The Harland Highway - 460: FUTURISTIC ROBOTICS, A WOMAN LOCKED IN A MALL

Episode Date: January 7, 2013

Today we discuss incredible futuristic robotics, a woman is locked in a grocery store, the question of the day, and the 1st review of my new stand up comedy special. Blast my blast furnace!!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, how's it going, man? What's up? Welcome to the Harlan Highway podcast, man. Hey, welcome, everybody. Really ignorant way to start the show, but why not? How you doing? It's Harlan Williams here. You're rolling down to Harlan Highway. And what a show we got today. Check this out later in the show. I've got my first review, my pre-review, for my new stand-up comedy special, Williams, a force of nature, the one that I shot out in the middle of the desert. I can't wait to read it to you. I'm very excited. So that's coming up.

We're going to be talking about a woman who had a very strange New Year's Eve. An old lady had a very bizarre New Year's Eve. We're going to tell you her story. And then some inspiring news. Oh, my goodness. Some robotics, some modern space age. technology that this is real stuff that's cutting edge and just kind of emerging onto the scene that's going to change lives, dare I say, change humanity.

Way to you hear about this stuff. It's just incredible and inspiring. We're also going to get to the Harland Highway Question of the Day and fill your head with curiosities. Like, why are you even listening to this? Why? Because it's the Harland Highway. Welcome to the Harland Highway

All right, let's get this sucker going, huh? You're causing a major disturbance on my time. It's the Harland Highway. What's up, Bra? If I'm here and you're here, doesn't that make it our time? I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass. Am I hallucinating here? Just what in the hell do you think you're doing?

You just made a wrong turn. On to the Harland Highway. This is your fucking wake-up comment. You're riding down the Harland Highway with Harland Williams. In 30 seconds, you'll be dead. I'll blow this place up and be home in time for cornflakes. Looks good in this moment. Roger.

B-FSI switches on. Okay, Victor. Lending rocket arm switch is on. Here comes the throttle. Check your breakers in. We have some reason. In-board now, ports you're on. We're coming forward with the side stick.

Looks good. I'll register. Slowout, damper three. It's your attention to zero. It's out. I can't hold out to two. Direction, Alport. A long trap, selected.

Emergency. Flight calm, I can't hold it. She's breaking up. She's breaking up. She's breaking. Steve Austin, astronaut. A man barely alive. Gentlemen, we can rebuild him.

We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster. Welcome to the Harland Highway, the $6 million. Bionic Harland Highway. So you're wondering, Harland, why the $6 million man theme off the beginning of the show?

And for those of you that, you know, are too young to know about this show, the $6 million man show was about an astronaut that crashed, as you heard in the intro, his body was, like, decimated, and they rebuilt him with robotics, or, as the case may be, bionics, as they call it. They gave him new arms, new legs, limbs, appendages, eyes, and all this material, all these mechanics, mechanical pieces, somehow we're able to merge with his body and make him bigger, faster, stronger, blah, blah, blah. Well, the reason I'm talking about it is I don't know if you folk, you good country and city folk, caught the last episode of 60 minutes before the Christmas holidays.

But an incredible groundbreaking show where they revealed to the world some technology that the military has been developing to assist people, amputees who have lost their limbs or appendages in the throes of war. They've had their legs blown off, their arms blown off, shot off, whatever. And over the years, over the last decades, they've put the challenge out there to the scientific world, to the world of physics, to the world of innovation, to the world of biologists, everyone involved. And they've been trying to develop an appendage, an arm, a hand that, works in unison with the human body. And if you haven't tracked down that episode, I don't know if it's on YouTube or not.

It is a mindbender, man. It's unbelievable. And let me tell you, I'll give you the short version of what it demonstrated. Basically, they had a woman that was paralyzed from a disease. She used to be full functioning. She hit 50 years old. She got a disease that kind of disconnected all her nerves and feelings from her neck down to the rest of her body.

So she basically lost the use of her whole body except for her face and her head, and her brain was still functioning at full capacity. So the powers that be at the military and at these research centers and these doctors, and these technicians and these computer brainiacs. They all worked together, and they created a robotic arm, okay? And the way it works is they cut into this woman's skull. They opened her skull, the way you'd pop open the hood of your car. And they attach sensors to her brain.

And then they reattached the skull, but kept two like stumps sticking out of the top of her skull, which had a direct contact to her brain. So I don't know if you've ever taken a battery out of a car or a truck, but if you'll know on a car battery, there's two terminals, negative and positive. And there's those little, like, lead stumps that you clamp the connectors on under your hood. Well, this lady looked like she had two stumps like you'd see on a car battery coming out of the top of her head. They attached the computer and the robotic arm to the stumps in her head, which were attached

to a part of her brain, which scientists had determined. I guess it's near the very surface of the top of your head. There's an area of your brain where the activity of your motor skills lie, where your motor movements to move your arms and your legs and close and open your fingers and move your hand and whatnot. So I guess fortunately, that stuff's close to the top of the skull. So they sealed her up, they plugged her into the computer, and lo and behold, this bionic arm, which, based on what they said,

is the same size and the same weight as a normal adult human arm. It's not like a freak arm, like it's a giant robot arm with metal, and apparently they've been able to master it so that it's the exact same feel, dimension, proportions, size as a real human arm in hand. So you're thinking, okay, somebody sits at the computer and feeds at commands and close hand, move arm forward, move arm left. You're probably thinking they type it all in and the robotic arm follows the commands. Well, this is where you're wrong and this is where it's a huge. huge leap forward, and this is where it kind of makes your hair stand up on end. What they did is they attached sensors to that portion of the brain I mentioned,

and these sensors feed through the computer directly into the arm, okay? And the arm moves based on what the brain's thinking. It's unbelievable to watch. so there's no manipulation of any keyboard, there's no typing in numbers or directions. The circuitry sitting on her brain is as if it's the same electron circuitry that your brain would send to your arm.

So for example, lift your arm up right now and close your hand and open your hand. Okay? You probably didn't really think about it. You just kind of did it. Well, that's what this apparatus does. The wiring into her brain just picks up what her brain is thinking about her arm and her hand, and it does it.

And if you're thinking, oh, well, it moved. No. It reached out and grabbed a cup. It reached out and shook another person's hand. It reached out and grabbed a cookie and fed the woman who has no movement in her lower body. I mean, it is just unbelievable. It's startling, it's amazing, it almost brought me to tears to go, wow.

I mean, the intelligence and the craftsmanship and the ingenuity, the inventiveness, the perseverance, the determination, all these incredible human qualities and characteristics that went into this thing. and to see this fake arm robotic or bionic or whatever you want to call it function at such a high capacity and to know we're at the beginnings of this technology it's a real mind-blower

if you can track it down on YouTube you just have to watch it it's just incredible and here's a person that has no ability to move their arm yet Now they have an arm that does exactly what their brain is thinking as if your arm does what it does when you think it. And they were saying that this arm, it had the strength of a real arm. It's not like, oh, well, it's a robotic arm. Why can it lift up a foam cup full of water? No, apparently it has all the strength of a real arm.

the guy was saying you could pick up a 40-50-pound dumbbell and do weights with this arm. Is that not incredible? And maybe my description is like, yeah, whatever, a robot arm. No, you got to watch it, man. In fact, why don't I give you a hypothetical? Imagine your arm was blown off, okay? Imagine your arm right now, your left arm was gone. And you couldn't do anything.

You just had a stump. And then imagine someone says, here, we're going to attach this to your brain. Now, think about what your arm would do and watch this metal robot arm do exactly what your old arm would have done. And even further, they went on and they had another guy there who had lost his arm just above his bicep, but he still had the stump. And so what was happening is his brain was still sending all the signals to the end of his stump. but the brain kind of didn't know that the rest of the arm and the hand was in there

so as long as the guy was thinking it all those impulses were going into that stub but there was nowhere for those impulses to go because they stopped at the end of the stub you see what I mean so these guys created an arm put it on the stub attached some like electrodes and some wiring

that picked up the impulses and now this guy had an efface arm on his stub and he was able to direct it how to function based on what he was thinking. Hey, everybody. Who wants to have better sex? No? Yes. Yes. The answer is yes. You always want to have better sex. That's what you want it to be better, not worse. Trust me. And Adam and Eve is offering 50% off just about any item plus free shipping. And more than that, Adam and Eve wants to make your life easy. They offer discrete shipping as your privacy is a priority. Plus, 100% free shipping on your entire order. Doesn't matter how much you spend or what you buy, I will be packaged and sent

discreetly for free and fast. Don't wait. Better Sex is just a click away. That's 50% off, one item, and free shipping. Bring more pleasure and satisfaction into your bedroom. Just go to Adam and Eve.com and select any one item. It could be an adventurous new toy, or anything you desire. Just enter the offer code Harland to check out. That's Harland, H-A-R-L-A-N-D at Adam and Eve.com. This is an exclusive offer specific to this podcast. So be sure to use this code Harland so you get your discount and 100% free shipping code Harland. Have fun. Don't throw your back out. And to further the point, they made him stick his hand through a hole in a wall, okay, so he could not see anything.

And they even had the ingenuity to put sensitivity in the fingertips of this bionic arm, where they tested the guy, they put his arm through a hole in the wall, and they said, squeeze this object. Is it hard or is it soft? And they gave him like a squishy little balloon ball, and then they gave him a hard ball from a baseball. And everything they put in his hand, he was able to detect the texture of it

and the shape and all that. And I'm just like, wow. And these are the first two people to try this technology, okay? These are the first two people to, you know, offer up their bodies to science, to medicine. and, dare I say, to the rest of us in the world, these people went through risky procedures, put their lives on the line

so that they could be the guinea pig, so to speak. And to see this stuff is amazing. But there's a deeper point to me telling you about all this stuff. And when you watch it, you can't help but be moved. And it made me think about all the strife in the world, all the bad things in the world. world, the wars in Afghanistan and holy wars and people killing in the name of religion and people that hate the West and blah, blah, blah.

It made me go, you know, when human beings can conquer things that just seemed impossible, when you can give life to a lifeless body, you go, what's the point of arguing and fighting and killing and suicide bombers and all that stuff. If everyone just put their energy towards positive things that propelled humanity forward in a positive way, in a way that benefited everybody, can you imagine the power in that versus the negativity and the backwards thinking for anyone who is obsessed with dealing destruction and death to other human beings, to humanity.

It's very powerful. And what's encouraging is that, you know, the guy heading the department, this guy in the military, was saying that it's just the beginning. They want this ingenuity to go into people who are blind so they can see, people who are deaf so they can hear. People who can't walk can walk. I mean, it really is.

I think I did a podcast not too long ago about the merging of technology and human flesh and humanity. And at what point do we become kind of living-walking robots or bionic men and women? It's when it's done right, when things are used for the right purposes, it's awe-inspiring. I mean, try and track it down 60 minutes. And I think it's an episode that aired on December 30th of 2012. And it discusses robotics that help people who can't move, move. Unbelievable. Check it out and let me know what you think. Now, if only this podcast could become useful somehow.

I don't know. Maybe I'll try and attach it to my brain and see if I can make it smarter. Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world's first bionic man. Yes, yes, rebuild me, please. Here's an interesting story. Here's a New Year's story as we start to crawl into the new year here. check this out A woman was trapped in a shop

for New Year's so check this story out while most people celebrated New Year's Eve with parties and fireworks one woman in northern France spent the night alone in a locked supermarket Hello

Hello Is there anybody there? Hello Oh Christ A 73-year-old woman felt faint at the store, and she went to use the toilet. But when she came out later, she found the shop deserted and locked up. Well, how long was she sitting on the toilet, for one? I mean, did she actually faint on the toilet?

How do you not realize they're locking it up and closing her down? Hello? Hello, I'm stuck on the toilet. Toilet, hello. Oh, whoops, a daisy. There's a little granny popcorn fart. Oh, there's another one. They say that she set off the alarm repeatedly and spent the night wandering the aisles,

but nobody came. Well, it's New Year's Eve, man. Nobody's going to come. They don't care if there's an alarm or not. So check this out. Not only are you, like, trapped in a supermarket, but you ever been in a place where an alarm goes off? Weep, weep, weep, boop, boop, beep, beep. Imagine wandering around all night with frozen turkeys and TV dinners and fresh produce all around you, canned goods.

Beep, beep, beep, boop. Hello, somebody. What are all these funny noises? Oh, there's another one. I mean, the poor old lady, she must have thought she was in a nightmare or something, right? So anyways, apparently a member of the staff found the old lady, safe but exhausted on Tuesday morning.

They say the woman was taken to a hospital for a health check and said she had tried unsuccessfully to get some sleep in the supermarket staff office. Yeah, well, good luck. Try sleeping to this. Beep, boop, boop, beep, beep, boo. Yeah, right. And in a nice note, I don't know if this is good or bad, she probably deserved it,

but it said the old lady had not helped herself to any New Year's treats from the store shelves. Hmm. I don't know, man. I mean, it's New Year's Eve. There's probably some booze somewhere in the, you know, there's probably a whole aisle full of booze. Maybe you think it's okay to crack a bottle of bubbly, crack some champagne, and maybe open a bag of cheesepups or something?

I mean, it is New Year's Eve. You get on the store speaker system. Happy New Year, should all the great kids be forgot and never run to mind. There's some delicious cheese pops in Isles Five oh and there's also some hot dogs Oh, excuse me, hello, is there anyone there? Hello, hello, I have been there here, hello The Harland Highway, question of the day. All right, here it is.

How do whales and dolphins sleep? Think about it. They live in a world full of water. And unlike all the other fish, whales and dolphins have to come up and breathe. like every like three, four minutes or every 20 minutes or whatever their lung capacity is. Either way, it's, you know, it's pretty frequent. So my question is, when it comes to having to breathe, you really can't get much sleep, right?

I mean, you're underwater, you're swimming around, you've been down there about 10, 15 minutes. you're like, oh, right, yeah, got to go up, got to go up, stick the hole in the top of my head out into the sky, yeah, and suck in a whole bunch of air so I can go back into this underwater world that I live in. So it's not like you can just, you know, lull off. It's like, yeah, man, I'm bushed. I need a, I need like a good 10 hours. right how many animals how many whales and dolphins die in their sleep they forget to set the alarm to go and breathe i mean you really got a plan your you're sleeping carefully it's like okay i just took a deep breath i'm going to go back under water and uh i've got exactly 11.5

minutes i'm going to sleep for nine minutes and then uh go up and get some more air so i can stay alive for the rest of my life. Hey man, how'd you sleep? Oh, well, you know, I got eight minutes. Oh, you look great, man. Are you ever refreshed looking? Yeah, I feel great. I think I'll go for a swim.

We're already in the water, jackass. Well, you know, you don't have to be like that. So there's my question, man. How do these damn underwater mammals sleep and for those of you that were about to say the Harlan Highway is how they sleep don't even go there

The Harland Highway Question of the day Yes exciting stuff But not as exciting as what I'm about to read to you Oh my God, I'm so excited You know what, give me a drum roll Can I get a drum roll please Yes, thank you. Thank you.

Here's what this drum rolls for and why I'm so jazzed up. I've been telling you about my new stand-up comedy special. Harland Williams of Force of Nature. It's out just days from now on iTunes. On the January 15th at iTunes, it's a digital download. It's my new special stand-up special where I'm out in the middle of the desert. I've been telling you all about it. Well, I've just got my first review.

Can you believe it? I just got my first review in print by a gentleman named Steve Anderson, and I'm very excited about it, so I want to read it to you. Here is my first review on my new stand-up comedy special. If you're as fond of Harland Williams' stand-up comedy as I am, then we've got a treat ready to help you kick off the new year in style. Welcome to 2013, folks, and welcome to Harlan Williams, A Force of Nation. Oh, boy. I'm excited. Let's keep going.

Okay, I'm going to continue here. This is good. Harland Williams, a force of nature, takes us out to the Mojave Desert. There's no one else there but Harland, but he's going to be telling jokes anyways. Lots of them. For the better part of an hour, he'll cover a wide variety of topics in his run, and he's going to do it in a fashion so thoroughly impressive and unique that it has, to the best of my recollection, and never been seen before. What's really amazing and really disturbing about Harlem Williams, a force of nature,

is that there is no audience. Ever hear how it's difficult to write when no one's reading? How it's difficult to do anything artistic when you think no one's ever going to see you do it but you? This is what Harlem Williams has voluntarily walked into. He's in the middle of the Mojave Desert, which is not a population-dense environment. most of Williams' audience for Harlem Williams

is what looks like a rather large turtle and there's nobody laughing no footage of people applauding no stage other than what looks like the top of a messa and the complete absence of even walls this has never been done before see that's what I've been telling you guys oh man well the jokes are somewhat hit or miss

he's going to spend the better part of a minute shouting angrily at an errant crow that wandered into frame and the crow will make appearances throughout and some of them might actually make you wonder if he's finally lost it for good there's no denying that this whole this is a wholly unique affair your total enjoyment of harland williams of force of nature will depend largely on your tolerance for weird because this one's going to be weird even for harland williams well okay sure this is the same guy who occasionally got upstaged by a chimp and rocket man and the same guy who managed to briefly play straight man to Tom Green and Freddie got fingered.

But this one's going to break new ground in terms of sheer, aggressive, weird. Hey, how about that, man? As for the extra features, there won't be much, given that the feature itself runs just 54 minutes. This isn't much of a surprise, but you'll get a set list showing the various jokes in the special as well as, oddly, an interview with nature. The interview is comprised largely of clips from the special itself, except for this time delivered out in the woods.

Harlan Williams, a force of nature, may be a little on the weird side, okay. It's sufficiently on the weird side, that it bought a condo and is already looking for work, but it's still going to be so thoroughly, undeniably unique, that it will be hard to pass up. It's worth checking out for that reason alone, and it also doesn't hurt that it's also bad. pretty darn funny.

How about that, man? Huh? I mean, I read it a little wrong because I'm all excited, and I can't read. But that's my first review, and you know what's cool about it, folks, is that that guy hit on a lot of the stuff

that I was going for. The fact that nobody's done this before, the fact that there's no audience, that it's in the middle of nowhere, that it's out there, but yet it's still funny and this gentleman seems to think it works so i'm excited my very first review uh for a stand-up special where i did take a lot of chances and i'm excited for you guys to see it and form your own opinions you may like it more than him you might like it less

than him i don't know but i hope you like it i hope you love it and uh it is available on iTunes, starting January 15th, please check it out, download it, and tell your friends. And that's it. That's a great way to end the show on a high note right there. I think I'll go have a nice power nap in my swimming pool with the whales, and we'll leave it right there, folks. Until next time, you know what I'm about to say. Chicken, shall me.

Baby!