Alt-BEAM Archive
Message #10635
To: beam@sgiblab.sgi.com
From: JVernonM@aol.com
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2000 09:06:01 EST
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: Steering an Aquabot and giving it a purpose.
In a message dated 2/22/00 8:52:36 AM Eastern Standard Time,
rwcaudle@hpamonon.com writes:
> The plan is to make them with a slight positive bouyancy so that when the
> battery runs down that it will float to the top so that it can charge
during
> the day, only to return to it's job at night
I like it! Only one problem though. Temperature. If you make these things
slightly positively buoyant at a given temperature, they will sink like a
rock at colder temps. Water density changes at different temperatures. This
isn't a problem with a bot made for an indoor aquarium where temperature is
maintained at a constant, but in the wild it becomes a major problem. The
only solution that I can see is an artificial swim bladder that not only
makes the bot dive and resurface, but also changes the bots buoyancy as
temperature changes. This will more than likely require a microprocessor, but
a variable resistor or switch made using mercury may be a viable solution.
See ya,
Jim
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Exhibit/8281/beamart.html
ICQ# 55657870
10636 Tue, 22 Feb 2000 16:22:29 +0100 [alt-beam] Re: BEAM: Tendency toward miniaturization "Thomas Pilgaard" (Initial note: by no means is it my intentions to display that I would be
scared of technology or that technology is to doom our existance or the
likes. I am merely scribbling some of the thougts that have occupied my mind
when soldering, bending wires, reading the list etc.)
> > It seems more
> > reasonable to ask: do we !want! antropomorphic or biomorphic macines.
> I must give a definite YES to that question.
Then a natural question would be : !why! do we want these machines? What
problems are they going to solve? What tasks are they going to perform? How
are they going to augment the premises of what we do? How are they going to
make our lives easier and better?
> Fact is, if it can
> be done, it
> will be.
Unfortunately I agree on this. Point is, this fact disregards questions on
the value of what we are doing. We tend to create something to which we
eventually find a use. If we are to take on the challenge of creating
capable biomorphic creatures we have to question the premises of our work.
In the end that is what will lead to higher expressions of quality.
At times we seem to have a blind faith that technology in itself will solve
all of our problems. If we could just get faster computation we could make a
neural net that would be just as complex as our brain. Technology has never
solved !any! problem on its own. It is the application of technology that
solves problems.
> It may well be that the created must inherently create.
> One could go
> so far as to say that we exist in order to create a more viable
> form. Capable
> of living beyond the confines of the planet. We, as a population, must
> eventually leave the safety of the nest. After all, the nest is
> not going to
> be here forever. I wonder at times if a robot will someday, in the far
> future, write a note to a list asking whether it is a good idea
> to create a
> biological lifeform that emulates mechanical life :).
If you are to suggest that we as a biological phenomenon are to replace
ourselves with an alternate organism - electronic or biological - I'd reckon
we would be just about the only creatures to do so ever. In the entire
universe.
Cheers,
Thomas
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