Best of 2018

The age of bio-inspired technology is upon us. Whether it's DNA as data storage, transparent displays based on mollusk shells, or surveillance robots modeled after swarming bees, the possibilities abound for natural systems to serve as patterns for the products of the future.

In this episode of The Digital Life we consider the evolution of the designer as technologist and engineer in conjunction with the ever expanding importance of bio-inspired technologies.

Get the full transcript: 
http://thedigitalife.com/bull-session/designing-bio-inspired-technology



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Designing Bio-inspired Technology

Debbie Millman talks with Krista Tippett about her religious orientation, her struggle with depression, and about why it's so hard to understand our historical moment. 

Krista Tippett

Are you proud of your kid for getting straight A’s in college? Well, high grades don’t mean you’re innovative. Matthew Mayhew explains.

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Why Colleges Need to Teach Creativity

A look into the future of design. The Studio is a new publication by Crew that takes a look at the lives, stories and inspiration behind today’s top agencies and creative professionals.

The Studio - Iain Roberts of IDEO

Gil, co-founder of a start-up that tests your genes for genetic mutations that can lead to cancer, explains why – after selling his last company to Twitter and helping start Google’s mobile offerings – low-cost DNA testing was his next focus. Podcast with Laura Mandaro of USA TODAY and Shruti Gandhi of Array Ventures.

Color Genomics’ Elad Gil: From Google and Twitter to the human genome

On this episode of The Digital Life, we chat about science, emerging technology and whiskey with Sammy Karachi from Relativity Whiskey. American craft whiskey is having a big moment and, more and more, innovation in science and technology is changing how whiskey is being made. In particular, Relativity Whiskey, uses a special, data-driven, maturation technology to age the spirit more quickly, saving years of time in the process. How will software and algorithms shape the whiskey creation process in the future? Join us as we discuss.

The Digital Life

The Whiskey Algorithm

This week on The Digital Life, our special guest is Noam Brown, a PhD student in Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University, who with his advisor, Professor Sandholm, created Libratus, an AI which decisively defeated four of the world's best human poker professionals in a Man vs. Machine competition. The breakthrough was published in Science, received widespread mainstream news coverage, and continues to be cited as one of the milestone achievements of AI.  Join us as we discuss poker, the application of AI to imperfect information games, and the possibilities for this kind of artificial intelligence to be used in negotiation and other real world scenarios.

AI Plays Poker

On The Digital Life this week, we take another look at the future of food, in particular, meat. Because the agriculture industry is the source of about 15% of greenhouse gas emissions, there are serious environmental concerns about the consequences of producing meat for a growing global population. The UN predicts that the number of people on the planet will grow to 9.8 billion by 2050, from 7.6 billion today. Compared to vegetable protein, raising animals for food is highly inefficient, using more land, water, fertilizer, and pesticides. This won’t work for a population of nearly 10 billion people.

While replicating meat in a convincing way is difficult, companies like Impossible Foods are now selling well-reviewed substitutes for ground beef. To see what the future of food might hold, we try out some meatball sandwiches made of Impossible Foods' product for lunch. Join us as we discuss the results of our experiment, and the evolution of food tech in general.

The Future of Food

Our special guest this week on The Digital Life is design strategist, Ben Sauer, who's investigating the idea of secret design skills for his new book. Design is filled with cross-pollination from other fields, from writing to architecture, acting to music. From these other fields we find ways of seeking, thinking and doing that are useful to a designer. What's your secret design skill? Join us as we discuss.

Secret Design Skills

This week on The Digital Life, we discuss the intersection of artificial intelligence and science with special guest is Dany DeGrave, founder of Unconventional Innovation. AI and science are coming together in new and significant ways, including the use of cognitive and other innovative technologies in R&D — like NLP, machine learning, and advanced analytics. As bio-science companies rush to invest in AI, the implementation of scientific research, drug trials, and even personalized medicine is undergoing significant change. But with the potential to make erroneous decisions, and even be used for malicious purposes, it may be a long time before we fully trust AI to be used in such development.

AI and Science

This week on The Digital Life, we talk with author and designer Cennydd Bowles about ethics and emerging technologies. Cennydd’s new book “Future Ethics”, published in September, is available in print and digital from Amazon and the book's Web site (https://www.future-ethics.com/).

How do we conceive of  ethics for emerging technologies? From data privacy issues, to embedded bias in software systems, to the myriad problems posed by artificial intelligence, what ethical issues should really matter to us, as a society? And, how do we grapple with these as new technologies emerge and gain traction?

For instance, mainstream conversations about ethics and artificial intelligence are typically centered around science fiction-type topics such as machines that are smarter than, or even from an evolutionary standpoint replacing, humans. This might be entertaining but is not addressing the real ethical issues that matter in the years and decades ahead. Join us as we discuss.

Ethics for Emerging Technologies

The Digital Life http://www.thedigitalife.com is an online radio show that explores important, timely topics in the world of design and emerging technologies like genomics, robotics, and the Internet of Things.

The show is created by GoInvo http://www.goinvo.com, a studio designing the future of healthcare, whose clients include market leaders like Apple, Johnson and Johnson, and Walgreens, as well as micro startups that will create the markets of the future.

Follow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/tdlpodcast

The Future of Food

The Digital Life Podcast

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