Last Wednesday, scientists of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology revealed SoFi, a soft robotic fish. The New York Times claims that its purpose is to observe the life and habitat of fish, which scientists believe to be conceivable because of SoFi’s ability to mimic a real fish. Scientists across the globe have experimented with robot fish in the past, but SoFi is noted as a more advanced robot fish. PhD Robert Katzschmann stated that, to his knowledge, SoFi is the first robotic fish to swim untethered in 3D for extended periods of time. SoFi is water proof, runs off of battery power similar to smartphones, and has the ability to control its own buoyancy and weight distributions. This fish also has a camera, a two-way hydrophone, environmental sensors, an operating system, and a communication system. SoFi is relevant to society in part that it may become more prevalent in the future. Scientists foresee SoFi being a pollution tracker, environmental monitor, and a piece of collective intelligence. Scientists also believe that it can be essential to understanding and protecting marine life, therefore, future investments in robotic fish are highly possible. In relevance to our class, SoFi is a great demonstration of the assumptions made within mainstream economics. The first assumption being that environmental issues that arise can always be fixed with technological innovations. Secondly, the economy uses the environment as a supply depot to better equip the economy. For instance the majority of the New York Times article brags about how flattering and informative this experiment will be as humans get to explore the habitat and behavior of fish species from the perspective of a fish and “uncover the mysteries of marine life”. Scientists are taking advantage of marine life for their own entertainment and technological advancement without thinking of the repercussions to marine species. For instance, the lead scientists of the SoFi experiment stated, “If a shark would have come and ate our fish, that would have been the most amazing footage”. What about the shark’s health after ingesting this high-tech device? Will this robotic fish make matters more complicated in its potential efforts in benefiting endangered environments? Why spend tons of money on an unsustainable piece of technology that’s bound to have malfunctions? I don’t see robotic fish being dependable solutions for environmental endangerments. There’s a possibility that SoFi may be making these environments more vulnerable all while stealing the attention of scientists from environmental health concerns and steering them towards making more efficient robotic fish. The first time I read through this article I became greatly biased against SoFi and did not see any reason for investing in such a thing. One reason for becoming biased came about after making the connection with mainstream economics and its heavy intrinsic value in the economy over the environment. The main reason was due to the author’s ironic title choice, “Robotic Fish to Keep a Fishy Eye on the Health of the Oceans”. The title gave me the impression that SoFi was made with the intent of protecting and resolving endangerments of marine environments, which is not the case. Katzschmann admits that the primary goal of the robotic fish was to provide an advanced tool for biologists.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/21/science/robot-fish.html

MIT reveals soft robotic fish for documenting marine life