A tail of two biddies

Old people fall down. That’s just an actuarial fact. Old people and drunks, but the drunks don’t usually hit the dirt and then die two months later. So. When you’re old, you should work on your balance. That’s what I’ve been doing. Using my own muscles, like a caveman.

There’s no need to go to all that trouble, though, now that the Japanese have invented a robotic strap-on tail. It’s called Arque, and it estimates the wearer’s center of gravity and shifts around with its own robotic muscles to compensate for balance failures. Many animals, such as cats and mice, use their tails to maintain balance and posture, and researchers at Keio University reasoned that a suitably trained tail might keep our elders upright.

It makes sense for such an innovation to come out of Japan, whose population skews elderly. Falls are the leading cause of injury-related death among older adults in Japan; being flattened by a falling Acme safe comes in a distant second.

“What kind of tail would you like if you could have a tail?” is one of those great party questions. Most people have opinions. Cat tails are popular because they look nice. I was impressed by the friend who wanted a kangaroo tail so he could shoot it out behind him and sit on it like a stadium stool. Me, I thought a pig tail might be fun. Nobody isn’t cheered up by a pig tail. The pig’s tail is designed to improve the rear view of the pig. But pigs don’t use their tails for balance. They rely on being too wide to fall over.

The Arque robotic tail, however, looks nothing like a sleek, sexy cat tail. It’s all a bunch of large, linked naked vertebrae and thus brings to mind almost any of your standard bipedal dinosaurs, which were also known for their naked boneage. There would be a clear secondary market for suitably attractive tail coverings here, if indeed there is a market for the tail at all. But for a demographic that has historically shunned tiny hearing aids because they make them look “old,” it’s hard to see how a T. rex aesthetic is going to catch fire. And nothing about these tails is going to make taking mass transit any easier.

Not only that, but the pneumatic actuators on the device make noise. We have been conditioned to recoil from excess noise in the tail region. Speaking of, is this thing going to roll up like a pug’s tail when you need to use the potty? Because otherwise you’re better off sticking with the walkers and the grab bars.

One reason the Arque, in its current beta mode, will keep people from falling is that all the tubing to operate it is attached to a massive compressor so you’re only going to be able to go as far as bending down for the remote. You’re not sprinting around with the thing. Most accidents occur within 25 miles of your home, but not that many within a yard and a half.

I don’t know. If the goal is keeping our senior population upright, wouldn’t a nice stout hoop skirt work just as well?

If I were to mine the prehistoric population for a useful tail, I think I’d opt for the ankylosaur model. You’re already low to the ground and built like a tank, and you have a massive club on the end of your tail to whack people with.

That’ll get you some room on the subway.