We spent Part I discussing Bionic Women on TV and speculating as to why they spent $55 Million on Jaime Sommers in the show but couldn’t fix actress Michelle Ryan’s chin. Now we’re going to get into actual science - not perceptual science, like how Michelle can take photos like this …

… yet still most often looks like this …

… but actual science, like how we would build a Bionic Woman today if we didn’t give a crap about television ratings. It’s a good thing I am writing this now because television ratings are important and this show could be cancelled any day, making it a lot less culturally relevant. How will I get you to buy a book on science if it doesn’t have relevant pop culture and cute girls?

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We all know that if there’s one thing certain to happen to professional tennis players who get hurt in skydiving accidents, it’s that a clandestine para-military organization will swoop in and replace the now defective natural parts with über-awesome cybernetic ones. Thus began the saga of Jamie Sommers in a 1975 episode of The Six Million Dollar Man

The episode garnered the actress her own series which ran for three seasons before losing its charge but the concept was so riveting that it could work at almost any time so I was always surprised that, TV movie specials aside, it never got re-made.

That’s why I was excited about the new Bionic Woman television show when I first heard of it. With the advancements in medical technology leading to new story ideas coupled with improvements in special effects, it could be a huge leap over the original which, let’s face it, doesn’t hold up very well. That’s not to say I didn’t watch it. I did, but only because of Lindsay Wagner, one of those natural beauties who never needed makeup to look terrific. And she won an Emmy for the show, so I guess she can act.

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I saw a few articles discussing an upcoming convergence between robot and human culture based on research by Netherlands student David Levy, who completed his PhD on the subject of human-robot relationships. Using the Artificial Intelligence ( A.I. if you are new to, well, everything ) curve laid out by Levy, humans and robots would be inter-marrying by 2050. Inter-marrying means sex and, of course, I am a specialist in the science of sex.

Before we get to the marrying stage, a few issues would have to be addressed. You think Japanese girls have a tough time explaining an American man to their parents? Wait until she brings home a robot. That’s right, sex is easy but relationships, even with women of other cultures, are more like Voodoo than science so robot relationship management must be a higher order of Voodoo, right?

Maybe. Maybe not. Psychologists state there are about a dozen reasons people fall in love - and there is no reason those same reasons couldn’t apply to robots. in some cases, like actual marriage, it will open up a legal can of worms but someone will be willing to give it a try - most likely in Massachusetts, according to Levy.

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Robocup 2006 will take place later today in Bremen, bringing us one step closer to apocalyptic destruction at the hands of our robot overlords.

Yes, it is robots playing soccer. Teaching robots to play soccer without any kind of central control is exactly what society needs. Next we can teach them to make factories that build more robots and dress up like Yul Brynner. Or that chick on Battlestar Galactica:

Oops, wrong Battlestar Galactica chick. Here:

Much better.

No wait, let me be Kyle Reese when the big fight happens. I’m already working on the cool dune buggy with the laser turret on the back. And he got to nail Linda Hamilton.