I'm an MIT professor, but I do not design buildings or computer systems. Rather, I build body parts, bionic legs that augment human walking and running.
我是麻省理工學院的教授, 但我不設計建築物或電腦系統。 而是建造人體的部件, 能增強人類行走 和跑步能力的仿生腿。
In 1982, I was in a mountain-climbing accident, and both of my legs had to be amputated due to tissue damage from frostbite. Here, you can see my legs: 24 sensors, six microprocessors and muscle-tendon-like actuators. I'm basically a bunch of nuts and bolts from the knee down. But with this advanced bionic technology, I can skip, dance and run.
1982 年我在英國遭遇登山事故, 由於凍傷造成組織損傷, 我的雙腿不得不被截肢。 在這裡,你可以看到我的雙腿: 24 個傳感器,6 個微處理器 和肌肉腱狀執行器。 基本上我膝蓋以下 是一堆螺母和螺栓。 但藉助這種先進的仿生技術, 我能跳躍、跳舞和跑步。
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Thank you.
謝謝。
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I'm a bionic man, but I'm not yet a cyborg. When I think about moving my legs, neural signals from my central nervous system pass through my nerves and activate muscles within my residual limbs. Artificial electrodes sense these signals, and small computers in the bionic limb decode my nerve pulses into my intended movement patterns. Stated simply, when I think about moving, that command is communicated to the synthetic part of my body. However, those computers can't input information into my nervous system. When I touch and move my synthetic limbs, I do not experience normal touch and movement sensations. If I were a cyborg and could feel my legs via small computers inputting information into my nervous system, it would fundamentally change, I believe, my relationship to my synthetic body. Today, I can't feel my legs, and because of that, my legs are separate tools from my mind and my body. They're not part of me. I believe that if I were a cyborg and could feel my legs, they would become part of me, part of self.
我是個仿生人, 但還不是個生化人。 當我想移動雙腿時, 來自中樞神經系統的神經信號 通過我的神經 激活殘肢內的肌肉。 人造電極感應這些信號, 仿生肢體中的小型電腦 將神經脈衝解碼為 我所預期的運動模式。 簡而言之, 當我想要移動時, 該命令會傳達給我身體的合成部分。 但是這些電腦訊息 無法傳入我的神經系統。 當我觸摸、移動我的合成肢體時, 我沒有正常的觸摸、運動的感覺。 如果我是一個生化人, 我就能感受我的雙腿, 能通過小型電腦傳訊息 給神經系統來感受我的雙腿, 我相信那會從根本上改變 我與合成身體的關係。 今天,我感覺不到自己的雙腿, 因此,我的雙腿是獨立於 頭腦和身體之外的工具。 它們不是我的一部分。 我相信如果我是一個生化人 就能夠感受到雙腿, 雙腿會成為我的一部分, 自我的一部分。
At MIT, we're thinking about NeuroEmbodied Design. In this design process, the designer designs human flesh and bone, the biological body itself, along with synthetics to enhance the bidirectional communication between the nervous system and the built world. NeuroEmbodied Design is a methodology to create cyborg function. In this design process, designers contemplate a future in which technology no longer compromises separate, lifeless tools from our minds and our bodies, a future in which technology has been carefully integrated within our nature, a world in which what is biological and what is not, what is human and what is not, what is nature and what is not will be forever blurred. That future will provide humanity new bodies. NeuroEmbodied Design will extend our nervous systems into the synthetic world, and the synthetic world into us, fundamentally changing who we are. By designing the biological body to better communicate with the built design world, humanity will end disability in this 21st century and establish the scientific and technological basis for human augmentation, extending human capability beyond innate, physiological levels, cognitively, emotionally and physically.
在麻省理工學院,我們正思考 神經體現(NeuroEmbodied)設計。 在這設計過程中, 設計師設計生物體本身, 肌肉和骨骼, 以及合成材料, 用來增強神經系統 和人造物間的雙向交流。 神經體現設計是一種 創造生化人功能的方法。 在這個設計過程中, 設計師思考的未來技術 不再是獨立於頭腦 和身體之外的無生命工具; 而是技術已經被仔細 整合在我們天性中的未來。 在這個世界裡 什麼是生物,什麼不是, 什麼是人類,什麼不是, 什麼是天然的,什麼不是, 將永遠界線模糊。 這未來將提供人類新的身體。 神經體現設計將把我們的神經系統 擴展到合成的世界, 並將合成世界擴展到我們, 從根本上改變我們是誰。 通過設計生物體 來與設計出來的世界溝通得更好, 人類將在 21 世紀結束殘疾, 並建立增強人類的科學和技術基礎, 來增強人類的能力, 使之超越先天、生理水平、 認知、情感和身體。
There are many ways in which to build new bodies across scale, from the biomolecular to the scale of tissues and organs. Today, I want to talk about one area of NeuroEmbodied Design, in which the body's tissues are manipulated and sculpted using surgical and regenerative processes. The current amputation paradigm hasn't changed fundamentally since the US Civil War and has grown obsolete in light of dramatic advancements in actuators, control systems and neural interfacing technologies. A major deficiency is the lack of dynamic muscle interactions for control and proprioception.
有很多方法能構建 不同規模的新身體部位, 從生物分子到組織和器官的規模。 今天,我想談一個 神經體現設計的領域, 用手術和再生的過程 來操縱和雕刻人體的組織。 目前截肢的做法 自美國內戰以來 並沒有在根本上改變; 它早已過時, 鑑於我們在執行器、控制系統 和神經接口技術方面的巨大進步。 一個主要的缺陷是欠缺 控制和本體感覺 動態肌肉間的相互作用。
What is proprioception? When you flex your ankle, muscles in the front of your leg contract, simultaneously stretching muscles in the back of your leg. The opposite happens when you extend your ankle. Here, muscles in the back of your leg contract, stretching muscles in the front. When these muscles flex and extend, biological sensors within the muscle tendons send information through nerves to the brain. This is how we're able to feel where our feet are without seeing them with our eyes.
什麼是本體感覺? 當你腳踝向上翹時前面的腿肌收縮 同時後面的腿肌伸展。 當你伸長腳踝時恰恰相反, 你的腿後肌肉收縮 而腿前肌肉伸展。 肌肉伸縮時, 肌腱內的生物傳感器 通過神經向大腦發送訊息。 這就是何以我們不用眼睛看 也能夠感受到腳在哪裡。
The current amputation paradigm breaks these dynamic muscle relationships, and in so doing eliminates normal proprioceptive sensations. Consequently, a standard artificial limb cannot feed back information into the nervous system about where the prosthesis is in space. The patient therefore cannot sense and feel the positions and movements of the prosthetic joint without seeing it with their eyes. My legs were amputated using this Civil War-era methodology. I can feel my feet, I can feel them right now as a phantom awareness. But when I try to move them, I cannot. It feels like they're stuck inside rigid ski boots.
目前的截肢做法打斷了 肌肉的動態關係, 因而消除了正常的本體感覺。 因此,一般的義肢 不能把義肢在空間的位置訊息 反饋給神經系統。 因此,病人若不用眼睛觀察 就看不到和感覺不到 義肢關節的位置和動作。 我的腿被用這種 內戰時期的方法截肢。 我能感覺到我的腳, 我現在能感覺到的 是幽靈意識的形式。 但當我嘗試移動它們時則動不了。 感覺它們像是被困在硬硬的雪靴內面。
To solve these problems, at MIT, we invented the agonist-antagonist myoneural interface, or AMI, for short. The AMI is a method to connect nerves within the residuum to an external, bionic prosthesis. How is the AMI designed, and how does it work? The AMI comprises two muscles that are surgically connected, an agonist linked to an antagonist. When the agonist contracts upon electrical activation, it stretches the antagonist. This muscle dynamic interaction causes biological sensors within the muscle tendon to send information through the nerve to the central nervous system, relating information on the muscle tendon's length, speed and force. This is how muscle tendon proprioception works, and it's the primary way we, as humans, can feel and sense the positions, movements and forces on our limbs.
為了解決這問題, 我們麻省理工學院發明了 收縮及伸長肌的神經脈衝界面 (agonist-antagonist myoneural interface), 簡稱 AMI。 AMI 是一種將殘留的神經 連接到外部仿生義肢的方法。 AMI 是如何設計、如何運作的? AMI 包括兩塊手術連接起來肌肉, 收縮肌連接著伸長肌。 (agonist/antagonist muscle) 當電子訊號觸發收縮肌這邊時, 會拉長另一邊的伸長肌。 這種肌肉的相互作用 會導致肌腱內的生物傳感器 通過神經向中樞神經系統發送訊息, 發送有關肌腱長度、 速度和力道的訊息。 這就是肌腱本體感覺的工作原理, 它是我們人類能夠感知肢體位置、 動作和力量的主要方式。
When a limb is amputated, the surgeon connects these opposing muscles within the residuum to create an AMI. Now, multiple AMI constructs can be created for the control and sensation of multiple prosthetic joints. Artificial electrodes are then placed on each AMI muscle, and small computers within the bionic limb decode those signals to control powerful motors on the bionic limb. When the bionic limb moves, the AMI muscles move back and forth, sending signals through the nerve to the brain, enabling a person wearing the prosthesis to experience natural sensations of positions and movements of the prosthesis.
被截肢時 外科醫生連接殘肢內的這些相對肌肉 以形成 AMI。 如今可以創建多個 AMI 構造 來控制和感覺多個義肢關節。 然後將人造電極 放置在每個 AMI 肌肉上, 仿生肢體內的小電腦解碼這些信號 來控制仿生肢體上強大的電動機。 當仿生肢體移動時, AMI 肌肉前後移動, 將信號通過神經發送到大腦, 使佩戴義肢的人能夠體驗 義肢的位置和動作的自然感覺。
Can these tissue-design principles be used in an actual human being? A few years ago, my good friend Jim Ewing -- of 34 years -- reached out to me for help. Jim was in an a terrible climbing accident. He fell 50 feet in the Cayman Islands when his rope failed to catch him hitting the ground's surface. He suffered many, many injuries: punctured lungs and many broken bones. After his accident, he dreamed of returning to his chosen sport of mountain climbing, but how might this be possible?
這些組織設計的原則 可實際用在人的身上嗎? 幾年前,我 34 歲的好朋友吉姆 · 尤恩, 向我尋求幫助。 吉姆遭遇了可怕的登山事故, 在開曼群島摔下 50 英尺, 因繩索沒能拉住他而撞擊地面。 他受了許多傷, 肺部被刺破,許多骨頭破碎。 事故發生後,他夢想要回去爬山。 但怎麼辦到呢?
The answer was Team Cyborg, a team of surgeons, scientists and engineers assembled at MIT to rebuild Jim back to his former climbing prowess. Team member Dr. Matthew Carty amputated Jim's badly damaged leg at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, using the AMI surgical procedure. Tendon pulleys were created and attached to Jim's tibia bone to reconnect the opposing muscles. The AMI procedure reestablished the neural link between Jim's ankle-foot muscles and his brain. When Jim moves his phantom limb, the reconnected muscles move in dynamic pairs, causing signals of proprioception to pass through nerves to the brain, so Jim experiences normal sensations with ankle-foot positions and movements, even when blindfolded.
答案是生化人團隊, 由外科醫生、科學家 和工程師組成的團隊 在麻省理工學院 重建吉姆以前的攀登實力。 隊員馬修卡蒂醫師 截斷吉姆嚴重受傷的腿, 手術地點是波士頓的 布萊根婦女醫院, 使用 AMI 手術程序, 他把創建的肌腱滑輪 連接到吉姆的脛骨上, 重新連接對應的肌肉。 AMI 程序重新建立了吉姆 腳踝肌肉和大腦間的神經聯繫。 當吉姆移動他的幻肢時, 重接的肌肉以動態配對動作, 使本體感受信號 通過神經傳遞到大腦, 所以即使蒙住眼睛, 吉姆也會經歷腳踝位置 和動作的正常感覺。
Here's Jim at the MIT laboratory after his surgeries. We electrically linked Jim's AMI muscles, via the electrodes, to a bionic limb, and Jim quickly learned how to move the bionic limb in four distinct ankle-foot movement directions. We were excited by these results, but then Jim stood up, and what occurred was truly remarkable. All the natural biomechanics mediated by the central nervous system emerged via the synthetic limb as an involuntary, reflexive action. All the intricacies of foot placement during stair ascent --
這是手術後吉姆在麻省理工實驗室。 我們通過電極連接吉姆的 AMI 肌肉與仿生肢體, 吉姆很快就學會如何移動仿生肢體, 在四個不同的腳踝動作方向移動。 我們對這些結果感到興奮。 吉姆接著站了起來, 發生的事情真的非常了不起。 所有中樞神經系統介面 所導引的自然生物力學, 都通過合成肢體呈現 無意識、反射的行為。 上樓時所有錯綜複雜的腳部位置
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emerged before our eyes. Here's Jim descending steps, reaching with his bionic toe to the next stair tread, automatically exhibiting natural motions without him even trying to move his limb. Because Jim's central nervous system is receiving the proprioceptive signals, it knows exactly how to control the synthetic limb in a natural way.
呈現在我們眼前。 這是吉姆走下台階, 用他的仿生腳趾伸向下一階, 自動展現自然的動作, 他甚至不用嘗試移動肢體。 由於吉姆的中樞神經系統 接收本體感受的信號, 所以它確切知道 如何自然地控制合成肢體。
Now, Jim moves and behaves as if the synthetic limb is part of him. For example, one day in the lab, he accidentally stepped on a roll of electrical tape. Now, what do you do when something's stuck to your shoe? You don't reach down like this; it's way too awkward. Instead, you shake it off, and that's exactly what Jim did after being neurally connected to the limb for just a few hours. What was most interesting to me is what Jim was telling us he was experiencing. He said, "The robot became part of me."
現在吉姆的動作和行為 就像合成肢體是他的一部分。 例如,某天在實驗室, 他不小心踩到了一卷電氣膠帶。 東西粘上你的鞋底時,你會怎麼做? 你不會彎腰去取,那太笨拙了, 而是會把它抖掉。 吉姆正是如此, 他在神經連接到肢體後 幾個小時抖掉它。 我最感興趣的 是吉姆告訴我們他經歷到的。 他說:「機器人成了我的一部分。」
Jim Ewing: The morning after the first time I was attached to the robot, my daughter came downstairs and asked me how it felt to be a cyborg, and my answer was that I didn't feel like a cyborg. I felt like I had my leg, and it wasn't that I was attached to the robot so much as the robot was attached to me, and the robot became part of me. It became my leg pretty quickly.
吉姆 · 尤恩:我連上 機器後的次日早晨, 女兒下樓來,問我 成為生化人的感覺如何, 我回答不覺得自己是個生化人。 我覺得自己的腿回來了, 不是我連在機器上, 而是機器連到我身上。 機器成了我的一部分, 很快就成了我的腿。
Hugh Herr: Thank you.
休赫爾:謝謝。
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By connecting Jim's nervous system bidirectionally to his synthetic limb, neurological embodiment was achieved. I hypothesized that because Jim can think and move his synthetic limb, and because he can feel those movements within his nervous system, the prosthesis is no longer a separate tool, but an integral part of Jim, an integral part of his body. Because of this neurological embodiment, Jim doesn't feel like a cyborg. He feels like he just has his leg back, that he has his body back.
通過將吉姆的神經系統 雙向連接到他的合成肢體上, 實現了神經體現。 我推測因為吉姆能夠 思考和移動合成肢體, 能感覺到神經系統中的這些動作, 所以義肢不再是單獨的工具, 而是吉姆身體不可分割的一部分。 由於這神經體現, 吉姆不覺得自己像個機器人。 他感覺他得回自己的腿, 得回自己的身體。
Now I'm often asked when I'm going to be neurally linked to my synthetic limbs bidirectionally, when I'm going to become a cyborg. The truth is, I'm hesitant to become a cyborg. Before my legs were amputated, I was a terrible student. I got D's and often F's in school. Then, after my limbs were amputated, I suddenly became an MIT professor.
現在我經常被問到 什麼時候我要雙向接上 合成肢體的神經, 什麼時候要成為生化人。 事實是我很猶豫要不要成為生化人。 在截肢之前我是個糟糕的學生, 經常在學校得 D 和 F。 截肢後, 我突然成為麻省理工學院的教授。
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Now I'm worried that once I'm neurally connected to my limbs once again, my brain will remap back to its not-so-bright self.
現在我擔心, 一旦神經再次接上義肢, 我的大腦就會重新回到 那個不怎麼聰明的我。
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But you know what, that's OK, because at MIT, I already have tenure.
知道嗎,沒關係,因為 我已有麻省理工的終身教職。
(Laughter)
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I believe the reach of NeuroEmbodied Design will extend far beyond limb replacement and will carry humanity into realms that fundamentally redefine human potential. In this 21st century, designers will extend the nervous system into powerfully strong exoskeletons that humans can control and feel with their minds. Muscles within the body can be reconfigured for the control of powerful motors, and to feel and sense exoskeletal movements, augmenting humans' strength, jumping height and running speed. In this 21st century, I believe humans will become superheroes. Humans may also extend their bodies into non-anthropomorphic structures, such as wings, controlling and feeling each wing movement within the nervous system. Leonardo da Vinci said, "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you will always long to return." During the twilight years of this century, I believe humans will be unrecognizable in morphology and dynamics from what we are today. Humanity will take flight and soar. Jim Ewing fell to earth and was badly broken, but his eyes turned skyward, where he always longed to return. After his accident, he not only dreamed to walk again, but also to return to his chosen sport of mountain climbing. At MIT, Team Cyborg built Jim a specialized limb for the vertical world, a brain-controlled leg with full position and movement sensations. Using this technology, Jim returned to the Cayman Islands, the site of his accident, rebuilt as a cyborg to climb skyward once again.
我相信神經體現設計的範圍 將遠遠超出替換肢體的範圍, 而會將人類從根本上帶入 重新定義人類潛能的領域。 在 21 世紀, 設計師們會把神經系統擴展為 人類能用思想控制 和感受的強力外骨骼。 體內的肌肉可以重新配置, 以控制強大的馬達, 感受和感知外骨骼的動作, 增強人類的力量、 跳躍的高度和跑步的速度。 我相信人類將在 21 世紀 成為超級英雄。 人類也可能將自己的身體 延伸到非擬人化結構,例如翅膀, 控制和感受神經系統內的 每一翅膀動作。 李奧納多 · 達文西說過: 「一旦你嘗試過飛行, 走在地上時你的眼睛 將會永遠朝向天空, 因為一旦你上去過那裡, 就會一直想要回到那裡去。」 我相信本世紀末將會出現 今天的人類所無法辨識的 形態和動力學。 人類將會飛行並翱翔。 吉姆 · 尤恩墜地並嚴重傷殘, 但他的眼睛轉向天空, 總是渴望回歸。 事故後,他不僅夢想再次走路, 還要回到他所選擇的登山運動。 麻省理工學院的生化團隊 為他造了專門用於垂直世界的肢體, 具有完整位置和動作的感覺, 由大腦全面控制的腿。 用這技術,吉姆回到 開曼群島的事故現場, 重建為生化人,再次爬上天空。
(Crashing waves)
(浪潮聲)
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Thank you.
謝謝。
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Ladies and gentlemen, Jim Ewing, the first cyborg rock climber.
先生女士們,吉姆 · 尤恩, 世界上第一個生化攀岩者。
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