The biggest problem with modern robotics is not the mechanisms, its the intelligence behind the mechanisms. Matching the human sense of balance is a major challenge, for example.
Enter cy
The biggest problem with modern robotics is not the mechanisms, its the intelligence behind the mechanisms. Matching the human sense of balance is a major challenge, for example.
Enter cybernetics, a field of study that looks at communications and control in complex systems (the term is actually an adaptation of a Greek word meaning steersman). Its best known application (and the one that most people think of when they hear the term) is the integration of human brain signals with external devices.
To control parts of the body, the brain sends out a complex series of electrical impulses. If we could decode those impulses, why couldnt we build replacement devices? Could we also send information directly to the brain? Theres nothing to say its not possible.
In fact, weve already come a long way. There are retinal implants working in labs that can help the vision impaired and even cameras that can transmit images directly to the brain, bypassing the eyes altogether - potentially a real cure for blindness. There are neural implants that hook directly into peoples brains to help counteract multiple sclerosis and Parkinsons disease. Cochlear implants have been built to help the hearing impaired. There are even chips that have been attached to peoples brains that give them mental control of computers and devices (it has been shown that people can move cursors around a computer screen using such chips).
Most of these applications are purely medical right now, but theres no reason why the same tools cannot be used to build enhanced people, with enhanced intelligence (as a result of computers directly attached to their brains) and the best body that money can buy. Its only a matter of time.
Quantum computing
Quantum mechanics - were sure youve heard of it. Its an introduction to the world of the weird, but quantum weirdness has its place in technology. Indeed, breakthroughs in quantum computing could lead to devices with power far exceeding anything standard Boolean logic computers could ever achieve. Its mind-bending stuff, though, so bear with us.
According to quantum theory, prior to observation, a particle exists in a state that is indeterminate. Its only when something is measured that it collapses into something measurable. Or, to use an analogy, if a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound? The commonsense answer is yes. The quantum mechanical answer is no (in fact, the tree does not even exist as a tree).
If thats not weird enough, the state that particles exist in prior to observation is a superposition. That is, theyre not one thing; theyre all things at once. Take the spin of an electron in a magnetic field; it can be either up or down. But when the electron is in a superposition, its both up and down at once.
Now, say you had an array of eight quantum bits (qubits). The array would actually represent all 256 possible values at the same time. One operation on that array would perform 256 calculations at once. With the quantum array representing all possible numbers, the answer to your problem is in there somewhere: you just have to figure out how to get it out.
Translating this knowledge into something practical is the challenge. When you measure a particle in a superposition, you destroy its delicate quantum state, effectively causing it to collapse into a definite state (making it useless). It is possible, however, to affect the probability of the state that the qubit will collapse into by applying small amounts of energy. Say theres a 50/50 chance that the spin will be up or down when the particle is measured. You could theoretically zap it with a small amount energy to change the probability to 60/40. Using algorithms to nudge the readout probability of the qubit, you can make sure that when you finally directly observe the array, it collapses into the answer you seek.
This may sound esoteric, but its not. Already quantum algorithms exist for many problems that take a conventional computer a great deal of time to solve, notably searching and factorisation (see The crypto conundrum on page 128).
Were getting quite close today to being able to build a quantum computer. Using quantum dots, superpositioned particles can be created (by applying a small amount of energy), held in place and operated on without disturbing the quantum state. Not for long, but it works. It will be many years before we see a practical, commercial quantum computer - and there have to be a few breakthroughs before then - but in the end we should see devices that can perform the kinds of calculations that conventional computers could never hope to tackle.
Nanotechnology
The principles of physics, as far as I can see, do not speak against the possibility of manoeuvring things atom by atom. It is not an attempt to violate any laws; it is something, in principle, that can be done; but in practice, it has not been done because we are too big. These are the words of renowned scientist Richard Feynman, in his 1959 speech, There is Plenty of Room at the Bottom.
Inspired by this speech, thousands of scientists set to work on a new kind of technology, called nanotechnology. As Feynman noted, there are no rules that said things could not by built, atom by atom. We just lacked the technology to do so because atoms are so damn small. To give you an indication of how small atoms are, a single strand of human hair is about 200,000 atoms in width. Still, if we can control atoms, the sky is the limit. What is the human cell, for instance, but a tiny machine that makes copies of itself? If we could build things one atom at a time, why couldnt we build living cells?
Of all the technologies weve talked about here, none has the potential to match the staggering power of nanotechnology. Think about it for a moment. We could build nanoscopic machines that enter the human body and destroy bacteria, viruses and cancers at an atomic level, eradicating disease. They could repair human cells, modifying them so that they continue to replicate without deterioration: people could be made effectively immortal. Trillions of nanomachines could be sent to other planets in order to terraform, ready for colonisation. New materials could be built that are 100 times stronger than steel, yet 50 times lighter than aluminium. Given the raw materials, you could build absolutely anything (including living things and complex devices) cheaply and quickly, one atom at a time. You could build computing devices with such precision and of such materials that they run faster and have greater storage capacity than anything we can imagine.
Of course, most of these applications are a long way off - wed have to understand the incredibly complex structure of the human cell, for instance, to be able to have a chance of modifying it to eliminate ageing. On the other hand, new materials such as mass-manufactured carbon nanotubes (along with Bucky Balls, the strongest substance known to man) are not so far out of reach.
So how do we achieve this utopia? The scary thing is, were already a good way there. In 1981, IBM scientists in Zurich invented what is called the scanning tunnelling microscope (STM), which allowed us to actually see individual atoms. The creation of the STM led to the creation of a range of devices, collectively known as atomic force microscopes. These devices not only allow us to see individual atoms, but move them as well. In 1989, IBM used this technology to write its name using just 35 xenon atoms.
Our biggest problem stems from the fact that atomic force microscopes are slow - it takes a long time to move just one atom. Even the simplest of machines requires billions of atoms to build. The solution, according to scientists such as Eric Dre