The Bionic Runner

Oscar Pistorius had both legs amputated below the knee when he was 11 months old, but equipped with Cheetah prosthetics he's trained to become an extremely accomplished runner who's in search of an olympic qualifying time. Only problem is that the International Association of Athletics Federations, the governing body for track and field, says the prosthetics give him an advantage over conventional runners.

Clearly, I'm not in a position to assess the validity of a claim like that. But they make a lot of these high-end prosthetics in Iceland, and when I was over there I met a guy who works in that industry and it was certainly his claim that their products exceeded the capabilities of organic limbs. As you see with the HGH and steroid scandals in baseball and Deep Blue's success in chess, our ideas about human competition are coming under increasing strain and there's no sign of that trend ending. Right now all of this exists on such esoteric levels that it doesn't really impinge on the political realm, but I bet that day is coming soon.

Comments

I await Richard Steven Hack to show up soon to dismiss this as child's play, and extoll the glorious future of transhumanism.

Posted by mad6798j | January 10, 2008 6:14 PM

Since then, Pistorius has been racing in South Africa and has been timed around 46.5 seconds in the 400, Davies said, well off the automatic qualifying time for the 2008 Olympics of 45.55 seconds.

Well that was disappointing. He isn't even that fast.

Posted by WillieStyle | January 10, 2008 6:19 PM

Too late. We already have a cyborg governor here in California.

Posted by Dutch | January 10, 2008 6:20 PM

I'm with mad6798j. (rubs hands together in anticipation).

In all seriousness though, I agree with Matt this is something that we'll be seeing more and more of, and in more and more different realms.

Suppose there was some way to augment one's own intelligence, without *significant* side-effects. In today's competitive work environment, wouldn't workers in some fields be under intense pressure to do so? It makes you a better multi-tasker!

We've only just scratched the surface on the whole idea of enhancements.

Posted by Just Another Greg | January 10, 2008 6:24 PM

If you can strap on the latest in high-tech sneakers and wear sci-fi suits to minimize your wind resistance, aren't high-tech prosthetics just the next step? Aren't they basically just stilts?

No-one is preventing the other competitors from getting their limbs amputated. Still, I think we can all agree that a program of amputating athletes is undesireable. For that reason, it is clear that the Olympics need to go back to their original rules, and have the contestants compete nude. Their viewing figures would go up, too.

Posted by Warren Terra | January 10, 2008 6:27 PM

I haven't seen much evidence that this guy is going to threaten Jeremy Wariner any time soon. Until then, I'd say let him run.

Posted by Steve Sailer | January 10, 2008 6:51 PM

Just Another Greg,

In terms of focus and efficiency, you're just talking about ritalin and the like.

Posted by Goldberg | January 10, 2008 6:52 PM

The robot candidate this year is Mitt Romney, and since he can't seem to win any important primaries, we've got at least another four years before bowing to our AI overlords.

Posted by Media Glutton | January 10, 2008 7:14 PM

Since I was invited to do so - OK.

I'll leave it at: you ain't seen nothing yet.

Wait until ROBOTS run better than humans. Some time back, a Japanese roboticist predicted that by 2050, a robot soccer team would win the world championship.

I don't much doubt that he's right - unless of course for some reason the technology veers off to some other more useful goal.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 10, 2008 7:36 PM

BTW, does Bush using a concealed radio under his coat in his debates count?

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 10, 2008 7:38 PM

Aren't they basically just stilts?

Pretty much, and I'm sure stilts are not legal in competitive racing. From what I've heard, people trained to run on stilts can run much faster people just running on their feet.

Posted by Rob Mac | January 10, 2008 7:53 PM

Right now all of this exists on such esoteric levels that it doesn't really impinge on the political realm, but I bet that day is coming soon.

Um, Matt--how, exactly would that work? Are you suggesting politicians of the future will take drugs or be surgically altered to enhance their political skills? Or am I missing the point here? Please advise.

Posted by James Gary | January 10, 2008 9:18 PM

"Right now all of this exists on such esoteric levels that it doesn't really impinge on the political realm..."

Excepting the president of the US making some very pointed, public statements on baseball steroid use & vowing investigations into the matter, I'll assume. Indeed, wasn't it one of his major 05/06 policy issues along with "To Mars, Bitches!"? Er, & haven't there already been congressional investigations?

It appears that "the HGH and steroid scandals in baseball" have already impinged on the political realm as much as they could given the current political climate. If not for an unpopular & failing war in Iraq, a volatile market, stagnant employment, a looming repression, the cloud of terrorism, a credit/housing bust, rising gas/oil prices, etc., I'm sure Bush would be riding the steroid issue like a wild mustang... er, if he actually knew how to ride a horse that is.

As for "Big Blue", I think you'll have to wait for a time of peace & prosperity before anyone gives a toss that a supercomputer beat a human at a game of chess... now that's esoteric -- baseball steroid use, not so much.

Posted by ripdash | January 10, 2008 9:51 PM

Sorry... "Deep Blue", not "Big Blue".

Posted by ripdash | January 10, 2008 10:02 PM

Deep Blue had human input during the second Kasparov match.

Posted by James Bowie | January 10, 2008 10:29 PM

Someday they will invent cars that go faster than humans. You wait.

Posted by El Cid | January 10, 2008 10:43 PM

I read that Cheetah prosthetics are some 70% efficient, while thanks to subtle use of upper leg muscles, lower legs are some 200% in normal runners. Maybe Pitorius gets some extra mileage out of his remaining muscles as a result, but I dunno.

Posted by Schwa | January 10, 2008 10:47 PM

Someday, a 17-year-old foreigner will start taking lots of steroids and become a bodybuilder and action movie star, then get elected governor of California.

You just wait and see ...

Posted by Steve Sailer | January 10, 2008 11:31 PM

Someday, a fading pundit will get a prescription for testosterone, which will totally revive his career and he'll become a leading voice clamoring to start a pointless war in the Middle East, and he'll be rewarded with a job blogging for the Atlantic Monthly.

You just wait and see ...

Posted by Steve Sailer | January 10, 2008 11:35 PM

Men and women both have legs yet don't compete against each other. Why is that?

There are rules about how long track spikes can be. Strange but true.

In a 400m race all runners have to run 400m. 390m doesn't count for some reason.

It's as if competition is more interesting when participants compete on the same basis. Just a thought.

Posted by scuttlebut | January 10, 2008 11:39 PM

"Right now all of this exists on such esoteric levels that it doesn't really impinge on the political realm, but I bet that day is coming soon."

Which I take to mean that, though now political attitudes towards this sort of thing are uncontroversial, as advances in technology and medicine enable performance beyond the norm in wider fields of endeavor, one's attitudes towards such advantages, and the regulation, etc., thereof will become important politically.

Posted by DNS | January 10, 2008 11:48 PM

"one's attitudes towards such advantages, and the regulation, etc., thereof will become important politically."

Exactly.

Which is why we Transhumanists will end up having to whack you all.

Unlike the Terminator movies, Star Trek, and all that nonsense, humans are going to lose - big time.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 11, 2008 12:15 AM

Having thought about it for all of five minutes (but having been a quarter-miler in high school and a 30 to 60 mile-a-week runner for the 32 years since), I bet there's a way to "equalize" the bio-mechanics of the Cheetahs such that Pistorius would not be at an advantage, or disadvantage.

See the thing to remember is that, while the Cheetahs are doing the work that his lower legs would be doing, the rest of his body is still doing its work naturally. That's why I always laughed at the idea of 'The Six-Million Dollar Man' when they'd show him running 60 mph or whatever it was. Sure, he had bionic legs and a bionc arm (or whatever), but the other arm and his stomach and back muscles and the other arm and shoulder muscles had to try to keep up. At 60 mph, the regular muscles (and tendons and ligaments, etc) would have been ripped to shreds.

So it seems to me that smart biomechanical engineers could look at what the Cheetahs are, and are not, doing for Pistorius, in terms of overall stride length, 'spring' off the track, shock absorption, etc., relative to what a 'normal' 46 second quartermiler's legs do for him. If the Ceetahs are indeed giving an advantage, then modify them until they don't give an advantage anymore.

(And as for 46.5 in the 400 meters being "not even that fast"... are you kidding me? Yeah, Olympians go faster, some college runners go faster, even the occasional (really good) high school runner goes that fast. But that is like 'one in a million' or maybe 'one in ten million' kind of speed.)

Posted by Robert Earle | January 11, 2008 1:28 AM

This was bound to come up sooner or later. The only way I can think of in general to adjudicate would be to model it.

Posted by sherifffruitfly | January 11, 2008 1:39 AM

"Deep Blue had human input during the second Kasparov match."

James is right, and it matters, a lot.

What that means is that they were able to alter the program between games, during the match. The masters were so superior to computers for all those years that little attention had been paid to that factor, but it matters. In effect, it allows the computer to send out a different player for each game, but with no notice to the opponent. Learn a tendency or see an exploitable weakness in game 1? Sorry, you're playing another player in game 2, and you don't know what player.

So in game 1, you're playing Tim Duncan? In game 2, you're playing Tracy McGrady, only you don't know it. Game 3, it's an Iverson type, though it takes you 20 moves to figure that out, because with the computer, it's not obvious.

Make your own analogies facing various pitchers, etc. If the machine itself can switch personalities / profiles, well fine, that's its capability and we bow to it. But if that requires the intervention of its handlers? And the nature of that intervention is completely masked? It's ridiculous to say that makes the computer based system better. That day may come, but it has not come yet.

If Big Blue or any other computer is to claim the crown, let it play it straight, from match beginning to end. It is, in fact, somewhat unfair for a computer to be able to be a 'new' entity at the beginning of a match, much less a game. If it really wants to show superiority, let Big Blue compete with a dozen masters in a round robin, with all players able to view the results of all games, as is the case for human players. My bet is that Big Blue would look pretty ordinary come about match 6.

IBM's 'retiring' Big Blue when it did was an act of cowardice akin to Mike Tyson's biting Holyfield's ear when he knew he was about to get his ass kicked.

Posted by drinkof | January 11, 2008 9:51 AM

I skate faster than I run. Can I enter the Olympic 100 metre dash in rollerblades? (I can cover that distance in under seven seconds on skates. Yay me!)

It's inspiring to see how Pistorious has overcome a real handicap, and I have no doubt that he's an exceptional athlete. But his prosthetics place him sui-generis among sprinters. This isn't like enhancements available to all; do we allow EVERY athlete to don performance-enhancing equipment, or just those who are somehow physically "disadvantaged"? Shoes with springs, like those worn by Wile. E. Coyote? Heelys? I mean, shit, this isn't too difficult a debate to settle for rational people.

Posted by Jamey | January 11, 2008 11:00 AM

I had never considered those points about Deep Blue. You should take it one step forward: what kind of career could Deep Blue have? With no change to the software, let it compete at a series of tournaments and see what kind of ranking it could achieve or how many it could win. That would be the true test. Until then, I don't think you can really argue that the computer is better.

Posted by mpowell | January 11, 2008 1:18 PM