Author: oliviaajarvis

Generally built over wide waterways, suspension bridges can prove beneficial to modern societies economically as their enable trade to occur more efficiently between countries. Suspension bridges span a large gap without restricting water travel of large ships belong them.

Suspension bridges are efficient forms of transporting large loads as their form enables an equilibrium balance of forces that enable them to support the large load.  They are meticulously engineered to ensure that this equilibrium is present as otherwise an instability could lead to their destruction. The added flexibility of suspension bridges allows them to flex under the power of winds and earthquakes. During construction, temporary central supports do not need to be built, and access to the construction is not required from beneath. This means busy roadways and waterways do not need to be disrupted.

However, a suspension bridge often entails a large opportunity cost to the country as it costs them billions of dollars to build, usually acquired through taxation.

Planned Obsolescence is a trend started in the 1920’s by the Phoebus Cartel, a group of light bulb manufacturing companies, in which the product is intentionally designed to become obsolete and require replacement.

After more than 100 years Thomas Edison’s early light bulbs still glow in the museum where they are kept. Clearly the technology exists to keep lightbulbs glowing for centuries but then why do our lightbulbs never last more than a year or two? This is because lightbulbs have been intentionally designed to die after 1000 hours, in a scheme to increase profits for the manufacturer.

Advantages for the manufacturer:

• generates long term sales which turn into profits
• increases the demand for the lightbulbs, if the lightbulb had a life-time guarantee then the consumer would only ever demand one lightbulb
• can use low-quality, non-durable, cheap materials which reduces the cost of production
• not designed to last so construction can be fast, simplified and efficient which also ultimately decreases the cost of production

Advantages for society:

• the increased demand places pressure on the manufacturer to increase output which provides more job opportunities
• promotes new innovation, as times are progressing demand for new and improved products is high

DiGORO is known as the ‘Learning Robot’ as it is able to remember actions that have been shown to it several times by humans then reciprocate them itself. For instance, if a person demonstrates to DiGORO how to place a ball in a bucket it will then be able to repeat the action. What is remarkable though is that it is able to reciprocate the action of putting the ball in the bucket with an unknown object. By imitating the actions of the human, DiGORO is able to learn the action and repeat it on command at another period in time. To do this, DiGORO must be told what each item is, for example you hold up a bottle and say ‘DiGORO this is a bottle.’ If you repeat this action with a bucket you will then be able to instruct DiGORO to place the bottle in the bucket.

DiGORO is also capable of remembering people’s faces and voices simultaneously by identifying patterns of the person’s face and recognizing their colours and shapes which can prove useful for people suffering from senile dementia.

DiGORO has a number of other useful abilities.  If words are not in its database it is able to extract them from the person’s speech and convert the word to it’s own voice. Also DiGORO can generate maps and estimate it’s location, even in places it had not been before so that it is incapable of getting lost.

Based on the information it remembers, DiGORO can take action autonomously.  It is capable of handling tasks freely and make decisions on its own accord.

With an increase in numbers of elderly people it has become a primary need to provide more carers and staff to care for them in their old age. When elderly people lose their ability to maneuver around with ease and perform simple tasks they begin to become reliant on other people. DiGORO provides a solution to this problem as after it has been programmed it is capable to performing tasks such as opening cans or turning the lights on which would have required a great deal of  effort from the elderly person. Although, one problem that can be foreseen with the use of robots to care for the elderly is the loss of human contact. With no human beings caring for them the elderly person will come to rely on the robot for company which raises a number of questions about the ethical implications of such a thing.