Elysium: Future Soldier Cyborgs? | S01E08

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Well, welcome back to the podcast
where we discuss the plausibility of sci fi

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concepts with experts. I'm your host, Heidi Coompo, and today we're going

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to be exploring the science behind soldier
augmentation in the movie Elysia. Joining us

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is doctor Justin Clifford, who is
a tactical physical therapist working with military special

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warfare operators. Stay with us to
the end when doctor Clifford tackles our burning

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question will soldiers of tomorrow be human
or cyborg? So, without further ado,

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let's be ready for another mind blowing
episode of reality Chat. All thanks

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prepared for hypercrime activating Activity. Just
a few in Contractor Bealey, you're late

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for lightspeedlights met It's too slow,
all right? Reality Chat by Sillians.

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All. So, some of you
have probably seen the twenty thirteen dystopian sci

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fi action thriller starring Matt David and
Jodie Foster. It is currently trending on

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Netflix right now, and after you
guys are tuning into this episode, you'll

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have a good idea why, because
there are lots of relevant things going on

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in that movie that are I'm not
going to get any spoilers, but let's

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just say that this is going to
be one of those episodes that might be

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bordering a little bit more on the
plausibility scale. But before we dive into

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all that, I am going to
give you guys a disclaimer. I am

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for those of you watching, I
am living in a holiday and express right

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now, so there might be a
little bit of background noise, but I

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am faithful and confident that my producer
Q will be able to clean it up.

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Before we jump into that, do
you actually want to hear the funny

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story about how I sound by producer? Yeah, sure, go forth.

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So I'm a big fan of the
Space Nuts podcast, and if you guys

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haven't listened to it, it's super
fun. So the Space Nuts, Space

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Time, and Astronomy Daily are some
of those ones that I've been listening to

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a lot. And then when I
was recently out at Kennedy Space Center for

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the NASA cru seven latch of wearing
my NASA Crew seven T shirt, I

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got invited to go out there and
just do some meat stuff for the launch.

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I met Miss USA there, Miss
United States. She is beauty,

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she is grace, she is Miss
United States. And while I was going

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there, I posted on their Facebook
page. I was like, hey,

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space Nuts, does anybody want me
to ask any of these subject matter experts

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or anybody anything on behalf of the
space nuts group, and they were like,

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can you get someone famous to say
I'm a space nut? So I

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had the c United States say I'm
a space nut and they thought that was

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the coolest thing ever. They were
like, that's so cool, like you're

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the coolest person. And I was
like, so maybe you guys can give

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my podcast to thumbs up and they
were like, we love your podcast idea.

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And so that's how it all like
happened. So it's like kind of

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really cool and serendipitous that a podcast
that I love to listen to, space

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Nuts we sort of like became I
guess friends through this whole weird like space

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NASA continuum and now they also produced
my show. So that's how I found

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Q is his name. They're in
Australia with bytes dot com and that's the

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story of how I got a producer. So that's that was kind of like

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a little bit of a side quest
to start the show off with. But

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let's let's welcome Justin to the show. So Justin, thank you so much

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for coming onto reality check and I'm
just so excited to have you here today.

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So tell me just kind of some
of your initial thoughts with Elysium the

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film itself. You know, it's
came over in the context, came around

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popularity around the same time like Jason
Borne, right, So I got the

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impressions like, how can we have
Jason Born white robots in space? Like

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I feel like that was part of
the pitch for this movie. But yeah,

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it's it covers a lot of ground
from a standpoint of like space travel,

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social dystopia, whatever, but also
getting into like some of these body

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augmentation you're in, neuroprosthetic and other
components that they use as plot devices to

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basically make super soldiers while also having
robot super soldiers and space and so yeah,

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there's there's a lot of stuff going
on. I'm not going to comment

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on, like you know, plot
where the holes thereof, but the suit,

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in particular the exoskeleton that they hook
up Matt Damien's character with, I

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think was probably the biggest thing that
you wanted to talk about on this feasibility

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of what something like that would look
like for our future military. So yeah,

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what what's uh? What questions do
you have on that topic? Oh?

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Man, Well, I feel like
we've really come so far in human

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history with prosthetics, and that's something
I want to hear your your insight on.

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But it's it's interesting to see,
like what they did with Matt Damon's

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character, because you know, I
give you know, these episodes are full

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of spoilers, so it's like,
if you haven't seen it yet, maybe

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watched the shows before, you listen
to the podcast because we talk about everything.

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But he goes through this accident which
weakens him and then he has to

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get sort of souped up so that
he can go through and do this task

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and fight the bad guys and save
the planet and everything. And I just

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am really curious about I don't know
if you could tell me some of a

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history of prosthetics and augmentation that sort
of led up to where we're at now,

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because I think the early days,
it was just like you had a

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peg leg and it wasn't even attached
to you in any way. And now

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we've really evolved to things where there's
less of a gradient, there's more of

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a gradient. It's harder to distinguish
between machine and man. Yeah, So

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as far as the history of broad
stutics, I'm just speaking the fact that

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I'm not a prosthetists, right,
Like that's my job is not make prosthetics

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for folks. But you can see
evidence of prosthetics going back. I want

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to even back into like the Eachi
and Egyptians, Like we found like you

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know, prosthetic toe, you know, carved that wood that was like strapped

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into a sandal for somebody, and
you can go mentally evil examples, or

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they had like articulated hands, and
a lot of those designs actually haven't changed

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dramatically for the most part for gen
pop. Right, So if we're applying

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this to most people who are just
needing these to get through with their day

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to day life activities a daily living, a lot of the designs like they're

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pretty clever and they haven't had to
be upgraded that much except from like a

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material standpoint and maybe like a manufacturing
standpoint. So you know, like the

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the clause that can open this way
as well as grisp grasp this way for

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hand prosthetics, foot prosthetics. We're
playing around with materials to get like a

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better elastic return out of the foot. If you've seen like you know,

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Oscripistorius was recently released from prison.
I think he was the blade runner,

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you know, he had those carbon
fiber blades that he was running on during

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the Paralympics. Stuff like that is
slowly becoming more mainstream within general population as

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well. And where we've seen the
biggest changes recently is one in manufacturing.

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So being able to like three D
print stuff and make things on demand with

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rapid adjustments is much more accessible than
it used to be. You know,

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I saw the other day, like
a guy like three D printed a Lego

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hand for his his hand prosthetic.
It was just a life sized Lego hand.

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Many three D printed a Lego mug. It's just just you know,

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just fun stuff. But you can
also take that the other direction and you

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can make you know, articulated hands
at home, which is pretty wild.

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And then as far back as I
want to say, the seventies or eighties,

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we were looking at putting sensors on
the skin to detect nerve impulses to

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help to control some of these functions, but also understanding that like mechanical items

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wear out, our bodies at desk
the stresses that we placed on them thankfully,

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so as we exercise. When we
train, like our bodies can actually

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you can get palaces on your hand, you can get bigger muscles, your

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bond density can increase, and so
on. And for the prosthetic that doesn't

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happen, right, because they're not
living organisms. They are subject to mechanical

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failure and wear and tear much more
so than the organic concloneness. And then

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over the past decade or so,
we've seen a lot more going on with

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like brain computer interfaces, which I
am not an expert by any means,

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but getting the central nervous system now
instead of the peripheral nervous system using you

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know, skin contact sensors, getting
the central nervous system to interface with some

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kind of system that can then translate
that into physic collection. Right, so

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like you know, controlling a mouse
cursor with your brain and then okay,

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well you're controlling a mouse cursor.
Can you control a prosthetic art? Yeah?

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Can you do that at a distance
across the country. Yeah, Because

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that kind of stuff is feasible and
it's being developed and polished right now.

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Yeah, And I have seen a
little bit of that technology. I don't

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know how soon it's going to hit
like the general market, but I'm seeing

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some celebrities kind of getting either like
in like surgical implants or non invasive,

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like I don't know how they even
work, or if you know how they

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work, but it's like I have
seen the ones where they can control a

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mouse on a computer screen. I
just think it's absolutely crazy that we're starting

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to see the human and the machine
sort of merging together. Yeah, and

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I think I think we have to
give a lot of credit to the nervous

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system on these rests, because it's
it's pretty rare that it's just plug and

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play where you just, you know, plug the thing in and then suddenly

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you go like oftentimes there's a bit
of a training or a calibration phase,

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and a lot of that has to
do with how much can the nervous system

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learn to use the nerve prosthetic right? How much can it interface or how

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much can it with whatever feedback you're
getting, can you can see the mouse

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groser, you would be able to
train yourself to move the mouse groser right.

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That kind of coordination and control would
be important, and that is something

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that I think is getting further and
further along. But then the question also

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remains, like how do you get
that to interface physically with the human in

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a way that is a meaningful Yeah, So tell me more about that,

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because my you know, bachelor degree
science level understanding of how the nervous system

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works as it works in binary just
like a computer. So our nervous system

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impulses are similar to computer code.
So do they have to like sync up

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our organic electronic signals with a computer
interface, Like, do you know how

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that process starts to work? Or
at least could you break it down in

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a digestible way for us. Yeah, I think the idea that the brain

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and the nervous system kind of functions
as a computer. And again I'm not

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a neurologist, I'm not an electrical
engineer, so take this with a grain

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of salt. But the idea that
our nervous is some kind of functions on

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binary is based on the principle that
a neuron when it depolarizes and sends a

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signal and an action potential balance membran, and it either does it or it

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doesn't. Either depolarizes entirely or it
does not. People are as as a

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result, You've got to get an
on or off or a zero or a

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one, right, but also things
told as all of that kind of adds

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up over time, you have summation
of signals. You have that either happening

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over a space, or we called
spatial summation where we're trying to activate like

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a larger muscle group or something like
that, we're gonna have a lot of

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neurons over in a large area of
the brain going down and and stimulating a

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muscle, or temporal summation where we
have things firing over and over and over

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to build up a bigger signal and
so on. And ultimately that turns into

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my understanding, it's more actually more
of an analog signal that then has to

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be processed using signal processing algorithms in
the computer and translated into the computer language.

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Wow. But again, I'm not
not at all an expert on that.

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I may have made like one hundred
different errors in the fifty words that

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I said there, but it's it's
the general summary. Yeah. So the

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general summary is our brain sends a
signal, it has to be translated through

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the computer before the machine can interpret
it. So it's like the computer is

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almost working as sort of like a
like a converter between the organic signals and

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the machine signals, And the challenge
then is to just sort of take these

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two different command languages, the human
brain which can send a signal, and

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then the machine which is receiving the
signal, and get those signals to sync

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up. So you mentioned something earlier
about the skin sensors, yeap, is

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that something that we're using in prosthetics? Are we using skin sensors in like

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if I have one of those skin
sensors you mentioned, like on my hand,

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is that something that we'd be using
in some kind of like an exosuit,

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like a Tony Stark type thing.
Potentially, But they're finicky. So

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anytime you have a excuse me,
anytime you have like an EMG sensor and

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some kind of sensor on the skin, there's small shifts in where the tension

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is on the skin can change the
scent can change the signal going into the

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sensor, And how sweaty you are
can change the signal going into sensor.

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How much pressure there is on it
can change that. So if your muscles

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underneath it are tighter versus loser,
that can change the quality of the signal.

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If you're wearing clothing and that presses
and rubs against it weird. So

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there's there's a lot of just mechanical
concerns and processing the signals and keeping them

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clean can be quite a challenge,
and I'm not sure exactly how well we've

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been able to handle that, but
for the most part, it's one of

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those things where it's like, yes, this can happen. We can use

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these to control things. We've demonstrated
that for a couple of decades. But

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keeping it robust enough that it's actually
stays functional and practical. And if we're

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talking about military like field environments,
yeah, probably not there yet, okay,

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And that would probably be why,
you know, circling it back to

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Elysium. So Matt Damon's character he
was in he was in a simple exosuit

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which was drilled into him and it
wasn't something that he was He didn't have

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any fancy skin sensors. It was
kind of just plugged into his ZiT.

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It was like a matrix kind of
like plug into the base of his brain.

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There. Yeah, yeah, I
am totally having a brain fight right

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now. But the base of the
brain is your or like is your muscle

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functions in the front of your brain
is your cognitive function? More so,

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right to an extent. Yeah,
frontal lobe is like executive function and planning,

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and as it moves back, you're
going to get into like some motor

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planning. You do actually have the
motor cortex. It kind of sits about

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where my headphones are sitting right here. You have the sensory cortex, and

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they kind of you have like a
map of the body laid out right there.

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And so from a standpoint of like
control and initiation of movement and feedback,

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you're going to get a lot of
that out of that pridal lobe.

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Sarahbellum is going to be a lot
more that coordination kind of smoothing out the

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signals so that you know, you're
not just like flailing around uncontrollably with much

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too large. So it would make
sense to have it plugged into that lower

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kind of brainstem section. Yeah,
and ultimately like that's that's that's where the

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outflow is going to be. Right, So if you plug in right there,

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and even if you're not disrupting the
spinal cord proper, you can maybe

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with this fancy future tech that can
monitor the signals going down and figure out

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which tracks they're going to and and
and play from there. So that's that's

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kind of what I'm guessing there doing. Yeah. Yeah, so with current

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physical therapy and just I guess either
human augmentation or rehab. Where are these

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brain chips being put right now in
humans? I remember about a decade ago

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we started experimenting with spin off words
stimulators, so lower landmark, you know,

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we had to take some guys through. This is before I was a

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PT. I was working in as
a tech in a a spinal cord clinic.

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But we had to take some patients
through extensive amounts of rehab because the

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spinal cort has some of its own, like like motor programs. It has

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what are called central pattern generators.
It can reproduce like walking and stuff like

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that. Right, It's like doctor
Edgerton's famous flexing and severing the spinal quart

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of a cat up in the neck
and putting it on treadmill. I could

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still by reflex generate the gate pattern
along the treadmill because the spinal quart is

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intact and spinal quarters where those reflexive
patterns you're stored. And so we had

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to so we had to go through
these processes of like okay, stimulate the

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crap out of the periphery and see
if we can get those those reflexes central

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pattern generators firing. And we basically
had to show like, yeah, no,

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we're not making gags with this,
and then that way when we put

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an implant in there, not we
but when you know, Susan Hart command

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those guys uh in Kentucky put put
the implant in there, they could say

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we any changes that happened were due
to the implant. And it was pretty

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cool because we saw some guys with
complete spinal cord injuries regain the ability to

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stand, regain control of like bowel
and black or and some other cool stuff.

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That was as ten or eleven years. Yeah, I was gonna say

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that was about a decade ago.
So it sounds like we've made some really

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amazing advancements for people who have had
paralysis, either quadriplegic or paraplegic injuries.

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Yeah, the trick is like there's
still a really long way to go,

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and because of the trauma of you
know, implanting something on somebody's nervous system,

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like there's potentially to do damage each
time you touch it. And so

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if you want to hardware upgrades are
not one of those things where it's like,

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hey, I'm just going to remove
this. When I put a new

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one, you're going to introduce scar
tissue. And you know, that's why

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you haven't seen these rolled out to
populations in mass because there's still very much

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in the testing paces trying to figure
out, you know, what can we

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really what gets us the best bang
for the buck, you know, ethically

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as well as medically. And so
that's where you know, as we move

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like further up the spok world,
like up into the brain, like neuralink

250
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implants on which I honestly know very
little of out you know, I get

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a little bit, not a little
bit, I get I get really disconcerted

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when people start saying like, yeah, I'm just gonna go put micro chip

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in my brain and you know,
be some kind of superhuman. It's like

254
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it's like injecting. I know,
it's the dream. It's like we we

255
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we were all raised on the matrix
and it's like, I just want to

256
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upload elite level come through skills into
my brain. Yeah, just elite at

257
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least level elite level, Uh,
just podcasting skills would probably be my go

258
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to for this. So that's interesting. So so as far as the Matt

259
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Damon suit. The we I mean, we kind of talked about his at

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least the electronic interface a little bit. But as far as the rest of

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the suit goes, are is that
it all feasible or realistic or similar to

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what's going on right now? Are
they drilling in exo suits into bonds?

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Are we utilizing exosuits much or are
a lot of our augmentation more inside the

264
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body interior. As far as that
goes, one of the things that that

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gave me pause when I was looking
at the movie, you know, because

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Matt Damon of course gets the gets
the exos suit, or gets the exoskeleton,

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but he gets that because there's obviously
there's a big bad right there's a

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big bad guy and he's got a
similar one who's you know, some kind

269
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of you know, Black Ops,
special Forces kind of guy, and he's

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got his own exoskeleton, and you
know, to the point where he's got

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to wear this like giant Jedi robe
to go on in public because otherwise he'd

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have like, you know, metal
apparatus sticking out all over the place.

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Looks wonky as I'll get out.
But what struck me is like, what

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are the ethics of doing this to
a human, you know, if we're

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going to be drilling this this mechanical
apparatus into somebody's skeleton and then dealing with

276
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the ramifications of that, Like you
know, my part of my job right

277
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now is to make sure like,
hey, we need to take care of

278
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our people, right the humanuh,
not just creating a you know, super

279
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soldier, but actually taking care of
them, because we we want to make

280
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sure that we have good people,
and people are more important than hardware ultimately,

281
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is what it is what it boils
down to. But in this case,

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in the case of Elysium, that
they're really focusing on the hardware and

283
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the person is really just kind of
a mechanism, like a man in the

284
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loop kind of thing, almost like
to interrupt the AI thing, which could

285
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be a which I know you've covered
a separate episode, but so the ethical

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piece in Elysium actually kind of goes
away because they've got these you know,

287
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these these magical uh fix all medical
beds. You know, you lay down

288
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in this bed, you know,
you get your face blown off by a

289
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grenade or whatever, somehow your brain
is still intact and they just kind of

290
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stitch it back together using you know
this thing that's like almost like from the

291
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fifth Element. I was just gonna
say, fit all of it, I

292
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think. I think, I think
the developments that are better, but the

293
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you know, the idea of like
using these some of these beds for like

294
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you know, like the cosmetic but
scarification, like the tattoos and stuff that

295
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they put on their bodies and kind
of kind of highlights like some of the

296
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some of the socioeconomic disparities in lesi. I'm a little bit better, just

297
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kind of cool, kind of a
nice touch. But when you have something

298
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like that, they can literally just
like heal anything, but only the elite

299
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people have access to it. The
ethical concerns of you know, screwing up

300
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somebody's body permanently kind of go away, because you could just you know,

301
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at the suit they gave Matt Damon
still had you know, still had bio

302
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on it from the last person that
they tore it out of, you know,

303
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still had hair and guts and skin
and stuff attached to it, and

304
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you went into the chop Scheff.
So from a standpoint of right now and

305
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realism, right we don't have those
those you know, magical beds that can

306
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heal any condition. I think ethically, it gets gets you into a really

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rocky place when you're looking at drilling
something into somebody's skeleton when they don't have

308
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like an amputation or some other major
some of their major disability associated with that.

309
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Because yeah, it is interesting though, because it's like, when you're

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talking about quality of life for someone
who's paralyzed, it's not just the lack

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of mobility, because if you do, you know, I don't know the

312
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right install. If you do,
like install something to the external of their

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body that changes their entire life,
from the clothes they wear, to their

314
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ability to maneuver to just like you
know, just even the comfort of laying

315
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next to the person they love.
It changes, it changes everything about being

316
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a human. So I could definitely
see that being a massive concern and that

317
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would be a big decision and trade
off for someone if they're like, hey,

318
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you can get your mobility back,
but now you have this thing attached

319
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to you, right, and we've
changed everything. We've seen that with with

320
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things like diaformatic pacers. Right,
It's like most people are familiar with pacemakers,

321
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right. They can implant this thing
under your collar bone and it's got

322
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some leads that go down and basically
your heart it's at a rhythmical shock,

323
00:22:56.000 --> 00:22:59.359
it back into rhythm. Yeah,
it's that, they say, why they're

324
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fantastic. There is a device and
I don't know where it stands in terms

325
00:23:03.359 --> 00:23:06.880
of testing right now. My last
exposure to it was about ten years ago

326
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as well, called a diafragmatic pacer, where you have somebody who has a

327
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spinal cord injury above the level of
a frentic nerve which innervates the diaphragm,

328
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so think like upper cervical spinal cord
injury and they can't breathe on their own,

329
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and so they put this Basically they
put electrodes much like you would put

330
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muscle stem on a muscle that you're
rehabbing. They put those electrodes on top

331
00:23:26.960 --> 00:23:30.400
of the diaphragm to get the diaphram
to contract so that you can not be

332
00:23:30.519 --> 00:23:33.720
on a ventilator. Right, So
instead of having a machine that breaths for

333
00:23:33.920 --> 00:23:38.880
you through a tracheostomy, here like
you can actually just take breaths by electrically

334
00:23:38.880 --> 00:23:42.559
stimulating your diaphragm. But then you
get into the control issue, right,

335
00:23:42.640 --> 00:23:47.640
that interface of like okay, well, what if I'm swallowing something and I

336
00:23:47.839 --> 00:23:52.480
don't want the machine to inhale for
me. Right, So you get into

337
00:23:52.519 --> 00:23:56.480
some similar issues there where Okay,
the risk of aspiration goes up. Now

338
00:23:56.519 --> 00:24:00.640
I've got something drilled into your body, risk of infection goes up. Right.

339
00:24:00.720 --> 00:24:06.799
Osteomilises an innection inside of a bone
is can be devastating and very very

340
00:24:06.839 --> 00:24:08.640
hard to come back from that,
and you lose not just a lot of

341
00:24:08.680 --> 00:24:11.079
the bone mass, but you lose
a lot of conditioning as you're recovering,

342
00:24:12.200 --> 00:24:18.200
and that kills people. So when
we're talking about drilling things in there,

343
00:24:18.319 --> 00:24:26.799
there are some there are some prosthetic
approaches. There's something called osteo osteo integration

344
00:24:26.240 --> 00:24:30.440
where they can actually take so rather
than having just like a muscle and skin

345
00:24:30.559 --> 00:24:38.359
flap on the bottom of stump and
typically the leg, they can have rawnod

346
00:24:38.559 --> 00:24:44.519
bolted into the bone that sticks out
past that and that kind of clips into

347
00:24:44.880 --> 00:24:48.000
the prosthetic and so you get a
much better mechanical interface. The energy transfer

348
00:24:48.079 --> 00:24:53.839
isn't having to go through soft tissue
like like a normal socket would. That

349
00:24:53.920 --> 00:24:59.519
can potentially make the wear a lot
more comfortable. And the problem with that

350
00:24:59.559 --> 00:25:02.720
if you've ever like you know,
if you've ever like debone a chicken or

351
00:25:02.759 --> 00:25:04.400
something like that. If you take
a bone and you kind of split it

352
00:25:04.519 --> 00:25:07.200
lengthwise like a wedge, it's a
lot easier to break. It's a lot

353
00:25:07.240 --> 00:25:11.519
of easier splay that open, and
that's a much harder injury to recover from

354
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than a frank fractures. So when
we're talking about screwing things into bones,

355
00:25:15.640 --> 00:25:18.759
like we've got to be careful about
what size of the screw, We're talking

356
00:25:18.799 --> 00:25:22.240
about what angle it's going into,
what forces are we exposing into during that

357
00:25:22.359 --> 00:25:27.640
time, and so on. Well
there's a lot going into it. Yeah,

358
00:25:27.759 --> 00:25:32.279
yeah, And those are things that
I don't you know, the average

359
00:25:32.319 --> 00:25:37.839
person isn't thinking about these things.
The average person isn't thinking about the life

360
00:25:37.880 --> 00:25:41.799
of somebody who has had one of
these injuries and amputation or paralysis. And

361
00:25:41.920 --> 00:25:45.200
it's so interesting to really just truly
think about the ethics of these and the

362
00:25:45.319 --> 00:25:48.599
quality of life issues, not just
for you know, soldiers, because this

363
00:25:48.640 --> 00:25:52.000
episode we are talking about the soldier
augmentation, but also just regular people and

364
00:25:52.079 --> 00:25:59.039
improving their quality of line. And
sometimes there can be really amazing advancements that

365
00:25:59.200 --> 00:26:02.599
do save your life. But it's
like kind of at what costs. And

366
00:26:02.640 --> 00:26:07.519
the example I'm thinking of is when
I was in undergrad in the anatomy lab

367
00:26:07.720 --> 00:26:12.359
and we had some heart to davers
and we were looking at some early valve

368
00:26:12.440 --> 00:26:18.720
replacement. So the earliest one,
yeah, so it was like one was

369
00:26:18.759 --> 00:26:22.920
like a yeah, oh yeah,
yeah, University of Utah. Yeah.

370
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What was his name? Nielsen?
Mark Jilson. Yeah, yeah, oh

371
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man, that guy you know.
Shout out to you, Mark Nielsen.

372
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I hope this episode gets back to
you. That guy was such a great

373
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anatomy professed. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's actually one

374
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of the highest break programs anyways.
But yeah, so we we held that

375
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same round old heart then. But
the thing it had a little cage and

376
00:26:47.480 --> 00:26:52.440
it looked like a like a metal
beary barbary yp yep, little bar bearing

377
00:26:52.480 --> 00:26:53.920
in the little metal cage and that
worked as a valve. So this was

378
00:26:53.960 --> 00:26:59.160
a replacement for a valve that that
no longer worked, and it was a

379
00:26:59.440 --> 00:27:03.400
gravity assisted valves, so they couldn't
lay down and they had to stand up

380
00:27:03.440 --> 00:27:07.519
all the time, and then the
ball would just slide up to close the

381
00:27:07.599 --> 00:27:10.240
valve and down to open it.
And it was that was the way that

382
00:27:10.319 --> 00:27:15.000
the heart now worked. But from
what my memory serves me as is with

383
00:27:15.279 --> 00:27:21.200
those types of valve replacements, suicide
actually went really high with those patients because

384
00:27:22.000 --> 00:27:25.119
for the rest of their life they
heard that valve click up, click down,

385
00:27:25.359 --> 00:27:30.759
click up, click down, and
you heard and felt every single heartbeat

386
00:27:30.799 --> 00:27:33.559
and it would drive them crazy.
So when we're talking about, yay,

387
00:27:33.640 --> 00:27:37.000
we saved their life, but at
what costs? Those are interesting ethics to

388
00:27:37.119 --> 00:27:45.039
consider. Yeah, really check coming
back to Elysium, looking back at the

389
00:27:45.240 --> 00:27:47.640
suit, and they bolted in the
mat damon Like it's actually kind of pretty

390
00:27:47.640 --> 00:27:49.759
comprehensive, Like they bolted it down
into each of the fingers and these are

391
00:27:49.839 --> 00:27:53.559
tiny, tiny bones, Like there's
not a lot of room for there's not

392
00:27:53.599 --> 00:27:56.440
a lot of river hard wearing here. And there's a scene you know at

393
00:27:56.440 --> 00:27:59.599
one point, because like why would
you wear a robot suit if you're not

394
00:27:59.599 --> 00:28:03.319
going to rip a robot's head off, And so he's you know, he's

395
00:28:03.319 --> 00:28:06.440
grabbing some robot's head and rips its
head off. But like if you've ever

396
00:28:06.559 --> 00:28:11.240
torn your calusies and a deadlip,
yes, right, there's there's there's not

397
00:28:11.400 --> 00:28:15.119
much going on on the palm side
of the hands there from a prosthetic standpoints.

398
00:28:15.240 --> 00:28:15.960
Yeah, the suit might take some
of the brunt of that, but

399
00:28:17.039 --> 00:28:19.319
like you're going to shear off all
the flesh on this other side, so

400
00:28:19.960 --> 00:28:23.160
some of the interface stuff, you
know, at least some you know,

401
00:28:23.279 --> 00:28:30.319
it takes some liberties. Where we
do see some interesting stuff is in like

402
00:28:30.440 --> 00:28:34.279
early like limbs Salvade surgery, right, so like somebody gets a combat injury

403
00:28:34.319 --> 00:28:38.400
or a traumatic injury and we're trying
to save the lamb that would otherwise be

404
00:28:38.519 --> 00:28:45.319
imputated right to like lower extremity stuff, and they'll they can you know,

405
00:28:45.400 --> 00:28:48.960
the centers for the intrepid down here
in San Antonio's pioneered a lot of this

406
00:28:48.000 --> 00:28:52.559
stuff. And this is also where
like bf R tying your blood flo restriction

407
00:28:52.680 --> 00:28:55.680
training came and came to the fore. Trying to work with these people to

408
00:28:56.279 --> 00:28:59.319
save you know, modern medicines and
saving limbs rather than just like chopping them

409
00:28:59.359 --> 00:29:03.200
off and giving everybody prosthetic all the
problems that come with prosthetics. But they

410
00:29:03.240 --> 00:29:07.319
would they would bolt a cage around
the bones, trying to get bones to

411
00:29:07.400 --> 00:29:11.880
kind of migrate and line back together
so they could heal up. But we

412
00:29:11.920 --> 00:29:15.599
also know the bones need a certain
amount of load. And so you know,

413
00:29:15.839 --> 00:29:18.039
you get some cowboy surgeons and pts
out there that are saying, okay,

414
00:29:18.119 --> 00:29:22.960
well, you know, typically like
about somebody like an RAF open reduction,

415
00:29:23.079 --> 00:29:26.960
external fixed state or internal fixation or
an external fixation in this case,

416
00:29:27.440 --> 00:29:30.160
like, I'm not going to be
putting much weay through that because I don't

417
00:29:30.160 --> 00:29:33.319
want disrupt anything screwis in there.
I don't want those to migrate out or

418
00:29:33.359 --> 00:29:36.279
whatever. But they started loading these
people up while they had these pages around

419
00:29:36.319 --> 00:29:41.720
their legs and seeing those bones actually
start starting to together and become healthier as

420
00:29:41.759 --> 00:29:45.359
a result. But that took time, right, Yeah, So I think

421
00:29:45.640 --> 00:29:51.759
I think there is some possibility of
having a suit that or having some components

422
00:29:51.799 --> 00:29:55.039
of your body that are actually drilled
into you that you are then able to

423
00:29:55.119 --> 00:29:57.839
load and work with. But again
the interface of like, okay, how

424
00:29:57.880 --> 00:30:04.559
do I know that hardware is interacting
with my hardware or the squishy stuff,

425
00:30:06.680 --> 00:30:10.039
and then how do I know that
I'm controlling it appropriately and not overdoing things

426
00:30:10.079 --> 00:30:12.079
in the world of Alicia, and
you can kind of cause over that.

427
00:30:12.160 --> 00:30:15.359
You screw it up, you just
throw them in one of those magic beds

428
00:30:15.400 --> 00:30:21.880
and heels everything. Yeah, in
these days it's yeah, we have that's

429
00:30:21.920 --> 00:30:25.960
it. That's the lend. Oh. Man, I always think of this

430
00:30:26.119 --> 00:30:29.200
is not a sci fi movie,
so believe it or not, I actually

431
00:30:29.279 --> 00:30:33.160
do watch other genres on occasion,
and I'm just totally thinking of the amputation

432
00:30:33.279 --> 00:30:38.599
scene on Master and Commander, which
is another amazing movie with the Yeah,

433
00:30:38.680 --> 00:30:41.799
oh, such a great movie.
But yeah, I'm just like, man,

434
00:30:41.920 --> 00:30:44.400
that was that was life back then, and now it's just it's so

435
00:30:44.559 --> 00:30:48.680
much different. We actually pick about
germs, yeah, and all those different

436
00:30:48.680 --> 00:30:55.240
things. So, yeah, that's
so interesting. So is there in the

437
00:30:55.319 --> 00:31:00.079
field of combat how because I'm just
I'm still a little bit fixated on what

438
00:31:00.160 --> 00:31:03.319
you said about ripping the head off
and the skin in the calluses? Do

439
00:31:03.480 --> 00:31:07.000
you deal much because the skin is
the biggest organ in the body. So

440
00:31:07.160 --> 00:31:12.680
in the rehab world, are you
more focused on gelatal muscle or do you

441
00:31:12.720 --> 00:31:17.720
go into a soft tissue like skin? Is that much a concern? Actually,

442
00:31:18.000 --> 00:31:21.839
skin is a huge insurn. Yes, And it's honestly not that much

443
00:31:21.880 --> 00:31:23.319
different than it was back in World
War One. Right, we're dealing with

444
00:31:23.400 --> 00:31:27.759
trench foot, we're preventing it,
really, So you're gonna have to tell

445
00:31:27.839 --> 00:31:30.920
me what trench foot is I'm just
guessing what it is. Yeah, So

446
00:31:32.119 --> 00:31:34.119
you imagine trenches, right, it's
like gutters in a on a on a

447
00:31:34.279 --> 00:31:37.920
road. They're going to accumulate water
any chance that they get same if you're

448
00:31:37.960 --> 00:31:41.680
dealing with trenches in the in the
environment. But if you're just rucking and

449
00:31:41.880 --> 00:31:44.359
running and that kind of stuff,
moving through mud and moisture, Like if

450
00:31:44.400 --> 00:31:48.039
you get moisture in your boots and
you don't change your sock, you don't

451
00:31:48.079 --> 00:31:49.960
keep them clean. The skin well, you know, just like you stay

452
00:31:51.000 --> 00:31:53.119
in the bathtom too long with your
fingers kind of start to get you know

453
00:31:53.240 --> 00:31:56.599
that that that that the wrinkles you
get in your skin is actually a neural

454
00:31:56.640 --> 00:32:00.200
response that's out a tsue level response. If you if you saver then nerve

455
00:32:00.240 --> 00:32:02.359
to a finger, it's not going
to get that pruning. Oh okay,

456
00:32:02.519 --> 00:32:06.039
okay. But if you oversoak it, right, like if you leave like

457
00:32:06.119 --> 00:32:07.440
a waterproof band aid on or something
like, that skin will actually like turn

458
00:32:07.480 --> 00:32:13.480
white. It's called maceration. And
that that becomes now very very easy to

459
00:32:13.559 --> 00:32:16.359
like floff off. And so if
you do that same same thing in the

460
00:32:16.440 --> 00:32:20.680
boot you're moving, you've get you've
got a fifteen mile rock or something like

461
00:32:20.759 --> 00:32:24.480
that. Yeah, that skin becomes
a huge factor in some of our selection

462
00:32:24.599 --> 00:32:31.119
courses. You know, you've seen
some really seeing some really interesting and significant

463
00:32:31.160 --> 00:32:37.759
levels of skin breakdown. Are callouses? Are callouses desirable to help protect the

464
00:32:37.799 --> 00:32:42.160
foot in this scenario or calors?
Do calluses make the foot more vulnerable because

465
00:32:42.160 --> 00:32:45.400
I could see it getting maybe ripped
off easier up to a point. Yeah,

466
00:32:45.519 --> 00:32:49.359
So it's it's kind of a it's
an adaptive response. It's it's a

467
00:32:49.400 --> 00:32:52.319
said principle, a specific specific annotation
to impose demand. If you go in

468
00:32:52.440 --> 00:32:55.359
with no callouses whatsoever, it's a
lot like more like you're going to get

469
00:32:55.359 --> 00:33:00.440
blisters. But if you've got your
calluses doing something similar to the activity that

470
00:33:00.480 --> 00:33:02.519
you're doing, like oh sorry,
the skin's gonna tell them and you're gonna

471
00:33:02.519 --> 00:33:05.920
be okay. Kind of like you
know, if you just take care of

472
00:33:05.960 --> 00:33:08.079
your hands and if you're doing a
lot of manual labor, the likely of

473
00:33:08.160 --> 00:33:10.880
you tearing a callous if you actually
take care of your caluis it's pretty slim.

474
00:33:12.000 --> 00:33:15.200
Same with the feet. Yeah.
So, because I do know a

475
00:33:15.279 --> 00:33:20.119
lot of my listeners are athletes,
because my background is in strength and conditioning

476
00:33:20.200 --> 00:33:22.000
and strong man and whatnot. This
is an interesting one. So let's kind

477
00:33:22.000 --> 00:33:27.839
of circle back to that deadlift hand. Sure this sorry for those of your

478
00:33:27.920 --> 00:33:30.640
squabish this is probably not the episode
for you, guys. We're talking about

479
00:33:30.640 --> 00:33:36.000
all all the skin stuff. I
was actually at a strong man competition with

480
00:33:36.160 --> 00:33:40.359
Brenda Mine you may know Connor Gordon, and he dee gloved his palm on

481
00:33:40.880 --> 00:33:45.519
a yeah, on a farmer carry
went to pick it up. It had

482
00:33:45.559 --> 00:33:47.160
been in the hot sun all day. Was a really narrow handle. It

483
00:33:47.240 --> 00:33:51.680
did deglove the entire hand. It
was probably just like maybe mid palm through

484
00:33:52.279 --> 00:33:53.920
the fingers. It ripped the whole
cal it's off. So in that case,

485
00:33:54.000 --> 00:33:59.759
he did build up those callouses through
deadlifting, but it was the deadlift

486
00:34:00.079 --> 00:34:04.720
basically that made that callus so vulnerable
and rip the whole thing off. So

487
00:34:05.319 --> 00:34:08.800
you said that the calluses can be
really helpful if it's built up in the

488
00:34:08.840 --> 00:34:15.679
same form, but in this specific
case, it was not helpful for him

489
00:34:15.719 --> 00:34:22.360
to have that big callous. Yeah, there's there's always a there's always a

490
00:34:22.360 --> 00:34:27.599
threshold where tissue will fill right,
and so if you combine heat and focus

491
00:34:27.679 --> 00:34:29.719
right, it's like a really narrow
handle. Right. This kind of like

492
00:34:29.800 --> 00:34:31.960
if you imagine like trying to drive
a nailing backwards with the broad head,

493
00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:34.960
you're not going to be able to
penetrate as far into the wood. Whereas

494
00:34:34.960 --> 00:34:37.320
you turn it around to get sharp, pointy end west surface area, you

495
00:34:37.360 --> 00:34:40.280
could push in through that with the
same amount of force, same swing and

496
00:34:40.320 --> 00:34:43.760
the hammer. If you can get
a lot more damage into that wood,

497
00:34:43.840 --> 00:34:46.239
you can drive that nail in further. Same kind of thing with with farmer's

498
00:34:46.280 --> 00:34:51.760
carries or the deadlocks or something like
that. You know, we the Spokane

499
00:34:51.800 --> 00:34:53.840
Highland Games, for example, there
was a there's a farmer's carry event where

500
00:34:53.880 --> 00:34:59.519
you do it with tractor weights and
it's just mac existence and the tractor weights

501
00:34:59.599 --> 00:35:01.840
like the hand it was literally rebar
and so it's you know, it's not

502
00:35:01.920 --> 00:35:06.320
only very narrow, it's it's got
some edges to it, right, that

503
00:35:06.440 --> 00:35:10.079
further focus that pressure. You know, if we're talking about and protecting somebody

504
00:35:10.119 --> 00:35:13.880
from a bullet, right, the
body armor's purpose is to spread out that

505
00:35:13.960 --> 00:35:19.280
little teeny point that focuses all that
kinetic energy into a broader surface area.

506
00:35:19.760 --> 00:35:22.719
So it's just a hit, right, it's less than one kill a calorie

507
00:35:22.760 --> 00:35:27.400
of energy. From a from a
seven to sixty two round. But you

508
00:35:27.440 --> 00:35:30.199
know, you focus that on a
tiny, little, tiny little spot doing

509
00:35:30.360 --> 00:35:32.719
very fast, you can cause a
lot of damage. So when we're training,

510
00:35:34.960 --> 00:35:37.960
what we try to do, if
we if we're interested in preventing injury,

511
00:35:37.039 --> 00:35:43.480
we want to either increase capacity or
or mitigate the load. And if

512
00:35:43.519 --> 00:35:46.079
you're not doing one of those two
things, you're not doing anything to change

513
00:35:46.119 --> 00:35:53.079
injury risk. The So yeah,
that's that's really what it boils down to

514
00:35:53.119 --> 00:35:57.400
if you take like one hundred thousand
foot view of injury. So in the

515
00:35:57.599 --> 00:36:00.079
in the context of callousies and that
kind of stuff, you still need to

516
00:36:00.159 --> 00:36:04.079
mitigate load to a certain extent,
right, Like I'm not going to like

517
00:36:04.119 --> 00:36:07.679
a callus is not going to make
my hand invincible to a chainsaw, you

518
00:36:07.719 --> 00:36:10.480
know, as an extreme example.
But if I don't have any callusies whatsoever,

519
00:36:10.519 --> 00:36:14.639
going to go pick up a sharp, sharply neural deadlick park, then

520
00:36:14.719 --> 00:36:17.119
yeah, I can tear my hand
open pretty easily there. And it's a

521
00:36:17.159 --> 00:36:22.760
matter of diminishing returns out to a
certain point. So would it be advantageous

522
00:36:22.960 --> 00:36:28.599
for soldiers or operators or anybody really
even firefighters, policemen, anybody who has

523
00:36:28.800 --> 00:36:32.480
any level of technical job or contracting
job like construction workers, for them to

524
00:36:34.199 --> 00:36:37.280
do their physical fitness training in the
gear they would wear. So, for

525
00:36:37.400 --> 00:36:42.280
example, if you are wearing combat
boots in your job, would you want

526
00:36:42.360 --> 00:36:45.440
to do your runs and your workouts
wearing both same combat boots so the foot

527
00:36:45.599 --> 00:36:50.519
and body is adapted to that.
That's a very interesting question, and to

528
00:36:50.599 --> 00:36:54.960
a certain extent, yes, not
universally, because it depends on what you're

529
00:36:55.039 --> 00:36:59.360
training for. So, if the
intent of the training is to say,

530
00:37:00.440 --> 00:37:04.159
boost aerobic conditioning, right, and
you happen to be in an environment like

531
00:37:04.239 --> 00:37:08.519
San Antonio where it gets very hot
and humid very quickly, if I'm doing

532
00:37:08.559 --> 00:37:14.159
that in full gear, okay,
I'm going to have the potential that a

533
00:37:14.239 --> 00:37:16.519
lot of my guys are going to
go down with the heat stroke as opposed

534
00:37:16.519 --> 00:37:21.880
to being able to actually train the
aerobic system. And so you have to

535
00:37:21.960 --> 00:37:23.880
kind of just beet to kind of
parts out what is the intent of the

536
00:37:23.960 --> 00:37:29.599
training and make sure that you're doing
things that support that intent rather than just

537
00:37:29.679 --> 00:37:32.159
like making it close to operations,
making it suck. You know, that

538
00:37:32.519 --> 00:37:36.960
kind of stuff is a little bit
misguided. You need to be looking at

539
00:37:36.960 --> 00:37:39.360
what system you're trying to cause the
adaptation in and make sure that you're optimizing

540
00:37:40.280 --> 00:37:45.960
that adaptation, because you can't do
everything once right, Like I can't you

541
00:37:46.000 --> 00:37:49.519
know, I can't jump off for
splate and give them this sense for what

542
00:37:49.639 --> 00:37:53.360
my aerobic conditioning is. It's just
a different system. So if you have

543
00:37:53.440 --> 00:37:57.760
a specific intent and you know exactly
what kind of adaptations you're trying to elicit,

544
00:37:58.159 --> 00:38:00.960
then yeah, you want to you
want to create as close to an

545
00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.159
environment as you can it allows you
to get that adaptation. There was a

546
00:38:04.199 --> 00:38:07.320
study done, I want to say
it was by Robin or down in Australia.

547
00:38:07.360 --> 00:38:12.840
They were looking at tactical police forces, specialist police forces and they had

548
00:38:12.880 --> 00:38:15.840
him run in a like an obstacle
course or anything like that. They hadn't

549
00:38:15.880 --> 00:38:20.239
run it both in their kit and
slick right, so no equipment, and

550
00:38:20.360 --> 00:38:23.039
then wearing your typical mission guard.
And then at the end of this,

551
00:38:23.360 --> 00:38:25.400
you know, the pretty high aerobic
load and at the end of this they

552
00:38:25.400 --> 00:38:30.719
would shoot. And what they found
in this case was that though the workload

553
00:38:31.159 --> 00:38:37.480
was higher obviously when they were wearing
more gear, it was of course they

554
00:38:37.519 --> 00:38:38.679
were somewha familiar with So when they
were running it slick. I don't think

555
00:38:38.679 --> 00:38:40.960
they were running it that much faster, right, because they kind of knew

556
00:38:42.000 --> 00:38:43.960
the pace and they had to go
through. But at the end of the

557
00:38:44.000 --> 00:38:46.039
course without their kit, they were
less fatigued, heart rates were lower,

558
00:38:46.079 --> 00:38:50.960
and so on. They actually shot
worse when they were slick versus when they

559
00:38:50.960 --> 00:38:55.159
were in their interest us from a
control from coordination standpoint, going back to

560
00:38:55.239 --> 00:38:59.760
this other piece, the specificity of
training took over because they were accustomed to

561
00:39:00.039 --> 00:39:02.440
having those shooting drills. Happened when
they had this extra weight on them.

562
00:39:02.480 --> 00:39:07.800
They could brace the weapons differently and
so on. So there's a time and

563
00:39:07.840 --> 00:39:12.440
a place, definitely, But it
has to do with the specific intent of

564
00:39:12.519 --> 00:39:15.320
what you're trying to train. Wow, I and you know, it's like

565
00:39:15.440 --> 00:39:20.519
it's a because this is something that
I have studied to a degree. It

566
00:39:20.639 --> 00:39:22.840
makes so much sense and it's so
obvious when you articulate it that way,

567
00:39:23.320 --> 00:39:30.039
but it's it's really something that we
should be considering, not just for tactical

568
00:39:30.119 --> 00:39:36.119
performance, but also for athletic performance
and just day to day people living their

569
00:39:36.199 --> 00:39:39.159
lives. You know, if you're
you know, doing literally anything, you

570
00:39:39.280 --> 00:39:43.639
want to be able to do it
well, and you know, kind of

571
00:39:43.679 --> 00:39:51.440
thinking about as we're advancing human augmentation
in special warfare, I can really see

572
00:39:51.480 --> 00:39:58.079
how maybe some of these potential adaptations
could actually backfire in a lot of ways,

573
00:39:58.119 --> 00:40:02.519
because if we're thinking about augmenting a
human in a non rehab way,

574
00:40:02.639 --> 00:40:07.400
like if we're just trying to make
them sure, like even just thinking about

575
00:40:07.440 --> 00:40:09.519
it in like a like a deadlift
belt, Like if you're wearing a belt

576
00:40:09.559 --> 00:40:14.039
for deadlifts and squads, that's I
would say that that's a form of augmentation.

577
00:40:14.199 --> 00:40:17.360
External augmentation. You're able to give
your abdominal wall something to brace against.

578
00:40:17.559 --> 00:40:22.559
And I've used this example before just
for those of you listening. It

579
00:40:22.559 --> 00:40:24.360
would be the equivalent of if you're
trying to move furniture in your house and

580
00:40:24.440 --> 00:40:29.079
you're just pushing against a couch versus
if you put your foot against a wall

581
00:40:29.119 --> 00:40:31.199
and then you push the couch,
like that belt gives you that abdominal wall

582
00:40:31.280 --> 00:40:35.480
to something to brace against, say
thing with external new sleeves. So it's

583
00:40:35.519 --> 00:40:39.559
like we're already doing this augmentation to
some degree, but if we are training

584
00:40:42.679 --> 00:40:49.360
tactical soldiers with certain external augmentation,
that can totally change their ability to perform

585
00:40:49.639 --> 00:40:54.079
in a very intense setting. Is
that correct? Yeah, And so you

586
00:40:54.199 --> 00:40:57.599
want to you want to train somewhat
how you fight. But at the same

587
00:40:57.679 --> 00:41:00.320
time, if you're trying to maximize
that for a given system, you want

588
00:41:00.320 --> 00:41:05.480
to bias that system. Right,
So if you're if your priority is say,

589
00:41:05.480 --> 00:41:07.679
hey, let's get through the shootouts
faster, let's let's work on our

590
00:41:07.719 --> 00:41:09.480
shooting skills and our our team coordination, then yeah, you're going to want

591
00:41:09.480 --> 00:41:13.360
to be kitted up. You want
to be able to coordinate and communicate with

592
00:41:13.440 --> 00:41:16.000
your guys as well as you would
in the field. If you're just looking

593
00:41:16.079 --> 00:41:21.159
to increase, you know, aerobic
capacity, you might need to just keep

594
00:41:21.199 --> 00:41:27.000
it very simple. You really don't
necessarily need all the extra bells and whistles,

595
00:41:27.039 --> 00:41:29.000
Like, you don't need to be
fully kitted up for every realm that

596
00:41:29.000 --> 00:41:34.679
you go on. From a standpoint
of augmentationally, the examples that you brought

597
00:41:34.760 --> 00:41:37.760
up knee sleeves in the bellot,
you can always take those of right,

598
00:41:37.519 --> 00:41:42.320
and you know, the suit that's
drilled into your skeleton like Matt Damon had

599
00:41:42.320 --> 00:41:45.199
here, Yeah, these days you
can't, right, Like we don't have

600
00:41:45.239 --> 00:41:49.960
those those magic medical beds so I
think where where we're seeing the trend now

601
00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:54.239
is really keeping a man in the
loop from a distance. So that's where

602
00:41:54.280 --> 00:41:59.000
we're looking at drones for reconnaissance as
well as for warfare. We're seeing those

603
00:41:59.079 --> 00:42:05.519
used extensively, and you crane first
person video, one way munitions, and

604
00:42:06.320 --> 00:42:09.679
lowder ammunitions, and now they're you
know, they're they're looking at you know,

605
00:42:10.199 --> 00:42:15.719
loyal wingman AI powered drones that fly
alongside fighters and bombers, and these

606
00:42:15.760 --> 00:42:20.000
are considered more atriable. Right,
we can sacrifice these, we can send

607
00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:22.360
them on a suicide mission if we
really need to, because the human is

608
00:42:22.400 --> 00:42:27.159
more important to the hardware, and
if we're just losing hardware. Yeah,

609
00:42:27.159 --> 00:42:30.360
we kept the operator absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, I love that, and

610
00:42:30.440 --> 00:42:32.360
I love that we're going there,
that we're moving that direction, and that

611
00:42:32.599 --> 00:42:39.159
our values are I mean, it's
war. War's never pretty or glamorous or

612
00:42:40.079 --> 00:42:44.159
you know, I was going to
say good, but it's like sometimes I

613
00:42:44.199 --> 00:42:47.199
feel like it, you know,
it is necessary, but it's so nice

614
00:42:47.239 --> 00:42:52.199
to see that we're really trying to
minimize the lives loss or even limbs or

615
00:42:52.760 --> 00:42:55.840
you know, just trauma to the
human to the human. Because I was

616
00:42:55.920 --> 00:43:00.119
going to ask you, So are
we seeing any kind of enhancements that are

617
00:43:00.239 --> 00:43:06.159
removable, like any kind of human
augmentation happening in warfare that they can put

618
00:43:06.239 --> 00:43:10.360
on or take off, whether it
be neurological and exo suit one of sensors.

619
00:43:12.800 --> 00:43:16.320
The most that I've seen on that
front has really been like focused on

620
00:43:16.519 --> 00:43:23.079
like trying to augment recovery. But
I think there's a lot to be said

621
00:43:23.239 --> 00:43:25.639
for mastering the basics for a lot
of this stuff, And that's where you

622
00:43:25.639 --> 00:43:31.079
get into the fundamentals of sleep,
nutrition, proper programming, stress management,

623
00:43:31.119 --> 00:43:36.119
and that kind of stuff. If
master those and then any other little thing,

624
00:43:36.199 --> 00:43:37.360
you know, whether that's a whether
that's a normatech or an icepath or

625
00:43:37.400 --> 00:43:40.159
whatever, you know, getting a
certain amount of sunlight at a certain hour

626
00:43:40.280 --> 00:43:45.280
or whatever, like you're gonna those
are going to make minuscule changes in combariss

627
00:43:45.320 --> 00:43:52.719
into the big rocks. And I
think part of the part of the problem

628
00:43:52.800 --> 00:43:57.039
too, is that like this technology
has come along so fast, right where

629
00:43:57.079 --> 00:44:00.719
we're so reliant on you know,
devices and all this other stuf. They

630
00:44:00.800 --> 00:44:04.039
haven't this like this has not been
part of my life, my entire life,

631
00:44:04.239 --> 00:44:07.800
right, and I did not grow
up with it generation does you listening?

632
00:44:07.320 --> 00:44:09.719
For those of you listening, he's
holding up a cell phone. Yeah,

633
00:44:09.800 --> 00:44:15.159
yeah, sorry. So, you
know, when we're staring at screens

634
00:44:15.159 --> 00:44:16.800
and we're interacted, you know,
like like you and I are across you

635
00:44:16.840 --> 00:44:22.400
know, a couple thousand miles,
Like, how how much are we how

636
00:44:22.480 --> 00:44:24.679
much have we adapted to being able
to handle that as a species, you

637
00:44:24.760 --> 00:44:29.239
know, and how much of that
is getting in the way of some of

638
00:44:29.239 --> 00:44:32.119
these fundamentals that we should be taking
care of otherwise, right, meaningful relationships,

639
00:44:32.519 --> 00:44:36.760
sleep, sleep, hygiene, right, getting off screens before bedtime,

640
00:44:37.519 --> 00:44:43.400
and quality nutrition and all of that
stuff, Like society has changed so much

641
00:44:43.519 --> 00:44:46.119
like that we as humans are almost
struggling as human organisms, right, are

642
00:44:46.199 --> 00:44:50.079
kind of struggling to kind of keep
up with that, And that can be

643
00:44:50.119 --> 00:44:52.000
a limit, a bigger limiting factor
than any of the fancy whiz bang stuff

644
00:44:52.039 --> 00:44:55.880
can ever touch. And I'm so
glad you mentioned that, because it is

645
00:44:57.039 --> 00:45:00.800
really interesting how we we kind of
forget that we do whole lot of these

646
00:45:00.480 --> 00:45:02.800
I guess, for lack of a
better word, we do have a lot

647
00:45:02.880 --> 00:45:07.400
of these advanced augmentations already built into
us. I'm wearing my or ring,

648
00:45:07.559 --> 00:45:12.079
super high tech advanced sleep tracker right
now. But I also have this really

649
00:45:12.159 --> 00:45:15.599
advanced bags under my eyes that show
up when I've got low quality sleep.

650
00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:19.400
So it's like, whoa, I've
detected the quality sleep today. I'm bloodshot.

651
00:45:19.639 --> 00:45:22.920
Yeah, I can't think. It's
like my mattress, my watch and

652
00:45:22.039 --> 00:45:25.599
my phone track my sleep and it's
kind of what I stopped paying attention to

653
00:45:25.719 --> 00:45:30.559
it because for me, it's like
it's a it's a no ce bow right.

654
00:45:30.960 --> 00:45:34.119
I might wake up feeling fine and
my you know, my watch and

655
00:45:34.239 --> 00:45:37.159
my apps or whatever beaban at me
telling me like, oh, your sleep

656
00:45:37.239 --> 00:45:38.559
was awful. It's like, well, yeah, I feel good. I'm

657
00:45:38.559 --> 00:45:40.599
still going to go train. I'm
still going to make the best of the

658
00:45:40.679 --> 00:45:45.840
day. But if I, if
I, if I outsource all of my

659
00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:52.400
personal judgment to devices into external features, then I'm gonna suffer as a result,

660
00:45:52.639 --> 00:45:57.159
and I'm causing problems for myself.
And I think that's where, you

661
00:45:57.239 --> 00:46:05.119
know, if we look at needing
these mechanical enhancements to augmented soldiers, like

662
00:46:05.360 --> 00:46:07.800
really, what we really need to
do is give them a tool. We're

663
00:46:07.840 --> 00:46:13.880
great at using tools, but I
never want to internalize what's going on on

664
00:46:13.920 --> 00:46:16.960
the other side of a drone,
right, I never want that entirely attached

665
00:46:17.360 --> 00:46:21.840
to me or my guys. I
want it out there somewhere that I can

666
00:46:21.960 --> 00:46:25.719
use as a tool. It can
provide information and can provide intelligence. It

667
00:46:25.800 --> 00:46:31.840
can you know, extend my reach, but it's never going to affect my

668
00:46:31.960 --> 00:46:36.800
adaptation to what I'm training and what
I'm trying to do day to day.

669
00:46:37.320 --> 00:46:38.719
That's said, there are some still
some adopations, Like we see we know

670
00:46:39.199 --> 00:46:45.239
interesting cases of PTSD in drone warfare
operators right very far away, like but

671
00:46:45.360 --> 00:46:49.360
they've got eyes on close up of
somebody that they're dropping a bomb on.

672
00:46:50.960 --> 00:46:54.960
And you know that that comes with
a certain psychological cost for each individual,

673
00:46:55.079 --> 00:46:59.639
and we're still trying to come up
with the ramifications of that and not that's

674
00:46:59.760 --> 00:47:02.960
likest, but it's something that we
have to factor into the whole picture of

675
00:47:02.960 --> 00:47:07.440
the human organism and the warfighter.
Well, you can even think back to

676
00:47:07.519 --> 00:47:13.239
our Wargames episode with Noah Heally where
we were talking about the opening scene in

677
00:47:13.280 --> 00:47:16.639
the movie Wargames where they had to
flip the switch for the nuclear bomb and

678
00:47:16.760 --> 00:47:20.719
the one guy because the two man
team and the one guy was like,

679
00:47:20.800 --> 00:47:24.320
I am not about to kill twenty
million people without a phone call and confirmation.

680
00:47:24.599 --> 00:47:28.679
Like it's just like there is that
psychological thing. He was in a

681
00:47:28.920 --> 00:47:31.440
window list box. He couldn't see
them, but it's still just knowing the

682
00:47:31.519 --> 00:47:36.039
implications, which is just kind of
the beauty of humanity. I think that

683
00:47:36.440 --> 00:47:39.519
I do believe that humans are inherently
good, and that we do inherently have

684
00:47:39.719 --> 00:47:45.679
compassion and empathy for each other,
because if you really do look at humankind,

685
00:47:45.039 --> 00:47:47.679
every single one of us is more
like than we are different, and

686
00:47:49.079 --> 00:47:52.199
we can experience empathy and compassion for
people who are very different from us,

687
00:47:52.280 --> 00:47:57.239
even if they're on the other side
of the battlefield, And that's kind of

688
00:47:57.280 --> 00:48:00.760
beautiful. But thinking about like outsource
saying, are you know with my sleep

689
00:48:00.800 --> 00:48:05.559
tracker, outsourcing it versus keeping it
as yourself. I'm kind of even thinking

690
00:48:05.639 --> 00:48:13.559
about just the quality of life for
people who've experienced like paralysis or amputation and

691
00:48:13.679 --> 00:48:15.119
thinking about outsourcing their care. It's
like, all right, we're going to

692
00:48:15.159 --> 00:48:17.239
do all this rehab, but we're
going to get you all these fancy new

693
00:48:17.280 --> 00:48:21.800
limbs and tools and all these things. But it's when in reality, if

694
00:48:21.840 --> 00:48:24.000
you think about just Mausow's hierarchy,
of needs. A lot of people who've

695
00:48:24.039 --> 00:48:29.920
experienced trauma the more so than losing
their limb. One of the biggest things

696
00:48:29.960 --> 00:48:34.199
they lose is their social equity and
their ability to be who they are.

697
00:48:34.840 --> 00:48:39.400
And so maybe instead of having them
have one hundred percent of the focus on

698
00:48:39.800 --> 00:48:44.719
the leg that was lost, maybe
there could be more of a reintegration of

699
00:48:44.840 --> 00:48:49.840
them back into the person that they've
always been. Think like adaptive adaptive sports.

700
00:48:50.119 --> 00:48:52.800
You know we're seeing I think we're
seeing adaptive sports become a lot bigger

701
00:48:52.880 --> 00:48:55.840
than they've ever bet. Oh yeah, wheelchair rugby and military basketball that are

702
00:48:55.880 --> 00:49:00.039
awesome to watch, Like, go
watch murder ball. It's amazing about wheelchair

703
00:49:00.079 --> 00:49:05.559
rug beats. It's it's it's it's
impressive. Put it that way. Oh

704
00:49:05.760 --> 00:49:08.039
there, they are some of the
coolest athletes ever to watch. And I

705
00:49:08.159 --> 00:49:14.079
appreciate Magnet for Magnus in for time
world Strongest Man. He's he's used a

706
00:49:14.159 --> 00:49:17.480
lot of his power and prestige to
really like he's put all of his focus

707
00:49:17.559 --> 00:49:22.559
into adaptive strong man. So he
runs the world's Strongest Disabled Man and you

708
00:49:22.679 --> 00:49:25.639
see some of the most impressive feats
of strength come out of that. Because

709
00:49:25.679 --> 00:49:30.599
it's like this guy's got one arm, and he's doing way more than a

710
00:49:30.960 --> 00:49:32.119
you know, able bodied guy supposed
to be able to do. And I

711
00:49:32.159 --> 00:49:37.480
think, just like psychologically, if
you're able to keep that person just sort

712
00:49:37.519 --> 00:49:42.880
of like emotionally and socially lifted up
by their community, their ability to like

713
00:49:42.920 --> 00:49:46.519
sort of like hypercompensate, they become
superhumans in so many ways. Yeah,

714
00:49:46.559 --> 00:49:52.719
it's it's really a testament to the
the resilience of the human spirit when we

715
00:49:52.840 --> 00:49:55.960
let the human spirit do its thing. One of the most impressive people and

716
00:49:57.039 --> 00:50:00.480
I've ever met was a patient I
was working with and well after an industrial

717
00:50:00.519 --> 00:50:06.000
accident. So I was only working
with them for more of a like like

718
00:50:06.000 --> 00:50:08.440
an illness really and just kind of
helping them with reconditioning. But they had

719
00:50:08.519 --> 00:50:14.079
lost three limbs an industrial accident,
both arms and one leg and suffered a

720
00:50:14.079 --> 00:50:21.039
spinal cord injury all at once and
maintain an impressive amount of functioning independence.

721
00:50:21.480 --> 00:50:24.360
But I had a supportive family,
was able to have children and all this

722
00:50:24.440 --> 00:50:29.599
other stuff, and just hearing about
how rich this person's life was was just

723
00:50:30.239 --> 00:50:34.400
astounding to me. And I say
that with you know, a certain amount

724
00:50:34.440 --> 00:50:39.159
of respect, because when we do
talk about these topics and we bring up

725
00:50:39.159 --> 00:50:42.639
these individuals who have gone through these
things, it's very easy for us to

726
00:50:42.679 --> 00:50:44.800
be like, wow, you're so
inspirational. It's like, that's not their

727
00:50:44.920 --> 00:50:46.800
job. Their job is not to
be an inspiration for us. Their job

728
00:50:46.880 --> 00:50:51.079
is to make their lives as awesome
as it is for them. That's really

729
00:50:51.119 --> 00:50:52.880
what it should be about. We
can see that as an example of human

730
00:50:52.920 --> 00:50:58.559
potential and that's awesome, but they're
not doing it for us, right,

731
00:50:58.719 --> 00:51:06.639
so that in perspective, be happy
for them, but don't try to I'm

732
00:51:06.679 --> 00:51:07.800
not sure what I'm trying to say, but don't don't try to make their

733
00:51:07.880 --> 00:51:13.440
success about anything other than their success. It's not for you. It's it's

734
00:51:13.440 --> 00:51:15.559
an example that you can take and
go do awesome stuff on your own.

735
00:51:16.119 --> 00:51:20.639
But yeah, well it's it's similar. It's almost similar to the people who

736
00:51:20.800 --> 00:51:24.320
film themselves giving the homeless food.
It's just like people sometimes use charity and

737
00:51:24.639 --> 00:51:29.599
passion to have things to it's just
don't do that. It's weird, yeah,

738
00:51:30.239 --> 00:51:34.360
but it's I think it's important to
recognize beauty and the humanity when we

739
00:51:34.679 --> 00:51:38.559
and the wonders of humanity when we
do see it absolutely and you know,

740
00:51:38.639 --> 00:51:45.119
sometimes if that involves ruby a robot's
head off. Awesome, Oh this is

741
00:51:45.159 --> 00:51:47.639
so beautiful and cheesey look at us
and that little I have to make this

742
00:51:47.800 --> 00:51:52.559
our our Christmas episode. But no, it's uh, you know, it's

743
00:51:52.599 --> 00:51:55.599
cool to think. And I don't
know the soldier's name right now, but

744
00:51:55.960 --> 00:52:01.039
his his quote has been popularized on
memes all over. But he lost both

745
00:52:01.119 --> 00:52:05.920
legs in battle and people and he's
you know, very happy, very rich

746
00:52:06.039 --> 00:52:07.599
life. And people ask him,
how can you be so happy you lost

747
00:52:07.639 --> 00:52:10.440
both your legs And he's like,
how can you be so unhappy? You

748
00:52:10.559 --> 00:52:15.480
have both of yours? And it's
just a reminder that, just psychologically speaking,

749
00:52:15.639 --> 00:52:20.000
that there's just so much life to
live. And I actually heard a

750
00:52:20.079 --> 00:52:22.360
study. Can't quote it, don't
know if it's even real. I heard

751
00:52:22.480 --> 00:52:28.960
somebody else who I respected quote this
study to me that it was a happiness

752
00:52:29.000 --> 00:52:32.599
study. And they tracked two different
people. They tracked amputees, and they

753
00:52:32.679 --> 00:52:37.320
tracked lottery winners over I think it
was like a twenty or thirty year like

754
00:52:37.360 --> 00:52:43.880
it was a long time timespan,
and what happened is immediately quality of life

755
00:52:44.119 --> 00:52:46.599
for the lottery winners. There are
reports of happiness and quality of life went

756
00:52:46.679 --> 00:52:52.199
way up, whereas the amputees their
reports went way down. But over the

757
00:52:52.239 --> 00:52:54.440
twenty to thirty year span it actually
inverted. In the people who were the

758
00:52:54.519 --> 00:53:00.159
lottery winners, they reported a lower
quality of life than the mp ever did,

759
00:53:00.639 --> 00:53:05.400
and the amputees reported a higher quality
of life than the lottery winners ever

760
00:53:05.519 --> 00:53:07.840
did. And I just think that
there's probably a lot there's a lot more

761
00:53:07.880 --> 00:53:12.000
really interesting stuff behind that. And
I think that, you know, when

762
00:53:12.000 --> 00:53:16.320
we're talking about like humans and cyborgs
and human augmentation, it's like part of

763
00:53:16.360 --> 00:53:20.199
the reason why I started this podcast
is because I am very excited about the

764
00:53:20.239 --> 00:53:23.079
future and all the things that we
can do to improve people's lives. But

765
00:53:23.519 --> 00:53:28.800
what I'm learning episode after episode talking
to all my amazing guests is that,

766
00:53:29.599 --> 00:53:34.360
you know, kind of the most
amazing parts of humanity are already with us.

767
00:53:35.519 --> 00:53:37.400
I'd agree with that. Oh,
this is totally going to be our

768
00:53:37.480 --> 00:53:42.679
Christmas episode, sir, you know, get all the warm fuzzies. That's

769
00:53:42.719 --> 00:53:46.760
the season too, be jolly and
joy Yes. So, you know,

770
00:53:46.840 --> 00:53:50.639
I feel like we've really kind of
talked about a lot of the things that

771
00:53:50.960 --> 00:53:54.199
I was curious about. Was there
any was there any other things that you

772
00:53:54.280 --> 00:53:58.159
were kind of thinking that you wanted
to bring up about this episode or this

773
00:53:58.280 --> 00:54:02.119
topic that we haven't gotten to yet. I mean, I would I think

774
00:54:02.280 --> 00:54:08.559
the biggest one. If people are
interested in the topic of exoskeletons or bioagmentation,

775
00:54:09.039 --> 00:54:15.760
narrow prosthetics, whatever it might be, take a physics class would be

776
00:54:15.880 --> 00:54:20.159
the biggest one. You know,
whether you're wearing an iron mansuit and getting

777
00:54:20.199 --> 00:54:23.119
hit by an anti tank shell or
whatever else, even if the suit blocks

778
00:54:23.159 --> 00:54:25.440
it, Like, what's that going
to do to the squishy stuff inside?

779
00:54:25.599 --> 00:54:30.039
Just the g horses? Right,
Let's let's just talk Let's just talk acceleration

780
00:54:30.159 --> 00:54:36.599
of matter, right, and and
and the tensile or the elastic U forces

781
00:54:36.679 --> 00:54:40.320
going on there. Just just take
just take some high just over over arching

782
00:54:40.400 --> 00:54:46.159
physics lessons and figure out how that
that would work out, and then look

783
00:54:46.280 --> 00:54:53.360
at situations outside of the application you're
thinking about. Right, So we're talking,

784
00:54:53.440 --> 00:54:57.280
you know, the initial context for
this is like warfare, right,

785
00:54:58.079 --> 00:55:02.840
uh, super soulterature, you know, committed soldiers, and think about what

786
00:55:02.920 --> 00:55:07.760
happens when there's no fighting happening,
you still have a human attached. What

787
00:55:07.840 --> 00:55:12.119
are you gonna do? Right?
And you think about like Miamodu Musashi and

788
00:55:12.280 --> 00:55:15.159
you know, being a renowned artist, not just the world's greatest samurai and

789
00:55:15.199 --> 00:55:16.599
that kind of thing like the Warrior
Monk trope. Like sounds cheesy, but

790
00:55:16.679 --> 00:55:20.159
it's it's kind of it's kind of
cool. I think it's one of the

791
00:55:20.199 --> 00:55:23.000
best ways to remain balanced as a
human who's if you're training to do hard

792
00:55:23.039 --> 00:55:29.719
stuff, is be able to appreciate
or create beauty and personally up one one

793
00:55:29.719 --> 00:55:32.159
in the beauty In physics too,
just studying and dirting out about the universe,

794
00:55:32.320 --> 00:55:36.679
science fiction and this kind of stuff. But there's there's a lot more

795
00:55:37.400 --> 00:55:40.480
technical information out there that's available.
I'm not publishing any of it myself.

796
00:55:40.639 --> 00:55:45.199
I'm just nerding out about it when
I see it. But don't let any

797
00:55:45.239 --> 00:55:49.239
of this discourage anybody from being a
researcher, Like there's there's still so much

798
00:55:49.280 --> 00:55:52.039
that we don't know and so much
that we can do better than we are

799
00:55:52.119 --> 00:55:57.599
doing right now, and uh there's
we only make those changes if people investigate

800
00:55:57.639 --> 00:56:00.199
them absolutely, and that's uh,
you know, I think it's just a

801
00:56:00.280 --> 00:56:06.239
really big call to action for either
the next generation of researchers and scientists or

802
00:56:06.280 --> 00:56:12.400
people who are already involved to really
just remain excited about your field. Remain

803
00:56:12.480 --> 00:56:16.119
excited about what you're doing, because
everything collectively that we're doing as humans,

804
00:56:16.639 --> 00:56:22.440
we should be doing to improve the
quality of life for a species as a

805
00:56:22.480 --> 00:56:24.400
whole. And if you look at
our my husband and I were watching Vikings

806
00:56:24.440 --> 00:56:28.639
right now and it's like we're watching
some episodes and we're like, their lives

807
00:56:28.719 --> 00:56:31.079
were horrible back then, like who? And then you see like these Viking

808
00:56:31.119 --> 00:56:32.840
bros in the gym, like,
I want to be a Viking. I'm

809
00:56:32.880 --> 00:56:38.000
like, do you do you?
I don't. I want to be especially

810
00:56:38.000 --> 00:56:40.960
as a woman. I'm like,
I want to live in this century,

811
00:56:42.159 --> 00:56:45.960
in this country that's that humanity's ever
had it. Yeah, I like I

812
00:56:46.159 --> 00:56:50.519
like, I like coffee. I
like you know, it's like if you

813
00:56:50.559 --> 00:56:52.920
look at my spice cabinet, I
live better than any king that has ever

814
00:56:53.360 --> 00:57:00.320
lived. I have cinnamon. I
have a lot of cinnamon. Oh man,

815
00:57:00.400 --> 00:57:04.000
I guess it's time for a reality
check moment. So here we go.

816
00:57:04.960 --> 00:57:10.239
So justin if we are talking about
the feasibility in Elysium of having a

817
00:57:10.480 --> 00:57:16.519
human who is enhanced with a cybernetic
exoskeleton that offers them superhuman strength and agility

818
00:57:17.599 --> 00:57:22.760
from kind of a bio mechanic and
prosthetic perspective. Where would you say that

819
00:57:22.960 --> 00:57:29.519
our reality check scores on from our
one to five scale. As a reminder,

820
00:57:29.880 --> 00:57:31.079
Oh, I was just going to
say, we've got pure fiction,

821
00:57:31.599 --> 00:57:37.440
speculative science, fringe reality, emerging
fact, and then science fact and justice.

822
00:57:37.519 --> 00:57:43.000
Drum roll, I just hope you
justice justin justin drum roll, I'm

823
00:57:43.000 --> 00:57:45.239
going to say the shoots and stuff
like that, I'm going to call that

824
00:57:45.239 --> 00:57:51.039
a fringe reality because we do have
some astious integration. We do have some

825
00:57:51.719 --> 00:57:55.480
brain computer interfaces, we do have
some exoskeleton concepts, none of them refusing

826
00:57:55.519 --> 00:58:00.280
together to make the what they're doing
in Elysium, and I don't forget see

827
00:58:00.320 --> 00:58:04.800
them doing that. But in theory, if you let ESX go completely,

828
00:58:05.119 --> 00:58:09.639
that might be bostil If you let
ethics go, a lot of things can

829
00:58:09.760 --> 00:58:14.880
happen. But we already talked about
the Nazis and the Dune episode, so

830
00:58:15.000 --> 00:58:17.400
uh, you guys can circle back
to that one if you want. So

831
00:58:17.800 --> 00:58:22.400
that's that's so interesting. It's really
it's like, conceptually, there's so much

832
00:58:22.480 --> 00:58:25.519
that we're capable of. But you
know, like you said, earlier in

833
00:58:25.599 --> 00:58:30.960
the episode, that's my dog.
Everybody, he's like probably gonna want to

834
00:58:31.000 --> 00:58:35.079
go for a walk scenes, But
the ethics of it stand, it's like

835
00:58:35.119 --> 00:58:37.320
we aren't going in that direction because
we are moving more towards drones. We're

836
00:58:37.360 --> 00:58:40.679
trying to protect the people and that's
really cool. Yeah, all right,

837
00:58:40.800 --> 00:58:44.840
perfect, Well, Justin, is
there any final thoughts that you want to

838
00:58:44.880 --> 00:58:47.079
share with us? Uh? Yeah, I'm just if anybody's sitting on a

839
00:58:47.519 --> 00:58:52.239
magic rehab in medical bed that heals
everything, you know, just like share

840
00:58:52.280 --> 00:58:54.039
that with everyone, that'd be cool, and don't put it up in a

841
00:58:54.039 --> 00:58:58.679
space station where nobody else can get
it. Yeah, so don't be rude.

842
00:58:58.880 --> 00:59:00.800
Yeah, all right, Yeah,
that's all I got. Perfect.

843
00:59:01.320 --> 00:59:05.320
Well, thank you so much for
coming on. And this is actually,

844
00:59:05.760 --> 00:59:07.000
you know what, this is going
to be our last episode of the year,

845
00:59:07.159 --> 00:59:10.960
So thank you so much everybody for
tuning in to our first calendar year

846
00:59:12.000 --> 00:59:15.039
of Reality Check. And I guess
we're going to see everybody next year.

847
00:59:15.880 --> 00:59:21.880
Real need to check any science fiction? Hey Reality Check fans. As we

848
00:59:22.000 --> 00:59:23.760
wrap up the first calendar year of
our show, I wanted to take a

849
00:59:23.840 --> 00:59:28.760
moment and say thank you for being
a listener. I felt moved by this

850
00:59:28.920 --> 00:59:31.079
episode, and in the spirit of
giving, I wanted to take a moment

851
00:59:31.199 --> 00:59:37.519
and acknowledge disabled veterans. Without their
sacrifice, I wouldn't have the luxury to

852
00:59:37.639 --> 00:59:40.760
ponder the future with you from the
comfort of my living room. If you

853
00:59:40.880 --> 00:59:45.400
know a veteran, please reach out
to them. Take a moment right now

854
00:59:45.599 --> 00:59:49.039
to text them and let them know
that you're thinking of them. If you

855
00:59:49.079 --> 00:59:54.159
feel further compelled to support disabled veterans, please consider making a donation or volunteering

856
00:59:54.280 --> 01:00:00.519
for an organization that supports veterans.
I will leave a list of organized in

857
01:00:00.639 --> 01:00:04.880
the comments. Thank you again for
listening to reality check the science of fiction.

858
01:00:05.440 --> 01:00:09.119
I wish you all a happy holiday, Merry Christmas, a lovely winter,

859
01:00:09.800 --> 01:00:12.119
and a great new Year.