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  • The human body is complex.

  • It’s got 206 bones, over 600 muscles, and every day I get older, I discover a new joint

  • I didn’t know could hurt so bad.

  • Learning to control the darn thing takes years of practice and refinement, and some of us

  • still don’t quite have the hang of it.

  • But artificial intelligence is getting better all the time, and using consumer-grade computer

  • hardware, scientists in South Korea were able to train a neural network to control a simulated

  • human body.

  • The work could shape the future of physical therapy, surgery, and robotics.

  • They started by building a simplified human body.

  • The researchers figured they didn’t need all of those 600 plus muscles, so they did

  • away with the superfluous ones that control things like facial expressions and kept just

  • the 346 that contribute to how joints move.

  • They rigged these muscles over a skeletal tree that had eight revolute joints like knees

  • and elbows and 14 ball-and-socket joints like hips and shoulders.

  • To save on the computational load,

  • they also gave him simplified feet with two blocky toes

  • and 31 fewer muscles to simulate.

  • Then they started training him, teaching an algorithm to control their skeleton through

  • a variety of tasks, some as simple as walking, while others were more complex, like cartwheeling

  • or lifting weights.

  • Now, this is about the time alarm bells started going off in my head.

  • Theyre training AI to control a buff emotionless skeleton that lifts weights.

  • I can practically hear that thing saying, “I’ll be back”.

  • Even more impressive, or worrying depending on how many times youve watched the Terminator

  • movies, is how fast the AI learned to coordinate these muscles.

  • Researchers started by feeding it motion capture data of humans doing the desired task like

  • walking.

  • Researchers have taught AI to make a biped model walk without a reference point in the

  • past, but the results weren’t alwayshumanlike.

  • Anyway, it’s faster to train the AI with these references.

  • Now, depending on how complicated the action was, the AI could learn to mimic it in anywhere

  • from 12 to 36 hours.

  • And this wasn’t some supercomputer that was crunching the numbers either, but a PC

  • using a higher-end CPU and graphics card from 2017.

  • Once the AI had the movement down, researchers could start changing the parameters to see

  • how it responded.

  • They made the weights it was lifting heavier, and watched as their model started using different

  • muscle groups.

  • They told it to jump higher, and their guy responded by using their arms in more dynamic ways

  • to balance.

  • They pelted it with simulated balls and watched him shake them off until toppling over, looking

  • like me in high school gym class on dodgeball day.

  • Or in my adult dodgeball league right now.

  • Go fighting Unicorns.

  • Anyway, whatever the researchers could literally throw at it, the AI adapted.

  • Finally, they started tweaking the skeleton and muscles to simulate various ailments,

  • like tightened calf muscles that made the character walk on its tip toes, or a prosthetic

  • limb that made the character learn a whole new gait.

  • They also simulated surgeries to correct for those ailments, and watched how their model

  • adapted post operation.

  • This is where the value of research like this is really apparent.

  • Building a bipedal model controlled by AI can teach us how people will walk with a new

  • prosthetic limb design, or can help inform doctors what surgeries will do their patients

  • the most good.

  • And someday, if the AI is robust enough and robotics are advanced enough, it can make

  • a bipedal robot blend in among humans.

  • I just hope it also learns to forgive us for when we simulated injuring it...

  • I’m not as worried about AI in the future as I am worried about human hackers right

  • now.

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  • The human body is complex and there are lots of ways it can all go wrong, like your bones

  • turning hollow.

  • For more on that, check out Sick’s video on osteoporosis here.

  • Do you see a benefits to teaching machines to walk or are you worried about a T-800 situation?

  • Let us know in the comments, make sure to subscribe while you're down there,

  • and I’ll see you next time on Seeker.

The human body is complex.

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