Slashdot Mirror
Dolphin Jumps Again with Artificial Fin
Ant writes "This Yahoo! News story mentions Fuji, a mother dolphin that lost 75 percent of her tail due to a mysterious disease, being able to jump again with the help of what is believed to be the world's first artificial fin. The 34-year-old dolphin held at Japan's largest aquarium in the southern island of Okinawa wears the rubber fin for about 20 minutes a day allowing her to jump and to swim at the same speed of other dolphins."
First Porpoise!
Not looking forward to artificial fin chunks in my Tuna sandwich
I expected that dolphin to be red with 'Marlboro', 'Shell' and 'Vodafone' painted on its other fins...
our bionic dolphin masters.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/this_world/3 754310.stm
Hmmm?
Rock beats scissors
Paper covers rock
Scissors cuts paper
Dolphin eats plastic
Got it?
...that wearing this fin for too long makes the dolphin tyred.
Well, its not as if they went out and found a physically challenged wild dolphin, and laughing at Darwin, gave it an artificial fin. This was a captive dolphin that contracted a disease and lost some finnage. That's hardly a natural situation, and I don't think the long-term genetic health of the species will be affected.
Trolls: The high-tech version of those morons that scrawl obscenities in public bathrooms.
every year there are a few people with artificial legs at the boston marathon.
and these people can run faster than the typical human. but not fast enough to win, some really thin guy from kenya always does that.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
There are more photos in the page of the Aquarium (in Japanese) Chura Umi Aquarium
Dolphins have been given artificial flippers on several occasions before this.
spending a few tens of thousands on a fun project, overstating the cost to your company to the press, and enjoying WORLDWIDE FEELGOOD PUBLICITY FOR NOTHING? doesn't sound that bad a deal to me. Look how much bridgestone spend on F1 tyres, for example...
" Like it or not, the weak are supposed to die out."
Uhh... says who? I think you're taking that "survival of the fittest" a little too literally. There is no direction to evolution. In the long run it might be the case that the fittest survive most often, but this isn't necessarily the case on a per-individual scale.
In any case, intelligent life has changed all this. Does this mean it's bad for evolution? No. It just means the "survival of the fittest" phrase needs some changing.
now she has to be balanced and rotated every 10,000 miles.
I dont think we have to admit that at all. The same science is being used to improve the quality of the very thing you're moaning about: prosthetics for humans. Its extremely complicated to design flexible materials that respond like types of flesh, and this is all part of the progress. Its disapointing, especially on Slashdot, to see people who don't realize that research isn't a straight line. Research is a branching tree, with some branches rejoining the main trunk, where distal improvements often reintegrate to improve the main research.
"Stumble before you crawl"
from bridgestone's point of view though, they just got some excellent worldwide feel good PR and advertising for $95,000, cheap at twice the price...I can't find data on the price of F1 tires (mostly because Bridgestone refuses to discuss figures, usually a good sign you can't afford them!),but i wouldn't be at all suprised if it made 95k look like spare change
not to mention they will have got some valuable research data from the experiment
and while i might agree that saving one dolphin, is (pardon the pun) a drop in the ocean... it's a start. Dolphins are truely facinating creatures, very bright and with a primary sense (ultra sound) we are just begining to understand. It would be a great shame if they were all gone before we actually got to know them a bit more.
and yes there is an element of "feel goodism" involved, but if that translates into more empathy for dolphins, ie NOT " euthanize the dolphin and go out and catch another one" then i for one am all for it.
Andrew Lourake is an American jet pilot, who had his leg amputeed in 1998. Now he has a C-Leg and in October 2004 he returned to his job. He works for the federal government carrying government officials, congressmen and the like in the C-20 Gulfstream. During the training his performance during some exercises (saving passengers from a burning plane after a crash, for example) was better than that of two healthy novice pilots training together with him.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
In the current Survivor:Vanuatu one of the contestants has an artificial lower leg. He is one of the best competitors in the physical challenges. The only test that he seems to have a bit more trouble than the others in is walking a narrow balance beam. He was voted off last night after 29(?) days and making it to the final 8.
Depending on whether you believe they actually live in that shelter on the beach for 39 days when the cameras aren't turned on or not, his leg doesn't seem to be having any trouble with the salt water, sand, dirt, etc. I'm actually very interested in seeing some interviews with him after the show ends on some of the particular problems he faced with it.
"Unheard of means only it's undreamed of yet,
Impossible means not yet done." ~~ Julia Ecklar
"When she saw the artificial fin for the first time, she ran away. She was so scared of the object. It took us five months to make her get used to the artificial fin. Now she is perfectly fine with it," he said.
Wow! They got her artificial feet too?
Vivin Suresh Paliath
http://vivin.net
I like