in the Transformers movies you know who
I feel the worst for people who bought
cars that turned out to be transformers
imagine trying to get to work just to
have your car turn into an alien robot
and fly away
well that's $28,000 down the drain
Optimus the least you can do is call a
man uber
hello Internet welcome to film theory
the show with a PhD in movie minutiae
now I don't know about you guys but
every once in a while I'm struck with
the powerful realization that the future
is here now granted it might not be the
future everyone predicted I'm still
waiting for my Back to the Future
hoverboard holographic clothing and
self-drying jacket after all but all of
this makes me wonder what other things
are just right around the corner quite
honestly it's hard to without anything
at this point even the craziest things
that we see in movies the amnesia
machine from men and black yeah you
don't have it already I bet they're
working on something similar Willy
Wonka's Everlasting Gobstopper yes
please and what about the transformers
self-aware robots that can on their own
change their form based on the task at
hand it's a huge ask things like that
could never be possible right well I am
doing a video about it so hmm
do I hear what you're saying matpat
you've gone too far
robotics have made advances in recent
history but the transformers defy the
laws of physics you buttmunch well then
I have one thing to say hypothetical
critic words hurt even words like
buttmunch which nobody is used since
they turn nine also I'm not saying that
in five years Optimus Prime is gonna
land on earth and start ripping
Decepticon heads off I'm saying that the
technology we have today makes
transformers closer to fact than they
are to fiction especially when you look
at what these automotive behemoths are
really made out of which nicely segues
to the question what are they actually
made out of well it turns out the source
material says a lot of different things
the Transformers have no less than four
separate origin stories whether you're
talking about the og Marvel Comics the
original TV show the UK version or the
live-action movies this franchise is
exhausting and don't even get me started
on the beast wars man I love that show
to me Megatron will always be a cute
purple t-rex so conflicting stories
wasn't bad enough then they all use
words like Quintus fine then to
creationism so you know that this is a
serious issue when it comes to what
they're made out of though all the
origins agree that the Transformers are
metal and basically mechanical so
instead of staying alive with food and
water they need the right kind of fuel
so thanks a lot Captain Obvious the
Machine Moms
are made out of metal what about some
specifics well we actually get the most
information about the chemistry of the
Transformers at the molecular level from
the movies specifically age of
extinction they even take the time to
name the Transformers material transform
Am transform IAM
[Music]
[Applause]
yeah super creative job there everybody
now if only you'd spend as much time
building your fictional world as you did
researching the laws around
relationships with minors this is
illegal she's a minor protected by the
Romeo and Juliet laws got a pre-existing
juvenile foundation that's you to seven
zero and on that note yeah yeah I know
it pains me to go to the Michael Bay
movies Michael Bay's transformers are
practically unwatchable and offensive
taking a lot of liberties with the
Transformers Lord
there's no compressor or damaged in
battle but the fact of the matter is
that the movies give us the most
concrete scientific clues about what
these guys are actually made out of so
if we're gonna take a look at the
real-world technology behind these
things this is gonna be the best route
to take so this theory is gonna focus on
transformium
and from there we're gonna see how close
we are to making our own Optimus Prime
and the fact of the matter is the
technology is really cool so let's all
just agree to get along here in the name
of science okay okay so an age of
extinction humans have gotten pretty
sick of alien robots destroying their
cities when they fight each other so the
US government starts trying to make
their own transformers the scientists
crack the code of how to work with
transformium and boom man-made
transformers so how far am i from being
able to make my own bodyguard slash
campervan well let's take a look at what
we know about transform IAM roll out the
tape earth metal molecularly unstable
industrial uses none so according to
tobias fume kaze evil twin we're looking
at a metal that's unstable rare and
isn't for industrial purposes we also
know a few things from the transformers
themselves transformium ought to be
pretty lightweight since some of the
transformers can fly which wouldn't
happen if they were made of say LED they
also enter an exit Earth's atmosphere so
this metal needs to have a high melting
point specifically entering the
atmosphere causes objects to reach one
thousand four hundred and seventy seven
degrees Celsius or twenty six ninety one
degrees Fahrenheit for all of us in the
good ol US of A where our independence
is dictated by how difficult our
measurement system is so the melting
point of whatever metal we're using
would have to be above that is there a
substance on earth that can check off
all these boxes well the quick perusal
of all the usual suspects on the
periodic table tells us
oh but then what's this a group of
elements called rare earth metals since
they are big shocker
rare man it looks like chemists are just
as bad at naming things as the writers
for age of extinction maybe I should
stop giving them such a hard time search
the property we need to search the
property you don't have a warrant my
face nope totally justified now the best
analogue for transformium would actually
be the lightest of the bunch scandium
atomic number 21 its lightweight with
the density similar to aluminum so
flying around like Starscream wouldn't
be an issue and it has a melting point
of 1540 degrees Celsius well above our
limit for objects entering the
atmosphere this ensures that optimist in
the gang don't pull an Alex Mac and turn
into a puddle of metallic goo each time
they enter the planet's atmosphere
we don't use scandium for industrial use
because it's so rare just like we hear
about in the movie and scandium even
looks like the sample of transformium
that we see an age of extinction on a
chemical level if we were to start
making our own transformers scandium
would actually be a really good really
accurate candidate and well that's all
well and good it's far from the whole
equation because the big challenge of
transform them isn't the chemistry it's
the physics the problem with creating
Optimus Prime isn't creating something
that looks like his truck form that's
just a truck we want a substance that
can mutate itself into practically
anything and as it turns out advances in
robotics are making transform look less
like a pipe dream and more like an
inevitability in fact the building
blocks are already here for example we
already have machines that can react to
their environments as necessary these
are cold self-configuring modular robots
and they can change shapes walk and in
some cases even fly just take a look at
the EM tram 3 an example of a
self-configuring modular robot made of
interlocking parts that can change its
configuration and movement at will as
you can see here it's arranged itself
into a long chain that moves by
undulating like a caterpillar but it can
also form a lattice grow legs even walk
away sure it's rudimentary but let's
face it it already looks a lot better
than those walking Domino blocks that we
saw an interstellar in both the real
world and the transformers universe the
robot is changing its appearance to best
suit the purpose it needs to fulfill now
you might think this thing is slow
impressive and looks like a miniature
plastic 8080 from Empire Strikes Back
than a transformer but keep in mind that
the EM tram 3 debuted at a robotics Expo
in 2005 in 2005 the Nintendo Wii and the
iPhone won four things of the future
more recently we've had M blocks small
cubes that self-assemble without legs
wheels or any external parts just cubes
that can hop around and assemble on
their own with nothing more than magnets
still if we're looking for something
like transform iam we would need robots
that are smaller faster and more
versatile than these self-configuring
modular robots transform iam as we see
in the movie is programmable it has a
memory programmable matter might seem
way out of our collective human league
but scientists are actually developing
exactly that in a branch of nano
technology known as claytronics think of
claytronics as a mix of robotics and
computer science claytronics uses a
system of very small programmable
computers known as clay tronic atoms orc
atoms working in conjunction with each
other to create three-dimensional
objects that the user can interact with
so imagine you're skyping or facetiming
with someone a few years in the future
right now all you're gonna get is a
two-dimensional feed of the person
you're talking to
but claytronics would make it possible
for your device to do a full-body scan
of the person you're talking to recreate
them out of Katims and then put a
three-dimensional version of the person
right next to you in your very room and
then when the Katims are done being your
friend they could potentially transform
back into a couch or a table or
television the possibilities truly are
endless here you know those cool
nanobots from big hero 6 yeah it's kind
of like that and here's the kicker even
though it seems like this sort of
technology should be decades if not
centuries away experts think we're
pretty close right now an article from
the institute of ethics and emerging
technologies in 2014 cites that
researchers at intel labs are projecting
basic electronic products for commercial
use by the year 2020 and researchers at
carnegie mellon university are making
noteworthy progress they've produced
electromagnetic atoms which are able to
disassemble and reconfigure themselves
in a span of one tenth of a second so
just give it a few more years and
shape-shifting programmable matter just
like transformium could be
in your very living room or I guess in
this case in your garage but then this
all begs one final question if we can
make transform um than wooden actual
transformers be right behind in fact all
you loyal fans of film theory will
remember our episode about Terminator
Skynet where we learned that artificial
intelligence is projected to advance to
the point that computers become
self-aware maybe as soon as 2045 so if
we create shape-shifting robot computers
through claytronics by 2020 and true AI
by 2045 it would only be a matter of
time before they become our robotic
overlords rights well there's still one
fatal flaw in building robots that can
transform and combine to become more
than meets the eye and it's not in the
robots themselves or their AI in fact
the biggest problem is also the most
stupidest and yes I know I did that
grammatically incorrect for effect I
know it's more stupider the issue
believe it or not is this that's right
friends there's one big issue holding
back the advent of transformers in the
real world and it's a problem that we
faced all our lives batteries aren't
included yes from the days of your
battery draining superscope 6-tier
transformers megatron walkie talkie
radio to the line you say yourself every
single day I need to go charge my phone
batteries are what are holding us back
the most even though our circuits are
going microscale and our computers are
getting more and more powerful we can't
say the same about batteries in the past
60 years we've seen a trillion fold
increase in computing power that's no
exaggeration a literal trillion fold
increase in computing power but since
2007 phone battery life has only
improved by 22 percent and the size of
the thing is still relatively huge
compared to the size of the phone the
problem isn't creating transformers it's
powering them entirely new power source
systems just don't exist for these sorts
of super-advanced robot AI hybrids and
it's standing between us and the
transformer revolution my friend well at
least until they become our overlords
and start harvesting human electrical
potential to fuel them like the matrix I
mean what but hey that's just a theory
Oh film theory
and cuts seriously though we all know
that the matrix human battery thing is
complete fiction so no need to leave the
note in the comments I know you will
anyway though you already have so if
you're a fan of film series like this
one then you must like the idea of
bringing fictional worlds into real life
well if that's the case then you should
click right here to check out my series
game lab over on the game theorist
channel where we take the same idea but
do it to video games and even if you
don't like video games I promise you're
gonna get a kick out of this one if you
like fantasy movies well then check out
the episode where we see jackass 'el how
about action movies watch us to fuse a
bomb opening the box now like The Matrix
then you're gonna get a kick out of the
hacker episode you gain access to a
network and from there you keep on
people doing dumb stuff with animals
will watch me ride an ostrich it's on
YouTube bread but all the episodes are
out right now so if you get a free trial
you can binge them all over the weekend
and then you know decide what you want
to do with your subscription from that
point forward I'm not gonna tell you
what to do you could cancel you could be
overwhelmed by the amount of quality
YouTube bread programming though and
stick with that subscription I just
really want you to watch my show that's
that's really all I care about
in fact the Streamy Awards just
nominated the series is the best
non-fiction series on the internet which
is a huge honor and points to how much
hard work went into it so if you checked
it out honestly I'd really appreciate it
just click this ostrich head to hop on
over now if you'll excuse me next week
we're going to the final frontier see
you then