Slashdot Mirror
Augmented Astronauts Needed for Deep Space Missions
A random reader writes "IEEE is carrying a story about how 'extended space missions' may require a little forced evolution, or BORGIFYING. Humans must have additional abilities via implanted technologies (repair bones, monitor radiation levels). Machines must become more organic (fixing themselves, etc)."
The Borg Hypothesis
Robert Hoffman, Jeffrey M. Bradshaw, Patrick J. Hayes, and Kenneth M. Ford,
Institute for Human and Machine Cognition
What if intelligent computing were centered inside humans? This essay's title is inspired by the nemesis of Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the starship Enterprise in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation. The Borg are--or should we say "is"--a species consisting of organic beings symbiotically merged with technology. Each individual Borg is laden with all manner of appliances, ranging from laser eyeballs to appendages resembling drill presses to computational and communication devices implanted in their nervous systems. The Borg is a collective, meaning that they--or it--possess a single mind. That Borg mind has the single intent of "assimilating" all organic species into the collective. Assimilation involves first injecting nanoprobes that thoroughly transform the organic being down to the molecular level, then grafting on the various appliances (or else growing them de novo like so many cloned carrots in a hydroponic garden). Wending their way through the galaxy in huge Rubik Cube-like vehicles, the Borg assimilate entire planets at a time and carve up starships as if they were roast beef, making them (it) an especially nasty adversary.
In our real world, we already routinely replace hip joints with titanium and inner-ear structures with microcircuits; we can carry telephones comfortably on our heads, and Web-enabled eyeglasses can augment our view of reality. To counter the effects of drowsiness or inattention, DaimlerChrysler is developing prototypes that continuously monitor drivers' physical and mental states, while DARPA's Augmented Cognition Program is planning an even more ambitious reach to "plug in" the warfighter of the future (www.darpa.mil/ipto/programs/augcog/index.htm).
Portending an even braver and newer world, it's now possible to insert wires into a person's nerves to control appliances. We can even send such signals over the Internet, where they are decoded by computer and then fed into another person's nervous system.1 Human bodies are getting more and more plugged in.
It's not easy to set aside questions of ethics and choice. It is not even possible. However, in this essay we simply overlook them in order to work toward our hypothesis. To do that, we must take you on a trip into space. Our argument is that if humanity decides to continue human exploration of space, we will sooner or later--probably sooner--be forced to center some intelligent computing inside humans.
Men into space
In 1959 and 1960, Ziv Television Productions and producer Lewis J. Rachmil produced a television series titled Men into Space. This series featured the space concepts of artist Chelsey Bonestell, whose works had a major impact on many writers, including Arthur Clarke, and motion pictures, such as Destination Moon and The Conquest of Space. For his TV series, Rachmil also relied heavily on advice from the US Air Force and the Surgeon General. Men into Space was intended to present the most realistic depiction of what it would be like to establish a space station or moon base and then begin the process of exploring the planets. Episodes included one in which a fold on an astronaut's space suit accidentally became crimped between two large pieces of a space station as he was assembling them in space. The problem: Is there a hole in the suit? If so, freeing the suit could kill the astronaut. In another episode, the crew was stranded at the bottom of a crater on the moon after a crash landing. The problem: Radio waves only move in straight lines, and there is no ionosphere to reflect them to receivers that are out of line-of-sight.
In one especially pertinent episode, an astronaut on a space walk at the space station becomes stressed out during a repair and botches a wiring job. As a result, a stabilizer rocket on the space station misfires, speeding up the rotation of the space wheel to the point where the crush of gravity