I wonder if this is how birds ‘work’?
Category Archives: Too Cool not to post
Screen capture of the live NASA feed of the Mars landing early this morning
We live in the coolest of times. It seems that not even Obama’s directive to make NASA’s priority Muslim outreach could stop NASA from doing near-miracles in research and science.
18 year old Australian engineering student makes levitating light with WIRELESS POWER supply
CERN announces the birth of a brand new baby boson.
Isn’t this why they built it? Whats next for CERN I wonder? Are they all gonna pack up and go back to waiting tables now? What about the Tachyon, I think we need to find the tachyon. That way we can either go back in time or cover our lawns with plastic birds.
From ABC.Net
World awaits Higgs boson announcement
Monday, 2 July 2012 Robert Evans
Reuters
The Higgs Boson is a vital component of the ‘Standard Model’ (CERN)
Related Stories
- Higgs boson: Have they found it?, Science Online, 12 Dec 2011
- Higgs boson may be a mirage, Science Online, 23 Aug 2011
- Does my Higgs boson look big in this?, Science Online, 26 May 2011
Physicists around the world are preparing for an announcement this Wednesday that is tipped to confirm the existence of the Higgs boson.
The Higgs boson is said to have appeared out of the chaos of the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago and turned the flying debris from that primeval explosion into galaxies, stars, and planets.
Its formal discovery, according to a broad scientific consensus, would be the greatest advance in knowledge of the universe in decades.
But until now, in the four decades of research since its existence was first posited, no-one has claimed to have more than seen a hint of the Higgs Boson.
This may be about to change.
At 5:00 pm (AEST) this Wednesday, two separate teams at the CERN particle physics research centre near Geneva, are expected to announce that they have spotted it.
Or at least something that looks incredibly like it.
“Think of it as a smoking duck,” says Oliver Buchmueller, a senior scientist on one of the teams, the CMS.
“If it walks like a Higgs and it quacks like a Higgs, then we would have to at least consider the possibility that we have a prominent new member of the boson family on our hands.”
The Higgs Boson is a vital component of the ‘Standard Model’ – the all-encompassing 30-year-old scientific theory of how the universe works at the simplest level.
Without it, says US physicist Matt Strassler, “nothing like human beings, or the earth we live on, could exist”.
Click to continue:
Real-time, brain-scanning speller gives the silent a voice
Western secular, Judeo-Christian science and culture. Healing the sick. Increasing our abilities. Relieving suffering. Breaking new ground. Acting on genuine compassion for the down-side of the human condition.
Gizmag:
By Darren Quick
02:19 June 29, 2012
Researchers have developed technology that automatically decode distinct brain patterns to allow individuals to spell out sentences (Image: Shutterstock)
Researchers at Maastricht University in The Netherlands have developed a device that gives a voice to those who are completely unable to speak or move at all. Building on previous work using functional magnetic imaging (fMRI) technology, which allowed individuals to give yes/no responses or answer multiple-choice questions, the new approach allows for full, unscripted back-and-forth conversations.
FMRI is a non-invasive technique that measures brain activity by detecting the changes in blood oxygenation and flow that occur in response to neural activity. It has previously been used to assess consciousness in people described as being in an unconscious, vegetative state and enable them to answer yes/no questions. This was then expanded to allow individuals to answer the equivalent of multiple-choice questions having four or fewer possible answers.
Breaking: Private company does indeed plan to mine asteroids… and I think they can do it
No idea how realistic this is, but I believe they are sincere, and I believe these are the kinds of people who drive mankind and civilization forward, not to mention critical new technologies.
From Discover magazine.
Planetary Resources, Inc. is not your average startup: its mission is to investigate and eventually mine asteroids in space!
Last week, the company issued a somewhat cryptic announcement saying they “will overlay two critical sectors – space exploration and natural resources – to add trillions of dollars to the global GDP”. I predicted this meant they wanted to mine asteroids, and yes, I will toot my own horn: I was right. They’re holding a press conference Tuesday morning to officially announce they’re going asteroid hunting.
The company had a pretty fierce amount of credibility right off the bat, with several ex-NASA engineers, an astronaut, and planetary scientists involved, as well as the backing of not one but several billionaires, including a few from Google… not to mention James Cameron. The co-founders of Planetary Resources are Peter Diamandis — he created the highly-successful X-Prize Foundation, to give cash awards to incremental accomplishments that will help achieve technological breakthroughs, including those for space travel — and Eric Anderson, X-Prize board member and Chairman of the Board of the Space Spaceflight Federation.
These are very, very heavy hitters. Clearly, they’re not screwing around.
So what’s the deal?
Step 1
I spoke with Planetary Resources President and Chief Engineer Chris Lewicki on the phone Monday. He has an excellent pedigree: Lewicki was Flight Director for the NASA’s Spirit and Opportunity Mars rover missions, and also Mission Manager for the Mars Phoenix lander surface operations. So when he says he’s confident the company can and will succeed, I’m willing to listen.
This appears to be a webcast of the launch of this company, or the IPO, not sure.
Mars Viking Robots ‘Found Life’
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Discovery:
Mathematical analysis adds to growing body of work questioning the negative results of a life-detection experiment 36 years ago.
- By Irene Klotz
Thu Apr 12, 2012 12:23 PM ET
THE GIST
- New results question the finding that the Mars Viking experiments did not find life.
- The analysis was based on studying the mathematically complexity of the experiment results.
- The idea is that living systems are more complicated than purely physical ones, a concept that can be represented mathematically.
Viking 2 Lander image (dated Nov. 2, 1976) showing the rocks of Utopia Planitia in the background. Click to enlarge this image.
NASA
New analysis of 36-year-old data, resuscitated from printouts, shows NASA found life on Mars, an international team of mathematicians and scientists conclude in a paper published this week.
Further, NASA doesn’t need a human expedition to Mars to nail down the claim, neuropharmacologist and biologist Joseph Miller, with the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine, told Discovery News.
“The ultimate proof is to take a video of a Martian bacteria. They should send a microscope — watch the bacteria move,” Miller said.
“On the basis of what we’ve done so far, I’d say I’m 99 percent sure there’s life there,” he added.
PHOTOS: Top 10 Places To Find Alien Life
Miller’s confidence stems in part from a new study that re-analyzed results from a life-detection experiment conducted by NASA’s Viking Mars robots in 1976.
I believe this is a benchmark moment in human history
**** Gizmag on the potential validity or not of this event****
I would just like to thank all the forces in history from the ancient Greeks to now, that have conspired to allow this moment to happen.
Unless I am mistaken, this is a first of sorts. But even if not, it is a truly beautiful thing nonetheless. It is a product of the enlightenment. A dream of Leonardo Davinci. A testament to what is best in the human conditions of both determination, frivolity and the courage to dream. Perhaps I am making too much of this, but these are the sorts of things I have lived for since being a child. Portable phones with video. Landing on the moon! And human powered flight.
Thank you for indulging me.
Eeyore.
Very cool new US navy weapon
Once again we see that without doubt the US has the coolest weapons out there by far. The only issue that remains is, does the US have the will to win an armed conflict? Will they actually use it against a determined foe? We will probably know soon.
Very cool new vehicle technology, and look who has the only video!?!?
First, the article linked here and partially reproduced below.
From Yahoo.com:
(Click above to read whole article)
Gibbs Amphibians Introduces Phibian and Humdinga High Speed Amphitrucks
Press Release: Gibbs Amphibians – Tue, Feb 7, 2012 2:29 PM EST
(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120207/CG49242)
Gibbs Amphibians introduced the Phibian today at an event preceding the American Society of Naval Engineers (ASNE) annual conference. Equipped with Gibbs Amphibians’ proprietary High Speed Amphibian (HSA) technology, Phibian joins Humdinga in the Gibbs Amphibians commercial portfolio, two new amphitrucks capable of many uses, including military and rescue roles.
Phibian and Humdinga feature Gibbs’ proprietary High Speed Amphibian (HSA) technology, which incorporates many technological breakthroughs in suspension, water propulsion and wheel-retraction design. The water-jet propulsion system enables safe operation in shallow water yet provides the high levels of thrust necessary to achieve planing speeds within seconds. A patented retracting suspension system provides exceptional ride-and-handling on the road, but in the water retracts wheels in seconds to reduce hull drag in marine use.
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Below, a video of the amphitruck, however not from the article. I searched youtube and found the video here
Perhaps some of you may want to click through to the youtube page that hosts the video and see if you find anything peculiar about it, or am I just being paranoid…
Cool military tech
Beats a grenade in the crotch
It would appear that the US may have something to lose by cutting ties with Israel as well.
Ill take 50 of these please
Click full screen, click play, sit back and be in awe
More Surfing Videos
Thanks TL
New camera captures movement of light itself
Since I came into being, a number of things scientists told me as a child that were “utterly impossible” have come to pass, much of which is now so common it is barely worth a mention.
Now, another one of those impossible things. A video of the movement of light itself.
Japanese man plays baseball with himself in space.
You know, there’s a pingpong joke in their somewhere but I’m not gonna touch it. It is cool though, sort of, to see a guy be pitcher, batter and catcher all in the same play.