Reproducing Robots

About 100 years ago the word robot was coined. Its origin is a Czech word, robota, which means “forced labor.” In the ensuing century, the definition of the term robot has evolved (thanks to the use of computers) from a machine that behaves as a slave, to an entity that can act autonomously and intelligently by performing complex tasks. In fact, with the advent of artificial intelligence, some people now speculate that we may be on the verge of creating robots that are far smarter than humans, and may soon turn the tables and enslave us!

Robots running amok is a fear that, by dint of unleashed technology, we may about to uncork a machine-like Pandora's Box, by taking an unwise step that will lead to future ominous problems. That possibility has created countless science fiction tales which suggest that our human future may contain many battles with robots who rebel and try to defeat us. One of the most famous depictions was a series of novels by Isaac Asimov, who expanded upon the Czech origin of robot, to coin the term robotics in 1941. Asimov conceived of his three laws of robotics—that would prohibit robots from harming human beings. His assurances, however, have not mitigated the fear in some people’s minds that robots may eventually rebel and some day take over.

Now comes the possibility from a scientific collaboration between teams from the UK and Netherlands, that robots may soon breed and evolve. That idea takes these machines ever closer to human-like capabilities—maybe even enclosing them within the realm of what we call life. Yikes! That's too close to Frankenstein's creation of a “living being” from dead body parts... and we know the troubles caused by that creature.

So can a robot ever attain the qualities of evolving and being “alive”? Biology defines life as exhibiting about six features: (1) a complex assembly of “living” cells, (2) able to respond to diverse stimuli, (3) reproduction, (4) self-regulation, to respond to its environment, (5) possessing homeostasis—to maintain critical internal conditions and balances, and (6) processing energy, to carry on its metabolic activities.

Maybe those 100-year-old robots were simple programmed machines, but today's robots feature most of these characteristics of life. For example, the UK and Dutch researchers' robotic technology is able to spawn (birth?) offspring that receive a transplanted “brain” (in the form of software) from their “parents,” which contain inherited traits.

These robots employ artificial intelligence, which guides that inheritance, so as to optimize certain capabilities for specific missions that we are as yet unable to comprehend. Is this some form of robotic evolution—an evolution in which they can control themselves, and pass traits on to future robotic generations? Are we opening a Pandora's Box, from which super robots will soon breed and become god-like beings? Asimov, we may need your robotic laws to protect us.

Covert Critters

We critters who live on the surface of planet Earth can become quite provincial about our kind—by being quite unaware of the many life forms that live underground. For example, people see other people as the most important critters on the planet. That's probably true for other surface species. We see each other, interact with each other, and conclude that's about all there is to it.

But there's a vast biosphere that is hidden from us, just below our feet. It might as well be covert. All of us surface critters live in an extremely thin layer on the surface of the planet. The atmosphere and the exposed land are like the thin skin of an apple—there's so much more below the skin. For example, subsurface fresh water—existing down to many miles—has a volume of about 100 times that of surface fresh water. Subsurface life has a mass of some 20 times all that lives in the ocean and makes up about one-third of all the planet's biomass. That's pretty impressive!

Never experiencing the sun, subsurface life cannot depend on photosynthesis, as must all surface life. Photosynthesis in plants enables them to manufacture sugars for themselves, as well as all other critters of the light, who eat plants or other plant-eating creatures. How do the covert critters survive without light and its resultant photosynthetic sugars? They feed on dissolved minerals in the water, as well as raw hydrogen. Thus they are reliant on biochemical reactions, which are much less efficient than photosynthesis. As a result, subsurface life exists in the slow lane. Underground microbes (and most life down there is in the form of microbes) may divide once every thousand years or so. Contrast that to surface E.coli, which divide every 20 minutes! This is a pace of life some 30 million times faster!

Moreover, underground life-forms are much tougher than their surface cousins. In 2003 the space shuttle Columbia broke up during reentry into the atmosphere. Aboard Columbia was a biological experiment on nematodes—very hardy, underground tiny worms. They survived the fiery explosion and they survived the 25 mile plunge to the ground where, a few weeks later—when they were subsequently located—they were reproducing!

Earth's subsurface life-forms are closer in character and metabolism to the earliest kinds of life on the planet, thus recent discoveries of these covert critters are helping scientists to understand how those deep ancestral creatures survived and thrived. Our expanding comprehension of the limits of metabolism of life on Earth is preparing us to better understand what kinds of life (if any) we'll find on Mars, or Jupiter's moon Europa, or Saturn's moon Enceladus—most all of which is likely to be subsurface, if it exists.

These findings make us wonder about what other kinds of critters we'll yet find on (or under) Earth. With each passing year we expand the limits of what we know to be life.

Life's Rerun

I believe that it's pretty common for people to begin a nostalgic sentence with, “If I had my life to live over...” A similar sentiment may be uttered as, “If I knew then what I know now...” We all could finish these declarations in our own particular manner, implying that, given the (impossible) opportunity to rerun my life, I'd do a much better job the next time around. We know that it's a ludicrous scenario, but we still dream, don't we?

What's going on when we have these thoughts come to mind that, given another rerun, we'd carve out a better life? Am I dissatisfied with the one I've got? Do I regret my choices? Am I jealous of the good life I see and envy in others and just know that I could do better than they, if I could only find the magic lamp and release the genie within? Hey, I'm really a better person than the other guy; I know I could really impress you, if only I had taken that other job, or married that other gal. I'd be someone special now.

These thoughts imply our having regrets about who we are and our circumstances in life, with the implication that we could do a better job, if we were granted a rerun. But is this true? First, let me put a little thought into the life I have and ponder all the good things I'm grateful for. Second, let me put some thought into the fact that I did make many good (and/or lucky) choices, and be thankful I was in a position to be able to do so. Third, let me recognize that many of these decisions (good or bad) weren't really within my purview. External circumstances were often controlling the situation, and a magical increase in wisdom on my part would unlikely have made a difference.

Then let me ponder the strong possibility that I was close to death many times, but managed to luckily squeak through. Give me a chance to relive my life and maybe I'd run my car into a ditch, rather than happily pull it out, a second time around. If so, I'd have expired, given a second chance! Maybe grace saved me then. Maybe grace would look the other way the next time around.

Why do we have these thoughts about rerunning our life? Why are we not content with what we have? Why do we want more? Why are we not more thankful for what we have? I believe it's simply human nature to do so... or maybe human laziness. With a little more effort we could put more focus on counting our blessings, rather than regret what we might have missed.

Finally, I believe that many of the regrets we have about our life are not necessarily due to dumb choices in the past, but the ongoing dumb choices we keep making. It's not the past that's the problem—it's today! Improving the past is an impossible dream. Improving the future depends heavily on what I do right now. Let me break from my daydreaming, with all its wishful thinking, and pay attention. Oops! I almost goofed up there, but I saw it coming instead and danced around that mistake.

Odd Life

I have written a few times in this blog about the origins of life on Earth, as well as the search for life elsewhere in the universe. (“Unlikely Alone,” 2/28/13, “Goldilocks Globe,”1/30/11, “Extra Terrestrial Life,” 1/22/10, and “Life Out There,” 11/20/08.) When scientists talk about looking for extraterrestrial life, they often qualify their efforts as seeking for “life as we know it.” They are cautious enough to recognize that alien life-forms may not resemble ours—especially since more and more examples of extreme forms of life have been discovered right here on our little planet. Just a few decades ago science did not expect to find examples of the so-called extremophiles that we now know flourish in hot, acidic, deep oceanic, and underground locations.

A new arm of research is currently examining the possibility of life-forms here on Earth that even further stretch our current concepts of what life is. Life, “as we know it,” (so far) is carbon based, water immersed, and uses proteins made up of 20 kinds of amino acids and DNA that uses four kinds of chemical bases. We know, however, that nature contains about 100 types of amino acids and a dozen or more kinds of bases. Why does our type of life employ only a small fraction of the available chemical compounds? Could it use more? Could other forms of life use other compounds? And is carbon the only basis of life—why not silicon? Could liquids other than water be the basis of life?

These questions are increasingly being asked and explored by some scientists. They feel that it is possible that there may be other types of life living right alongside us, but we have heretofore ignored them, because our expectations of what life is have been too narrow. These scientists' explorations are being broadened to seek life forms that may be odd (to us).

This issue of alternative kinds of life is even more relevant, as we go looking for life elsewhere in the universe. In the 1970s, two NASA Viking missions to Mars were explicitly designed to test for Martian life—past or present. The Viking landers took samples, ran tests, and at first seemed to indicate they'd found life. A closer look forced NASA to declare the tests negative, however. No Mars life in those samples...or so they thought.

At the present moment the rover Curiosity is rummaging around in Mars's Gale Crater, checking to see if conditions there could once have supported life. NASA is careful to caution that this time they are not looking for life, just signs that conditions could once have been amenable for it. They've learned the lesson of getting too specific in the hunt for life.

But the newest scientific studies suggest that we may still have biochemical blinders on, when it comes to looking for life elsewhere. If there are unrecognized life forms sharing Earth with us, what even more odd forms might exist somewhere “out there?” Perhaps we should open up our minds even more.

When life first emerged on Earth—some 3.5 billion years ago—it may well have consisted of more than one chemical basis. As time passed, our type—carbon and water based—may have come to dominate. Evolution may have favored our kind of life and either eliminated the others as unfit, or relegated them to the margins, where we simply haven't noticed them. During the 150-million-year reign of the dinosaurs, mammals existed only as small critters who kept under cover and avoided the big reptiles. If you were to ask a dinosaur about mammals, he'd probably have shrugged (I believe they did have shoulders), having no clue that mammals even existed.

It's amazing what we open ourselves to when we let go of our selfish, narrow-minded viewpoints—whether the object of our attention is life forms, religion, food, or musical tastes. We have so much to learn. One of the biggest barriers to wisdom is our inability to step outside ourselves.

Life is Delightful

To be alive is a precious gift. Whether we’re in human form or are an insect, every one of us inherently knows that being alive is special. Every creature will valiantly struggle to stay alive, whenever death threatens. Nature has placed a tremendously strong drive in every one of us to hold on to our life.

One reason we embrace life so dearly, I think, is its promise to bring us countless forms of delight. The taste of exquisite food, the sight of a sunset sky, the love of another person—these are rewards we experience, and experiences from which we take great joy. Watch a bird soar, a dog chase a ball, a bear dive into a stream full of fish—and know that animals have the same ability to experience delight.

Some folks might point to a gloomier side of life, however. Life is fragile, they would say. We constantly are but a heartbeat away from death. Circumstances beyond our control can snatch this existence from us at any moment. We face constant threats. An animal inherently knows that it can be eaten—that a predator may lurk around the next bend. These threats can dampen our joy of life and fill us with dread.

Additionally, we humans fear death in our own special way—burdened with the knowledge that our mortality may come calling the next minute. Disease and violence may rob us of this precious life, and there may be little we can do about it. As Carlo Strenger (a philosopher and psychoanalyst) puts it, “…we all need protection from the unbearable knowledge that we are mortal.”

Rather than let these dark thoughts intrude on our enjoyment of life, I believe we can allow them to heighten our sense of the preciousness of living. Life’s very fragility and shortness makes it all the more cherished. Gold and diamonds are valued by many people simply because they are rare and thus expensive. Isn’t it the same for life?

Another author I have learned much from—Bernd Heinrich, a biologist—describes how we all (humans and animals) do things out of an urge to survive, without any conscious understanding of why we do them. We act in so many ways to enhance our staying alive. Why do we do this—simply to hang on to this existence or to take delight in all that life brings us? Heinrich also ponders the drive to stay alive, not as an effort to become immortal, but just to taste those delights. He writes, “I try to imagine what it would be like if I had the assurance that I’d never die, and wonder if life would be so sweet.” It seems to me that immortality would probably be excruciatingly boring.

The Meaning of Life

A question most every human has pondered goes something like, What is the meaning of life? Philosophers have waxed endlessly and debated vigorously, in their attempts at responses. Does life have a purpose? A significance? Is there an intention or reason for it all? Why is life like it is? Is there some goal, some objective to this existence?

It’s within the capacity of highly-conscious human beings to ponder these puzzles. We look within ourselves and wonder. We observe our world—peering into the past, experiencing the present, curious about what’s to come—and find ourselves asking, What’s it all about? Seeking order and meaning to the world, we look for a plan, a design, a higher purpose. We’re uncomfortable with the unknown. We want answers.

Part of our dilemma, I believe, is due to our propensity in the West for thinking dualistically. We sort things into good/bad, right/wrong, left/right. Thus, if we are unable to decide what the meaning of life is, we are prone to conclude that it has no meaning. If I can’t understand its purpose, maybe it has none?! But just because we can’t come up with an answer when a question is posed in a certain way, must we leap to an opposite conclusion?

Another problem with this question as it is posed is that we don’t even know how to measure meaning; and if we think we do, our measure is nothing more than subjective. One person’s meaningfulness is another’s worthlessness. What we thought was meaningful when we were in our twenties can seem pretty shallow after we cross the half-century line.

I tend to feel that an answer to the meaning of life question is well beyond us at this stage of humanity’s development—and may forever remain so. We don’t even know what life is; we can’t really define it and we’re ignorant of most of its manifestations on this little planet. (Biologists estimate that we’ve named only a tiny fraction of Earth’s species, let alone understand what they do.)

I think the question can be addressed, however, if I back away from considering all life and look in the mirror. How do I make my life meaningful? What gives my life purpose? The answer comes pretty easily: Serve my world. Help others. Try to see that my actions are done in the spirit of love and in a way that I do the least harm. Rather than endlessly pondering rhetorical questions, let me get on with the business of doing some good.