From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Mon Jun 11 2001 - 13:16:35 MDT
Max M wrote:
> > From: owner-extropians@extropy.org
> > [mailto:owner-extropians@extropy.org]On Behalf Of Anders Sandberg
>
> > If cryonics ever takes off (and before we all turn into posthuman
> > monoliths as per the Great Plan)
>
> Well actually ... don't you think that in the future we would look a bit
> more like trees? Or rather like tumbleweeds with leafs?
>
> For collecting energy, or signals, or for a whole lot of other practical
> reasons, the fractal tree-like shape would probably be the most efficient.
>
> Naturally if we all turn into Jupiter brains it's different, but I could
> easily imagine a planet, or a Dyson Sphere covered with an intelligent
> tumbleweed network.
>
> It's right on the tip of my tongue but I can't for the dead of me remember
> in what book there was that view of a fractal life form. You all know it, it
> is one of the classics.
One of David Brin's novels has such a character, and S Andrew Swann's Hostile
Takeover trilogy has such entities as members of the nanotech oriented Proteus
Commune, they move by rolling around like tumbleweeds...I think possibly Niven's
'Outsiders' were of a similar architecture.
> Well I have allways thought that it needed leafs, for both practical and
> estethic reasons. Like nano-tech nature has evolved a reasonable design
> allready.
Maximizing surface area for heat radiation, solar flux absorption, and signal
transmission are all useful benefits of leafy designs, especially for living in
space or when using a high energy metabolism.
There is a significant difference between intentional design and evolved design,
since evolutionary systems rely on accident, random fluctuations to create
variations for testing. Evolved devices/organisms typically operate by means
outside the standard rules of intentionally designed devices. I am reminded of
an electronic circuit that was evolved a few years back to recognise a given
tone. The resultant evolved design had components hanging off into space to no
apparent purpose, yet removing them from the circuit eliminated its ability to
actually recognise the desired tone. I actually hesitate to call the results of
evolution 'designs'. Perhaps a new word is required to describe the product of
evolutionary systems.
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