#2,631 – I’m a Philosopher?!

Am I one of the greatest philosophers to ever live?! Probably not.  But I do have a lot in common with some of history’s most famous thinkers.  Consider the following:

Like Marcus Aurelius I have trouble sleeping, chest and stomach pains, and have written a self-help book.

Like Jean-Jacques Rousseau I feel at home everywhere and nowhere.

Like Henry David Thoreau I keep dozens of journals and have supersonic hearing that can hear faint distant sounds. 

Like Arthur Schopenhauer I don’t meditate or like noises and no one reads my books.

Like Epicurus I’m not a foodie.

Like Simone Weil I flinch at physical contact, believe that patience is a virtue, practice radical empathy and pay close attention.

Like Sei Shonagon I believe that who we are is represented by what we choose to surround ourselves with.  I find the beauty in objects and believe in the concept of Wabi – that there’s perfection in imperfection.

Like Friedrich Nietzsche I’m known as the philosopher of the exclamation point! A prolific writer and walker who can’t dance. 

Like Michel de Montaigne I surround myself with books and obsessively underline and annotate while reading.

Like the Stoics I’m indifferent.  Realizing that forgoing pleasure is one of life’s great pleasures.

And I’m even like author Eric Weiner who taught me about all of these philosophers in his wonderful book The Socrates Express for, I too, am freaked out by nonexistence.

So while I may not be a great philosopher perhaps all these similarities means that I’m destined to be?! On my way to becoming the next Socrates?! I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Am I destined to become one of the greatest philosophers of all time?!

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#2,630 – Grow in the Dark Plants

First came plants that can glow in the dark. Now comes plants that can grow in the dark thanks to a new process that changes how they’re fed. 

SciTechDaily explains:

“For millions of years, photosynthesis has evolved in plants  to turn water, carbon dioxide, and the energy from sunlight into plant biomass and the foods we eat. However, this process is very inefficient, with only around 1% of the energy found in sunlight ending up in the plant. Researchers at the University of California, Riverside and the University of Delaware have found a way to bypass the need for biological photosynthesis altogether and create food independent of sunlight by using artificial photosynthesis.

The new research, published on June 23, 2022, in the journal Nature Food, uses a two-step electrocatalytic process to convert carbon dioxide, electricity, and water into acetate, the form of the main component of vinegar. Food-producing organisms then consume acetate in the dark to grow. Combined with solar panels to generate electricity to power the electrocatalysis, this hybrid organic-inorganic system could increase the conversion efficiency of sunlight into food, up to 18 times more efficient for some foods.”

The fact that natural photosynthesis is only 1% percent efficient is shocking to me.  A process that we need to survive and it barely works?! That’s crazy. You would think that evolution would have improved upon that number by now but I guess that doesn’t matter anymore.  Now that humans have figured out a way to improve upon nature’s designs and make photosynthesis more efficient.

All in all, this is actually a very important discovery as it could pave the way to growing plants on space ships, space station, lunar colonies and other places where sunlight may not be prevalent.

Is growing plants in the dark the Greatest Idea Ever?

 

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#2,629 – Exomuscles

I just finished watching Halo which makes this a good time to discuss a new invention that could give us “wearable muscles”.  A more subtle option compared to bulkier exoskeletons that could fit underneath our clothes.

New Atlas sums it up best:

“Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a lightweight, wearable textile exomuscle that uses sensors embedded in its fabric to detect a user’s movement intentions and chip in extra force as needed. Initial tests show a significant boost in endurance.

Where powered exoskeletons act as both muscle and bone, providing force as well as structural support, exomuscles make use of the body’s own structure and simply chip in with additional force. As a result, they’re much lighter and less bulky, but they’re also limited in how much force they can deliver, since human bones and joints can only take so much.

This ‘Myoshirt’ from ETH Zurich is designed as a vest, with cuffs for the upper arm and forearm. Sensors in the fabric feed data on muscle control impulses to a control box, which processes the information in real time and decides when to actuate the artificial muscles – which are short Dyneema cables aligned parallel with the wearer’s own muscles. By shortening the cables as the muscles contract, the Myoshirt is able to contribute power to your movements in a subtle, discreet, intuitive and tuneable way.

The ETH team developed the Myoshirt particularly to enhance the strength and endurance of people with restricted or declining mobility, and ran a small test, placing the unit on 10 people without any physical impairments, one with muscular dystrophy, and one with a spinal cord injury.

In an endurance test, which required people to lift their arms and/or an object and hold them up, healthy subjects were able to hold the position for a third longer with the exomuscle active than without it. The results were even better for the other two; the MD patient saw an endurance boost around 60 percent, and the patient with a spinal cord injury saw an endurance leap of 300 percent.”

So, while this innovation is targeting people who need help lifting things I’m hoping that one day it becomes commercially available for everyone so that I won’t have to go to the gym anymore.  I could live without having Cortana in my head though.

Is an exomuscle suit the Greatest Idea Ever?

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#2,628 – AI Shakespeare

Despite recent claims by a Google researcher AI is not yet sentient.  But it is making great strides towards that goal and even if it never quite gets there AI could still give humans a run for their money.  At least when it comes to creative pursuits like creating new art and literature.  Something long thought to be the sole province of people.  In fact, one day AI may be responsible for creating all content. 

Singularity Hub explains:

“‘Nay, nay, I say! This cannot be,
That machines should e’er surpass our art.
We are the masters, them the slaves,
And thus it ever shall be so!
They learn, ‘tis true, but they learn
Only what we bid them learn, no more.
They cannot understand the heart
Or beauty of our words, you see.
So let us not give in to these
Machines—they’ll never be as good
As we are at creating art.’

If that reads a little like Shakespeare defending humans’ innate superiority over artificial intelligence hundreds of years ahead of his time, it’s not.

But it is something almost as far out: an AI system trained to express itself like the bard. The AI assimilated his style and perspective by ingesting his plays—educating itself to give an opinion on AI creativity in iambic pentameter.

‘Shakespeare’ was speaking as part of a debate held in the University of Oxford Union featuring AI versions of classic writers and literary characters.

The motion was: ‘This house believes most of the world’s content will soon be created by AI.’

This was a follow-up to another special AI debate that we described in The Conversation a few months ago. Whereas that one featured an AI in its ‘own character’ discussing the ethics of its technology, this time, by taking on different personas, we were able to explore this subject from a very different angle. The timely question is whether human-created content will soon be overwhelmed by the synthetic.

Other synthetic contributors included Mrs. Bennet from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813); Winston Churchill, with a rousing parliamentary speech; and Oscar Wilde, improvising a previously unknown AI-themed scene from The Importance of Being Earnest (1895).”

As a content creator myself I sure hope that AI doesn’t get to the point where it is responsible for generating all content.  But at the same time there could be some value to AI generated content.  For starters, these celebrity AI debates are kind of fun in their own right.  And who wouldn’t want to get some new Shakespearean style plays even in the famous bard isn’t the one creating them? Not to mention the fact that having AI versions of historical figures that you can conversate with does have a certain appeal.  Just think of the potential for interactive museum exhibits that let you have a conversation with famous people in their own style. 

The possibilities are endless.  Just so long as we humans don’t have to end our own creative pursuits.

To be Shakespeare or not to be Shakespeare? That is the question.

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#2,627 – Graphene Tattoos

Here’s a use case for the wonder material graphene that I did not see coming: tattoos.  Specifically, e-tattoos capable of turning into a health monitor to keep an eye on our blood pressure.

New Atlas explains:

“Having the cuff tightened around your arm in the doctor’s office is the standard method of measuring blood pressure, but it’s not the most reliable way. It’s only a single data point that doesn’t necessarily capture the whole picture, and it can be influenced by a person’s mood at the time.

Continuous monitoring is needed to really understand how the body is functioning, but that’s hard to do outside of the clinic. Smartwatches and fitness trackers may seem like the answer, but they aren’t reliable enough to handle the job just yet – they tend to move around, and are too simple.

So for the new study, researchers at Texas A&M and the University of Texas at Austin developed a less invasive device that can measure blood pressure over time. The device is what’s called an e-tattoo, made up of a graphene sensor encased in a sticky material that’s apparently comfortable enough to wear for long periods of time, and doesn’t move around. Other e-tattoos have been designed to monitor cardiac patients’ hearts, vital signs during exercise, or muscles of neurodegenerative patients.

The new device makes its blood pressure measurements using a new method, so the team had to develop machine learning models to analyze the readings. It works by firing an electrical current into the skin and measuring how the body reacts – a value called bioimpedance, which has an indirect correlation with blood pressure that the new models can calculate.

In tests, the e-tattoo was able to accurately monitor blood pressure in arteries for more than 300 minutes. Ultimately, the team hopes to develop the tech into e-tattoos that can be worn by patients long-term to measure their blood pressure in a range of situations, including sleeping, exercise, and during stress. That data is important to help diagnose or monitor health conditions.”

Plus, having a tattoo will make you look cooler.

Is a Graphene Tattoo the Greatest Idea Ever?

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#2,626 – Laundry Jet

Since our rights are being taken away now may not be the best time to talk about something else that takes things away from us.  But since the Laundry Jet is taking away our dirty laundry I don’t think we’ll mind.  Plus the promotional videos make using it look like so much fun.  Something that even kids would love to use when they have to tidy up their rooms since it turns doing laundry into a game of basketball thanks to a design that sucks up anything thrown its way.

As My Modern Met puts it:

“Doing laundry can be a dreaded chore that involves a lot of upper body strength for collecting and lugging piles of dirty clothes to the washer. But what if the muscle work was eliminated? Laundry Jet might be the solution. The appliance is an updated laundry chute that transports your laundry from your room to the laundry room.

What makes it different from ordinary laundry chutes is the fact that this futuristic-looking version is not reliant on gravity, but air power. Vacuum force sucks the laundry from a wall port down to a central repository in the laundry room. It can even work in reverse, too—there’s an optional return system installation that will suck the clean laundry back up to a designated location in the house.

As for those ports, each system can be installed with up to eight of them in different rooms of the house. Each one opens either with a manual slide or motion sensors. The ports are just narrower than the 6-inch wide pipes, and can be fed bulky items, like sheets and towels. The system is best installed during home construction; but, since the pipes are usually run through an attic, it can also be retrofitted into an existing home.”

Sign me up!

Is the Laundry Jet the Greatest Idea Ever?

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#2,625 – Craig’s Lists: Great Abortion Ideas From Other People

Guns literally have more rights than women do. Welcome to America in the year 2022.

I don’t even know what to say. Or how to fix the broken country that we find ourselves in. Luckily, others do. Here are some of the best ideas I’ve heard recently about how to handle abortion going forward:

• Cancel the Fourth of July this year. This is not a country worth celebrating right now.
• Go on a general strike. Women are the driving force behind a functioning society. So, what would happen if all women suddenly refused to work? Let’s find out.
• Put abortion clinics on federal land in red states (Elizabeth Warren’s idea).
• Hold Supreme Court Justices to account; perjury charges for anyone who lied about Roe v. Wade during their confirmation hearing.
• Change how Supreme Court Justices are chosen; hold elections. Change how long they can serve for; add term limits.
• Tax churches.
• Vasectomies are reversible; make it mandatory for men to get them until they reach a certain age or threshold of financial stability.
• No more political donations to Democrats until legislation is passed that codifies Roe v. Wade into law.
• Different religions view abortion differently. Banning abortion on the grounds of Christian values violates the sanctity of those religions that allow abortions. Enforce the separation of church and state.
• If you can’t have clinics at least provide abortion pills for free; travel vouchers for anyone who has to travel to another state to get an abortion
• Have corporations take action; don’t film movies/tv shows or conduct any business in states that ban abortion.
• And as Gavin Newsom puts it, if you are truly pro life then support a pro life agenda of:
  • gun safety laws
  • taking action on climate change
  • protecting LGBT rights
  • healthcare for all
  • expanding pre-natal care
  • expanding mental healthcare
  • expanding childcare
  • universal preschool
  • free school meals

As you can see not all hope is lost. There are still actions we can take. The fight is not over. On the contrary, we’re just getting started.

Ideas to help people fighting for their reproductive rights.

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#2,624 – Spiderhead

The other day I envisioned creating a system where humans had built in “outlets” that could be plugged into for a variety of reasons.  For instance, we could hook ourselves up to an IV drip to receive the daily nutrients we need instead of going through the time consuming process of shopping for groceries and then cooking, eating, and cleaning up after ourselves.  And we could receive anesthesia at bedtime so that we fall asleep instantaneously instead of twisting and turning all night.  We could also directly connect ourselves to the Internet or let doctors feel exactly what we’re feeling instead of having to describe pain.  A series of plug and play options for all of our needs.  What a great idea.

But then I watched the new movie Spiderhead on Netflix and immediately thought otherwise.  For here was a future in which people have built in drug delivery systems implanted in their backs that allow them to receive different drugs for different purposes.  Drugs that make them instantly fall in love with another person (even beat up nasty individuals), become fearful of something (even something as benign as a stapler), or do whatever they’re told (even consent to the study itself).  Chris Hemsworth’s evil scientist character thinks these drugs will make the world a better place as people would be forced to act in the best interests of the greater good instead of choosing to act selfishly as so many of us currently do.  But in actuality such drugs would be exploited for nefarious purposes by evil governments or bad actors who would aim to control the populace as they see fit or even eliminate entire groups all together by driving them to commit acts of self-harm.

But this is just a movie and my own idea is extremely far-fetched so we won’t have to actually worry about being controlled by drug delivery implants any time soon.  Or will we?! For it turns out that the concept of Spiderhead isn’t just science fiction.  Thanks to researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden we could actually be on the verge of delivering drugs via implant after all.

As the Daily Mail puts it:

“Scientists have taken a step towards ‘remote-controlled’ medications by inventing a material which uses electrical signals to release molecules.

It could be used to make futuristic implants which produce doses of a drug at regular intervals so patients no longer need to remember to take their pills.”

The article added that:

“a prototype could be available within a year. It could be smaller than a centimeter across and operated using a smartphone app.

The new material is a polymer surface which, triggered by a simple electrical pulse, switches from holding to releasing molecules.”

Now if we’re just talking about delivering drugs that we’re already scheduled to take that’s one thing.  It probably would be better to make the process more efficient and ensure that we never miss a dose.  But then again there’s a lot of potential for things to go wrong from hackers taking over control of an app and causing an overdose to people unwittingly receiving doses of medications that they’re not interested in.  So, it’ll be interesting to see how things play out from here and if this idea of a drug delivery implant ever takes off.  Kind of like Hemsworth at the end of Spiderhead.

Is Spiderhead coming true?

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#2,623 – Robophysics

A new branch of science is figuring out how to provide locomotion to robots and may have just reinvented the wheel in the process thanks to a new version that is capable of rolling uphill.

Quanta Magazine explains:

“In a physics lab in Amsterdam, there’s a wheel that can spontaneously roll uphill by wiggling.

This “odd wheel” looks simple: just six small motors linked together by plastic arms and rubber bands to form a ring about 6 inches in diameter. When the motors are powered on, it starts writhing, executing complicated squashing and stretching motions and occasionally flinging itself into the air, all the while slowly making its way up a bumpy foam ramp.

The odd wheel’s unorthodox mode of travel exemplifies a recent trend: Physicists are finding ways to get useful collective behavior to spontaneously emerge in robots assembled from simple parts that obey simple rules. ‘I’ve been calling it robophysics,’ said Daniel Goldman, a physicist at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

The problem of locomotion — one of the most elementary behaviors of living things — has long preoccupied biologists and engineers alike. When animals encounter obstacles and rugged terrain, we instinctively take these challenges in stride, but how we do this is not so simple. Engineers have struggled to build robots that won’t collapse or lurch forward when navigating real-world environments, and they can’t possibly program a robot to anticipate all the challenges it might encounter.

The odd wheel, developed by the physicists Corentin Coulais of the University of Amsterdam and Vincenzo Vitelli of the University of Chicago and collaborators and described in a recent preprint, embodies a very different approach to locomotion. The wheel’s uphill movement emerges from simple oscillatory motion in each of its component parts. Although these parts know nothing about the environment, the wheel as a whole automatically adjusts its wiggling motion to compensate for uneven terrain.

Energy generated during each cyclical oscillation of the odd wheel allows it to push off against the ground and roll upward and over obstacles. (Another version of the wheel with only six motors was studied in a recent paper.)

The physicists also created an ‘odd ball’ that always bounces to one side and an ‘odd wall’ that controls where it absorbs energy from an impact.  The objects all stem from the same equation describing an asymmetric relationship between stretching and squashing motions that the researchers identified two years ago.

‘These are indeed behaviors you would not expect,’ said Auke Ijspeert, a bioroboticist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne.”

But what we can expect is more oddities coming our way as the burgeoning field of robophysics takes off.

Is robophysics the Greatest Idea Ever?

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#2,622 – Everything Everywhere All At Once

Everything Everywhere All At Once deserves all the praise it’s receiving.  If it was up to me it would win every award, be shown on every TV in every house, and would be all anyone talked about all the time.  In short, it would be everything everywhere all at once.  It’s that good.  The most original movie concept since Inception this low-budget sci-fi epic is as spectacular as it is ambitious.  And it might very well be the perfect metaphor for our times.  A future filled with limitless possibilities.  A multiverse full of hope.

The LA Times explains: 

“As Hollywood doubles down on such sagas — think ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,’ ‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ and the cyclical properties of Marvel and DC — the concept has greater potential than how it’s being exploited in blockbuster pop culture, the filmmakers argued.

‘The multiverse can be way more than just this corporatized version of it that we’re seeing right now, where it’s basically used for fan service or for cultural fracking, almost — like we’re mining our past cultures just so that we can resurrect them in new arrangements,’ Kwan said.

‘We should be looking to a forward-looking multiverse, because right now this universe we’re in is on a very scary path. And the multiverse is actually a really beautiful, important metaphor for right now because we need to be looking at all the possibilities, not just the one that we think we’re in,’ he said. ‘And we definitely shouldn’t be looking backwards.’”

So, instead of having all three versions of Spider-Man appear in the same movie we should be doing more of what Everything Everywhere All At Once does.  Dreaming up new possibilities, new combinations, new original stories.  And we should be applying that same mindset to all aspects of our lives.  Re-imagining how we see ourselves and one another. Reorienting our worldviews.  Putting ourselves into someone else’s shoes as if they were another copy of ourselves from another Universe.  Gaining new perspectives.

When we do that everything seems possible.  Whether that’s a world where people have hot dogs for fingers or a world where we’re all tolerant of one another’s beliefs. 

Is Everything Everywhere All At Once the greatest movie of all-time?!

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