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What could possibly go wrong here? - Xenobots
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Ned
Nov 30, 2021, 11:31:34 AM11/30/21
to
---
Scientists that created Xenobots - the world's first living
robots - have found a way to efficiently form the bots to
reproduce themselves on their own.
The Xenobots are formed from stem cells of the Xenopus
laevis (an African clawed frog), the cells of which have tiny
little hairs called cilia to help them move around a petri dish.
Scientist Sam Kriegman told Insider that, while people may
think of large industrial or metallic figures as robots, the
term really refers to any machine that does "physical,
useful work" in the world.
Kriegman worked on the Xenobot project along with researchers
affiliated with the University of Vermont, Tufts University,
and Harvard University's Wyss Institute for Biologically
Inspired Engineering.
"We tried to figure out what useful work they could do, and
one of the things that we came up with was to clean up the
dish," Kriegman said.
https://www.businessinsider.com/researchers-working-on-worlds-first-living-robot-reproduce-itself-2021-11
---
Makes he think back to Freeman Dyson, bless his sweet
dead soul. Near the end - well, several years ago - he strongly
supported making genetic engineering 'kits' available to kids
to experiment with making new forms of life, kind of like the
old chemistry sets we had as kids.
He also mused about the possibility of engineering a new
life form of a bacteria that eats metal - To clean up all the junk
metal lying around in our world. Yeah, I can see how THAT one
would never get out of hand.
Ned
Noah Sombrero
Nov 30, 2021, 11:49:13 AM11/30/21
to
On Tue, 30 Nov 2021 08:31:33 -0800 (PST), Ned <ned...@ix.netcom.com>
wrote:
>
>---
>Scientists that created Xenobots - the world's first living
>robots - have found a way to efficiently form the bots to
>reproduce themselves on their own.
>The Xenobots are formed from stem cells of the Xenopus
>laevis (an African clawed frog), the cells of which have tiny
>little hairs called cilia to help them move around a petri dish.
>Scientist Sam Kriegman told Insider that, while people may
>think of large industrial or metallic figures as robots, the
>term really refers to any machine that does "physical,
>useful work" in the world.
>Kriegman worked on the Xenobot project along with researchers
>affiliated with the University of Vermont, Tufts University,
>and Harvard University's Wyss Institute for Biologically
>Inspired Engineering.
>"We tried to figure out what useful work they could do, and
>one of the things that we came up with was to clean up the
>dish," Kriegman said.
>https://www.businessinsider.com/researchers-working-on-worlds-first-living-robot-reproduce-itself-2021-11
>---
So what is it that makes them robots? They are repurposed cells?
Does that count?
They can be made to clean up a petrie dish? There are probably other
living organisms that could do that.
In any case, robot is probably an overreach. If they could put some
chemicals together and have them assemble into a cell, that would be
closer, but not quite, since it would simply be a matter of mimicing
life processes that had suddenly become well enough understood to do
that.
For me, a robot would be from scratch. No repurposing, no mimicing.
And a robot would need a controler (brain) with spicific instructions,
do this harmless thing, don't do that harmful thing. Which would mean
that scientists who are unaccumstomed to anticipating what could go
wrong, as we see above, would suddenly need to aticipate all possible
wrongnesses. Perfhaps interested scientists could be shipped to mars.
Let us know when you have something.
> Makes he think back to Freeman Dyson, bless his sweet
>dead soul. Near the end - well, several years ago - he strongly
>supported making genetic engineering 'kits' available to kids
>to experiment with making new forms of life, kind of like the
>old chemistry sets we had as kids.
>
> He also mused about the possibility of engineering a new
>life form of a bacteria that eats metal - To clean up all the junk
>metal lying around in our world. Yeah, I can see how THAT one
>would never get out of hand.
>
> Ned
--
Noah Sombrero
wrote:
>
>---
>Scientists that created Xenobots - the world's first living
>robots - have found a way to efficiently form the bots to
>reproduce themselves on their own.
>The Xenobots are formed from stem cells of the Xenopus
>laevis (an African clawed frog), the cells of which have tiny
>little hairs called cilia to help them move around a petri dish.
>Scientist Sam Kriegman told Insider that, while people may
>think of large industrial or metallic figures as robots, the
>term really refers to any machine that does "physical,
>useful work" in the world.
>Kriegman worked on the Xenobot project along with researchers
>affiliated with the University of Vermont, Tufts University,
>and Harvard University's Wyss Institute for Biologically
>Inspired Engineering.
>"We tried to figure out what useful work they could do, and
>one of the things that we came up with was to clean up the
>dish," Kriegman said.
>https://www.businessinsider.com/researchers-working-on-worlds-first-living-robot-reproduce-itself-2021-11
>---
Does that count?
They can be made to clean up a petrie dish? There are probably other
living organisms that could do that.
In any case, robot is probably an overreach. If they could put some
chemicals together and have them assemble into a cell, that would be
closer, but not quite, since it would simply be a matter of mimicing
life processes that had suddenly become well enough understood to do
that.
For me, a robot would be from scratch. No repurposing, no mimicing.
And a robot would need a controler (brain) with spicific instructions,
do this harmless thing, don't do that harmful thing. Which would mean
that scientists who are unaccumstomed to anticipating what could go
wrong, as we see above, would suddenly need to aticipate all possible
wrongnesses. Perfhaps interested scientists could be shipped to mars.
Let us know when you have something.
> Makes he think back to Freeman Dyson, bless his sweet
>dead soul. Near the end - well, several years ago - he strongly
>supported making genetic engineering 'kits' available to kids
>to experiment with making new forms of life, kind of like the
>old chemistry sets we had as kids.
>
> He also mused about the possibility of engineering a new
>life form of a bacteria that eats metal - To clean up all the junk
>metal lying around in our world. Yeah, I can see how THAT one
>would never get out of hand.
>
> Ned
Noah Sombrero
Noah Sombrero
Nov 30, 2021, 12:55:00 PM11/30/21
to
On Tue, 30 Nov 2021 11:49:11 -0500, Noah Sombrero <hibi...@fea.st>
wrote:
anticipating undesirable behior does not take into account:
biological systems
cancer
insanity
mechanical systems
crashing
fried circuits
And don't give anything free will. We know what a mess that can be.
--
Noah Sombrero
wrote:
biological systems
cancer
insanity
mechanical systems
crashing
fried circuits
And don't give anything free will. We know what a mess that can be.
--
Noah Sombrero
Sanford Manley
Nov 30, 2021, 3:30:49 PM11/30/21
to
they are in and it peters out after one generation.
--
Sanford M. Manley
"Trying to be right all the time
is a very subtle way of being wrong."
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