it. You would just have an inert robot if 0:23:26.160 --> 0:23:29.560 you weren't, if you weren't using that external control. Be like, 0:23:30.040 --> 0:23:33.719 you know, if you had a remote control car and 0:23:33.760 --> 0:23:36.440 there's no wireless frequency going on around that car, it's 0:23:36.440 --> 0:23:41.400 not going to start moving on its own unless it's tobor. Granted, 0:23:41.840 --> 0:23:45.639 if Tobar has been reincarnated as an RC car, you 0:23:45.800 --> 0:23:48.040 might have some problems. I think we just came up 0:23:48.040 --> 0:23:53.040 with a plot for Toy Story five. Pixar call us, yes, 0:23:53.080 --> 0:23:56.439 please do? I mean generally, yeah, Well, we'd love to 0:23:56.440 --> 0:23:58.960 talk to you. I love the idea of a completely 0:23:59.160 --> 0:24:03.800 organic row bot. I think that's hilarious and it's it's 0:24:03.840 --> 0:24:07.280 something that should encourage us to be thoughtful. Look as 0:24:07.359 --> 0:24:09.359 what what is a robot in that sense? So you 0:24:09.440 --> 0:24:12.040 say a robot is something it's a machine that uh 0:24:12.680 --> 0:24:17.520 that in well, actually, I mean there are different definitions. Well, 0:24:17.520 --> 0:24:19.600 if you can, you go with the classic definition, the 0:24:19.920 --> 0:24:25.200 Carol Capeck definition, where you had organic robots. A robot 0:24:25.280 --> 0:24:28.879