Inventing Iron Man

by E. Paul Zehr

  Figure 7.3 shows what an implantable defibrillator looks like when inside someone. The wires from the implanted defibrillator (see label “electrodes in heart”) snake down into the priming chambers, the atria, and into the main pumping chambers, the ventricles. While Tony is carrying on doing his daily work or sporting around as Iron Man, the ICD will continually measure and monitor the beating of his heart. When and if a series of irregular contractions is detected in his ventricles, the ICD will provide an electrical pulse to reset and restore the natural heart rhythm. The device also has the ability to increase the strength of the pulse if the restoration of heart rate doesn’t occur. Although Tony and Professor Yinsen wired up the electric chest plate in Tales of Suspense #39 in 1963, it was actually in 1980 that the first human implantation of a defibrillator was performed. So, even if we revise the origin story a bit, it still presages actual scientific advances that came later! Iron Man science fiction and Iron Man science do link up.

  Figure 7.3. An implantable defibrillator. Courtesy Medtronic, Inc.

  What If Iron Man Goes Haywire?

  Raise your hand if you have never had a computer problem. Ever. It could have been hardware or software—or maybe even neither if you were extremely lucky! If you didn’t raise your hand, I am not going to say you are a liar, but maybe you have a selective memory? Almost all of us have had some form of computer malfunction from time to time. It has been frustrating and may have affected our ability to work or complete some project. Well, imagine what would happen if you had the same kind of glitches while inside Iron Man? Would Iron Man get viruses and what kind of malfunctions might he have? And what might it mean if such a machine ever ran amok?

  This isn’t a main theme for this book—it could be a whole book unto itself. But it needs to at least be considered here in the context of keeping things running smoothly. This very theme has been addressed numerous times in the Iron Man comics. A recent example was part of the humungous all-encompassing Marvel Secret Invasion story arc, which dealt with the Skrull having infiltrated earth’s great superheroes and being poised to take over the planet. As part of the takeover invasion, they have managed to slip a virus into the Iron Man operating system. In the Secret Invasion (2008) graphic novel collection, Tony is shown inside the Iron Man suit—and not doing well. At all. The computer voiceover says, “Starktech armor: Complete system failure. Virus detected. All systems failing.” Tony responds by saying, “I need to disconnect my bioware. The tech virus is hitting me like pneumonia. I have at least a hundred and two fever.” This computer crash effectively takes Iron Man out of the picture.

  An even more ominous example of a dangerous robotic suit of armor gone wild played out in Iron Man Hypervelocity. In this story arc, the idea of software and artificial intelligence is a major theme. Tony quips, “Ever get enraged by having to deal with poorly programmed and inadequately debugged software? Well, you should try being made out of software, like I am now.” Later, the suit develops a mind of its own and goes berserk. Tony says “the latest iteration of my Iron Man armor has developed autonomous sentience and, presumably, gone rogue.” This is a bit of a problem, as you could well imagine, both in Tony Stark’s world and in our own. What kind of safeguards could be put in place to offset this?

  Well, it is an open question but this issue was specifically addressed by the legendary and visionary author Isaac Asimov. In his amazing and influential 1942 short story “Runaround,” Asimov laid down the Three Laws of Robotics: (1) a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm; (2) a robot must obey orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law; (3) a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

  Clearly the control systems for the Iron Man suit would need to have safeguards that incorporate these laws. However, Asimov did not envision (or maybe he did!) the kind of military application that Iron Man essentially presents. That is, Iron Man in action is routinely breaking the First Law! That is, causing harm or injury to a human being. Sure, they are bad guys, but how can this conflict be reconciled? Good question. And one for which I have no clear answer. Hopefully as we move down the road that could lead to such an item, someone else—maybe one of you reading right now—will come up with the answers. The huge problems of not having such a rock-solid safeguard were well shown in the 2010 Iron Man 2 movie. Ivan Vanko, using Justin Hammer’s technology, was able to hack into the War Machine operating system. With Jim Rhodes helplessly watching (or actually an unwilling participant inside War Machine), Vanko controls the suit to try and kill Iron Man—or Tony Stark really. This is big technology with big problems in need of big solutions. In the next chapter, we will look at whether Tony has the “right stuff” to come up with those solutions by exploring the mind of the “genius” inventor.

  CHAPTER EIGHT Visions of the Vitruvian Man

  IS INVENTION REALLY ONLY ONE PART INSPIRATION?

  I’ll be even better … once you shoot me up … with a reconfigured Extremis dose … I’m just a man in an iron suit. I’ve spent months in my garage trying to increase the armor’s response time. And it’s still. Not. Fast. Enough. I need to wire the armor directly into my brain. Extremis could do that…. I need to be the suit … I need to grow new connections.

  —Tony talking to Maya Hansen, Iron Man: Extremis (2007)

  Howard Stark: “It’s big enough.”

  Tony Stark: “It’s just a prototype, Dad. It’s a lot easier to do the preliminary work when it’s super-sized.”

  Howard: “What’s the range? Flying, I mean.”

  Tony: “Fly! Give me a break, Dad, this thing weighs a ton. So far all it can do is hover and bounce.”

  —A conversation between father and son in a reinvented Iron Man origin story, Ultimate Iron Man, vol. 1 (2006)

  I have no particular talent, I am merely extremely inquisitive.” So said Albert Einstein (1879–1955), one of the most celebrated scientists of all time. To this we can add the quote of Addison Altholz that “necessity is the mother of invention.” The very birth of Iron Man in the hands of Tony Stark speaks directly to these themes.

  Although Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) is most widely associated with his art (for example, that fairly well-known painting of someone known as “Mona Lisa” and that little sketch of “The Last Supper”), he has also been labeled one of the greatest, most innovative, and most forward-thinking inventors the world has ever seen. And with good reason. He combined many aspects of arts and sciences to become the original and prototypical Renaissance man. He created many machine-based inventions like the helicopter and the tank that just weren’t possible to be implemented in his lifetime.

  Sir Isaac Newton (1643–1727) represents another great example of genius, necessity, and invention. We usually see Newton being depicted as deep in thought under an apple tree. Then the apple falls, hits him on the head, and he is supposed to then be inspired to create a theory of gravity and gravitation. He is clearly one of the most influential—if not singularly the most important—scientist ever. What is not as well known is that, simultaneously with but independently from Gottfried Liebnitz (1646–1716), he also refined the mathematical language of calculus. Calculus was a necessity for the mathematics needed for Newton’s studies of mechanics. So if we include invention to not represent solely a new device (Hey! I just invented a new mousetrap—here it is) but rather to include the development of fundamental and powerful new ideas, clearly da Vinci and Newton were great inventors.

  Closely linked with discovery and invention is creativity. Have you ever spent much time thinking about creative thought? I am trying to get at that kind of thinking that—please suitably prepare yourself as I am about to use a hugely overused phrase—is often called “outside the box.” Some people seem to have a real capacity for insight and creativity that they can tap into with tremendous success. In a book about the plausibility of differ
ent aspects of Iron Man, it is really worth asking how such an invention could be created in the first place. In my view, that means probing the basis for brilliance, discovery, and invention in science and engineering. Sadly there isn’t really a recipe or user guide of steps to follow to become the next Benjamin Franklin. However, by examining a bit about the lives of some great inventors and pioneers related to Iron Man, I think we can take a glimpse into the process of “divine insight.”

  There are rather a large number of brilliant scientists and inventors in recorded history and it would be a bit much to talk about all of them here. So, for the rest of our exploration on invention and creativity, I think we should stick to those people who made discoveries that were fundamentally related to the main technology of Iron Man that we have been exploring: inventors who have done things that would help realize the vision of Iron Man.

  Accidentally on Purpose

  I must admit that, as a scientist, one of my pet peeves is the idea (mistaken in my view) that you can actually specifically target and deliberately direct creativity in science and engineering research and discovery. While we often partition out creativity in the arts as separate from creativity in the sciences, I think they represent one and the same deep process. This makes the opening of this chapter and the discussion of Leonardo da Vinci as an artist and scientific inventor highly relevant. What would da Vinci have produced if he was told “you have two years to make me a pretty picture”?

  This also brings up a quote from a comedy sketch by my all-time favorite group, Monty Python’s Flying Circus. In a sketch entitled “A Book at Bedtime” and aired on Monty Python’s Flying Circus in 1971, we can hear: “Would Albert Einstein ever have hit upon the theory of relativity if he hadn’t been clever? All these tremendous leaps forward have been taken in the dark. Would Rutherford ever have split the atom if he hadn’t tried? Could Marconi have invented the radio if he hadn’t by pure chance spent years working at the problem? Are these amazing breakthroughs ever achieved except by years and years of unremitting study? Of course not. What I said earlier about accidental discoveries must have been wrong.”

  This shows in some ways the opposite idea—that non-targeted discoveries get portrayed as targeted. I suggest instead that the process of creativity and discovery in science and engineering is a highly nonlinear and abstract one. It requires, to use that old expression, an open mind. A mind that is not constrained in any way, at least in the initial stages of forming the ideas. Implementing the ideas—putting the invention into play so to speak—clearly does have to be related to a realistic appreciation of what may be possible. In “With Iron Hands, Part 3” (Iron Man: Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. #31, 2007), Tony Stark is thinking about the direct neural integration of his armor when he says, “I have full mental control over the Extremis armor—all the time. Even when it’s deactivated. The trick is to zero in on the control systems…. One part engineering, one part inspiration.” The last bit is the most important. Engineering combined with inspiration. But what inspires?

  And the Inventor Is …

  It seems fairly clear that the skill set needed to invent Iron Man requires someone with an extraordinary and fertile mix. Creative thought, a strong will to succeed and pursue ideas at all costs, a technical knack for electrical and mechanical engineering, a deep appreciation of the neuroscience and kinesiology of how the body moves and works, and a ridiculous sum of money to enable the fulsome pursuit of all this. One of the interesting twists on the inventor angle for Iron Man is that Tony isn’t just someone who creates the device but is also the very person who depends on the invention to survive.

  I want to focus on three modern-day inventors and technological pioneers in this chapter. Of relevance to the idea of Iron Man and Tony Stark, these three have all developed and actually used the devices they created. They are Yoshiyuki Sankai, creator of the HAL robotic exoskeleton; Phil Nuytten, diving pioneer and inventor of the Newt-suit; and Yves Rossy, inventor and pilot of the jetpack fixed wing.

  You will notice that I am limiting the discussion of invention and Iron Man to those inventors who intended to use their inventions and not just create something for others. Examples that come to mind that are relevant to the risky idea of robotic armor are the exploits of “birdmen,” sky flyers, and the Wright brothers. With any development idea, the concept of trial and error testing is pretty commonly applied. This means slowly making incremental progress on a problem by testing whether some new change helped or hindered. What is less obvious possibly is the fact that this means the inventor risks being part of the error. And if the device you are working on is something that is implantable and links directly to your nervous system or allows you to make very large powerful movements—even flying were the technology and energetics available—that error could be fatal. I want to explore this idea to put in perspective just how spectacular an invention Iron Man would really be. And how extra-ordinary it would be for any inventor to actually survive the process right through to the end.

  Since many of the images in Iron Man comic books and in the movies involve seeing Tony Stark flying around with his suit on, let’s begin with the concept of human flight. Please don’t think I have double-crossed you here! We did of course agree right up front in the introduction that the energetics and physics of really flying around in the Iron Man armor don’t currently exist and are unlikely to exist any time soon. I still think we can use this as a metaphor for the creative process and dangers associated with inventing such a device. This brings us very close to the idea that genius and madness and derring-do of invention and foolhardiness are all intimately related. With that said, let’s move on to the brilliant and daring Yves Rossy and his “fixed wing flyer.”

  The Skyflying “Jet-Man”: Yves Rossy

  Once upon a time a little Swiss boy named Yves Rossy (born August 27, 1958, in Neufchâtel) had a dream to fly like a bird. Lots of little boys (and girls, of course) have had a similar dream of being able to fly. (We can safely assume that Tony Stark had this dream sometime, perhaps many times, during the time after he developed the original Iron Man gray armor—although his initial dreams clearly involved also a whole lot of ammunition.) Often that dream goes unrealized and remains a really fanciful idea from youth. If it is realized, it often takes the form of becoming a pilot or in skydiving. Typically the dream would end there. And it did for a while for Yves Rossy. Yves was very fond of sports and did lots of running and biking but then became very interested in extreme sports.

  He initially trained as an engineer and then qualified as a fighter pilot in the Swiss military. For eight years, he flew the fighter jets Hunter, Tiger F-5, and Mirage III. He then flew commercial jets like the DC-9 and Boeing 747 for 12 years. However, those more than 20 years of military and civilian piloting didn’t relieve the itch of flying like a bird. Nor did his extensive experiences doing skydiving, hang gliding, paragliding, and aerial acrobatics. He needed to fly like a bird and that meant having wings and some form of power strapped to his back. So, Rossy became a skyflyer, someone who goes up in a plane as if to parachute to the ground but instead glides using wings. As described by Michael Abrams in his book Birdmen, Batmen, & Skyflyers, the ultimate goal is to be able to actually fly, not to fall more slowly. That means covering lots of horizontal distance with little vertical drop (think of a bird flying overhead—literally).

  You can see Yves Rossy in flight in figure 8.1. Panel A shows Yves on the ground, panel B is just after exiting the plane, and panel C is under power and flying. Many have attempted to do this over many centuries but one of the closest to this so far was Rossy. Using his customized carbon-fiber-based wing design, in 2003 he covered 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) of horizontal distance while falling only 3 kilometers (1.9 miles). However skilled he is at “flying man,” Rossy apparently preferred the idea of “jet-man” and so added a pair of kerosene-fueled jet engines to his repertoire. Using the jets with his wings allowed Rossy to make a groundbreaking flight on June 24, 2004. W
hile gliding down using his wings he then ignited his engines and was able to fly horizontally (about 15 meters above the ground) at almost 190 kmh (120 mph) for over four minutes. Yves Rossy has now performed sustained human flight at speeds of over 200 kmh (124 mph). In May 2011 he completed a historic eight-minute flight over the Grand Canyon. These successes have not come without risks, though, and that is something I want to highlight. Yves has had his share of crashes. Since Yves is a pioneer in the use of jet-pack flight with his fixed wing and this is the closest approximation we actually have to Iron Man in flight, I thought it might be interesting to talk to him. The following interview comes from that exchange.

  EPZ: What interested you in creating a jet-powered fixed wing? At what age did your interest start?

  YR: Many years ago! Flying is a passion; it’s a dream since I was a young child. I always wanted to fly. I was a fighter pilot; I am working now as a captain for Swiss Airlines, and I tried lots of sports such as skydiving, for example. It was great but finally it was only a fall. I decided then to create a wingsuit—to fly longer—and then a wing, to fly level and finally to fly up! I created a jet-propelled wing to realize my dream.

  EPZ: How is the “feel” of the fixed wing compared to your experiences in fighter jets?

  YR: It is such a different experience—it is very hard to compare. A 747, a Mirage Fighter Jet, and my wing do have a similarity though. The decisive moments are at the same time, when you take off. After that, it is only pleasure! The same in a 747, after the take off, you often fly using the autopilot. But I chose to devote all of my spare time to fly in the purest sense. Flying with my wing is an incredible feeling of liberty. It is awesome!