Cyborgs v. Grobycs
Will Brown emails us with a link to an Al Fin's post:
Introducing the grobyC--the Inverse of a Cyborg
The "grobyc" ....clever name, but I'm hopeful it doesn't catch on. It doesn't roll off the tongue. While a cyborg is a biological organism that has had one or more biological functions replaced or enhanced by machinery, a grobyc is a machine with biological parts.
The problem of devising linear actuators for autonomous robots is an interesting one. Several artificial substitutes for muscle have been devised and tested. Scientists from South Korea have decided to avoid the substitutes and go straight to the real thing--using actual living muscle tissue as robot actuators!...
According to Chemical Science, Sukho Park of the Nano/Micro System Laboratory at the Seoul National University and his colleagues "made the robot by growing heart muscle tissue from a rat onto tiny robotic skeletons made from polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)."
Al Fin mentioned a previous biologic/machine hybrid - the ratbrained F-22. I'm not sure that project would qualify as a grobyc. If the brain is biological, shouldn't it be a cyborg, or would it be something else completely? This area may end up with as many classifications and subclassifications as the Animal Kingdom.
-Linkathon.
Comments
Al Fin and I discuss that very question in the comments to that post Stephen. Basicly, he makes the distinction based upon the medical (and other) ethical issues involved. If the initial organism being modified is human, one set of ethical concerns are initially operant in the development of a cyborg. If the initial subject is non-human,particularly if it's a mechanical construct, then a different set of ethical considerations and inhibitions would initially be in force. Al Fin posited the grobyC term to make that distinction and begin the sub-classification debate along those ethical lines. Since the rat-brained controller was developed for the previously developed F-22, the grobyC distinction would be operant during it's development. Left unsetteled is the question of when and how such initial ethical considerations ought to morph as the construct further develops beyond base-line goals and parameters. Here struck me as the perfect site for just such speculation as that. :)
As an aside to you and Phil, I hope you will consider adding Al Fin to your links; his own collection of reference links is truely comprehensive and, I must say, the extant example is quite typical of his usual posting content.
Posted by: Will Brown![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.blog.speculist.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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September 9, 2007 11:10 AM
Will:
I'm not sure why we haven't gotten around to putting Al Fin on our blogroll. We've linked to him many times.
Yeah, he's definitely a kindred spirit.
Posted by: Stephen Gordon![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.blog.speculist.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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September 9, 2007 06:25 PM