Talk:Self-replicating machine

testing —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.120.25.253 (talk) 14:49, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

I have a question and sincere concern. The "RepRap" project is a rapid prototyping project that admittedly does not self-replicate its own small parts. Should it not be in the rapid prototyping article instead of in here? I am planning on moving it. Rapid prototyping devices alone, inherently have no means of self-replicating small parts unless some hitherto invented accessory is employed. Germs self-replicate all their smallest parts, so do birds. Even with the parts it so-called "self-replicates" it needs a human to supply it with plasic and thereafter to even assemble it. This is far removed from any form of "self-replication". It just needs to be in the rapid prototyping section. RepRap may be important work, it just should not be clasified as "self-replication". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.249.48.23 (talk) 01:47, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

I am very concerned about that last paragraph in "F-Units". I have taken much time to read the entire book cited of reference "35" named "Kinematic Self-replicating machines" and find no such references in the book. Further, if you know your patent law the book only cites material in the description and nothing in the claims which are not too broad. Description requires broad descriptions, unlike the claims and does not make the patent "overly broad". Seeing how many unorthodox style blocks have occurred here of late I am posting it here for discussion prior to any possible alterations.

Rattler2 (talk) 18:09, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

I believe that Mr. Collins refers to the following excerpt of KSRM:

"Replicating systems engineers who, upon reading the above, might become concerned that their existing or future inventions could infringe the Collins patents, should take note that the disclosures of prior art attested in both patent filings [650, 651] include not a single reference to von Neumann’s substantially identical prior work (beginning in 1948; Section 2.1.2). Astonishingly, von Neumann’s name appears nowhere in any of Collins’ documents, nor is there a single mention of any of the many hundreds of items of previously published relevant literature that are cited elsewhere in this book. These fatal omissions should have significant implications for the future viability and enforceability of the Collins patents."

Now, it is clearly the case that the statement from KSRM is summarised by the phrase *overly broad* and so Mr. Collins complaint is reasonable. KSRM clearly conveys a notion that the Collins Patents are overly broad, owing at minimum to the lack of references to *von Neumann's substantially identical prior* art. William R. Buckley (talk) 19:21, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The authors of KSRM, clearly sedulous competitors of the prolific Collins patents would have one and all confuse the prolific innovations set forth in the patents with only broad description. Also, again if one would know one's patent law any one or two claims that a judge or jury may find "overly broad" would not weaken in the least any and all other remaining claims. This makes the very general comments in KSRM, which are more general than not because it refers to no specific claims, not only self serving but contains insufficient reference to such. Therefore, weak at best and useless at worst.

Further, I find no references to the alleged "prior art", and I've searched far and wide for anything that approaches the following list of new art in the Collins patents, including the John von Neumann extensive written works that are admitted by the author himself to be not rigorous:

1. "Trolley car" means of any kind, used in self-replicators, replicators or programmable matter,

3. Discrete, self-replicating actuators of that type or otherwise, anywhere,

4. Discrete "programmable matter", as it is referred to today, used in any self-replications,

5. Colorized tile indexing used in self-replicating devices and software of any kind anywhere, prior to the Collins patent disclosures now being extensively used over the net,

6. Systems capable of self-replicating all necessary "small parts" without exceptions,

7. Systems for placing conductive traces to utilize conductivity of high load electrical power, discrete or otherwise,

8, Use of "electromagnetics" in complete self-replications in any enabling disclosures of any kind, discrete or otherwise,

9. Any self-replicating data storage means, like the "data track", discrete or otherwise practical to be used in any known self-replicating plan to date nor one that is portable and interchangeable,

10. An overall, well planned, practical system of wide distribution and control, discrete or otherwise.

Further, John von Neumann bestows no fully "enabling" descriptions nor clear enabling drawings on any self-replicator and neither does KSRM and it refers to none which would be very necessary to be classified as legal "prior art", short of actual constructions and there are no photos as in the Collins site.

Further, since Collins has clearly stated that work commences under "trade secrecy" the comment "To date, no working examples of such devices have been constructed" is pure speculation and opinion by the Wikipedia author in question and this is not at all stated in KSRM. KSRM only states that the Collins patents only "appear" not to present a workable self-replicating device but fails to offer up any enabling comment in the least as to why not. In short, very general commentary, useless as source. The use of the word "appear", a very general term renders it completely useless as source.

Further, the personal attacks on Collins in KSRM are highly irregular, bestowing personal political bias, not to mention not becoming a formal writing and therefore casting serious doubt on the whole KSRM works.

Rattler2 (talk) 21:40, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

"Contentious" paragraph

To date, no working examples of such devices have been constructed, and the only published information about F-units is in the patents themselves and a critical mention by Freitas and Merkle in their text Kinematic Self-Replicating Machines There have been complaints that the granted patent was overly broad and did not give mention to most existing prior art. Collins strongly contests these assessments.

Rattler2 removed the above paragraph, and I reverted, so I'll be explaining myself. The above paragraph is the result of a lot of work myself and other editors put into expressing a neutral point of view. I think it's fair and balanced: no editor has demonstrated any of the facts to be false, and Collins' contesting of the claims are noted. The complaints that the patent is overly broad and fails to mention prior art is also cited. I do not believe there is a consensus to delete this paragraph, though I'm open to a discussion to re-assess that consensus. Before anyone removes the paragraph again, I'd like to discuss specifically what's wrong with the paragraph, so we can address these issues rather than remove it completely. Thanks. -FrankTobia (talk) 17:49, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

No matter how much work you and others put into the article note that you may not protect it which is a violation of Wikipedia rules. You state in your userpage that you advocate "open source" software and seeing how you and other open source Wikipedians are ignoring the facts here that were carefully drafted and agreed amongst the experts there is nothing left to conclude excepting that you are in contempt of patents which is another form of intellectual property rights.

There is no "prior art". This is a lie. Sir, find the prior art and show me or cease reverting my hard work or change what you have written to what is factual. Better yet for a real article expose KSRM for the lie it is which is a major scandal. A scandal that you do not understand or have chosen to ignore. Would you have Wikipedia to publish lies? The fact that you and your open source lobby has called the work of Adrian Bowyer a "self-replicator" clearly bestows your bias, as well. Does the rapid prototype device he discloses self-replicate its motors, its slide bars, its circuit boards? No. Adrian Bowyer even admits it. So, move it to the Rapid prototyping section where it belongs because it cannot and will not self-replicate.

You are trying to argue again which was clearly settled above with no new logical facts which is pure equivocation. You said, as well that you did not spend much time on the article before you blocked Mr. Collins and all his friendly editors with your cabal. Blocking Collins for in good faith reporting a perceived hack which is a wrongful block and you and your cabal well know it firing off a vicious flame war. So there is no fair "consensus" of what you speak. At the very least the "hard work" you speak of is not finished.

Further, Collins started the first self-replicating article. Remember "independent operability"? This, which you editors have continually hi-jacked and filled with crack pots such as Adrian Bowyer, Toth-Fejel, and KSRM all that attack intellectual property rights. Should not Collins, an expert at the least be having a say so on other players in the game? Or advising you of the facts about his technology without being accused of and blocked for "self promotion". You even deleted his userpage which makes sense because he was commenting on some bad practices of open source advocates. You and many others here who advocate this open source movement appear to be only quietly attacking all intellectual property rights as well known nefarious members of the group are well noted at doing. What is your point on this "open source" activity anyway? Do you wish to "open source" patents? That is clearly what the KSRM authors are doing, inviting the world to infringe the Collins well drafted patents. Rattler2 (talk) 19:45, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Rattler2, your response does not address my concerns. We must come to a consensus to delete this content from the article, and I believe that a consensus does not exist. Please succinctly describe what you find contentious about the paragraph you have deleted, so that it can be addressed. Also please note that it doesn't need to be truthful to be on Wikipedia, it must only be verifiable. Thank you. -FrankTobia (talk) 12:56, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

There was no consensus when the paragraph was added because you and your cabal strategically deleted Mr. Collins's work before consensus could occur. You are gaming the system. Consensus does not mean simply a vote count after a flame war or the like, it means good faith communications to arrive at "consensus". This you seem not to understand. Further but not least you and your cabal, just like you have tried to do here to me blocked Mr. Collins at an undue time. You have no right to block Mr. Collins for reporting a hack as you did when a hack occured from your cabal and you have no right to block me for taking up Mr. Collin's cause which I try to do as perfectly as I can. If you want "succinct" I'll give you that: The first sentence of that paragraph stating that no device was constructed is not sourced. It is a lie by you, not source. KSR speaks only of his patent, not the device itself. Rattler2 (talk) 21:41, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

RHaworth, what objection do you have of what you deleted and why? You delete in mass and don't talk, yet force all others to talk under threat of blocks. Your character is really showing thereby.Rattler2 (talk) 11:08, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Example Self-replicators for von Neumann cellular automata.

Mr. Collins:

You want example configurations that do engage the act of self-replication? See the URL

http://uncomp.uwe.ac.uk/automata2008/buckley/buckley.pdf

What will be downloaded is a catalog of such self-replicating automatons. This catalog is part of the paper Signal Crossing Solutions ... which is part of the proceedings of the conference Automata 2008.

William R. Buckley (talk) 00:39, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Mr. Collins:

Though I have complaints regarding his work, it is clearly the case that Umberto Pesavento produced images quite similar to mine in 1995, which is fully two years before your patent; see the journal Artificial Life.

The images presented for Automata2008 were produced since 2004. This work was in consequence to certain inadequacies of the Pesavento design. As published, it is not a self-replicator, though with some extremely minor modification (the increase in length, and hence delay, of a single signal line), it becomes a self-replicator. There are philosophical issues surrounding my rejection of the Pesavento design. For instance, though as given the configuration is not able to construct one of its cells, it is clearly the case that his configuration can construct a separate little configuration which is then able to construct this one otherwise non-constructible cell. I hold to a strict definition (self-replicators do not use external configuration), while Pesavento may hold to the contrary position.

Clearly, the configurations I give are for the abstract mathematical environment known as von Neumann 29-state cellular automata, and the variant 32-state model developed by Renato Nobili, which I term Nobili cellular automata. In your parlance, they are software self-replicators. And, such have I been building since early 1981, and publishing since March of 1985; see the column Computer Recreations in the magazine Scientific American.

You, like everyone else, are welcome to a copy of the catalog, so long as the copyright is obliged.

I have spent no time reviewing your documents, nor shall I devote such time.

William R. Buckley (talk) 18:28, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Partial construction

Partial construction may not be appropriate to the section in which I placed the discussion. As the work is the product of my research, discussion within the article is best left to other editors. My addition is little more than an introduction. The impending publication of my paper Computational Ontogeny within the journal Biological Theory prompts me to disclose the topic to other editors. I have also created an article called *Partial construction* within which to give more detail. William R. Buckley (talk) 05:39, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Proper citations

Is this analysis "This is to say, means exist by which automatons may develop via the mechanism of a zygote." included within the published document cited for the rest of the paragraph? If not such a conclusion is original research and not allowed in Wikipedia. TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 15:39, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I deleted it. It didn't make sense. Zygotes still require tending/nutrients/warmth/hormones/education/whatever from the mother to complete development. Linking the automaton & biological concepts is unnecessary & uninformative. Ripe (talk) 17:57, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Photo and text additions

I am concerned about the over representation of Adrian Bowyer in this article. Although rapid prototyping may be useful research upon future self-replicating technology it cannot reproduce all of its components as admitted by Bowyer himself. Present day automobile plants are more autonomous than his device and so are many other existing projects in many places. He as well has not produced conductive traces that can be implemented in his device. The "steel rods, nuts and bolts, motors and discrete electronic components" will never be devised by the device. I am concerned with the fact that complete self-replicators are blurred with replicators that do not completely self-replicate and those may be confused with "partial self-replicators" as Buckley describes. Clarity is lacking and Bower's device does not present significant enough input to the subject to have dates and times presented as if it were some sort of historical milestone. The article seems very much like promotion copy. AvantVenger (talk)