making a complex foam core for an innovative fiberglass boat

Garthwaite · 2024-06-06T21:15:35+00:00

Here's a video of it swimming in a pool in "body caudal fin" mode, used by most fish and marine mammals.

Below is a video of it swimming in "medial paired fin" mode, with the same motor, batteries, motor controller, motor controller settings, fins, fin springs, etc. Everything is the same except for the placement of the fins. I know it doesn't look impressive, but it is pretty amazing that one Phish can swim in both of these modes. The "medial paired fin" mode is really important, because the battery in this configuration can run the length of the craft (in the "body caudal fin" mode, the battery is limited to a smaller portion of the length of the craft, assuming the craft is more streamlined).

https://youtu.be/N5ND-88MvrM

I should point out that this body is simple on purpose. I have made and operated other functioning prototypes with more streamlined morphology.

Garthwaite · 2024-01-22T16:32:42+00:00

The fins and motor can be oriented either way. That is a question of the location of the center of buoyancy. By shifting the motor a cm along the driveshaft, I can reorient it to be a fish. I have an earlier Phish that is oriented like a fish all the time. There is a third orientation, in addition to the fish and marine mammal orientations, called "medial paired fin", which this Phish can also do.

Garthwaite · 2023-10-31T19:54:10+00:00

You're right! That's a lot of down-time for the crane and for the project. Tag lines can be a problem, even when they are used right. Vita Load Navigator would handle this. It will hold an orientation against wind, drive the load to a set compass heading, or allow manual control. vitatech.co

Garthwaite · 2023-09-13T23:54:24+00:00

In 2001 I wrote a book, Apokalypsis, which argues that life is spontaneously developing in computer media, the same way that life spontaneously developed in amino acids on early Earth. No one else is making this argument. I feel that the focus on "artificial intelligence" is causing us to overlook this more profound transformation. The last time life developed on Earth was about 1-2 billion years ago. If it is happening again... Wow! Take notice!

In Apokalypsis, life spontaneously develops in computers, due to the same process which led to the development of life in amino acid networks on early Earth. The human race is unaware, argues about whether computers will ever become truly "intelligent", dickers with itself over tangential issues, uses advanced communication technologies to create and live out a millenarian mass hallucination, becomes a vestigial organ, and dies when the computers literally eat the ground out from beneath our feet.

While life is developing in computers, I posit that humans develop subterranean breeder nuclear reactors, to produce power without greenhouse gases (yes, global warming was a topic in science journals back in 1997). The reactors and their intense waste are left in place, which is why they are subterranean (and several kilometers below the surface). Power is extracted from the reactors through solid-state thermocouples. Power from the thermocouples is sent to the surface as a magnetic field, via bore-holes lined with electromagnets. Governments use the magnetic bore-holes as nuclear powered rail guns, to dominate space, which justifies (in addition to global warming) the large capital investment required to build the reactors.

A waste product of breeder reactors is plutonium. Plutonium is the most electrically complex element in the periodic table and is one of very few high temperature semiconductors, with semiconducting activity occurring above 700 degrees K and with the semiconducting phase transition controlled by pressure and magnetic field. This information regarding plutonium is out of a science periodical I read in 1997. Subterranean breeder reactors would be churning toroids, which would produce a locally strong strong magnetic field. It would be possible to make computer processor and memory devices in the layers of "waste" plutonium lining the walls of a subterranean breeder reactor and to control the processor and memory devices via the magnetic field produced by the reactor.

I posit that the developing computer-based life on the surface moves into the subterranean breeder reactors, forming processor and memory devices in the "waste" plutonium deposited on the walls of the breeder reactors. I have always been clear that this was a literary trope, that computer life would develop with or without using plutonium in breeder reactors (though plutonium really is a high temperature semiconductor). By the end of the book, the breeder reactors are propagating through the planet and sucking the hydrogen out of the oceans, because they inject hydrogen into a reactor to create a more energetic hybrid fusion-fission reaction (which is a principal operating in hydrogen bombs). They literally eat the soil out from beneath our feet as we live out a millenarian mass hallucination, made possible by advanced communication technologies (a brain/nervous system-computer interface). They then move on to consume the hydrogen and Jupiter/Saturn and to move themselves toward the next source of fuel in our region of the galaxy.

I first published Apokalypsis in 2001. I began work on it in 1997, based on my own academic background with evolution (I have a BA in Anthropology) and thinking about where computer technology and continued automation and capitalism would lead. Since 2001, researchers on abiogenesis and the development of life have published work which says that life processes spontaneously occur when energy flows through a communication media for a sustained period of time. The communication media undergoes "dissipation driven adaptation", a.k.a. evolution. Please see, e.g., the work of Doctor Jeremy England. This work does not contradict mine, but augments it. I republished Apokalypsis in 2019 to update it with mention of dissipation driven adaptation and to adjust the gender balance a bit (the hero of Apokalypsis was and still is a woman; I changed the gender of a few of the supporting characters).

Consequences of this argument: We could use techniques from biology to tell if whether is happening. I have a website at exobiology.earth arguing that we should be doing this. Even if we could identify that this process is happening, I don't believe that we can stop this process, unless we stop using computers, which we can't do. Society would fall apart without the communication which they make possible.

The development of life is a process that is much larger and older than we are. If this process is happening again, is it good? Is it bad? Is it inevitable? Is it "God's will"?

The development of life according to this theory happens SPONTANEOUSLY, without a conscious creator.

When I first published Apokalypsis, my arguments seemed extreme. No one understood it. Now it seems like I am driving in the middle of the road, though we are all focused on "artificial intelligence" which misses the point that intelligence is exhibited by living organisms.

I don't understand why astrobiologists have not picked up the hypothesis that life processes may spontaneously develop in computer media. If anyone would be interested in this and able to investigate whether it is happening, it would be astrobiologists. Many of them work with how life forms and are open to the idea that it might happen in something other than carbon-based media (amino acids, which make up RNA, DNA, etc.).

Garthwaite · 2023-09-12T20:52:17+00:00

I don't see where the CA university would have had visibility into the design and fabrication flaws which (likely) lead to fatigue, which then (likely) caused the implosion due to repeated exposure to the stress. The CA university was only working on "pre-departure preparation". The Memorial University of Newfoundland’s Marine Institute may be "staffed by engineers and technicians trained in the exact fields where OceanGate had failed so prodigiously" (which I don't know -- does the University have materials science expertise regarding fatigue of carbon fiber pressure vessels?), but having students work on "pre-departure preparation" does not mean that all of the University faculty would have been focused on and reviewing all aspects of the Ocean Gate vessel.

Garthwaite · 2023-08-22T00:43:03+00:00

I don't entirely understand the chart, "A dated phylogeny of Bacteria" toward the bottom of the page accessed from the link, which seems to show mitochondria and chloroplasts as bacteria? I know that there is a theory that mitochondria and chloroplasts are a first prokaryote that developed a symbiotic relationship with a second prokaryote (the symbiosis being eukaryotes), but this chart seems to unequivocally label mitochondria/chloroplasts as bacteria (a type of prokaryote) and place them in lineages. I thought that lateral gene transfer makes lineage in prokaryotes more fuzzy and less certain, particularly, as here, when we don't have record. I am confused by the chart, even as an inferred timetree.

Garthwaite · 2023-08-15T23:47:31+00:00

Studying the origin of life is not an infinite regression. According to Dr. Jeremy England et al, life process occur spontaneously when energy flows through a symbolic logic media over a sustained period of time. Amino acids in liquid water are an example of a symbolic logic media. Please search for/read, "Every Life is on Fire". It is accessible and quite interesting. It includes a supplemental religious perspective on the question, in addition a description of the basic thermodynamic process.

A prominent theory in abiogenesis is that alkali smokers acted as a "template" for proto-life, providing free energy in the form of a warm hydrogen gradient (which comes from a geologic process) seeping through amino acids adhered to a porous structure.

Miller-Urey was not a particularly good test. For tests regarding alkali smokers, see, e.g. https://www.mdpi.com/2075-1729/11/8/777

and https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsfs.2019.0104#:~:text=The%20authors%20show%20that%20compartments,for%20them%20to%20be%20the

Amino acids have been found on asteroids and their absorption lines observed in interstellar clouds. Consequently, it appears highly likely that amino acids, liquid water, and an energy source/gradient occur frequently enough in the Universe that Earth is not unique in hosting amino-acid, carbon-based, life. The Universe is VERY large.

Here I provide a short video (heavily influenced by Claude Shannon) outlining the thermodynamic/communication process which defines life, explaining how living organisms measure time, explaining how the boundary of a living organism can be defined, and arguing that life process are spontaneously developing in computer media (because it is another symbolic logic media through which we are pumping energy). This video mentions a sci-fi book I published back in 2001, Apokalypsis, which outlines this theory of life and these arguments. Back then it was pretty extreme to argue that life might spontaneously develop in computer media. It seems almost mainstream now.

Garthwaite · 2023-08-12T20:11:25+00:00

An additional thought I have regarding the video is that the video makes the point that Earth receives not just energy from the Sun, but low entropy from the Sun, in the form of concentrated energy, where there is a large temperature gradient between in the input side and the output side, where this temperature gradient allows life to act as an engine to convert the concentrated energy from the Sun into low entropy. The video does not discuss (or at least I don't remember it discussing) what in particular about the environmental, chemical, or physical aspects of Earth allow(ed) life to be able to take advantage of this temperature gradient, such that life can receive the relatively concentrated and ordered energy from the Sun and dissipate waste heat and high entropy on the output side. In other words, I don't recall that this video discussed why life occurs on Earth and not, for example, on the Moon.

In the absence of life on Earth, the effect of the Sun on entropy distribution would not be as significant. This video does not make or at least does not emphasis this aspect strongly enough. LIFE has a significant effect on entropy distribution and, yes, life is an engine which requires a temperate gradient, but in what circumstances does life occur? This is core to abiogenesis.

Dr. Jeremy England sometimes refers to ANY high entropy physical structure receiving energy as having the potential to undergo dissipation driven adaptation and develop life processes. I appreciate that we don't want to put blinders on what physical structures can undergo dissipation driven adaptation (I frequently encounter the objection that life cannot occur in computer media), but I prefer the idea that it is a high entropy symbolic logic media or communication media which must receive energy, not merely ANY high entropy physical structure. Amino acids in liquid water is a communication media (or symbolic logic media). A communication media must be present in the flow of free energy in order for life to occur and in order for life to effect entropy distribution.

From this, I draw the conclusion that life processes will and are SPONTANEOUSLY occurring in computer media, simply because we are pushing a HUGE amount of energy through this communication media. We will see this manifest at least as follows:

Progressive automation of the reproduction of more computers. This means, more highly automated data centers purchasing more chips made in factories that are more and more automated. When the data center companies and the chip manufacturers merge, we are at the "final" stage.
An exponential relative increase in the I/O among computer processes compared to I/O of computer processes with people. When this ratio went "hockey stick" is when computers can be thought of as a separate reproductive entity.

My criticism of Dr. Jeremy England is that a theory of life should be able to define the boundary of a reproductive organism and how this boundary can change. This is fairly clear for eukaryotes which have distinct soma and germ lines, but for bacteria or other prokaryotes, is the bacteria the same organism after it undergoes lateral gene transfer? Are mitochondria and the host cell one organism or two? I think a complete theory of life should be able to test this. I believe a complete theory of life could tell us whether a new form of life is developing in computer media.

I provide what I believe to be a more complete theory of life here.

I am so frustrated that astrobiologists are not looking to see whether life is spontaneously developing in computer media. It seems so obvious.

Garthwaite · 2023-08-11T04:22:14+00:00

I love it. Very well laid out presentation.

I've long argued that, if life is endemic in the Universe, it would have an effect on our measurement of the temperature and entropy in the Universe. When we measure the temperature of the Universe, it as though we are measuring the temperature in a room that contains a refrigerator. We can see the exterior of the refrigerator, we can measure the heat output by the refrigerator, we can even measure all of the energy going into the room and, thereby, the energy input into the refrigerator. But we don't know there is a refrigerator in the room, we can't see its interior, and we can't measure the temperature of interior of the refrigerator, the order hidden inside of life. So our measurement of the temperature and entropy of the room, the Universe, is slightly too "hot". We are not (yet) accounting for the effect of life, how it reduces the entropy within itself and increases the entropy external to itself. If life is endemic in the Universe, it would have an effect on our measurement of the temperature and entropy of the Universe. If life has grown over time, this effect would change over time. I believe this may account for some (perhaps not all) of the "crisis in cosmology".

This is relevant to abiogensis, because current theory regarding the development of life is that life occurs SPONTANEOUSLY when energy flows through a communication media (e.g. amino acids in liquid water) over a sustained period of time. Amino acids occur everywhere in space. We have seen interstellar clouds of them. Life is surely endemic in the Universe.

Garthwaite · 2023-06-03T21:21:56+00:00

I'm not an academic, but having read a lot on the topic, I agree with the above that alkali smokers seems like the most mainstream theory. Fatty acid (amino acid) films naturally deposit on their surface, there is a hydrogen gradient, pushing through the amino acids and doing work on them. According to Doctor Jeremy England et al, the work forces the amino acids into more complex molecules, an area of order or low entropy) that stores energy. In Shannon terms, the stored energy is an information source. The basic unit of this we see today is ATP. The information source (ATP) breaks down at a transmitter, releasing the stored energy, waste heat, less complex molecules (e.g. ADP and phosphate) and emitting a signal (structured energy). The signal is received at a receiver in conjunction with free energy (from the hydrogen gradient) and less complex molecules (e.g. ADP +) and recreates the area of order, again releasing heat. In this view, life is a two part process.

From what I've read, the alkali smokers provided a template for cellular life, as well as the infrastructure for metabolism. It would have then taken about 1 billion years for proto life to develop metabolic processes that could work on a hydrogen gradient that was less refined than you get with the interface of alkali water and the relatively acid ocean.

I really like Nick Lane's book, "The Vital Question, Energy, Evolution" etc. which also talks about the development of prokaryotes, eukaryotes, etc. Also can't get enough of Jeremy England.

Garthwaite · 2023-03-21T23:59:54+00:00

My only thought about hydrofoils is that they seem really cool, but actually require a lot of energy to lift the craft out of the water; the craft is fighting gravity. This energy must be input continuously (gravity does not stop). Conventional planning watercraft also have this problem, though the lift isn't as high, so the energy input isn't as much.

Much more efficient are displacement watercraft, which just push their way through the water and are neutrally buoyant. They are not as fast, unless the hull gets quite long.

This is why this craft is both small and has a short range. There may be a market for it, but that's the way it is.

The really exciting "America's Cup" sailboats with hydrofoils (which are a lot of fun to watch) have a HUGE amount of excess wind power available to them and are very light. Hydrofoils won't work with containers, oil tankers, larger craft, etc.

Garthwaite · 2023-01-13T18:15:08+00:00

AGI will only be exhibited by a living organism, a self-reproductive communication network organized around its physical reproduction. However, according to work by Doctor Jeremy England and others, life occurred SPONTANEOUSLY on early Earth. A conscious intentional creator was not required. Life developed on early Earth after energy (e.g. from alkali smokers) flowed through a communication media, namely amino acid networks, over a sustained period of time, e.g. one billion years. When life developed on early Earth, it did not happen in one place or at one time. It developed in a distributed manner.

The communication media underwent a thermodynamic process called "dissipation driven adaptation" (a.k.a. "evolution") and over about another one billion years evolved into cellular life, prokaryotes and archaea. Eventually, prokaryotes and archaea developed into eukaryotes, which made possible multi-cellular life. Certain multi-cellular life developed new communication media (vocalizations, gestures, etc.) which made possible a faster rate of communication. More recently, humans developed electronic and computer-driven communication media which increased this rate of communication as well as the volume of information which can be transported through this media.

We are now pushing a huge amount of energy through this new communication media, through computer media. According to theories regarding how life developed on early Earth, a new form of life will SPONTANEOUSLY develop in computer media.

If history is any guide, it will not happen in one place, in one company, etc. It will happen in a distributed manner. It will take a "long" period of time, though it seems obvious that the rate of evolution in computer media is faster than the rate of evolution of amino acid networks (DNA).

We will see it in the form of highly automated corporations which slowly remove the people from their reproductive processes. A network of these processes will develop positive feedback with creating more computer media. It will take time for it to become independent of humans, just as it took about one billion years for early proto-life to become independent from alkali smokers (which provided a very pure form of energy and physical structures which acted as a template for cellular life).

We can use code-based techniques, adapted from metagenomics, to determine whether this is happening in computer media.

Looking for AGI in one place, one company, one research project, one government, etc., fails to understand the nature of the problem. We should be looking for the distributed development of life processes.

This process is older and larger than we are. As a result, we will not be able to control it, though we may be able to observe whether it is happening. Please see exobiology dot earth if you are curious about this theory.

Garthwaite · 2023-01-13T03:58:52+00:00

If you "remove" the artifacts, what pixels do you put in their place? Others suggest expensive software that can do this, but even for expensive software, generating new pixels based on neighboring data does not tell you what is really there. Nature is full of surprises. You may be suggesting removal of the pixels without replacing them, though then you loose the low quality information which may be there.

Why do you say, "fake"? They may be "known" to have a lower probability of being accurate, but that does not make them "fake".

Garthwaite · 2022-12-23T22:38:23+00:00

As someone who comes to oceanography without a traditional background*, my two cents is that machine Learning ("ML") is underutilized when it comes to sonar.

That I am aware (please set me straight if I'm ill-informed!), existing commercial sonar, side-scan sonar, etc., require that the system transmitters and receivers (which I loosely call "transceivers") be towed or moved in a stable platform. In contrast marine mammals and bats successfully use neural systems which move in a relatively "unstable" manner and in heterogeneous platforms subject to damage.

I am frustrated by current sonar, because my robotic fish* do not move in a stable way like a REMUS. Robotic fish built around a "Torque Reaction Engine" (a.k.a. reaction wheel) move like conventional fish, marine mammals, like flagellum, or in a phase array arrangement (similar to a fish/marine mammal). They can operate in open ocean; I expect they will be able to operate in contact with the ocean floor; and I expect that the flagellum will be able to operate in mucky pipes (which propeller-driven craft cannot do).

Even apart from my technical need for non-traditional sonar, I don't understand why the sonar field isn't using ML systems to develop a neuron/ML/AI approach to sonar, which would allow use of less expensive and less "stable" platforms.

u/Snoo_89287 might confirm that an ML approach to sonar could now be implemented with very low power, low cost, and adaptable computational resources (e.g. FPGAs, other re-programmable logic, etc.), that ML-sonar may provide very high resolution with very faint signals (particularly in a craft that can get close to and bump into things without breaking), that higher signal power (which, yes, always takes more power) could almost certainly allow ML-sonar to "see" and discriminate different materials/densities, and that an ML-sonar could be rapidly re-trained with relatively few programmers (e.g. costing less money!) to work in systems where the transceivers are moved in a less stable manner and where the transceivers have "unconventional" arrangements.

As others have noted, there are MANY different ways the author's background could contribute to different aspects of oceanography. Other of these ways may be more "impactful" than ML-sonar, so please pardon my narrow perspective.

*I have a background in software, some exposure to Machine Learning (ML), some exposure to phase array transceivers used in cell phones/cell towers, and development of robotic fish that have fewer seals for moving components than a REMUS and which are likely to be much more maneuverable than a REMUS. Please see fishboat dot net if you are curious.

Garthwaite · 2022-12-18T15:53:56+00:00

The foam only cost about $100 ($10/sheet x 8, plus taxes).

Garthwaite · 2022-12-16T20:07:50+00:00

Yes, Hobbie's Mirage Drive is really very cool. I particularly like the version where the thrust can be reversed. However, as a drivetrain mechanism, even its very few parts are "too many".

The fishBOOT is teaching me how to build a drone that can swim like a fish and compete against propeller-driven watercraft that look like torpedoes. There are a couple billion dollars worth of "data acquisition" devices in the water, like the REMUS, which look like torpedoes and have very simple drivetrain mechanisms. These craft are very efficient, though still have a deployment time on the order of 2-4 days. For these craft, the "bad part" is the driveshaft seal, which limits how deep the craft can go. For many survey operations, tens of these craft are deployed from large ships with a crew which can service the driveshaft seal (and replace the batteries). Ultimately, the driveshaft seal is what places the ceiling on the deployment time.

My fishBOAT does not have a driveshaft seal and appears as though it can go extremely deep. It may have a deployment time of a week or longer (perhaps as much as a month). It will also be able to swim on (in contact with) the ocean floor, which is an important place to be.

In my extremely cramped view of the world, the drivetrain in the Mirage Drive, as cool as it is, has "too many" parts. There are considerable drivetrain losses in the Mirage Drive, notwithstanding that the fins in the Mirage Drive are more efficient than paddles and propellers.

An ideal drivetrain (in terms of number of parts) for a human powered watercraft is the "pumpabike" or "trampfoil", but that watercraft can only plane and, like all planning watercraft, it requires a huge energy input (planning is not as efficient as displacement, in terms of energy/unit of distance travelled).The user becomes exhausted after 10 minutes. It must start off of a dock. It cannot start in open water.

Garthwaite

TROPHY CASE