

It is equally, and crucially, a resource to be factored into the solutions. The environment is not best conceived solely as a problem domain to be negotiated. The tale of the tuna reminds us that biological systems profit profoundly from local environmental structure. 69) point out," it is even possible for a fish's swimming efficiency to exceed 100 percent." Ships and submarines reap no such benefits: they treat the aquatic environment as an obstacle to be negotiated and do not seek to subvert it to their own ends by monitoring and massaging the fluid dynamics surrounding the hull. " Aided by a continuous parade of such vortices," Triantafyllou and Triantafyllou (1995, p. By thus controlling and exploiting local environmental structure, the fish is able to produce fast starts and turns that make our ocean-going vessels look clumsy, ponderous, and laggardly. by flapping its tail) and then uses these to support subsequent speedy, agile behavior. Instead, the fish actively creates a variety of vortices and pressure gradients (e.g. But the fish's exploitation of such external aids does not stop there. Such fluid phenomena sometimes occur naturally (e.g., where flowing water hits a rock). Such fishes, it seems, exploit aquatic swirls, eddies, and vortices to " rurbocharge" propulsion and aid maneuverability. In attempting to unravel this mystery, two experts in fluid dynamics, the brothers Michael and George Triantafyllou, have been led ro an interesting hypothesis: that the extraordinary swimming efficiency of certain fishes is due to an evolved capacity to exploit and create additional sources of kinetic energy in the watery environment. It is estimated that the dolphin for example, is simply not strong enough l to propel itself at the speeds it is observed to reach. Such fish are both mavericks of maneuverability and, it seems, paradoxes of propulsion.

These aquatic beings far outperform anything that nautical science has so far produced. The swimming capacities of many fishes, such as dolphins and bluefin tuna, are staggering. Here's how fish can take off like rockets: I had the opportunity to take four graduate seminars with Andy at Washington University and he excelled at filled our heads with non-stop counter-intuitive observations and explaining them in clear English. It turns out that this was explained in Andy Clark's excellent book, Being There: Putting Brain, Body, and World Together Again (1998). One thing that I always found amazing is how fast a fish can go from zero to some absurdly fast speed. And at some point in your adventures as a bipedal ape, you might be lucky enough to see some fish. You are only 26 days old, but you will someday escape your crib and your room with the same aplomb with which you escaped your mother's womb. All of these chapters (soon to be 100) can be found here.
#FOXTROT PROFESSIONAL SEARCH APPLED HOW TO#
And yes, what I'm really doing is acting out the time-travel fantasy of going back give myself some pointers on how to navigate life. This is Chapter 26 of my advice to a hypothetical baby.
