I remember attending an exhibition about Leonardo Da Vinci a couple years ago and I was astounded by the complexity of some of the machines he created. It wasn’t just that he’d figured out these things where no one else had, more it was some of the things that he designed didn’t seem possible to me, at least with the technology he had available to him at the time. Ever since then I’ve had something of a fascination with mechanical structures, marvelling at creations that seem like they should be impossible. My favourite example of this is Theo Jansen’s Strandbeests, a new form of life that he has been striving to create for the better part of 25 years.
All of his designs are essentially tensegrity structures (I.E. all parts of the structure are under constant tension) arranged in such a way that when an outside force, in this case the wind at a beach, acts on them they’re able to walk. His initial designs only functioned when the wind was blowing however further designs, many of which you can see in the video, are able to store wind energy and then use it later through some rather clever mechanical engineering. Unfortunately I couldn’t find the best video which has Theo explaining how they work as that one also shows another Strandbeest he created that would avoid walking itself into the ocean (something which I’m still not sure I understand how it works completely).
The idea of creating a new form of life, even if it doesn’t meet the 7 rules for biological life, is a pretty exciting idea and one that’s found an unlikely form of replication: 3D printing. After many people made their own versions of his Strandbeests (I even printed a simple one off, although it broke multiple times during assembly) Theo has made the designs available through Shapeways, essentially giving the Strandbeests a way to procreate. Sure it’s not as elegant as what us biological entities have but the idea does have a cool sci fi bent to it that tickles me in all the right places.
Taken to its logical extreme I guess a Reprap that printed Strandbeests that assembled other Repraps would be the ultimate end goal, although that’s both exciting and horrifying at the same time.
