Spin-Off On "tiny People"

[SaxonViolence]

Imagine a small Android about six to eight inches tall.

 

Call him "Shorty".

 

Shorty is manlike.

 

Shorty is very muscular—Think "Boston Terrier" or an extreme Bodybuilder type + extra muscle.

 

Shorty's arms are a bit long in proportion to his body. His torso is thicker and chest expansion is Phenomenal.

 

Shorty probably has muscles very similar chemically and biologically to Human muscles, as well as skin—but I won't rule out stronger/better muscles or bone if we can think of better materials to use.

 

He almost certainly has two hearts.

 

Now we're going to save Shorty some Oxygen...

 

Shory's's brain—and perhaps his eyes and ears are entirely solid state electronics.

 

Shorty has no independant "Intelligence" to Speak of—though he may have trained neural pathway sub-routines on file.

 

A Human dons some sort of SQUID Headset and so long as he is within radio distance, he perceives the world As IF he were the Android.

 

{It is probably expensive and/or a real chore to hack Shorty together. You can feel Shorty's pain, but not as strongly as you would if it happened to you.}

 

A.} What is he for?

 

i] Petty Theft

 

ii] Very low profile Courier Service

 

iii] Espionage/Sabotage

 

iv] Even Assassinations.

 

B.} He is most likely to be found in the hands of Petty Criminals/Anarchists/Hackers.

 

C.} He is most likely the Result—at least partially—of some near-future bathtub Genetic Hacking.

 

The Hacker may very well have used his own Genes and Stem Cells to Help Grow "Shorty".

 

#1} Given that we've greatly beefed up Shorty's Musculature in order to get more power—Just how agile should he be?

 

How High is it reasonable for him to Leap?

 

#2} About how much would he Weigh?

 

#3} Will we need to find a Barbie Dress Maker to make Shorty tiny little Silk Underwear and Mole Skin Fur Dusters so that:

 

i] We don't shiver uncontrallably when we're "inside" him on a less than 92^o Night.

 

ii] So Shorty doesn't actually shut down due to extreme Hypothermia.

 

#4} Would Shorty probably have a very short lifespan like a Rat or Mouse?

 

#5} Psychologically, who would you expect to make the most accomplished Shorty Operators?

 

Yes, yes...

 

Always researching Ideas for Fiction.

 

 

Saxon Violence

 

 

Going back to the formula CraigD used on "Shrinking Humans".

 

72"/8"= 9

 

1/ (9)³= 1/27= .03703703703703

 

(.03703703703703) * 240 Pounds= 8 Pounds 14 O_z...

 

I said he was extra stocky.

 

Say 10 Pounds.

 

He really is a little Fireplug, ain't he?

 

Duh!!!

 

9³= 729 NOT 27!

 

1/729= .001371742112483

 

(.001371742112483) * (240 Pounds)= 5.257 O_z

 

Call him 6 or even Seven Ounces.

Edited August 17, 2013 by SaxonViolence

[CraigD]

Another fun topic! :) :thumbs_up

 

#2} About how much would he Weigh?

...

(.001371742112483) * (240 Pounds)= 5.257 O_z

 

Call him 6 or even Seven Ounces.

We nearly agree on Shorty’s mass. I made slightly different assumption, making Shorty a convenient 0.2 m tall and basing him on a 2 m tall 100 kg person (a length scale of 1:10 rather than your 1:9), getting a 0.1 kg mass (about 7 oz)

 

How High is it reasonable for him to Leap?

Here we can follow DrDick’s observation that muscle force scales as Length². My calculations (which are in a box at the end of this post so folk can check them – though with no helpful comments) give that where the (athletic) normal on which Shorty’s based can vertical jump 1 m, Shorty can jump 0.2 m – proportionally twice normal, but absolutely only 1/5th.

 

The key point of these calculations, which make lots of simplifying assumptions to ignore complicated anatomical stuff, is that while Shorty can exert 10 times the jumping force, and has much less of it reduced by gravity (9.8/(9.8+284.4)=3.2% vs 9.8/(9.8+19.62)=33.3%), he only has 1/10th the “suspension travel” to exert it in before he becomes airborne (or, more colorfully, “goes ballistic”) and muscle force ceases to matter.

 

Better muscles could much improve on this, vertical jump height increasing (in Shorty’s strength/mass-domain, in which gravity is less significant than for normal athletic humans) nearly proportionally with strength. 10 times stronger muscles would allow him to vertical jump 2 m.

 

I doubt such improvements on biological muscles are possible, however – the more we learn about the microanatomy of muscles, in many cases in an effort to make artificial muscles, the more likely it seems that biological evolution has found a near optimal solution.

 

More practical, I think, would be purely mechanical systems – springs, jets, and the like. With his high strength/mass ratio, and no concern about the pain, suffering and long term effects of injury, Shortly could stand up to the rough treatment of such systems.

 

He almost certainly has two hearts.

Why? Other than it’s cool, and something of a SF tradition (ie: Dr Who has 2 hearts), it’s pretty unheard of in real, vascularly sophisticated animals, for the good reason that it complicates plumbing, lowers efficiency, and doesn’t confer much advantage in roles like our little badass Shorty’s

 

... What is he for?

i] Petty Theft

ii] Very low profile Courier Service

iii] Espionage/Sabotage

iv] Even Assassinations.

A 20 cm waldo (which is, essentially, what Shorty is) might be good for this in certain missions, such as creeping through narrow conduits and other 100% stealthy approaches, but a key ability for most thieves, spies and assassins is the ability to blend into a crowd. Unless robots, waldos, or actual people of his size were commonplace, Shorty would be terrible for that! (imagine “holy crap! It’s an 8” tall walking humanoid … something!” [crowd rabidly gathers])

 

B.} He is most likely to be found in the hands of Petty Criminals/Anarchists/Hackers.

C.} He is most likely the Result—at least partially—of some near-future bathtub Genetic Hacking.

A system that requires cutting edge microbiology, radio communication, and computer programming – 3 complicated and dissimilar disciplines – is now, and l suspect will remain for the near future, not something that could be accomplished by a single person, or people not well academically and professionally connected with these disciplines. And, while a catchy, punky phrase, I don’t believe there is now or will in the near future be such a thing as “bathtub genetic hacking”. Present day microbiology requires a lot of education, specialization, and expensive equipment. As you describe it, SV – some sort of MRI brain imaging-based remote VR/telepresence – the radio data bandwidth and software requirements would be fairly huge. I doubt such an interface would be feasible near-future, and suspect it’s neither necessary or desirable – experience in immersive VR from the video game industry has shown that skilled operators are very effective and satisfied with much more modest, lower bandwidth sensory and control systems. My guess would be the best controls for Shorty would be a CAVE display and an at most slightly modified DualShock 3 or similar handheld videogame controller.

 

This is not to say it, as well as the other disciplines required to create the Shorty system, couldn’t be done by criminals. They just couldn’t be petty criminals, but rather ones with access to resources greater than many small nations. They’d have to be criminals able to employ many non-criminal (At least not intentionally) academics and professionals.

 

At present, the ability to field the most sophisticated remote surveillance and weapon systems – such as aerial drones – is limited to a few national militaries. Despite strong desires, concerted efforts, and spending lots of money, smaller organizations and individuals have mostly failed terribly in these efforts – not only because they’re inherently technically difficult, but because the national militaries and their governments that have drones and the systems that support them are vigorously committed to maintaining their monopolies on the technology jailing (and perhaps killing – much of their dealings are kept secret, so I can only speculate and rely on difficult journalistic sources to know) “hackers” of this technology (which governments conventionally term “terrorists”).

 

So my guess is, were a Shorty to be created and fielded, it would be by the same big national military and intelligence agencies that currently fly long-range drones – that is, the US CIA.

 

Calculations:

 				Normal		"Shorty"
g				9.8 m/s/s	
L				2 m		0.2 m	
M				100 kg		0.1 kg
F_m = (a +g)M			2942 N		29.42 N
a = F_m-F_g/M = F_m/M -g			284.4 m/s/s
F_m/M = a +g			29.42 m/s/s	294.2 m/s/s
d_a = a/2 t_a^2			0.5 m		0.05 m
t_a = \sqrt{2d_a/a}				.007032 s
v_0 = a t_a					2 m/s
v_0^2 = a 2d_a			
a = V_0^2 / 2d_a		19.62 m/s/s
0 = v_0 -g t_j			
t_j = v_0/g			0.45 s
d_j = v_0 t_j -g/2 t_j^2	1 m
   = v_0^2/g -g/2 (v_0/g)^2	
   = v_0^2/2g					0.204 m
v_0 = \sqrt{2g d_j}		4.43 m/s 

[SaxonViolence]

I pictured a low level drug dealer putting an ounce, maybe two ounces of Pure Cocaine into a tiny backpack and letting Shorty Deliver.

 

He moves at night. He stays to the gutters and shadows and isn't averse to using the sewer system like a Rat.

 

If the local laws weren't even aware that something like shorty existed, its hard to believe they'd see him sneaking through the gutter.

 

As for surveillance, I assumed that he'd be used to plant mini-cameras and bugs and get out.

 

If you had working models today—just suppose—don't you think that a skilled driver could get him right into the White House undetected?

 

No, but you're probably right about it being too high tech.

 

My fascination with two hearts goes back when to my aunt—who was a Registered Nurse in the Roaring Twenties—told meThat a very distant cousin who died in the 1800s was a Freak of Nature who had two perfectly well-formed hearts—as they discovered only upon Autopsy.

 

True?

 

Quite Probably not...

 

{This would have been in the 60s and my Aunt was no SF Geek.

 

If she made it up, I can't imagine why.

 

Of course, she didn't claim to have bee at the autopsy...

 

So someone else might have ben mistaken or confabulating.}

 

 

Saxon Violence