WEBVTT - What's Up With DARPA? 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.080 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:14.760 Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:17.680 podcast that looks at the future and says, but there's 0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:21.360 no danger. It's a professional career. I'm Jonathan Strickland, I'm Lauren, 0:00:21.960 --> 0:00:24.000 and I'm Joe McCormick. And today we're going to be 0:00:24.040 --> 0:00:28.159 dealing with another listener request topic. This is awesome. We 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:31.440 love doing these and we love that you guys are listening. 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:36.520 So keep keep listening and keep requesting. Ah yeah, Joe, 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:39.040 do you want to read it for sure? Well? Our listener, 0:00:39.120 --> 0:00:42.080 Nate wrote in via our email address, w thinking at 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:45.040 how stuff works dot Com? Say it again, f W 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:47.080 thinking at how stuff works dot Com. Wait are you 0:00:47.080 --> 0:00:50.240 sure it wasn't f X thinking. No, it's f W 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:54.040 thinking at how stuff works dot Com. That sounds it's 0:00:54.080 --> 0:00:57.640 just music to my years. Okay, Nate wrote in, saying 0:00:58.160 --> 0:01:01.400 good show on the five G topic. Thank you, Nate, uh, 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:04.240 he said, thanks for making podcasts that are technical nature 0:01:04.240 --> 0:01:07.360 but not so full of techno jargon that I can't 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:11.720 understand it possible. Show topic DARPA, the future of the 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:15.279 world's most advanced military in the world speculated about the future, 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:18.560 or review some of the groundbreaking ideas inventions that have 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:22.000 come out of DARPA. Thanks much, Well, thank you, Nate, 0:01:22.080 --> 0:01:25.880 because we do talk about DARPA an awful lot on 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:31.959 this show. DARPA is responsible for so many technicals. Well, 0:01:32.160 --> 0:01:35.880 it's not because we love DARPA. It's just because you 0:01:35.920 --> 0:01:39.680 trace the money back when you're talking about the technology, 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:44.120 and somewhere along the line you'll find DARPA. Yequently a 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:47.040 couple of guys in dark suits and sunglasses with a 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:50.480 briefcase and saying just keep going. But it all sounds 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:56.680 so silly slash sinister and a lot of sists. But anyway, 0:01:56.720 --> 0:01:59.920 what is DARPA. Let's go back and look at DARPA 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:04.400 as an organization and figure out why so many technological 0:02:04.600 --> 0:02:10.680 historical roads lead to this strange military shadow organizations or 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:14.400 have led out from there. Well, let's start by saying, 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:18.079 because we love saying it the even though no one 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:20.600 ever calls DARPA by its full name, it is the 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:24.639 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Yes, and uh, well, let's 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:27.959 also say that as shadowy government organizations go, this is 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:31.639 a really forward facing one. Yeah. Yeah, they put their 0:02:32.040 --> 0:02:34.600 like their press releases and their call for proposals on 0:02:34.600 --> 0:02:37.080 the Internet. Yeah, they've worked with a lot of people 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:40.680 who went on to work for other massive companies like Google. 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:43.440 But we're getting hut of ourselves. So this is the 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:47.359 research and development arm of the US military, specifically part 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:49.799 of the Department of Defense. Well that sounds scary, Well 0:02:49.840 --> 0:02:53.160 it's it's not. Kind of is it can be. I 0:02:53.160 --> 0:02:56.160 mean some of the because a lot of the technology 0:02:56.200 --> 0:03:00.880 they're looking into our specifically for military applications, it makes sense. 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:03.320 It's a it's part of the Department of Defense. It's 0:03:03.400 --> 0:03:09.360 very important that uh technology play a role in military applications. Sure, 0:03:09.520 --> 0:03:11.760 but so much of the technology that we're talking about 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:14.720 that where those roads lead back to DARPA has nothing 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:17.119 to do with weapons in the end. Yeah, it may 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:19.960 be that it's in lots of other ways, um supporting 0:03:20.240 --> 0:03:25.720 military roles and ends up in filtering down into civilian 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:28.600 technology that we all stand to benefit from. So it's 0:03:28.600 --> 0:03:32.600 not like this is all uh super secret ray guns 0:03:32.919 --> 0:03:35.920 and stuff like that and that that's the only thing 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:38.680 they work in. This is all sorts of technology that 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:41.800 could support the military in multiple ways and often ends 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:46.080 up becoming part of other types of tech right, because 0:03:46.280 --> 0:03:48.840 I would argue that the that the really key word 0:03:49.600 --> 0:03:54.240 in the DARPA acronym is not defense, it's rather advanced. 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:57.120 Part part of the agency's mission statement is to go 0:03:57.240 --> 0:04:01.440 after these high risk, high reward research and development projects 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:05.600 as often they're pushing four main areas of strategy, and 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:12.080 those are rethinking complex military systems to being not just 0:04:12.280 --> 0:04:16.680 reactive but proactive about the speed with which information technology 0:04:16.760 --> 0:04:23.000 is changing these days. Uh three, harnessing biotechnology, oh boy, 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:25.320 and four is missing, and I forgot to write the 0:04:25.360 --> 0:04:29.200 fourth one down and the Know such a good podcast. 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:31.080 And the fourth one is on a need to know 0:04:31.160 --> 0:04:36.520 basic three, which is putting backpacks on beatles and getting 0:04:36.520 --> 0:04:39.120 them fly around the room where you want. That's what 0:04:39.279 --> 0:04:41.200 let's hold for a second to find the fourth one 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:44.520 and four. I'm going to quote this one because it's 0:04:44.520 --> 0:04:47.960 a little bit less uh fourth, right, than than the 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:56.000 rest of them. Expanding the technological frontier. And also we 0:04:56.000 --> 0:04:59.279 should point out that DARPA is not dark as nine 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:04.960 organization that has an enormous secret underground scientific laboratory. No. 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.760 In a lot of ways, DARPA is money. Yeah, DARPA 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:11.040 is I think of it kind of like um Like 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:14.000 they're almost like a consulting firm for the government in 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:17.960 a way, Like they put out a request for proposal saying, 0:05:18.279 --> 0:05:21.600 here's the thing that we want done. We have this 0:05:21.680 --> 0:05:24.120 is our goal, we need to have this thing happen, 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:26.680 and then they put that request for a proposal out 0:05:26.720 --> 0:05:29.800 and they wait for the various organizations, usually things like 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:33.400 universities and research centers to respond to that and say 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.680 we're going to attempt to do this thing that you 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:39.960 have put a request out for, and then it goes 0:05:40.040 --> 0:05:43.000 from there and it all depends upon the actual technology. 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:45.800 You know. Sometimes we're talking about massive companies like Boeing 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:51.760 being involved. Sometimes we're talking about labs. Yeah, there, there's 0:05:51.839 --> 0:05:55.320 um plenty. Like Stanford has had a long association with 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:59.640 doing some DARPA projects, particularly in the robotics field. So uh, 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:04.800 don't think of DARPA as those secret labs. These are 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:08.240 the guys who fund the secret labs. Were not the 0:06:08.279 --> 0:06:14.599 agents of Shield. No there there, that's that's fair. That's fair. 0:06:14.640 --> 0:06:17.359 So yeah, like we said before, it is part of 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:20.560 the Department of Defense, huh. And the current director is 0:06:20.720 --> 0:06:25.160 a woman named dr Addati Propaka who came up through 0:06:25.240 --> 0:06:29.200 DARPA's offices from being a program manager in six to 0:06:29.720 --> 0:06:32.600 leading a whole bunch of semi conductor programs to being 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:37.640 the founding director of their Microelectronics Technology Office. So I'm 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:40.480 not saying that she oversaw nano box, but she probably 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:43.560 oversaw some nano box. And to be fair, you could 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:45.719 be overseeing nano bots and never even know it because 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:48.080 that's how small they are, right, you can kind of 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:51.520 only oversee them. Yeah, you can't really undersee. No, you 0:06:51.520 --> 0:06:53.560 can't really. I mean have you ever tried to get 0:06:53.600 --> 0:06:56.480 under a nano bot? It is like impossible. So as 0:06:57.480 --> 0:07:01.960 DARPA had a two point nine billion dollar budget, they 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:06.960 employ only two hundred nineteen like official full time government employees. 0:07:07.120 --> 0:07:11.000 Salaries must be on though and world two point nine billion, right, 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:14.720 and they but they oversee two hundred and fifty programs 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:18.960 and they have some two thousand collaborations with universities, private companies, 0:07:19.000 --> 0:07:22.880 and other governmental entities. Right. Yeah, So this is uh, 0:07:22.960 --> 0:07:25.200 I mean, this is a big deal where we're having 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:27.520 a lot of fun discussing this. But you know, it's 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:28.960 kind of because it has a little bit of the 0:07:29.000 --> 0:07:34.120 cloak and dagger kind of reputation and also mad science reputation, 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:36.640 So those lend themselves to that. But when I'm sure 0:07:36.640 --> 0:07:38.280 the stuff they don't want you to know, kids could 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:40.800 come in here and talk a big game about various 0:07:40.960 --> 0:07:44.280 DARPA alternatives. Sure, I'm sure we could bring them in 0:07:44.360 --> 0:07:46.880 for that. But the cool thing to me is that 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:50.680 this is also an organization that has been responsible in 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:57.520 a very direct way for incredible leaps in technological capabilities 0:07:57.720 --> 0:08:02.600 in various fields. Jonathan, Yeah, tell me the story of DARPA. Well, 0:08:02.600 --> 0:08:05.520 it wasn't always DARPA, for one thing, that's true. It 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:11.160 was ARFA ARCA so close of course. Yeah, they only 0:08:11.240 --> 0:08:16.400 dropped the letter. Actually they gained a letter afterward. But yeah, 0:08:16.400 --> 0:08:20.280 it was originally ARPA, just the Advanced Research Projects Agency. 0:08:20.600 --> 0:08:25.720 And yeah, there was a specific event in history that 0:08:26.320 --> 0:08:31.000 that prodded the United States and de forming this organization. Right, Well, 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:36.400 it was formed in oh less than a year after 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:41.280 the uss are launched Sputnik. Yeah, the thing what beeped, 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:45.400 as my my old colleague Chris Palette would say, yeah, well, 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:48.079 of course, put Nick was the first artificial satellite ever 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:51.000 put into orbit by humans. Right, It wasn't the fact 0:08:51.080 --> 0:08:55.280 that it was beeping that really disturbed anyone. It was 0:08:55.320 --> 0:08:58.000 the fact that it was beeping and anyone in the 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:00.320 world contune and in here it and further that they 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:03.200 had launched it into space. Yeah. So if you are 0:09:03.240 --> 0:09:06.240 the United States and the Soviet Union has just put 0:09:06.480 --> 0:09:10.280 something into space, and you are part of the Department 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:14.160 of Defense, you're going to be thinking some pretty serious thoughts. 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:16.600 One is that if the Soviet Union can put something 0:09:16.600 --> 0:09:20.199 into space, it can potentially put something here in the US, 0:09:20.240 --> 0:09:22.760 all the way from the Soviet Union. Yes, not into 0:09:22.800 --> 0:09:25.520 space over the US, but just into the US. Yes, 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:30.000 so essentially intercontinental ballistic missile kind of thing. Secondly, if 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:32.559 they can put something into space, sure, right now, all 0:09:32.600 --> 0:09:34.880 it's doing is sending out a signal that you could 0:09:34.880 --> 0:09:36.880 pick up if you're a you have a ham radio 0:09:37.000 --> 0:09:39.000 or something, which is you know, kind of interesting in 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:44.160 neat but potentially further down the line, yeah, it might 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:46.439 be able to do other stuff than just beep. It 0:09:46.520 --> 0:09:48.840 might be able to take pictures, it might be able 0:09:48.880 --> 0:09:51.959 to take video or stream video. I mean, obviously this 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:56.440 is talking further years in advance, but the potential was there, 0:09:56.440 --> 0:09:59.959 and so clearly there was a need for the United 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:03.160 States to get on the ball as far as technology 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:05.800 is concerned. And so that's where the government said, all right, 0:10:05.800 --> 0:10:09.319 we're going to we're going to found an organization whose 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:15.360 purpose is to develop science and technology specifically for defense. Yeah. Yeah, 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:18.720 so that was the that was the reason for ARPA 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:21.200 to come into being. And in fact, in the earliest 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:24.760 days of the United States Space Program, ARPA oversaw a 0:10:24.760 --> 0:10:29.240 lot of those operations that would eventually transfer over to NASA, 0:10:29.320 --> 0:10:32.200 but originally it was ARPA that was overseeing those early 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:36.960 uh space programs. Yeah, a lot of the projects that 0:10:36.960 --> 0:10:39.960 they were that they were working on during their early 0:10:40.200 --> 0:10:44.320 days would wind up being really important to the state 0:10:44.360 --> 0:10:47.760 of technology as we know it today. For for example, 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:51.640 ARPA hired on J. C. R. Lick Lighter as their 0:10:51.720 --> 0:10:56.120 director of the Information Processing Techniques Office. And if you 0:10:56.160 --> 0:10:58.840 haven't heard about this dude before, his vision of computers 0:10:58.880 --> 0:11:04.480 as communication asian devices, not not just information information processing devices, 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:07.360 which they were generally thought of back in that time. 0:11:08.640 --> 0:11:11.960 His vision is a big part of why we have 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:15.960 computers right now, right, I mean the kind of computers 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:18.439 that we talk into and you know, can play but 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:20.400 jeweled on and all of that kind of right, because 0:11:20.440 --> 0:11:25.000 before that you're talking about massive machines that were self contained, right. 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:29.640 They were. Often they were purposed for specific applications and 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:34.080 couldn't do very much outside of those. So computers were useful, 0:11:34.200 --> 0:11:36.400 but they were also very limited, and it was his 0:11:36.520 --> 0:11:41.880 vision that really helped push that beyond those early limitations. Yeah, 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:44.800 so they hired him on in the nineteen sixties and 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:48.480 that led to a whole bunch of developments, including well, 0:11:48.520 --> 0:11:51.760 first the Arbannett so Arbet. Often people will call that 0:11:51.840 --> 0:11:54.720 like the predecessor to the Internet, which that's that's fair. 0:11:54.760 --> 0:11:58.680 It was the first computer network that was a wide 0:11:58.720 --> 0:12:03.400 scale computer network nected uh initially just three computers, although 0:12:03.440 --> 0:12:06.360 more would join on later, and they were separated by 0:12:06.600 --> 0:12:10.360 vast regions of geography, so it wasn't like three computers 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:12.160 that were saying next to each other that then we're 0:12:12.200 --> 0:12:17.559 wired together there. This was a true accomplishment, and it's 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:21.679 hard to explain to someone who now can plug into 0:12:21.760 --> 0:12:24.800 the Internet wirelessly pretty much wherever they happened to be 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.880 how hard this was at the time because they had 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:31.240 to build the infrastructure, as in the actual physical infrastructure, 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:34.360 the things that would plug into the various machines. They 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:37.200 also had to create a means for these machines to 0:12:37.240 --> 0:12:40.560 communicate with each other, because the other issue about computers 0:12:40.600 --> 0:12:42.920 back in those days is that if you had two 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:47.480 different computers, they essentially spoke two different languages. So you 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:50.439 had to create a common form of communication for these 0:12:50.440 --> 0:12:53.840 computers to be able to work together in any meaningful way. 0:12:54.240 --> 0:12:58.160 And that became the purpose of several of the researchers 0:12:58.160 --> 0:13:02.040 there to develop the protocols that would allow information to 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:05.720 be passed across this network and to be accepted and 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:10.760 interpreted properly on either side. So this would end up 0:13:10.800 --> 0:13:14.319 leading into the technologies that we now use in the Internet. 0:13:14.400 --> 0:13:18.640 A lot of them have evolved into that role. So, uh, 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:20.679 while the ARPA net you might argue, was just a 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:24.679 computer network, the Internet was a network of networks which 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:27.360 incorporate lots of stuff you need. You need some networks 0:13:27.360 --> 0:13:30.600 first in order to really get off the ground, exactly. So, 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:33.920 so we can thank DARPA for the fact that the 0:13:33.920 --> 0:13:36.800 Internet is a thing. I mean, it's again, a lot 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:40.600 of the technologies will talk about you could argue would 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:45.720 eventually come to being eventually anyway, but the keyword there's eventually. 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:49.520 The reason they happened when they happened is largely because 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:52.840 DARPA was funding the research that made it possible. Sort 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:56.080 of side question, has anybody ever put a date on 0:13:56.200 --> 0:14:00.040 the time that the Internet became the Internet? Yeah, I 0:14:01.080 --> 0:14:05.559 don't have the date in front of me, but essentially, yes, 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:08.600 there is a record. There is a record of that thing. Yeah, 0:14:08.640 --> 0:14:10.640 because if you're talking about the Internet. One other things 0:14:10.640 --> 0:14:12.840 to remember, of course, and I mean, I'm sure our 0:14:12.880 --> 0:14:15.000 listeners are really aware of this, that the Internet and 0:14:15.040 --> 0:14:17.080 the Worldwide Web are two different things. Right. The World 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:19.400 Wide Web exists on top of the Internet, So you're 0:14:19.400 --> 0:14:22.480 talking about the Internet probably wasn't really the Internet until 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:26.160 there was an x files fan site, so so in 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:27.760 other words, you had to wait for the x files. 0:14:27.840 --> 0:14:29.560 So the Web had been around for a little bit, 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:33.600 but no one cared, right, it didn't have any x files. Really, 0:14:33.680 --> 0:14:37.680 I would argue that it didn't really become the Internet 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:42.880 until because that's when cats were invented, and that would 0:14:42.920 --> 0:14:47.280 be when when the Internet really tell I think so, 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:51.520 and finally made all those hieroglyphs make sense. That was retroactively. 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:53.720 It was rhet conning is what we call that. Anyway, 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:57.320 It's not the only technology that DARPA had a hand 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:01.520 in developing. It also was largely responsible for the funding 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:05.440 of research that led to the Global Positioning System or GPS, 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:09.560 another technology that got a big boost from spotne going 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:13.600 into space absolutely so. The Navy first tested a system 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:17.280 called Transit back in nineteen sixty They used five orbiting 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:21.200 satellites that would allow ships to fix their exact position UH. 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:25.560 A successor to that was called Timation in nineteen sixty seven. 0:15:26.120 --> 0:15:29.479 The interesting thing was that the military used the satellites 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:35.160 for a very long time and civilians only got partial 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:40.040 access to this data. It was specifically degraded on purpose 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:43.160 so that you would not get an accurate reading of 0:15:43.200 --> 0:15:46.360 your position because it was considered too valuable for military 0:15:46.440 --> 0:15:50.440 use to allow civilians to really get that information, right. 0:15:50.480 --> 0:15:53.360 That's why that's why some of the first GPS systems 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.440 were so crappy in comparison to the ones that we 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:59.400 have today. It wasn't because there was something lacking in 0:15:59.440 --> 0:16:02.640 the technolo pology. It was because it had been purposefully restricted. 0:16:02.880 --> 0:16:05.960 It was called selective availability. And you if you look 0:16:06.000 --> 0:16:10.120 at the there were forums that were dedicated to GPS, 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:11.920 Like the people who are really into this kind of 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.480 stuff less like any other technology. There were people who 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:17.280 really thought it was super cool, like the early adopters 0:16:18.280 --> 0:16:22.160 radio enthusiasts. They might talk about, oh, this one has 0:16:22.680 --> 0:16:25.880 a precision of up to five hundred feet, so you'd 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:28.400 be somewhere within five hundred feet of like you knew 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:30.640 your position was within five feet of what you were 0:16:30.640 --> 0:16:33.600 being told. It made geo cashing a lot trickier. Yeah, 0:16:33.600 --> 0:16:37.840 and in fact, geo cashing really took off because Bill 0:16:37.840 --> 0:16:42.080 Clinton got rid of the policy of selected availability, and 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:46.800 once that was eliminated and these GPS receivers could suddenly 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:50.360 get much more accurate readings, people were more interested in 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:53.240 buying them and using them, And the the enthusiasts were 0:16:53.240 --> 0:16:55.000 the ones who were saying, hey, why don't we use 0:16:55.080 --> 0:16:57.960 this to have a game? And you you know, I 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:00.440 did a whole article on how geo cashing works where 0:17:00.440 --> 0:17:02.520 I talked about the history of it. It actually is 0:17:02.560 --> 0:17:06.160 really fascinating. It became this this means of hunting treasure 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:09.760 using these online forums. And again DARPA is largely responsible 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:12.680 for the research and development of that technology. Yeah. Then, 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:15.119 of course there are all kinds of DARPER projects that 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:17.400 we've talked about on the podcast before. We've talked about 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:20.280 the ones where they where they were trying to control 0:17:20.400 --> 0:17:23.560 the flight of beatles and stuff with little backpacks that 0:17:23.720 --> 0:17:27.080 they put on them. We've talked about of course they're 0:17:27.160 --> 0:17:34.520 the DARPA contracted Boston Dynamics robots there, we'll legged walking. 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:38.199 We we've talked about autonomous cars. Yeah, yeah, the Grand 0:17:38.359 --> 0:17:41.600 Challenges those were those are a really big deal with 0:17:41.680 --> 0:17:46.240 DARPA's past, where DARPA had created these challenges for teams 0:17:46.280 --> 0:17:48.879 to create autonomous vehicles that would have to complete a 0:17:48.920 --> 0:17:52.440 course within a certain amount of time. Uh. And um, 0:17:52.480 --> 0:17:55.199 the very first one, there were no winners. None of 0:17:55.200 --> 0:17:58.399 the cars were able to complete the course successfully. The 0:17:58.440 --> 0:18:01.040 second year they had I think five or six teams 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:03.560 successfully complete the course and the one that had the 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:07.639 lowest time one. And then they decided to make it harder. 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:11.440 So the original course was like a desert course, right. 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:13.960 It was pretty wide open space, and it was you 0:18:14.040 --> 0:18:15.520 had to go from point A to point B, and 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:17.639 it did require turns and stuff. It wasn't like a 0:18:17.680 --> 0:18:23.000 straight shot, but it wasn't having to navigate through like traffic. Uh. 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.200 They they made it tougher by setting it in a 0:18:26.359 --> 0:18:29.320 simulated urban environment I think. I think they used essentially 0:18:29.359 --> 0:18:33.639 in an old army base, and they set it up 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:36.719 as if it were a town, and they included actual 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:40.440 traffic in the streets, and I think even pedestrian traffic, 0:18:40.920 --> 0:18:44.320 and the vehicles had to be able to autonomously plot 0:18:44.359 --> 0:18:47.679 a path from a starting position to a destination. They 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:49.679 were not told what it was going to be beforehand, 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:52.920 and then the cars had to navigate through that, obeying 0:18:52.920 --> 0:18:56.480 all traffic laws as well. So a much more difficult 0:18:56.480 --> 0:18:58.680 task than just going from point A to point B. 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:02.720 And we've seen that continue to the most recent robotics challenge, 0:19:02.760 --> 0:19:05.000 the one that's going on right now and will conclude. 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:10.040 We're recording this in April. In the summer, there's going 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:13.760 to be the Robotics challenge that requires teams to create 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:17.000 a robot that can get into a vehicle, drive the 0:19:17.119 --> 0:19:20.639 vehicle to a location, get out of the vehicle, go 0:19:20.720 --> 0:19:25.400 into said location, navigate a set upstairs, go over possibly 0:19:25.440 --> 0:19:31.040 some rubble, breakthrough a wall, connects some wires together, operate 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:35.680 some control systems, and do something secret that has yet 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:39.800 to be revealed to the teams. And the purpose of 0:19:39.840 --> 0:19:41.639 this is to create a robot that can respond to 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:46.800 emergency situations. It was specifically inspired by the Fukushima disaster. 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:51.920 I'm really sorry, guys, but the second that you got 0:19:51.920 --> 0:19:54.439 to breaking through a wall, I could think of in 0:19:54.520 --> 0:19:57.840 my head was like a like slim Ninja version of 0:19:57.880 --> 0:20:01.920 the kool Aid Man. See, that's interesting. My first thought 0:20:02.040 --> 0:20:04.359 was that it's it's a robot that turns into the 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:07.720 Incredible Hulk. That was my version of smashing through the wall. 0:20:07.760 --> 0:20:10.720 But Cooley man, is that's good too. It would be 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:13.320 hilarious if it actually did get shout out oh yeah 0:20:13.400 --> 0:20:17.320 when it does that. Um yeah. And I'm sure at 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:19.199 least one team is going to have to do it 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:23.000 that way. I really hope that someone does. Yeah. So anyway, 0:20:23.040 --> 0:20:25.919 that's that one is going on right now, and I 0:20:26.000 --> 0:20:29.760 look forward to following the the progress of the various 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:32.240 teams and kind of also, I'm very curious to find 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:35.680 out what the secret objective is that has yet to 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:38.440 be revealed, And the idea is it's supposed to test 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:42.399 the robot's ability to deal with um changing situations that 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:46.800 are difficult, if not impossible, to predict. Yeah, but of 0:20:46.840 --> 0:20:50.159 course there are lots of new DARPA proposals going on 0:20:50.400 --> 0:20:52.800 all the time. Yeah, and we should preface this. We're 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:54.880 going to be talking and some of these we will 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:56.880 not be covering in depth. And the reason for that 0:20:57.600 --> 0:21:00.800 is that the proposals are in various state ages right now. 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:03.240 Some of them are so early and so vague as 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:07.200 to be impossible to go into depth about because there's 0:21:07.240 --> 0:21:09.359 nothing to talk about yet. Yeah, there's no science to 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:12.440 talk about because no one has done the science yet. Yeah, 0:21:12.480 --> 0:21:15.120 but that's where science comes from from, no one having 0:21:15.160 --> 0:21:18.920 done it yet exactly. So. Yeah, and this, this first 0:21:18.920 --> 0:21:21.639 one that I'm going to mention, is one of those things. 0:21:21.760 --> 0:21:26.240 The press release for this was only put out on April, 0:21:27.119 --> 0:21:31.920 I believe. And uh, this is for Project the Darpest, 0:21:31.960 --> 0:21:37.360 calling and zero. They love acronyms, you guys. Oh yeah, 0:21:37.400 --> 0:21:41.560 a whole bunch. They are metal gear solid. I've got 0:21:41.560 --> 0:21:43.879 a feeling, hey, call back. I've got a feeling that 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:47.679 uh uh, that we're going to see like there's a 0:21:47.840 --> 0:21:50.600 there's gotta be a department in DARPA that's just like, 0:21:50.800 --> 0:21:53.120 all right, you gotta come up with a really awesome 0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:56.560 project name that could be a cool acronyms. Just keep 0:21:56.600 --> 0:22:00.280 on tweaking it until the acronym makes sense. Yeah, So 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:03.320 so end zero that's near zero power r F and 0:22:03.400 --> 0:22:08.800 sensor operations. And this project is currently seeking proposals and 0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:13.640 it's it's looking to develop low energy, wireless sensors that 0:22:13.680 --> 0:22:17.200 can wake up and take action when a particular event 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:21.720 triggers them, like, for example, infrastructure damage. If a crack 0:22:22.080 --> 0:22:26.879 appears in a dam, for example, then these these sleeping 0:22:27.160 --> 0:22:29.800 sensors could could wake up and phone home, or if 0:22:29.840 --> 0:22:34.560 there's a forest fire or etcetera, an earthquake or an earthquake. Yeah, 0:22:34.600 --> 0:22:37.960 that makes sense to me actually, because one thing we've 0:22:38.000 --> 0:22:41.520 talked about before is imagine we're going into the world 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:44.080 of the Internet of things, and one of the primary 0:22:44.119 --> 0:22:47.320 components of the Internet of things as we've imagined it 0:22:47.520 --> 0:22:51.840 at least, is sensors, right, you know, ubiquitous sensors. Sensors 0:22:51.880 --> 0:22:55.119 on everything that let you know when something's going on 0:22:55.320 --> 0:22:58.080 that needs attention, or they give you data that you 0:22:58.119 --> 0:23:02.160 can use somehow to to decisions or have your environment 0:23:02.280 --> 0:23:05.720 changed for you, or whatever it may be. You're going 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:08.399 to have sensors everywhere, yeah, Yeah, so that you don't 0:23:08.440 --> 0:23:11.200 have to be in a place watching a thing personally, 0:23:12.200 --> 0:23:15.880 your your place can monitor that for you. Sure, but 0:23:17.359 --> 0:23:20.400 you don't want those sensors to be a big power drain, 0:23:20.480 --> 0:23:22.959 of course, and you don't want them to have just 0:23:23.000 --> 0:23:25.320 sort of like little batteries that you'd have to replace 0:23:25.400 --> 0:23:28.400 or recharge all the time. So this makes a lot 0:23:28.400 --> 0:23:29.919 of sense to me if you can come up with 0:23:29.960 --> 0:23:33.720 ways of of having sensors that are basically not draining 0:23:33.800 --> 0:23:37.200 power or somehow inactive when they're not in use, so 0:23:37.280 --> 0:23:39.800 essentially they can go into some form of sleep mode 0:23:40.320 --> 0:23:44.520 and thus prolong the life of their power source. Also, uh, 0:23:44.560 --> 0:23:47.520 it's attractive or another reason, that reason being that I 0:23:47.560 --> 0:23:50.439