Science In Real Life

The Impending Robot Upheaval April 7, 2011

Futurism is a dangerous business. Historically, human beings have shown an ability to predict future events more than, say, a few days in advance that is, on average, much less effective than chance. And the greater the scale of these predictions, the more people involved in making the prediction a reality, the more abysmal our power of precognition becomes. Nowhere is this more evident than in claims about new or (allegedly) forthcoming technology, for the simple reason that technology is the single most rapidly changing field of human endeavor that has ever existed. How many times have we heard that this or that device will be The Next Big Thing, only to have it exert only minimal effect on the lives of those who use it, or only be used in very rare applications, or manifest only as a passing fad, or even never make it to a working prototype, much less the public market? The segway, blu ray, flying cars, laserdisc, video phones, blimps, jetpacks. The simple fact is that no matter how much it may seem to the engineer or the scientist that a given piece of technology will provide definite alterations to society as it presently exists, the economic and social responses are far too complex to anticipate.

So why is it, then, that the title of this essay predicts with such apparent confidence a staggering change to the way our world works as a result of a certain type of technology? Because in this case, the case I am about to present, the mere possibilities are stark enough that we should all be sitting up and taking notice. Risk analysis must be based on both the likelihood and severity of a potentiality; even if the likelihood is very low, the consequences may be severe enough that preparation is called for.

Advances in robotics have been accelerating. In the last ten years, amazing innovations have been made in robotic movement and information processing. As a theoretical physicist, I am trained very thoroughly in learning the basic elements of a system, then anticipating and evaluating the logical consequences. I find that at this point in my career I do this automatically, with almost every situation I come across. And so it was with what I learned today. As soon as I learned of the latest development, a connection was forged in my brain with other robotic inventions of which I already knew, and from the top of my head consequences sprang forth unbidden. Terrifying consequences. Consequences which might never, which hopefully never, come to pass. Let me show you the pieces of which I am aware – and recognize that there are almost certainly pieces of which I am not aware.

This one seems helpful, or at worst innocuous. It is the Brain Computer Interface, and researchers were stunned to find that making one is as easy as directly connecting an input chip to the nervous system. With adaptive software, the plasticity of the brain does the rest, and within a day the brain can, by thought, control whatever device is attached to the system. This video was posted in 2009, and newer BCI systems make this one look slow. Companies like Braingate and IntendiX are already putting these devices on the market and into medical applications. So what do you want to control with your interface?

How about a nice powered exoskeleton? One of these babies enhances strength, speed, and endurance by factors of anything from five to ten. The reaction time gets even faster if the input is from a well-trained neural interface.

Or how about one of these? A company called Boston Dynamics has developed robotic locomotion possessing balance and terrain capability on par with organic systems (you know, animals with legs). Available in regular size (seen there) and fun size.

But maybe legs are too, well, pedestrian. Enter the quadrotor. Developed by UPenn’s GRASP lab, these are autonomous hovering drones capable of astonishing feats of agility and cooperation. That one video does not do justice to their potential. They can do surveillance, dynamic flight adjustment, and cooperative transport of heavy objects. Did I mention they’re autonomous? That doesn’t mean true artificial intelligence, but it does mean that once you give them a goal (like “fly through the opening”, or “keep the ball in the air”) they get the job done without further instruction and by communicating with each other. Oh, and they’re already commercially available.

Now, this is the final piece, the one I found today. It’s not a physical invention, it’s software. Very, very smart software. Given a reference image on any object, this software will be able to track it in a visual field. Not only that, it learns as it watches and improves its tracking. It can pick out faces and objects in rapid, erratic motion. Oh, and it’s called “Predator”.

Some of you readers are already seeing what I see. Combine any of these inventions with any other, or with conventional weaponry, and you have something that the world has never seen, has never had to deal with. Combine a quadrotor, a predator-controlled camera, and a simple explosive. You now have a device that can search for, track, and destroy a specific human target or group of targets. Combine a BCI, a remote datalink, and a locomotive robot with some mounted machine guns, and you have a human mind that can power across a battlefield without suffering any pain. Combine enough quadrotors with any kind of mounted weapon and you have something that can only be described as a swarm.

I don’t know where all this is going. I don’t know which of the possibilities I see, if any, will come to pass. If they are used, I know not who will use them, nor in what way, nor to what purpose. I do know that there are powerful agencies on this planet. I do know that the first-world militaries already have access to all of these pieces, and may have had access for some time. I do know that there are large national and multinational corporations with billions of dollars and unchecked profit motives. I do know that across the world are millions of smart, young, bored people who all have access to some of these pieces, and who might as easily create something horrific as they might create something that will save the world.

Certainly there are many, many positive uses for all of these inventions. I fervently hope those are implemented. But positive or negative, the possibilities from these leaps in robotics are staggering. I am not the only one who sees that. So a change is coming. Bigger than a revolution, bigger than a mere cycling round of human powers. It will be a robot upheaval. When the full force of this entirely new phenomenon comes, it will introduce entirely new elements, and maybe even new members, to society. How can we be ready for this? I haven’t even the slightest idea. Comments, speculation, and additional questions are very welcome.

Physics Playlist April 6, 2011

I trust this will speak – or sing – for itself.

1) “The Power” – Snap!

2) “Free Fallin’” – Tom Petty

3) “Sound Check (Gravity)” – Gorillaz

4) “She Blinded Me With Science” – Thomas Dolby

5) “Time” – Hootie & the Blowfish

6) “Bang Bang Bang” – Mark Ronson

7) “Under Pressure” – Queen & David Bowie

8) “Danger! High Voltage!” – Electric Six

9) “Absolutely Zero” – Jason Mraz

10) “Intergalactic” – Beastie Boys

11) “The Universal” – Blur

I’ve also composed it into a youtube playlist, for convenient listening, here. Meanwhile, share your favorite physics songs! What should I have included, or not included?

Physics Problem Error Code March 17, 2011

Usually I try to aim my posts at, well, everyone. That is, after all, the point of this endeavor. But this time I’ve had an idea that might only make sense to those of you who have had to complete some sufficient amount of physics homework, or if you’ve ever had to grade any. For those of you who have been there, this will make sense. It may even make a staggering amount of sense. For those of you who are currently looking for something else to read, I promise that, if nothing else, what follows will grant you some insight into the way physics problems are solved.

It was while I was wandering through the barren and hostile wasteland that is a grading session that I began to wonder about streamlining the correction of common errors in the solutions. There are four main aspects to every physics homework problem solution, and so it is in these four categories that standard errors can be recognized:

Concept: of or relating to a student’s conceptual understanding of the system to be analyzed or the problem to be solved.

This category would seem at first to be the most complex: how do you navigate the murky qualitative waters of conceptual understanding? You don’t. You let the problem do it for you. Each correct solution, we will say, requires some set of correct conceptual statements, and each of these will either be implicitly stated or explicitly stated as required. Then the conceptual errors break down straightforwardly into the following categories:

C1) Omitted implicit conceptual statement

C2) Omitted explicit conceptual statement

C3) Incorrect implicit conceptual statement

C4) Incorrect explicit conceptual statement

C5) Logical fallacy

Now, the third one does have a bit of a wrinkle in it: In my experience, almost all of the implicit incorrect conceptual statements have been a result of incorrect mathematics, which would be taken care of by an error code in the Mathematics section. In other words, the logical consequence of an incorrect formula or equation give rise to a physical contradiction. However, in the interest of completeness I have included it, because I can readily imagine a student’s written words implying some incorrect concept.

Execution: of or relating to the choice of problem solving techniques used in a solution.

It’s a bit difficult at first, when considering solutions to physics problems, to draw a line between Execution and Mathematics. The key is choice: A student chooses to use F = ma and F = kx, she does not subsequently choose to obtain a = (k/m)x. Often there is overlap between the Concept section and the Execution section – choice of an equation to describe the system under consideration amounts to a statement of the properties of that system. Instructors will have to take care to discern whether it is incorrect physical understanding or incorrect problem solving method, or both, that has yielded an error.

E1) Insufficient clarity of procedure (read: “What ARE you doing here?”)

E2) Omission of required technique

E3) Omission of required formula or equation

E4) Use of incorrect or irrelevant formula or equation

E5) Inapplicable approximation

E6) Inappropriate quantitativeness in approach (Note: this can either be too much or too little)

Mathematics: of or relating to the use of quantitative or analytic methods to obtain an answer.

This one also seems complex, but similar to Concept we can use a few catch-all categories to simplify things. This section is also simplified by realizing that much of what seems like incorrect Mathematics is actually incorrect Execution.

M1) Insufficient clarity of procedure (see above)

M2) Omission of required technique

M3) Algebra error

M4) Calculus error

M5) Other math subtype error. Specify.

Numerical: of or relating to obtaining a specific number or set of numbers for an answer. Duh.

N1) Digit transposition.

N2) Incorrect choice of numerical input.

N3) Insufficient precision.

N4) Computer error.

And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen. These error codes should, by judicious combination, be able to address every possible mistake in solutions to any possible physics problem. The basic architecture here is based on my own experience in solving and grading physics problems, so I am biased, and it is possible I have missed something. I therefore encourage you to try to throw an exception to these rules! Give me your best shot.

Debunkation March 7, 2011

Just because I want to spread the word on this as much as possible: You may have seen in recent days that Fox News posted an “exclusive” about the discovery of “extraterrestrial life”. You may have seen in the previous sentence the use of quotation marks. This is because the science that has been reported is extremely dubious at best. First and foremost, it was not published in a peer-reviewed journal. Second, it’s a pile of equine feces. I give you the introduction to PZ Myers’ take on this development:

No.

No, no, no. No no no no no no no no.

No, no.

No.

You can read the rest here: Did scientists discover bacteria in meteorites?

Quiet Re-Opening March 4, 2011

After a long hiatus, Science In Real Life is quietly puttering along again, in this corner of the intertubes. No schedule of posts, no set format. Just me, my mission, and my audience (such as it is). I would appreciate any word-spreading you feel is appropriate. If you enjoy this blog, if you think you might someday enjoy this blog (tell me what you want to see more of!), if you like science … then this, for you, is a cause worth promoting. Now, to business. There are two more items to deal with in this post.

1) A snazzy new URL! Here at the Science In Real Life main office, we have secured for everyone’s convenience the URL reallifescience.org, or http://www.reallifescience.org, if you’re not into the whole brevity thing.

2) I have to take time to give a science shout-out to another author who has done perhaps the best job I have ever seen of illuminating what it means to think scientifically, to think empirically. His pen name is Less Wrong, and he has done this through, of all things, a Harry Potter fanfiction called Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. In particular, I want to quote something from the author’s profile page:

The Rule of Rationalist Fiction states that rationality is not magic; being rational does not require magical potential or royal bloodlines or even amazing gadgets, and the principles of rationality work for understandable reasons. A rationalist!hero should excel by thinking – moreover, thinking in understandable patterns that readers can, in principle, adopt for themselves. As opposed to the hero just being a born “genius” who comes up with amazing gadgets through an opaque discovery process, or who pulls off incredibly complicated gambits that would fail miserably if the reader tried something similar in real life.

This is something that, as someone who is every centimeter a rationalist, I wish were in more works of fiction. As much as I enjoy watching some of the popular Smart People in today’s media, such as House, they are at best incomplete representations of the process of analyzing a system or situation and deducing or inducing intelligent observations. What they don’t show, and what this fanfic does, is the grunt work of being smart. That sounds like a contradiction, but absolutely crucial to the process is a laborious laying of mental foundations that shore the mind against a set of errors in thinking to which human beings are particularly prone. One must continuously re-construct and re-interpret everything against a list of checks and balances to make the best possible attempt to both avoid overlooking some potentially significant piece of information, and to avoid assigning too much or an inappropriate significance to some piece of evidence.

Here I am unpacking all of this for you. The real clincher is that almost all of this happens subconsciously, once a person has enough practice/experience/training in thinking along rationalist lines. That makes it very difficult to explain, because most of us rely on some kind of subconscious upgrade, an Intuition 2.0, if you will, to get this done. Which brings me back to Less Wrong: he is elucidating these processes with fantastic clarity. If you want to know how to think in accordance with reality, read what he writes.

Science Fact of the Day February 22, 2010

Twenty-five percent of all ordinary matter is helium, which explains why the Universe has such a squeaky voice.

Badges! February 3, 2010

There is a new page up here at SiRL, and it’s all about badges. I know what you’re thinking: We don’t need no stinking badges! But these are extra special science badges, and they come from the very fine folks over at the Order Of The Science Scouts Of Exemplary Repute And Above Average Physique. While I may fall a little short in the latter category, I am a proud member and I support what they stand for – the primary goal being to present science to the public in an understandable way and generally promote scientific literacy. And if that isn’t an umbrella statement for the mission of this very blog then I must be getting very wet indeed.

Anyway, among the various activities of the Science Scouts are virtual badges used to indicate accomplishments or experiences obtained whilst in pursuit of scientific understanding. On the Badges page are the ones I have earned, with a short explanation, note, or cheap joke. As new badges are created, I will keep the page updated.

Science In Reel Life: Avatar, pt 2 January 11, 2010

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to Pandora … the menace returns. And this time, it’s personal. It’s time for Avatar Science 2: Electric Boogaloo. I mean all of these things literally, sort of. It’s time to zoom in from the planetary, the astrophysical, to the personal, the genetic, the electromagnetic. The centerpiece of the movie, the Avatars themselves, the bodies that the humans somehow pilot using sophisticated technology. We’ll address all of this and more, on Science In Reel Life! *theme music*
Okay, that out of the way

Revised scheduling December 27, 2009

For several reasons I have decided that the schedule of essays I have been maintaining thus far is not the best way to go about running an establishment such as this one. So, here’s how it’s going to play out. You will, from now on, find three types of posts in this blog:

1) Science Facts of the Day. These will continue unchanged.

2) Science In Real Life essays. These will now be posted once a week, on Monday mornings. They might start to get slightly longer, and more playful. In addition, I will be adding a new subcategory that I hope to see take on a life of its own. No details now; all will be explained in due time.

3) Science Bites. These will be one or two paragraph infodumps of whatever science thing I happen to be thinking about. They will not be on a regular schedule, but you can expect two or three of them each week.

As always, you can follow Science In Real Life on facebook and twitter.

Ch-ch-ch-changes December 22, 2009

Science In Real Life will be trying out a new schedule in the coming weeks. Be patient while things get sorted out. Rest assured the Science Facts of the Day, at least, will remain as they are.