*clap*clap*clap*clap*<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 5:04 PM, Nathan Cravens <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:knuggy@gmail.com">knuggy@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
---------- Forwarded message ----------<br><div class="gmail_quote">From: <b class="gmail_sendername">Smári McCarthy</b> <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:smari@anarchism.is" target="_blank">smari@anarchism.is</a>></span><br>
Date: Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 2:40 AM<br>
Subject: The Terminator Industrial Model, or, why the Machines will never Win<br>To: Vinay Gupta <<a href="mailto:hexayurt@gmail.com" target="_blank">hexayurt@gmail.com</a>>, "\"Hallgrímur H. Gunnarsson\"" <<a href="mailto:hhg@hhg.to" target="_blank">hhg@hhg.to</a>>, Rohan Choukkar <<a href="mailto:rohan.choukkar@gmail.com" target="_blank">rohan.choukkar@gmail.com</a>>, Nathan Cravens <<a href="mailto:knuggy@gmail.com" target="_blank">knuggy@gmail.com</a>>, Elisabeth Ottilia Carlsson <<a href="mailto:elisabeth.carlsson@gmail.com" target="_blank">elisabeth.carlsson@gmail.com</a>>, Phoebe Moore <<a href="mailto:p.moore@salford.ac.uk" target="_blank">p.moore@salford.ac.uk</a>>, Michel Bauwens <<a href="mailto:michelsub2004@gmail.com" target="_blank">michelsub2004@gmail.com</a>>, Anu Määttä <<a href="mailto:narnua@gmail.com" target="_blank">narnua@gmail.com</a>>, Stian Rřdven Eide <<a href="mailto:stian@julipan.org" target="_blank">stian@julipan.org</a>>, Thato Riet <<a href="mailto:fabkimberley@gmail.com" target="_blank">fabkimberley@gmail.com</a>>, Herbert Snorrason <<a href="mailto:odin@anarchism.is" target="_blank">odin@anarchism.is</a>>, Birita í Dali <<a href="mailto:uwcbunny@yahoo.co.uk" target="_blank">uwcbunny@yahoo.co.uk</a>><br>
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[Disclaimer: This is a bit of a joke, written last night as I was<br>
falling asleep.]<br>
<br>
I just arrived in London after another one of those mind-numbing long<br>
haul flights, this time from Mumbai. And in my eight hours of pneumonia<br>
induced pain I managed to watch a delightful array of films that I<br>
hadn't gotten around to, including the fourth 'Terminator' movie.<br>
<br>
Two-or-so years ago, just before it became public knowledge that this<br>
film was being developed, I was visiting MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms<br>
when the makers of the film contacted CBA looking for technological<br>
goodies that could make the film more interesting. I'm sad to say that<br>
none of the more profound ideas tossed at them made the script, but<br>
either way, I think that the entire discussion contained an important<br>
implicit subtext which was lost on the kind of people who think that<br>
hurdling Christian Bale between flying machines whilst explosions happen<br>
is a good idea.<br>
<br>
So I present here a short analysis of where the Terminator movies go wrong:<br>
<br>
The first Terminator movie didn't stretch things very much. It was a<br>
simple time travel scenario with man versus machine, a kind of<br>
crypto-luddite cumfest. It wasn't until Judgement Day came around that<br>
the industrial model started to warrant scrutiny.<br>
<br>
In Judgement Day we are treated to a view of Los Angeles being vaporized<br>
by a nuclear explosion. For the machines, this tactic makes sense. Take<br>
out major human outposts to diminish their numbers significantly<br>
straight off. Humans have very low tolerances for nuclear hijinx such as<br>
radioactivity, but machines, being simpler and more discreteized, can<br>
presumably take much higher doses before problems start to occur. Expose<br>
a titanium alloy to a source of beta radiation for long enough and sure<br>
enough it will melt or otherwise morph, but long before humans melt from<br>
that kind of radiation atoms in their DNA start picking up extra core<br>
elements, altering their nucleic structure, and causing their host to<br>
die a very brutal death.<br>
<br>
This illustrates a model. Consider that for anything that is "required"<br>
for sustenance, or "must not be" for survival, there exists a continuum,<br>
and each individual occupies an interval on that continuum. The length<br>
of this interval is often called "slack". More slack equals more likely<br>
to survive a lack of something crucial or an excess of something lethal.<br>
<br>
Simply by comparing the average slack values and their 95% intervals for<br>
each individual species you can pretty easily discern the smartest set<br>
of tactics that can be employed by each side. The robots can go ahead<br>
and use nuclear instability, thermal radiation (metal objects tolerate<br>
high heat while humans like myself start to go all wiggly and faint when<br>
it's higher than 45°C out), extreme climates, darkness, and that kind of<br>
thing to their advantage.<br>
<br>
The humans on the other hand have a much better ways of dealing with<br>
machines at their disposal.<br>
<br>
In Terminator 4 a huge 7-or-so-story evil robot thing came out of<br>
nowhere in one scene and started scooping up people. It later became a<br>
part of some sort of super-carrier aircraft. Each of these things must<br>
require a large amount of metal to build, not to mention rare earth<br>
metals, plastics, semiconductors, etc. In T-2 Schwarzenegger claims that<br>
he has a "metal" endoskeleton, without being specific as to which metals<br>
exactly. From what I've seen of the Terminator's Moh's hardness, it is<br>
most certainly an alloy of something. Either way, Ferrum is for this<br>
kind of purposes a pretty aweful atom, and it kind of only makes up for<br>
it by fact of its general ubiquity. It requires lots of special<br>
treatment to be very hard, it rusts easily, and it is a crappy conductor<br>
compared to lots of other metals.<br>
<br>
For proper construction of a Terminator you'd presumably need a bunch of<br>
metals: Titanium, cobalt, paladium, chrome, copper, gold, silver,<br>
tantalum, etc. Each of these metals is relatively easy to get, provided<br>
you know where to look. Tantalum is a pretty good one. Most of it is<br>
mined in the Congo, by children. I would be very happy to replace those<br>
children with robots, but let's face it: if the robots are out to kill<br>
us, one of our best ways to kill them off is to keep them away from<br>
tantalum. Even if that means making a bunch of child slave laborers<br>
unemployed. Not being able to use tantalum for capacitors would mean<br>
they'd need to use other types of capacitors, such as electrolytic,<br>
which have worse properties for a number of things, and are generally<br>
larger and more fragile.<br>
<br>
See where I'm going with this?<br>
<br>
Humans are part of an eco system that has been around for millenia, and<br>
through our evolution we have managed to adapt our "slack" values to be<br>
narrow for things very abundant in our environment (such as amino acids)<br>
and wide for things that are relatively scarce (such as certain metals).<br>
We can survive without tantalum. The robots cannot. We can survive<br>
without electricity. The robots cannot. We can survive without most of<br>
the infrastructure we take for granted - it won't be pretty, but<br>
honestly, you can stick a human in a Mumbai slum far more readily than<br>
you can stick a Terminator.<br>
<br>
Humans are good at surviving the kind of situation where everything is<br>
messed up and ugly. Our bodies adapt. Robot's specifications don't<br>
change. Sure, you'll have a T-1000 liquid metal thing every now and then<br>
that'll cause you some grief, but honestly there's no threat that the<br>
T-1000 can pose that a little electromagnetic resonance burst can't fix.<br>
<br>
When it comes down to it, the battle between humans and robots is not so<br>
much about sheer power as it is about controlling the industrial chains.<br>
Attacking the slack. And as long as robots require things that are<br>
harder to get than the things humans need, the humans will win.<br>
<br>
<br>
- Smári<br>
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