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Living Technology – Putting People in the Present
A discussion of the broader implications of living technology
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When: |
August 24th 2010, 17.30 - 20.30 |
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Where: |
University of Southern Denmark The meeting will be held in room 100 |
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Price |
Participation is free of charge |
What is Living Technology?
The concept of 'living technology' calls attention to the fact that modern science is increasingly capable of engineering systems whose power is based on the core features of life.
Today, genetically modified organisms are designed and used in the laboratory to allow pharmaceuticals to be synthesized with precision in large quantities; autonomously working robots acting on the same principles thought to underlie insect behavior are increasingly introduced not only in industrial production but also healthcare; and adaptive network traffic controllers are currently being developed to control the flow of the 'arteries' of working life.
Playing God?
Concerns about violating nature are sometimes connected to the worry that creating synthetic cells would be playing God.
Mark Bedau discusses the perspectives and pitfalls of living technology.
Why should we care?
The scientific state of the art today makes the possible perspectives and implications of living technology seem almost endless.
The prospect of living technology brings hope of sustainable solutions to the challenges we're facing such as climate change or growing healthcare problems and expenses.
Yet, at the same time popular consciousness often represents the scientists and engineers who make living or lifelike technology as dangerous to society in one way or another.
Fiction readily provides well-known mental templates such as Frankenstein and his monster, the autonomous robots ruling The Matrix, and the synthetic humans of the now-classic movie Blade Runner.
But, obviously, fiction is too fragile a foundation for serious and sober recommendations about whether and, if so, to what extent to make and use increasingly lifelike technology. Instead, dialog between citizens, scientists, and policy makers today is the single most crucial component in shaping the future consciously, intentionally, and thoughtfully.
Can protocells save Venice from sinking?
Hear Dr. Rachel Armstrong discusses her work creating protocells, programmable technology that "live" but are not "alive." Armstrong explains that these cells do not have DNA and are based on the chemistry of oils. She speculates that protocells could be used to save Venice from sinking.
When to participate?
The Initiative for Science, Society, and Policy (ISSP) is an independent non-profit international scientific and technical organization. We bring interdisciplinary expertise in complex systems and living technology to policy makers, business leaders and the general public.
ISSP invites you to participate in a public and media-covered event on August 24th, 2010. The theme of the event is 'Living technology: Putting people in the present.'
Artificial life scientists will explain what living technology is, what exists today, what will happen in the next few years, and why living technology likely will be the most society-transforming technology of our generation.
The scientific talks will be followed by a discussion involving invited stakeholders, policy makers, scientists, industry leaders, students, and other interested parties, who will reflect on the real and near-term potential commercial impact of living technology, and more generally on people's hopes and fears about this new technology.
Living technology is green
Professor Steen Rasmussen is convinced that technology based on the principles of life will be of great importance in the effort against global warming. Living technology with e.g. the ability to self-repair is one way that we may come to reduce pollution. (Article in Danish)
Preliminary Program
17:30 - 18:30 - Four Brief Introductory Talks on Living Technology
- Speaker 1: Mark Bedau, Director of ISSP, Reed College, US - Engineering emergence: the key promise and challenge of living technology
- Speaker 2: Martin Hanczyc, Center for Living Technology, DK - Artificial Life
- Speaker 3: Rachel Armstrong, Bartlett School of Architecture, UK - Surviving the 21st Century with Living Technology
- Speaker 4: Kasper Støy, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark - Robots are moving in with you
18:30 - 19:00 Break and Posters
Light refreshments will be served outside the conference room, with a display of posters on living technology.
19:00 - 20:30 Panel Discussion
Panel and public discussion addressing the questions of living technology's implications:
- for our everyday lives,
- for Denmark
- for innovation in business and industry
- for the responsibilities of scientists, politicians, businesses, and the general public.
Moderator:
- Vincent F. Hendricks
Professor, University of Copenhagen
On the panel:
- Steen Rasmussen
Professor, University of Southern Denmark - Peder Agger
Chairman, the Danish Council of Ethics - Vibeke Hjortlund
Chief editor, Videnskab.dk - Norman Packard
CEO, ProtoLife - Mihaela Ulieru
Professor, University of New Brunswick
Speaker Abstracts
Mark Bedau - Engineering emergence: the key promise and challenge of living technology
All living systems have many important emergent properties, that is, macro properties that are determined by complete micro details, but only by the brute-force process of crawling the micro-causal web. Valuable emergent properties of living and life-like systems are hard to engineer, precisely because they are so unpredictable. This makes certain social and ethical issues especially sting. We now need a concerted effort to innovate in methods for emergent engineering.
Martin Hanczyc - Artificial Life
Making life in the laboratory is not easy, as there are many technical and conceptual obstacles. For over 100 years researchers have been trying to synthesize life, but so far no one has been successful. I will present a few examples of how scientists are trying to create life and what this kind of artificial life might look like. Finally, I will discuss if artificial life would be useful and impact our lives in any meaningful way.
Rachel Armstrong – Surviving the 21st Century with Living Technology
I strongly believe that not only can we survive the twenty first century but also that we will leave the world in a much better condition than the way we found it. The good news is that we can use a new technology to help us achieve this. The key is to change the relationship between technology and nature at the most fundamental level because, quite frankly, we’re in the middle of a toxic relationship where the parties have no common interests with any hope of a connection.
Now, this deeply appeals to the doctor in me. I want to make this connection since our lives depend on it. So I’ve been working with international architects and scientists to create a new group of materials that can align the interests of technology and nature – using a chemically programmable operating system – that can redesign the carbon cycle.
The Carbon Cycle - The carbon cycle is the most important chemical system on earth. It is how sunlight is trapped using carbon dioxide and turned into useful substances that we need. These are then consumed by animals, people and technology and turned into energy – releasing carbon dioxide. The Carbon Cycle therefore links technology and nature. Now we can influence this. Especially when we incorporate this new operating system into the very fabric of our machines and programme them to make useful substances that we need as opposed to the current random production of waste products. This is very important as we can now take technology out of the consumption arm of the carbon cycle and place it into the production phase where it does similar work to plants with positive environmental impacts that can simultaneously drive technological and natural development.
Living Technology and architecture - Because of the scale of the problem, our sights are focused on our largest technology – the built environment –, which covers one point five percent of the earth’s surface, and makes forty percent of our carbon footprint. The plan is to incorporate these materials on the surface of buildings.
Imagine for instance, a design for a new generation of solar panels and cladding that can use sunlight to make biofuels rather than electricity or which can be programmed to produce water in desert climate; or surfaces that can trap carbon dioxide and reduce pollution levels.
If we accept that we need to do something radical about the impact that technology has on the environment – and if it is evident that the current incremental approaches are not enough; then these new materials offer a way forwards through new science, technology and business to underpin a New Industrial Revolution where the interests of people, technology and nature are aligned - and gives rise to a twenty first century that is prosperous and which we can be proud of.
Kasper Støy - Robots Are Moving in With You
Robots are moving from factories into our homes: Robots increasingly take part in our daily chores such as cleaning and lawn-moving and even find their way into kids' rooms in the form of entertainment. In this talk I will present this development through examples as well as discuss the future of robotics. The talk will form the background for discussing how robots may change our lives for better or worse.