this guy has been doing this for years, I believe I saw the early stages of this project 4 or 5 years ago at least, anyone out there got the actual start date handy?

@013 oh, man! I loved Sodaplay. I know why I wont get anything done at work today ;)

I dislike the way the media hypes up this project so much! What deserves the hype is the Jansen mechanism/linkage that is used to create incredible walking motion. What doesn’t deserve the hype is the StrandBeest project. “Look guys, I put a tricycle on the beach with a sail and it lives and thrives there!” The only difference here is that the devices utilize leg linkages to facilitate locomotion. What happens if a living, thriving StrandBeest accidentally moves into several inches of water and wet sand where the tide is hitting the shore? What happens if a living, thriving StrandBeest walks into a bush? Is a leaf being blown by the wind living and thriving?

what i hated the most about this was that he kept talking about it as if it was alive. very cool and well designed machine YES! alive very very NO!

If you like, have a look:

http://vimeo.com/952254

found here:
http://www.strandbeest.com/film.html

Whoops, spelling errors abound.
‘simple’ -> ‘simple manner’
‘studding’ -> ‘stunning’

Agreed…. Constantly referring to it as “living” is annoying and pretentious.

Really, I find it sad that he smothers the arguably brilliant engineering and simplicity of his design in all that existential BS.

This is the first time I’ve seen it.

I agree that “animal” is a misnomer. However, it is an impressive machine, considering all that it does without a conventional computer.

When is burning man again?

He gave a speech on campus a year or two ago. It was really interesting hearing him talk about his creatures. As an engineer, hearing him talk about them as if they are alive is a little disturbing and, as someone else said, sounds conceited. However, his speech was not just to engineers, but artists and math majors, and everyone else. The more he talked about the emergent behaviors, and the things he was trying to build into them; a fear of water, ability to sense the surface they walked on; the more they did seem to get closer to being alive.

If we want to complain about it being ‘alive’, we should complain about programmers talking about genetic or evolutionary algorithms. Or computer ‘vision’ and ‘sensing’. Just because the machines do not yet meet all the criteria of life does not mean they will not at some point. After all, mixing this with some of the rep-rap reproducibility could result in a machine that would be a very basic form of life.

As a engineer-in-training, the pneumatic oscillator built from not gates was very interesting. Studying how he uses that to act as the clock cycle for the rest of the beast’s mechanics was worth the wait of his talk.

He’s been working on this project for about twenty years now, I think. It’s really cool to see the creations from up close. He’s from Delft, where I live, and gave a talk some months ago. The legs are impressive, but that he did twenty years ago. The air-based logic system is at least as impressive.

He’s built an asymmetrical NOR-gate from PVC pipes, tubes and bottles. It’s really, really impressive to see. He has timers based on slow leakage, and pumps for energy storage, incredible stuff.

And, yes, indeed, for the press there’s a lot of talk about artificial life, but in private he’s just an awesome engineering artist.

@Larz – brilliant!!

Yeah guys, chill out. Hes a nut, but a loveable nut who makes f*cking cool gadgets – at least he is not using an Arduino – that would really get you all fired up.

He does state at the end that they can’t survive without his help yet, so the further up about what happens if it hits a bush etc didn’t listen.

He calls them ‘animals’ I think working on this project for 16 years will do this to you, but if thats what it takes to keep him motivated, I say go for it. Christ, I got bored of my Arduino and hacking about 4 weeks after I started.

so he can’t fix the ship either?

Here’s a deal,

you guys keep up with the amazing engineering, hacking and programming of wonderful gizmo’s and we philosophers will continue to work out semantics and ontology.

Listening to engineering types try to philosophize is like listening to nails on a chalkboard.

@Renee: Listening to philosophers at all is about as useful and giving as listening to Rick Astley over and over.

Get over yourself. Of the millions upon millions of self-proclaimed “philosophers” through the ages, only a handful are considered to have contributed enough to even be remembered by name.

Theo Jansen is creating stuff! AMAZING stuff! Mindblowingly complex stuff from simple, everyday items. Let’s face it.. you’re pissing on his parade because you know as well as anyone else that “philosophers” don’t make any difference. ;)

I mean stuff like logic gates got their name from somewhere….

You’re welcome ;)

@Renee:

I’m sorry, my post got away from me. =P

I’m just saying, people who do nothing but think and argue sound a lot like politicians, and we all know how useful they are. ;)

Besides, saying we need philosophers for logic or ethics is to me like saying we need religion for morale and compassion.

As to what constitutes life.. Science has got that covered, right? True, it is a matter of semantics*, but philosophers generally concern themselves with things less corporeal than hard science, right? I’d be hard pressed to see the difference between a philosopher who is into theoretical physics, and a theoretical physicist. =P

*Like the term “A.I.”. I mean, why would a human-like intelligence on/in a different medium be “artificial”? A computer is a computer, and firmware is firmware. As a sentient being, it is of little import to me whether my brain is made from carbon-based neurons or a silicone-based computer.

hehe… neat stuff.

I once built an LED flashing hat which exhibited interesting behaviour (used the classic transistor shift register).
Something like this with alternating outputs hooked up via a driver stage to small motors would be an amusing “walker”, BEAM style.

interestingly, simple circuits like this can generate complex behaviours if feedback/feedforward is implemented using small capacitors (presence of several small inputs causes the output to change state)..

just my $0.04 worth (adjusted for inflation)

@PlastBox: you’re making a philosophical argument, so your argument annihilates itself.

@Renee: Baruch is my fave. And someone who had a very tough life. Philosophy is a difficult enterprise.

I’ve got no problems with this guy calling his stuff alive or an animal.

If you want to push ontological arguments feel free, but I’ve yet to see any strongly useful ontologys (there’s a pun in there for philosophical types). Anyway, this is a technocracy – go build something better than this guy did and then we’ll listen to you.

I think without going into any of that you can still call philosophy useful.

Something like engineering and philosophy aren’t that different.

The ways in which engineers use diodes, resistors etc as well as the different theories and laws surrounding electrical engineering all in the effort of either creating something new or reverse engineering things is comparable to the methods of philosophers.

Philosophers use things like logic and mathematics as well as epistemological, metaphysical and ethical theories and axioms to either create something new or reverse engineer a statement, belief and/or ideology my way of breaking it down into its constituent parts.

I don’t consider someone who tinkers with an arduino or does hacking on the weekend to be a full blown engineer. Perhaps an amateur one depending.

Likewise I also don’t consider anyone who thinks about something really hard or intelligently to be a philosopher, perhaps an amateur one depending on the method.

In the end philosophy, in itself,is still absolutely important. However due to the nature of it you don’t often see tangible results. Usually because the philosopher passes on the thing to someone else to actualize it.

Such as the mathematicians and philosophers who conceived of formal logic, multiple realizability and computational theory which then got passed along to the engineers who turned those theories into practical applications.

However most people just assume philosophy to be random ramblings about reality not being real and stuff like that.

The comparison to the Professor on GI is interesting. I would like to see him be more like the Professor (and greener at the same time) by using bamboo and other natural materials, wherever possible.

first time i’ve seen these things. frickin’ awesome. i second that motion to use bamboo and other natural materials. not because i’m a green freak, but because it would introduce several different aspects to the strandbeests. remember those self-enclosed life-globe ecosystem things? the bamboo, over time, will decay, much like a living body. a solar/water still system (with algae, maybe?) could provide heat which can be used as for the high-ish pressure side of a diaphram pump, and run-off moisture could serve as lubricant on the joints (sand gets everywhere). different colors of materials to identify successive “evolutions” of design, and combinations to note mixing of different types. i bet, with a little more thinking, the things could be designed to be able to turn. if the binary step counter can compute dry sand/water distances, it may be possible to set it up to turn, say 90*, at the midway-point once that calculation has been determined. they’d be able to rove up and down the coast, instead of just surf-to-shore jaunts.

oh, by the way, 4 + 3 = 7 is useless all by its lonesome. this means math is useless, just like philosophy… right up until someone does something with the calculations they’ve been scribbling, or the thoughts they’ve been pondering.

just my 2 cents.

I am always very skeptical to AI and AL. As a student of philosophy I must say however that these creatures are really intriguing as ambassadors of artificial life.

It is artificial, as in an (man made) artifact, but it is life in that it is based on the same primary functions of simpler life. Get nutrition, stay alive. All it needs to go away from the “artificial podium” is the ability to replicate and develop itself.

Just imagine when these critters will be able to look after themselves, and you meet one one dark afternoon. It will be like meeting a giant alien insect, and your instincts will treat it as an animal (unexpected, unpredictable and possibly dangerous).

I for one, welcome our multi-legged sand dune overlords!

yes, engineering is useless unless something is engineered. get it? once someone comes up with an idea and actually puts that idea to use or shares it with another that puts it to use, it is simply a thought. if you, i, or anybody comes up with a great idea, but does not disseminate that information, then it is wasted. if i think it, then act on it, then it is of value. the number 5 is an intangible, unless you’re, say, counting objects. a shade of the color blue is an intangible, unless you paint your wall that color. these strandbeests were nothing but a thought at one point. it wasn’t until the thinker put a bunch of pvc pipes and lemonade bottles together did it become a reality.

had another thought on the evolution of these strandbeests. put the legs, or a group of legs, into a quadrapedal configuration. the “backbone” section could be used for a simple autonomous load carrier. think giant bees. hell, figure out a blade rotor setup and you have a legged lawnmower. another, or the same one, with a clamshell bucket could distribute the mown grass into piles. another, or again, the same one, could then “ingest” the clippings and use the heat of the mulch to power itself. it could then deposit the composted mulch in different areas of your yard. you’d have a strandbeest with a rudimentary metabolic/digestive system.

I meant tangible in the literal sense of holding an item in your hand, not how we use it.

After all I did mention logic gates, I know how important philosophy is but to most people, value is judged by material worth.

one thing he didn’t put thought:
speech

Wouldn’t it be easy to put some sort of tubes with a bottle on the other end and when it blows you can hear “KIiiiillLLL MEEE PLEEAAASE!”

Don’t you all realize that you’re infact engaging in philosophical discourse throughout your entire discussion?! Well, maybe at least an attempt at, but your entire conversation has roots in philosophy. What a bunch of idiots.