First hotel in space set to open in 2025 with cruise ship amenities and out-of-this-world views – FOX 13 News, Tampa Bay

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The Von Braun Station will feature 24 modules with a different dedicated function, the company said. In addition to the hotel, it will also hold research facilities, restaurants and bars. (Photo credit: The Gateway Foundation) The Von Braun Station will feature 24 modules with a different dedicated function, the company said. In addition to the hotel, it will also hold research facilities, restaurants and bars. (Photo credit: The Gateway Foundation)

ALTA LOMA, Calif. - Much like taking the family on a cruise or a trip to visit Mickey Mouse at Disney World, one California company believes that going to space will eventually become just another vacation option.

Design plans for the Von Braun Station, the first-ever hotel in space, have been revealed by the Gateway Foundation. Set to have the first 100 people on board by 2025 and be fully complete by 2027, the company said the Von Braun Station is designed to give tourists "the feel of home" with luxury suites, recreation halls, restaurants and bars while simultaneously floating in space with an out-of-this-world view.

It will also hold research facilities for governments, scientists and commercial interests, the foundation said.

"As a species we have had a transient and limited presence in space by a small number of specialists for over 58 years," Senior Design Architect Tim Alatorre told the architecture and design magazine Dezeen. "We want to change that and open up space to anyone who wishes to work or live in space."

When compared to the Stanley Kubrick movie "2001: A Space Odyssey," Altorre said the atmosphere of the station station hotel will be warmer with fabrics, lighting, paints and materials with texture to "help us to connect and feel at home."

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Some of the planned for activities at the luxury hotel in space could include low-gravity basketball, trampolining and rock climbing. Because the majority of the station will initially have about a sixth of Earth's gravity and other parts with near zero gravity, there's also potential for playing fictional games like Quidditch from the Harry Potter series and the battle games from the Ender's Game series, Altorre told Dezeen.

"There will also be many of the things you see on cruise ships: restaurants, bars, musical concerts, movie screenings, and educational seminars," Alatorre told Dezeen. "Eventually, we plan on offering excursions in true space ships (not designed to return to Earth) out to other stations or the moon."

Alatorre said astronaut Scott Kelly's recent stay on the International Space Station for nearly a year made clear that "long term habitation of space in microgravity is not sustainable." The senior design architect said the main objective for the Von Braun Station is to be the first space station to have artificial gravity, allowing a permanent culture of people living and working in Earth's orbit.

The station is planned to have a total population of 350 to 450 people, including more than 100 crew.

When it comes to the logistics of holding hundreds of people, Altorre told Dezeen that the majority of food will be served in one of the two restaurants on the station "with all of the dishes you would expect on a luxury cruise ship or in a major hotel."

With artificial gravity, the restroom facilities will function "almost identically" to how they are on Earth, Altorre said. Drinking water will be brought from Earth, and showers and toilets will use recycled water.

Alatorre told Dezeen that much of the technology and overall architecture of the Von Braun Station was "heavily influenced" by the International Space Station, but varies on the way it will be constructed. While the ISS was assembled in orbit using the labor of astronauts performing space walks, this station will primarily be constructed in space by automated and semi-autonomous systems.

The space hotel design was named after Dr. Wernher von Braun, a rocket scientist and space architect who popularized the rotating space station concept first in Germany and later in the United States. Members of the Gateway Foundation "overwhelmingly" voted for the name earlier this year.

This story was reported from Cincinnati.

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First hotel in space set to open in 2025 with cruise ship amenities and out-of-this-world views - FOX 13 News, Tampa Bay

Designs revealed for incredible new space hotel – CNN

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(CNN) It's 50 years since man first stepped on the moon, and we're still harboring dreams of escaping life on Earth for the mysteries of space.

If a career as an astronaut isn't for you, perhaps the promise of a sojourn in a space hotel might be appealing.

Among the stars

According to digitally rendered video and images released by the Gateway Foundation, the station resembles a rotating wheel, comprised of 24 modules, orbiting the Earth.

But how would the physics of the hotel work?

Tim Alatorre, senior design architect at the Gateway Foundation, says the rotating wheel would create a simulated gravity.

Near the center of the station there's no artificial gravity, Alatorre says, but as you move down the outside of the station, the feeling of gravity increases.

A close-up of the modules.

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

The Gateway Foundation's hotel design is named for Wernher von Braun, an aerospace engineer who pioneered rocket technology, first in Germany and later in the United States.

This could be viewed as a controversial move. While living in Germany, von Braun was involved in the Nazi rocket development program. He later worked on the Apollo space program in the United States.

The name was voted for by the Gateway Foundation members because the station is based on designs von Braun sketched out some 60 years ago.

"The basic physics of the station haven't changed since the 1950s, the way the station rotates," says Alatorre.

The main difference is the modern materials -- new metal alloys, carbon composites, 3D printing and launch pad technology that, says Alatorre, make a space hotel more probable in our current era.

What the space hotel might look like inside.

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

Space tourism is an expensive game -- Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic plans to launch passengers into sub-orbital space at the hefty sum of $250,000 per person, per trip.

Meanwhile, Aurora Station says a stay in its space hotel will cost an eyewatering $9.5 million.

Price wise, in the early phases the Von Braun hotel will also be catering to those with dollars to spend, but the foundation is hoping to make it equivalent to "a trip on a cruise or a trip to Disneyland."

Aurora Station aims to sleep just 12, whereas the Von Braun Station will sleep 352 people with a maximum capacity of 450.

Warm aesthetic

The Von Braun Station is going for an Earth-bound aesthetic.

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

So what will Von Braun Station be like inside?

Alatorre says the hotel's aesthetic was a direct response to the Stanley Kubrick movie "2001: A Space Odyssey" -- just maybe not in the way you might think.

"It was almost a blueprint of what not to do," says Alatorre. "I think the goal of Stanley Kubrick was to highlight the divide between technology and humanity and so, purposefully, he made the stations and the ships very sterile and clean and alien."

It's supposed to be the opposite of the Stanley Kubrick movie "2001: A Space Odyssey"

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

Instead, Alatorre wanted to bring a slice of earth to space, to avoid a laboratorial, overly Star Trek-esque feel.

On board, there'll be warm suites with carpets and stylish monochrome touches and chic bars that wouldn't look out of place back on Earth, just with star-gazing views.

There will also be plenty of fun recreational activities for guest to enjoy, says Alatorre.

"We're going to have a number of different recreation activities and games that'll highlight the fact that you're able to do things that you can't do on Earth," he says. "Because of the weightlessness and the reduced gravity, you'll be able to jump higher, be able to lift things, be able to run in ways that you can't on Earth."

A sport that's intriguingly called "supersize basketball" is one such concept, according to Alatorre.

'Starship culture'

The Von Braun station hopes to launch in 2025.

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

If it all sounds like a space-age gimmick, Alatorre is emphatic that the concept will have widespread, enduring appeal.

"People will want to go and experience this just because it's a cool new thing and they've never done it before," he admits.

"But our goal -- the overall goal of the Gateway Foundation -- is to create a starship culture where people are going to space, and living in space, and working in space and they want to be in space. And we believe that there's a demand for that."

That means having space be a place where thousands of people are "living, working and thriving."

The Gateway Foundation also intends the space station to be used for research purposes, as well as asteroid mining.

Alatorre says the Von Braun hotel wants to be "the first in orbit," but that even if the Gateway Foundation doesn't launch by 2025, the company knows one of its competitors will.

Space tourism is the future, he says, and the Gateway Foundation believe that future's imminent.

Sustainability in space

The hotel is pitching itself as sustainable.

Courtesy Gateway Foundation

Given the design is still exactly that -- just a design -- there are some questions that remain unanswered about how the space hotel will function in actuality.

For example, it's been suggested that living in low gravity for an extended period of time is damaging to the human body. While vacationers will probably only visit the hotel for a few weeks, staff will plan to be there for six months to a year.

They'll adjust schedules as needed, says Alatorre, but right now, the foundation thinks this proposition would be "perfectly safe."

There's also the sustainability question, as people look for more eco-friendly vacations, surely going to space is not the solution?

Alatorre points to SpaceX's Raptor engine, which uses methane instead of petroleum-based fuel, suggesting "eco-friendly" rocket designs are the future.

He says recycling will be woven into the fabric of the space hotel.

"On the station itself, it's going to be about the most environmentally friendly vacation you'll ever have. Because we're recycling everything," says Alatorre.

"There's no amount of water or trash or waste that is going to be discarded, everything will be recycled, reused, stored, converted to some other form."

Terrestrial construction on the Gateway Foundation's project is set to begin October 1, 2019.

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Designs revealed for incredible new space hotel - CNN

First space hotel set to open in 2025 with cruise ship, Disney World amenities – WSB Atlanta

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First space hotel set to open in 2025 with cruise ship, Disney World amenities

The first hotel in orbit above the Earth is set to open in just over six years, according to the ambitious plans of the company anticipating the worlds first space tourists.

>> Read more trending news

The Gateway Foundation unveiled its designs for a rotating space station that will produce differing levels of artificial gravity and will accommodate up to 100 tourists a week when it opens in 2025, according to news reports.

Named the Von Braun Station after rocket technology pioneer Wernher von Braun, Gateway said on its website that its working with national space agencies to research low gravity while assembling the station and also providing space tourists who want to experience life on a large space station with the comfort of low gravity and the feel of a nice hotel.

Using technology for the construction of the International Space Station, the Von Braun station will consist of two concentric structural rings connected together by spokes that will support a so-called Habitation Ring of large, pressurized modules, Gateway officials said.

The foundation said the station will include an array of modules, including an air water power module, a gym module, a kitchen, restaurant and bar module. There will also be a crew quarters; privately owned modules for villas, hotels and commercial uses and government-owned modules for research and training.

Initial activities for tourists might include low-gravity basketball, low-gravity rock climbing and trampolining, Von Braun Station design architect Tim Alatorre said, according to ABC News, which sited the architecture and design magazine Dezeen.

Alatorre predicted travel to the station would compare with a cruise or a Disney World vacation with activities like concerts, movies and seminars.

Others are getting in on the race to commercialize space, including NASA, which announced this summer it expected to open the International Space Station to tourists by 2020.

2019 Cox Media Group.

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First space hotel set to open in 2025 with cruise ship, Disney World amenities - WSB Atlanta

First Trailer for Space Station Survival Thriller ‘3022’ with Omar Epps – First Showing

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by Alex BillingtonSeptember 18, 2019Source: YouTube

"We're all that's left!" An official trailer has arrived for an intriguing indie sci-fi film titled 3022, the latest from producer / director John Suits (The Scribbler, Pandemic). It's hard to tell if that title refers to the year, or something else. The film is about a crew of four astronauts stuck on a dying space station after Earth experiences a cataclysmic event. They watch this happen, then spend the rest of the time trying to figure out what to do and how to survive. Starring Omar Epps, with Kate Walsh, Miranda Cosgrove, Jorja Fox, Angus Macfadyen, and Audrey Looye. This really doesn't look too bad. Way too many lens flares being used, but otherwise seems like a much better take on the concept from The Cloverfield Project about people trapped in space when Earth suddenly goes bye bye. I really hope it's better! Check out the first look below.

Here's the first official trailer for John Suits' 3022, found directly on YouTube:

After Earth suffers a cataclysmic extinction-level event, four astronauts now marooned on a dying space station must embark on a desperate fight for survival amidst the mind-shattering horror of what it means to be the last humans alive. 3022, also known as Correction, is directed by American filmmaker / producer John Suits, director of the movies Breathing Room, 2nd Take, The Scribbler, and Pandemic previously; producer of many other indie features. The screenplay is written by Ryan Binaco. This hasn't premiered at any festivals or elsewhere, as far as we know. 3022 will be released later this year - stay tuned for more info.

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First Trailer for Space Station Survival Thriller '3022' with Omar Epps - First Showing

Brad Pitt to Speak with NASA Astronaut on Space Station about Artemis Program – PRNewswire

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WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- As NASA prepares to send the first woman and next man to the Moon by 2024 under theArtemis program, Brad Pitt is playing an astronaut in his latest film. Now the actor will have the opportunity to discuss what it's truly like to live and work in space with a NASA crew member living aboard the International Space Station.

Pitt's Earth-to-space call will air live at 11:35 a.m. EDT Monday, Sept. 16 on NASA Television and the agency'swebsite.

NASA astronautNick Haguewill answer questions from the actor. For nearly 20 years, astronauts have continuously lived and work on the International Space Station, testing technologies, performing science and developing the skills needed to explore farther from Earth.

InAd Astra, which Hague and his Expedition 60crewmates recently watched during their downtime aboard the orbiting laboratory, Pitt travels across the solar system, including to theMoon and Mars. Without providing spoilers, the parallels between the movie and the current state of human spaceflight stop there, making the film more science fiction than reality.However, the agency did provide visuals for the film and some technical expertise.

"We reviewed a script of Ad Astra early in production," said Bert Ulrich, the agency's liaison for film and TV collaborations at NASA Headquarters in Washington."Although there was no NASA storyline, we provided some of the exciting images and footage for the film especially of the Moon and Mars.Sci-fi films like Ad Astra, the Martian, Interstellar, and Gravity take movie audiences out of this world incorporating some of NASA's most inspirational photography and footage."

Inspiring the next generation of explorers the Artemis Generation ensures America will continue to lead in space exploration and discovery. Additional information about working with the agency on a feature or fictional film is available online under theMedia Usage Guidelines.

The agency is planning to return astronauts to the Moon in the next five years with commercial and international partners. First, NASAwill send a suite of new science instruments and technology demonstrations to the Moon oncommercial landers.

Following the 2024 crew landing, NASA will send astronauts to the Moon about once per year thereafter and establish sustainable lunar exploration by 2028. After gaining experience at the Moon testing new systems, such as NASA's Space Launch System rocket, Orionspacecraft,Gateway,andhuman landers, NASA will take humanity's next giant leap, sending astronauts to Mars.

Follow America's Moon to Mars exploration at:

https://www.nasa.gov/topics/moon-to-mars

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Fox’s ‘Ad Astra’ Bets on More Than Just Space Spectacle to Draw Moviegoers – Hollywood Reporter

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Brad Pitt, very much in the public eye after a well-received performance in Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, is back in theaters on Sept. 20 with Ad Astra. Directed by James Gray, the movie has Pitt starring as astronaut Roy McBride. When mysterious events begin occurring around the world and the safety of the planet at stake, McBride is called upon to travel to deep space to investigate. The reason hes selected is that these events may be tied to his father Clifford, an astronaut himself who disappeared decades ago but who, it turns out, may still be alive.

The movie is one of the titles inherited by Disney when it acquired Fox earlier this year. Other Fox holdovers such as Dark Phoenix and Stuber have disappointed at the box office, and with a mid-teen millions opening weekend forecast by tracking estimates the movie would have a long way toward breaking out as a hit. However,Ad Astrais being positioned as awards contender, with an 82 percent "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on positive early festival reviews backing that up.

To sell the movie not based on any existing property or material the studio has run a campaign focused on the emotional drama of Pitts McBride and how he deals with his personal issues while also trying to save the world.

The Posters

An astronaut presumably Roy is floating in mid-space on the first poster (by marketing agency WORKS ADV), his body fuzzy as if its being distorted or pulled apart in some manner. The mysterious nature of the story is communicated through the copy The answers we seek are just outside our reach. Later that month the second poster came out that showed Roy looking out from his helmet. The third poster, released in July, shows Pitts face more clearly as he stands in what seems to be a space station. The same copy from the first two posters is used again here.

A silhouette of Pitt is seen on the IMAX poster, the sun shining over one shoulder and a field of stars shown within the outline of his body. Floating there is the same fuzzy astronaut seen on the first poster, this time seen to be hurtling toward Earth without the benefit of a ship or other protection other than his suit. On the Dolby Cinemas poster the focus is more on perspective, the shadow of an astronaut and his space station seen as small and seemingly insignificant against the massive fiery glow of the sun in the background.

The Trailers

The first trailer (5.3 million views on YouTube) finally debuted in early June after months of anticipation. It immediately establishes that Roy is driven to be the best astronaut he can because hes following in his fathers heroic footsteps. An incident on a mission lands Roy in the hospital and it turns out there were several similar ones around the world. They may be related to what appears to be the return of his father after being presumed missing in deep space decades ago. Roy is sent to find out whats happening, a mission that wont be easy or safe.

Another trailer (2.8 million views on YouTube) came out in mid-July. Some sort of crisis is facing the world and the key to resolving it involves Roy finding his long-lost father. Theres some dramatic footage shown involving space exploration along with helpful exposition from various characters. Its a tighter message than what was used in the first trailer but it still may play as a bit vague, at least for the general audience.

IMAX debuted an exclusivethird trailer(136,000 views on YouTube) in August. This one begins with Roy talking about the inspiration he draws from the example of his father. After we see him go through his evaluations, the mission is explained: He has to stop an event that could erase the entire solar system. The stakes are high, then, as Roy navigates his personal feelings and the hostile environment of space.

Advertising and Publicity

The movie was part of the studios presentation to exhibition executives at CineEurope in mid-July 2018, but mostly conversations around the movie were focused on when it would finally be done and where any sort of marketing for it was, even just months before it was scheduled for release.

As soon as the first trailer was released it was repurposed as a promoted tweet to increase the reach of the spot. Just a few days later a cut-down version of the trailer was used in an extended TV commercial that jettisons most of the familial backstory to focus on Roy being sent on a vague mission to outer space. Another commercial also featuring a 60-second runtime was more about the threat being faced while also including mention of Roys father. Shorter commercials continued to be released throughout August and September that highlighted various elements of the story, including the secrets being kept, while continuing to sell the overall spectacle of the film.

Additional commercials came from IMAX that focused on the spectacleof the film and encouraged audiences to see it in the biggest format available.

Pitt introduced a promotion for the movie in a special video that aired during Week 2 of the NFL season on Fox.

A featurette was released in late July on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, with Gray talking about the nature of space travel and how his film expands on the human tendency to look for adventure among the stars. Another featurette about a month later offered more details of the movies story, selling audiences on the epic scale of the movie.

The movies world premiere took place last month at the Venice Film Festival, with appearances by Gray and the cast. That screening generated positive reviews and awards buzz.

A clip released in early September offered an extended look at the chase action sequence involving moon rovers. A second has Roy being briefed on the details of the mission hes being sent on while a third pulls footage from early in the film to show Roy one of the storys inciting incidents. An exclusive clip of Roy investigating an abandoned ship was given to IMAX as well. There was also a promotional video that focused on how composer Dev Hynes incorporated sounds recorded from space into the films score.

Ever since the projects inception, Gray has emphasized his desire to make the space sequences in the movie as realistic as possible. That effort was communicated to the audience through two promotional partnerships:

Lockheed Martin, one of the primary companies providing NASA with the hardware used in space exploration, produced a series of featurettes with Gray talking with Lockheed Martin staff. One focused on designing the spaceship, another on designing the space station habitat and a third on conveying the realities of life in space.

NASA itself got involved, hosting a livestreamed event featuring Pitt participating in a Q&A with the crew of the International Space Station. Later on, Pitt and Gray were joined by NASA staff to talk about the film and their research during production.

Virgin Atlantic was also a promotional partner, using footage of the film showing the company to be a key provider of travel to the moon in the future in commercials.

Online ads used video snippets along with elements pulled from the key art to drive traffic to the movies official website and get people to buy tickets.

Those seeing the movie in XD at Regal Cinemas location opening weekend will receive a mini version of the second poster, while those opting for IMAX screenings at AMC Theaters will receive an exclusive pin designed to look like a NASA mission patch.

Final commercials labeled the movie as the must-see event of the year, making an explicit call via pull quotes from early reviews to see it on the big screen.

Overall

Theres an interesting dynamic formed as various appeals and messages vie for contention throughout different elements of the campaign.

The minimalist aesthetic of the posters, featuring just a single image in an attempt to convey the solitude of space and the dangers posed by the vast nothingness astronauts operate in, is countered by the clips released later on that pull out as many explosions and lunar rover chases as possible.

The intimate nature of the story conveyed in the trailers is countered by the way the movie is sometimes presented by IMAX, not Fox, and the message that it must be experienced in as immersive a manner as possible.

Through all of that, Pitts Roy McBride is shown to be a good soldier who stoically does his duty when called upon. That the mission hes tasked with also holds the promise of providing closure on a very intimate matter the disappearance of his father makes success vital on both a personal and professional level.

Fox has focused on Pitt throughout the campaign not only because of his status as one of Hollywoods biggest stars but because there isnt the built-in appeal of an existing franchise of IP to fall back on. Its hoping that audiences, at least those who arent rushing to revisit the residents and servants of Downton Abbey, will come out for the spectacle and drama and help propel the movie into awards contention.

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Evening with an astronaut – Point Pleasant Register

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OHIO VALLEY Dr. Garrett Reisman would definitely be an interesting dinner guest for any occasion and on Tuesday evening, the public can spend some time with him at Gallia Academy High School in the gymnasium.

Starting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 24, Reisman, who was an astronaut with NASA, will be speaking on his experiences. The presentation is free and open to the public and has been arranged by the Bossard Memorial Library and the Gallia-Vinton Educational Service Center. The evening is meant to compliment the librarys current exhibit, SPACE: A Journey to Our Future. The exhibit at the library, is also free.

According to background information provided to Ohio Valley Publishing, Reisman was selected by NASA as a mission specialist Astronaut in 1998. His first mission was aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour, in 2008, which dropped him off for a 95-day mission aboard the International Space Station after which he returned to Earth aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery. His second mission was aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis, in 2010, and returned Reisman to the Space Station.

During these missions, Reisman performed three spacewalks, operated the Space Station Robot Arm and was a flight engineer aboard the Space Shuttle. After leaving NASA in 2011, Reisman joined SpaceX where he worked for Elon Musk and prepared SpaceX for human spaceflight as the Director of Space Operations. Currently he is a Professor of Astronautical Engineering at USC and a Senior Advisor at SpaceX.

Reisman spoke with Ohio Valley Publishing about his upcoming visit, explaining the structure of his presentation will focus on not only the accomplishments of the past but what the future, in terms of space exploration, holds. He said he was humbled to travel to Ohio to speak, given some of the states famous residents involved in the space program over the years. Reisman will also share some of his experiences in becoming an astronaut and how determination and hard work can pay off for anyone with a dream.

Prior to his Tuesday evening talk which is open to the public, Reisman will be addressing area students earlier in the day, including students at River Valley Middle School joined by students from South Gallia Middle School and Gallia Academy Middle School along with students from Ohio Valley Christian School. The students will be largely made up of those in sixth-eighth grades. These sessions earlier in the day are closed to the public.

Reisman said he will share his own experiences with students in regards to achieving his dream and overcoming obstacles.

It is true, there is a disparity in resources and opportunities availablenot everyone in this country has the same advantages and Im very aware of this as a father, he said. I grew up in New Jersey, went to public schools.my message to all kids out there is dont buy into that (negative) narrative. If you really apply yourself and are really passionate about getting involved in something like space, you can do itI didnt go to a fancy prep schoolmy parents werent billionaires, but I was fascinated with everything about space and read every book I could get my hands on. I wasnt going to let anything stop me. If something is really important to you and people tell you its impossible, or you grow up with everyone telling you, you cant do thator thats not something people from around her do, dont listen to that. If its important to you, just do it, dont allow yourself to be taken down by depressing peopledont let them win.

Addressing how to achieve what some see as the impossible, Reisman explained, People told me things I wanted to do were impossible, that they were never going to happen. Doesnt mean it wasnt hard, I had to work really hard and sometimes I was at a disadvantage not being the tallest person (for space walks) or not having attended a fancy prep schoolhard work can overcome those disadvantages. If its important to you, you can do it.

Reisman explained many people told his boss Elon Musk, the things he wanted to achieve were impossible but he went out and did it.

Resiman added the impossible is possible by being willing to work and willing to fail.

Failure is OK, thats another message I really want to sendElon would say, if youre not failing youre not trying. I failed so many times along my pathyouve got to be OK with that.

Though the numbers have grown over the decades, to say you have been in space is to be part of a select club with experiences most human beings havent had. Reisman said his most memorable experiences in space were his three space walks. He called them mind blowing and incredible and not something easily put into words.

Its not safe, you do know that (when attempting it), doing a space walk is just as risky as reentry, he said.

Reisman said the adrenalin rush aside, there is the worry you will make a mistake and not achieve all your objectives after training for this incredibly scrutinized period of time where time is incredibly important, youre using up oxygen and resources, theres a giant team of people on the groundits not something to be taken lightly.

As stated earlier, hes now teaching full time at USC while remaining a senior advisor at SpaceX. Given this transition in careers, he was asked what is more difficult, being a teacher or an astronaut?

They both have their challengesit was a big transition for me (going from being an astronaut to teaching), he said. When teaching I dont have to worry about the pressure of (having enough) oxygen or if the propulsion system is working, he joked. It was a huge transition but Ive made a number of them over the course of my career.

Reisman talked about the panic a person can feel when taking a new career path and referred to the imposter syndrome. He said there were times he felt like an imposter when giving a lecture for the first time, putting on a flight suit or running sophisticated programs, though his training prepared him for these various paths.

Thats common (that imposter syndrome) and that will happen and be uncomfortable but eventually goes wayeventually you get good at it (this new path) and no longer feel like an imposter anymore but it takes time, he said of the hard work and persistence that follows.

Reisman is also in a select group of people who have been able to look at Earth from space and said what impressed him most about that view is how thin the atmosphere was, it looks incredibly fragile. He said it drove home for him the importance of taking care of the planet.

As for something about Reisman most people dont know, he said, I was a lousy Cub Scout, I never even make it to Boy Scouts. I failed out of Webelos.

Despite this early exposure to failure in life, Reisman took it in stride and recently found himself giving lessons to actor Brad Pitt on how to fly a fake spaceship or at least look realistic while trying. Reisman was a consultant on the new film Ad Astra, and added, Pitt caught on and did well.

Bossard Library is pleased to partner with the Gallia-Vinton Educational Service Center to provide the opportunity for the public to hear Dr. Reismans presentation, as he shares his amazing experiences in the space program, Debbie Saunders, library director, said. It is our hope that people of all ages will enjoy his presentation and that his words will spark an interest in attendees to want to learn more about NASA and all things relating to space. His presentation will perfectly compliment the Space exhibition currently on display at the Library now through January 5, 2020.

Saunders also noted, as children have experienced the exhibit, we hear comments from some of them about their career aspirations, with some of them even noting an interest in becoming aerospace engineers. If hearing from Dr. Reismans experience and/or attending the exhibition can plant the seed in all these students to follow their dreams and reach for the stars, then the goal of these types of events will be fulfilled.

Reisman said he hopes those who hear him speak leave with a better awareness of whats gong on in the recent past and near future in space exploration, but more important, I hope at least I reach some kid out there that gets inspired and the lessons I learned can help them with whatever they want to do, whether they want to be an astronaut, or doctor, or scientist, and even a dancer, whatever it might be, whatever their dreams are, just let them know dreams do come true, it is possible and they shouldnt be discouraged.

For more information on Reisman, visit http://www.GarrettReisman.com, http://www.AstronautGarrettReisman.com or follow him at @astro_g_dogg

For more information on the SPACE exhibit at the library, go to https://www.bossardlibrary.org/

Gallia Academy High School is located at 2855 Centenary Road, Gallipolis, Ohio.

Dr. Garrett Reisman, pictured, will be speaking at 7 p.m., Tuesday, Sept. 24 at Gallia Academy High School. Reisman is a former astronaut with NASA and currently a Professor of Astronautical Engineering at USC and a Senior Advisor at SpaceX.

Dr. Garrett Reisman to speak at GAHS

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Chandrayaan 2: India’s Moon Mission – A Failure or Not – Forbes

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Indias ambitious attempt to land on the unexplored polar south of the moon has ended in disaster. With less than two miles to a place in history, Vikram lander (named after Vikram Sarabhai, who cradled the Indian Space sciences in their infancy) landed beyond ISROs reach, a live broadcast. It was set to countdown to this new milestone, showed tensed scientists attempting to retain control, but all signals were eventually lost.

The Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, who was also present for the occasion, took the failure. With a pinch of salt, he offered encouragement to the team of scientists and children that had accompanied him to the ISRO campus.

Be courageous. Our faith in ISRO has not lost. I can proudly say that the effort was worth it and so was the journey. We are full of confidence that when it comes to our space program, the best is yet to come,he stated, lauding the ISRO.

Scientists and employees view the Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft Lander module at the Indian Space Research Organization Satellite Integration and Test Establishment (ISITE) at the ISRO headquarters in Bengaluru, India, on Tuesday, June 12, 2019. India will launch a lunar mission on July 15, attempting to become the fourth country to land on the moon and cementing its place among the world's space faring nations. Photographer: Karen Dias/Bloomberg

India would have been the fourth country to complete a lunar soft landing

Space is a difficult terrain to conquer, and the lunar surface lays polluted with failed attempts. These failures are mostly attributed to the lack of atmosphere on the moon, which renders parachutes useless. The landers are left solely at the mercy of thrusters to cushion the landing. The difficulty can be evaluated from the fact that had the landing been successful. India would have been only the fourth country to complete a lunar soft landing - with the former Soviet Union, the US, and China having achieved it thus far - and the first to do so on the lunar South Pole.

K. Sivan, Indian Space Research Organizations chairman stated that"Vikram lander descent was as planned and normal performance was observed till the altitude of 2.1 km. Subsequently, the communication from the lander to the ground station was lost. The data is being analyzed,CNN reported.

Not a complete failure

The mission, however, was not a complete failure. Chandrayaan-2, a $140 million mission, partially intends to study the possibility of water deposits further within the moon carters, first highlighted by Chandrayaan-1 in 2008. The 142-foot tall spacecraft that blasted off the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Andhra Pradesh on the 15th July, under this mission carried an orbiter, the Vikram lunar lander, and a six-wheeled rover. The orbiter that had detached from the lander earlier this week can expectedly continue to operate for about seven years. The failure of the Vikram lander, interestingly, comes, just months after Indias close ally Israel's first moon mission, Beresheet, met a similar fate.

But unlike Beresheet, Chandrayaan-2's mission still lives on in the orbiter that will continue to orbit the moon, albeit alone. Tentative plans for Chandrayaan-3, indicate a third mission to the moon in 2024. Like Chandrayaan-2, it too is expected to contain a moon rover.

ISRO has come a long way!

While the price tag of failure seems heavy on the paper, it is important to mention here that the ISRO has come a long way in specialized low-costing space launches since the early 1960s, when the components assembled by hand and transported via bicycles. ISROs maiden interplanetary mission, with the launch of the Mars orbiter in 2013 cost just $74 million, a remarkable nine times cheaper than what NASA could manage in the same year. The cost-effectiveness allowed ISRO to launch a record 104 satellites in under 18 minutes, in 2017.

Earlier this year, ISRO stated that it intends to have its operational space station soon, to allow conducting separate missions to study the Sun and Venus. Work on the space station is expected to begin following ISROs first manned space mission, coined Gaganyaan (Sanskrit for space vehicle), to which the government has allotted $1.5 billion. The Gaganyaan purpose is set to stage in 2022, just in time to celebrate 75 years of Indian independence from Britain.

Indias attempt to make the history by becoming the fourth nation to land on the Moon failed. After journeying millions of kilometers and coming excruciatingly close, the lander lost the contact in the last few hundred meters, crash landing on the lunar surface. However, ISRO has still not admitted defeat and they will try connecting to Vikram for the next two weeks more.

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Chandrayaan 2: India's Moon Mission - A Failure or Not - Forbes

The Four Converging Technologies Giving Rise to the Spatial Web – Singularity Hub

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How each of us sees the world is about to change dramatically.

For all of human history, the experience of looking at the world was roughly the same for everyone. But boundaries between the digital and physical are beginning to fade.

The world around us is gaining layer upon layer of digitized, virtually overlaid informationmaking it rich, meaningful, and interactive. As a result, our respective experiences of the same environment are becoming vastly different, personalized to our goals, dreams, and desires.

Welcome to Web 3.0, or the Spatial Web. In version 1.0, static documents and read-only interactions limited the internet to one-way exchanges. Web 2.0 provided quite an upgrade, introducing multimedia content, interactive web pages, and participatory social media. Yet, all this was still mediated by two-dimensional screens.

Today, we are witnessing the rise of Web 3.0, riding the convergence of high-bandwidth 5G connectivity, rapidly evolving AR eyewear, an emerging trillion-sensor economy, and powerful artificial intelligence.

As a result, we will soon be able to superimpose digital information atop any physical surroundingfreeing our eyes from the tyranny of the screen, immersing us in smart environments, and making our world endlessly dynamic.

In the third post of our five-part series on augmented reality, we will explore the convergence of AR, AI, sensors, and blockchain and dive into the implications through a key use case in manufacturing.

Lets deconstruct everything beneath the sleek AR display.

It all begins with graphics processing units (GPUs)electric circuits that perform rapid calculations to render images. (GPUs can be found in mobile phones, game consoles, and computers.)

However, because AR requires such extensive computing power, single GPUs will not suffice. Instead, blockchain can now enable distributed GPU processing power, and blockchains specifically dedicated to AR holographic processing are on the rise.

Next up, cameras and sensors will aggregate real-time data from any environment to seamlessly integrate physical and virtual worlds. Meanwhile, body-tracking sensors are critical for aligning a users self-rendering in AR with a virtually enhanced environment. Depth sensors then provide data for 3D spatial maps, while cameras absorb more surface-level, detailed visual input. In some cases, sensors might even collect biometric data, such as heart rate and brain activity, to incorporate health-related feedback in our everyday AR interfaces and personal recommendation engines.

The next step in the pipeline involves none other than AI. Processing enormous volumes of data instantaneously, embedded AI algorithms will power customized AR experiences in everything from artistic virtual overlays to personalized dietary annotations.

In retail, AIs will use your purchasing history, current closet inventory, and possibly even mood indicators to display digitally rendered items most suitable for your wardrobe, tailored to your measurements.

In healthcare, smart AR glasses will provide physicians with immediately accessible and maximally relevant information (parsed from the entirety of a patients medical records and current research) to aid in accurate diagnoses and treatments, freeing doctors to engage in the more human-centric tasks of establishing trust, educating patients and demonstrating empathy.

One of the nearest-term use cases of AR is manufacturing, as large producers begin dedicating capital to enterprise AR headsets. And over the next ten years, AR will converge with AI, sensors, and blockchain to multiply manufacturer productivity and employee experience.

In initial application, digital guides superimposed on production tables will vastly improve employee accuracy and speed, while minimizing error rates.

Already, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) whose airlines supply 82 percent of air travel recently implemented industrial tech company Atheers AR headsets in cargo management. And with barely any delay, IATA reported a whopping30 percent improvement in cargo handling speed and no less than a 90 percent reduction in errors.

With similar success rates, Boeing brought Skylights smart AR glasses to the runway, now used in the manufacturing of hundreds of airplanes. Sure enoughthe aerospace giant has now seen a 25 percent drop in production time andnear-zero error rates.

Beyond cargo management and air travel, however, smart AR headsets will also enable on-the-job training without reducing the productivity of other workers or sacrificing hardware. Jaguar Land Rover, for instance, implemented Boschs Reflekt One AR solution to gear technicians with x-ray vision: allowing them to visualize the insides of Range Rover Sport vehicles without removing any dashboards.

And as enterprise capabilities continue to soar, AIs will soon become the go-to experts, offering support to manufacturers in need of assembly assistance. Instant guidance and real-time feedback will dramatically reduce production downtime, boost overall output, and even help customers struggling with DIY assembly at home.

Perhaps one of the most profitable business opportunities, AR guidance through centralized AI systems will also serve to mitigate supply chain inefficiencies at extraordinary scale. Coordinating moving parts, eliminating the need for manned scanners at each checkpoint, and directing traffic within warehouses, joint AI-AR systems will vastly improve workflow while overseeing quality assurance.

After its initial implementation of AR vision picking in 2015, leading courier company DHL recently announced it would continue to use Googles newest smart lens in warehouses across the world. Motivated by the initial groups reported 15 percent jump in productivity, DHLs decision is part of the logistics giants$300 millioninvestment in new technologies.

And as direct-to-consumer e-commerce fundamentally transforms the retail sector, supply chain optimization will only grow increasingly vital. AR could very well prove the definitive step for gaining a competitive edge in delivery speeds.

As explained by Vital Enterprises CEO Ash Eldritch, All these technologies that are coming together around artificial intelligence are going to augment the capabilities of the worker and thats very powerful. I call it Augmented Intelligence. The idea is that you can take someone of a certain skill level and by augmenting them with artificial intelligence via augmented reality and the Internet of Things, you can elevate the skill level of that worker.

Already, large producers like Goodyear, thyssenkrupp, and Johnson Controls are using the Microsoft HoloLens 2priced at $3,500 per headsetfor manufacturing and design purposes.

Perhaps the most heartening outcome of the AI-AR convergence is that, rather than replacing humans in manufacturing, AR is an ideal interface for humancollaboration withAI. And as AI merges with human capital, prepare to see exponential improvements in productivity, professional training, and product quality.

On the hardware front, these AI-AR systems will require a mass proliferation of sensors to detect the external environment and apply computer vision in AI decision-making.

To measure depth, for instance, some scanning depth sensors project a structured pattern of infrared light dots onto a scene, detecting and analyzing reflected light to generate 3D maps of the environment. Stereoscopic imaging, using two lenses, has also been commonly used for depth measurements. But leading technology like Microsofts HoloLens 2 and Intels RealSense 400-series camera implement a new method called phased time-of-flight (ToF).

In ToF sensing, the HoloLens 2 uses numerous lasers, each with 100 milliwatts (mW) of power, in quick bursts. The distance between nearby objects and the headset wearer is then measured by the amount of light in the return beam that has shifted from the original signal. Finally, the phase difference reveals the location of each object within the field of view, which enables accurate hand-tracking and surface reconstruction.

With a far lower computing power requirement, the phased ToF sensor is also more durable than stereoscopic sensing, which relies on the precise alignment of two prisms. The phased ToF sensors silicon base also makes it easily mass-produced, rendering the HoloLens 2 a far better candidate for widespread consumer adoption.

To apply inertial measurementtypically used in airplanes and spacecraftthe HoloLens 2 additionally uses a built-in accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer. Further equipped with four environment understanding cameras that track head movements, the headset also uses a 2.4MP HD photographic video camera and ambient light sensor that work in concert to enable advanced computer vision.

For natural viewing experiences, sensor-supplied gaze tracking increasingly creates depth in digital displays. Nvidias work on Foveated AR Display, for instance, brings the primary foveal area into focus, while peripheral regions fall into a softer background mimicking natural visual perception and concentrating computing power on the area that needs it most.

Gaze tracking sensors are also slated to grant users control over their (now immersive) screens without any hand gestures. Conducting simple visual cues, even staring at an object for more than three seconds, will activate commands instantaneously.

And our manufacturing example above is not the only one. Stacked convergence of blockchain, sensors, AI and AR will disrupt almost every major industry.

Take healthcare, for example, wherein biometric sensors will soon customize users AR experiences. Already, MIT Media LabsDeep Realitygroup has created an underwater VR relaxation experience that responds to real-time brain activity detected by a modified version of the Muse EEG. The experience even adapts to users biometric data, from heart rate to electro dermal activity (inputted from an Empatica E4 wristband).

Now rapidly dematerializing, sensors will converge with AR to improve physical-digital surface integration, intuitive hand and eye controls, and an increasingly personalized augmented world. Keep an eye on companies likeMicroVision, now making tremendous leaps in sensor technology.

While Ill be doing a deep dive into sensor applications across each industry in our next blog, its critical to first discuss how we might power sensor- and AI-driven augmented worlds.

Because AR requires much more compute power than typical 2D experiences, centralized GPUs and cloud computing systems are hard at work to provide the necessary infrastructure. Nonetheless, the workload is taxing and blockchain may prove the best solution.

A major player in this pursuit, Otoy aims to create the largest distributed GPU network in the world, called the Render NetworkRNDR. Built specifically on the Ethereum blockchain for holographic media, and undergoing Beta testing, this network is set to revolutionize AR deployment accessibility.

Alphabet Chairman Eric Schmidt (an investor in Otoys network), has even said, I predicted that 90% of computing would eventually reside in the web based cloud Otoy has created a remarkable technology which moves that last 10%high-end graphics processingentirely to the cloud. This is a disruptive and important achievement. In my view, it marks the tipping point where the web replaces the PC as the dominant computing platform of the future.

Leveraging the crowd, RNDR allowsanyonewith a GPU to contribute their power to the network for a commission of up to $300 a month in RNDR tokens. These can then be redeemed in cash or used to create users own AR content.

In a double win, Otoys blockchain network and similar iterations not only allow designers to profit when not using their GPUs, but also democratize the experience for newer artists in the field.

And beyond these networks power suppliers, distributing GPU processing power will allow more manufacturing companies to access AR design tools and customize learning experiences. By further dispersing content creation across a broad network of individuals, blockchain also has the valuable potential to boost AR hardware investment across a number of industry beneficiaries.

On the consumer side, startups likeScanetchainare also entering the blockchain-AR space for a different reason. Allowing users to scan items with their smartphone, Scanetchains app provides access to a trove of information, from manufacturer and price, to origin and shipping details.

Based on NEM (a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency that implements a blockchain consensus algorithm), the app aims to make information far more accessible and, in the process, create a social network of purchasing behavior. Users earn tokens by watching ads, and all transactions are hashed into blocks and securely recorded.

The writing is on the wallour future of brick-and-mortar retail will largely lean on blockchain to create the necessary digital links.

Integrating AI into AR creates an auto-magical manufacturing pipeline that will fundamentally transform the industry, cutting down on marginal costs, reducing inefficiencies and waste, and maximizing employee productivity.

Bolstering the AI-AR convergence, sensor technology is already blurring the boundaries between our augmented and physical worlds, soon to be near-undetectable. While intuitive hand and eye motions dictate commands in a hands-free interface, biometric data is poised to customize each AR experience to be far more in touch with our mental and physical health.

And underpinning it all, distributed computing power with blockchain networks like RNDR will democratize AR, boosting global consumer adoption at plummeting price points.

As AR soars in importancewhether in retail, manufacturing, entertainment, or beyondthe stacked convergence discussed above merits significant investment over the next decade. The augmented world is only just getting started.

(1) A360 Executive Mastermind: Want even more context about how converging exponential technologies will transform your business and industry? Consider joining Abundance 360, a highly selective community of 360 exponentially minded CEOs, who are on a 25-year journey with meor as I call it, a countdown to the Singularity. If youd like to learn more and consider joining our 2020 membership, apply here.

Share this with your friends, especially if they are interested in any of the areas outlined above.

(2) Abundance-Digital Online Community:Ive also created a Digital/Online community of bold, abundance-minded entrepreneurs called Abundance-Digital. Abundance-Digital is Singularity Universitys onramp for exponential entrepreneurs those who want to get involved and play at a higher level.Click here to learn more.

This articleoriginally appearedonDiamandis.com

Image Credit: Funky Focus / Pixabay

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Singularity rebuild their roster around Excalibur – VPEsports

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A new competitive season always comes with new hopes for the tier two competitive scene. Team Singularity fought through the past Dota Pro Circuit to no avail, despite having a few rather experienced players on their side.

TI3 champion Jerry EGM Lundkvist will no longer be playing under the Singularity banner, neither will be Yaroslav Miposhka Naidenov. Following the TI9 regional qualifiers, the team members decided to split ways and focus on personal growth said Noah Eingenheer, Team Singularitys manager in the official press release. He also mentioned that everyone concluded their stay with Singularity on good terms with the organization and that for the new season the team found new friends. The initial new roster should have featured the former Infamous support duo Malthe Biver Winther and Oliver oliver/Skiter Lepko, but according to the Singularity manager, the two have decided to actually sign with a yet to be revealed North American team.

Shortly after Biver got an offer from NA and decided to leave us. It was hard to find a proper replacement, Handsken was focusing on rebuilding his own roster and most EU pos4 players were taken or on a break. We got in touch with Velheor and played a few games, he was insecure and left us hanging to stay with his old team-mates. On the same day, Oliver got the same offer to join that NA team and reconciled with his friend Biver, Noah Eingenheer bluntly reveals the entire recruiting process.

With both Biver and Oliver changing their mind, Singularity will enter the new season with the following line-up:

Singularitys new line-up can be watched in action this week at the GG.Bet Hamburg Invitational, an online tournament with a qualifier spot for the upcoming ESL One Hamburg on the line. Next week, starting on the 21st of September, Singularity will also be playing in the 2019 WePlay! Reshuffle Madness, an online event with a prize pool of $50,000.

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Where Do Black Holes Lead? – Livescience.com

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So there you are, about to leap into a black hole. What could possibly await should against all odds you somehow survive? Where would you end up and what tantalizing tales would you be able to regale if you managed to clamor your way back?

The simple answer to all of these questions is, as Professor Richard Massey explains, "Who knows?" As a Royal Society research fellow at the Institute for Computational Cosmology at Durham University, Massey is fully aware that the mysteries of black holes run deep. "Falling through an event horizon is literally passing beyond the veil once someone falls past it, nobody could ever send a message back," he said. "They'd be ripped to pieces by the enormous gravity, so I doubt anyone falling through would get anywhere."

If that sounds like a disappointing and painful answer, then it is to be expected. Ever since Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity was considered to have predicted black holes by linking space-time with the action of gravity, it has been known that black holes result from the death of a massive star leaving behind a small, dense remnant core. Assuming this core has more than roughly three-times the mass of the sun, gravity would overwhelm to such a degree that it would fall in on itself into a single point, or singularity, understood to be the black hole's infinitely dense core.

Related: 9 Ideas About Black Holes That Will Blow Your Mind

The resulting uninhabitable black hole would have such a powerful gravitational pull that not even light could avoid it. So, should you then find yourself at the event horizon the point at which light and matter can only pass inward, as proposed by the German astronomer Karl Schwarzschild there is no escape. According to Massey, tidal forces would reduce your body into strands of atoms (or 'spaghettification', as it is also known) and the object would eventually end up crushed at the singularity. The idea that you could pop out somewhere perhaps at the other side seems utterly fantastical.

Or is it? Over the years scientists have looked into the possibility that black holes could be wormholes to other galaxies. They may even be, as some have suggested, a path to another universe.

Such an idea has been floating around for some time: Einstein teamed up with Nathan Rosen to theorise bridges that connect two different points in space-time in 1935. But it gained some fresh ground in the 1980s when physicist Kip Thorne one of the world's leading experts on the astrophysical implications of Einstein's general theory of relativity raised a discussion about whether objects could physically travel through them.

"Reading Kip Thorne's popular book about wormholes is what first got me excited about physics as a child," Massey said. But it doesn't seem likely that wormholes exist.

Indeed, Thorne, who lent his expert advice to the production team for the Hollywood movie Interstellar, wrote: "We see no objects in our universe that could become wormholes as they age," in his book "The Science of Interstellar" (W.W. Norton and Company, 2014). Thorne told Space.com that journeys through these theoretical tunnels would most likely remain science fiction, and there is certainly no firm evidence that a black hole could allow for such a passage.

Artist's concept of a wormhole. If wormholes exist, they might lead to another universe. But, there's no evidence that wormholes are real or that a black hole would act like one.

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

But, the problem is that we can't get up close to see for ourselves. Why, we can't even take photographs of anything that takes place inside a black hole if light cannot escape their immense gravity, then nothing can be snapped by a camera. As it stands, theory suggests that anything which goes beyond the event horizon is simply added to the black hole and, what's more, because time distorts close to this boundary, this will appear to take place incredibly slowly, so answers won't be quickly forthcoming.

"I think the standard story is that they lead to the end of time," said Douglas Finkbeiner, professor of astronomy and physics at Harvard University. "An observer far away will not see their astronaut friend fall into the black hole. They'll just get redder and fainter as they approach the event horizon [as a result of gravitational red shift]. But the friend falls right in, to a place beyond 'forever.' Whatever that means."

Certainly, if black holes do lead to another part of a galaxy or another universe, there would need to be something opposite to them on the other side. Could this be a white hole a theory put forward by Russian cosmologist Igor Novikov in 1964? Novikov proposed that a black hole links to a white hole that exists in the past. Unlike a black hole, a white hole will allow light and matter to leave, but light and matter will not be able to enter.

Scientists have continued to explore the potential connection between black and white holes. In their 2014 study published in the journal Physical Review D, physicists Carlo Rovelli and Hal M. Haggard claimed that "there is a classic metric satisfying the Einstein equations outside a finite space-time region where matter collapses into a black hole and then emerges from a while hole." In other words, all of the material black holes have swallowed could be spewed out, and black holes may become white holes when they die.

Far from destroying the information that it absorbs, the collapse of a black hole would be halted. It would instead experience a quantum bounce, allowing information to escape. Should this be the case, it would shed some light on a proposal by former Cambridge University cosmologist and theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking who, in the 1970s, explored the possibility that black holes emit particles and radiation thermal heat as a result of quantum fluctuations.

"Hawking said a black hole doesn't last forever," Finkbeiner said. Hawking calculated that the radiation would cause a black hole to lose energy, shrink and disappear, as described in his 1976 paper published in Physical Review D. Given his claims that the radiation emitted would be random and contain no information about what had fallen in, the black hole, upon its explosion, would erase loads of information.

This meant Hawking's idea was at odds with quantum theory, which says information can't be destroyed. Physics states information just becomes more difficult to find because, should it become lost, it becomes impossible to know the past or the future. Hawking's idea led to the 'black hole information paradox' and it has long puzzled scientists. Some have said Hawking was simply wrong, and the man himself even declared he had made an error during a scientific conference in Dublin in 2004.

So, do we go back to the concept of black holes emitting preserved information and throwing it back out via a white hole? Maybe. In their 2013 study published in Physical Review Letters, Jorge Pullin at Louisiana State University and Rodolfo Gambini at the University of the Republic in Montevideo, Uruguay, applied loop quantum gravity to a black hole and found that gravity increased towards the core but reduced and plonked whatever was entering into another region of the universe. The results gave extra credence to the idea of black holes serving as a portal. In this study, singularity does not exist, and so it doesn't form an impenetrable barrier that ends up crushing whatever it encounters. It also means that information doesn't disappear.

Yet physicists Ahmed Almheiri, Donald Marolf, Joseph Polchinski and James Sully still believed Hawking could have been on to something. They worked on a theory that became known as the AMPS firewall, or the black hole firewall hypothesis. By their calculations, quantum mechanics could feasibly turn the event horizon into a giant wall of fire and anything coming into contact would burn in an instant. In that sense, black holes lead nowhere because nothing could ever get inside.

This, however, violates Einstein's general theory of relativity. Someone crossing the event horizon shouldn't actually feel any great hardship because an object would be in free fall and, based on the equivalence principle, that object or person would not feel the extreme effects of gravity. It could follow the laws of physics present elsewhere in the universe, but even if it didn't go against Einstein's principle it would undermine quantum field theory or suggest information can be lost.

Related: 11 Fascinating Facts About Our Milky Way Galaxy

Artist's impression of a tidal disruption event which occurs when a star passes too close to a supermassive black hole.

(Image credit: All About Space magazine)

Step forward Hawking once more. In 2014, he published a study in which he eschewed the existence of an event horizon meaning there is nothing there to burn saying gravitational collapse would produce an 'apparent horizon' instead.

This horizon would suspend light rays trying to move away from the core of the black hole, and would persist for a "period of time." In his rethinking, apparent horizons temporarily retain matter and energy before dissolving and releasing them later down the line. This explanation best fits with quantum theory which says information can't be destroyed and, if it was ever proven, it suggests that anything could escape from a black hole.

Hawking went as far as saying black holes may not even exist. "Black holes should be redefined as metastable bound states of the gravitational field," he wrote. There would be no singularity, and while the apparent field would move inwards due to gravity, it would never reach the center and be consolidated within a dense mass.

And yet anything which is emitted will not be in the form of the information swallowed. It would be impossible to figure out what went in by looking at what is coming out, which causes problems of its own not least for, say, a human who found themselves in such an alarming position. They'd never feel the same again!

One thing's for sure, this particular mystery is going to swallow up many more scientific hours for a long time to come. Rovelli and Francesca Vidotto recently suggested that a component of dark matter could be formed by remnants of evaporated black holes, and Hawking's paper on black holes and 'soft hair' was released in 2018, and describes how zero-energy particles are left around the point of no return, the event horizon an idea that suggests information is not lost but captured.

This flew in the face of the no-hair theorem which was expressed by physicist John Archibald Wheeler and worked on the basis that two black holes would be indistinguishable to an observer because none of the special particle physics pseudo-charges would be conserved. It's an idea that has got scientists talking, but there is some way to go before it's seen as the answer for where black holes lead. If only we could find a way to leap into one.

(Image credit: All About Space magazine)

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Singularity 2: Singularity is The New Black – OxGadgets

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After Vantablack debuted as an exclusive, patented blackest-of-black material, many people have tried to come up with their own versions of the blackest paint imaginable. Singularity 2 is one such material, with collectors pieces starting at $35.Singularity 2 is the new and improved version of Singularity 1, the first commercially available blackest black for curious people and artists. Singularity 1 didnt quite cut the mark on absorbing all the light that came its way, so this version has improved upon that and the surface texture as well. The developers also made a new surface coating for it to protect it from damage. The idea behind such a deep black for them was to make it resemble black holes, which are perhaps the only thing in our universe that completely swallow light. Their existence itself is being hotly debated right now, but from what weve been able to capture through telescopes, their image gives a profoundly beautiful feeling to people who are fascinated by the science behind them.

Many people view such innovations as useless startup ideas fueled by the capitalist desire to improve aesthetics. But it does come with its own sets of practical uses as well, considering that blacker shades of black are built on the principle of less light being reflected back by the surface. This means that it can be used in space imaging by reducing the amount of stray photons going into an image of the stars or galaxies. For military uses, this paint can better camouflage air-crafts flying through the sky at night.

The amount of research going into projects such as Singularity 2 signifies a change in how black paints will be made in the coming years. Whereas people have been using charcoal to form black paint for centuries, Singularity 2 and similar prototypes are made with carbon nanotubes, which are known not just for their color but their incredible tensile strength as well. But theyre also reported to be as flexible a thread, depending on how theyre structured.. This means that itll be difficult to use them as a smooth paint for ordinary objects, but with refinement we may be able to use them as a coating for electronics as well.

Carbon nanotubes are a relatively newly discovered allotrope of carbon. Theyre constructed with extremely thin sheets of carbon and have a variety of uses in electronic equipment. Since theyre semi-conductors, theyre very useful in electrical as well as thermal conduction. Black paint is only one of the many uses of nanotubes and groundbreaking research has been carried on regarding them in recent years. One may argue that for such a useful and expensively produced material, Singularity 2 is hardly one of the best ways to use it.

Theres only a niche market for art collectors and artists who want to use this material, so it doesnt come as a surprise that demand for a blacker black isnt very high these days. Currently the large scale production of Singularity seems infeasible due to the high cost but perhaps such a light absorbing material may improve camera technology for ordinary devices as well. And who knows, maybe the next iPhone will launch with a Singularity shade too!

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Noor Us Sahar

Chatty tree frog. Currently studying Economics at Lahore University of Management Sciences.

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Artist and Researcher’s Book Explores World of Subversive Bioart – Rutgers-Camden NewsNow

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By Tom McLaughlin

Art is in the eye of the beholder. But art made from DNA and living cells? Like it or not, says LiQin Tan, we are only at the beginning of a revolutionary fusion of art and living organisms.

Tan notes that his book looks toward the future to consider how technological singularitys impact on conceptual and live bioart raises many thought-provoking and sometimes controversial issues.

The Rutgers UniversityCamden artist and researcher explains that the future of bioart art conceptualizing and/or incorporating biological elements will continue to be impacted by technology at a meteoric rate.

This is where art is going; no one can escape it, says the art professor matter-of-factly.

Tan explores the unchartered world of bioart in his new book, Singularity: Subversive BioArt (Guangdong Peoples Publishing House).

The book is a follow-up to his 2018 offering, Singularity Art: How Technology Singularity Will Impact Art (China Machine Press), which explores the impact of technological singularity, the notion that artificial superintelligence will trigger runaway technological growth, resulting in previously unforeseen changes to human civilization.

Some people want to panic when they consider, for instance, art that merges living organisms with inanimate materials, says Tan. Of course, we always fear everything new.

The RutgersCamden artist explains that there are two definitions as to what constitutes bioart. The first is live art, which uses genes, DNA, bacterium, algae, and living cells to create artworks.

For instance, some artists are using DNA to create transgenic genetically modified plants and animals, says Tan, citing the work of artist Eduarto Kac, who combined rabbit and jellyfish DNA to produce a bunny that glows green under blue light.

In another example, he notes, artist Li Shan changed the genes of pumpkins, resulting in the vegetables growing in an array of different shapes and sizes.

The RutgersCamden artist focused his art on ink-brush drawing on rice paper before being introduced to computers in the early 1990s.

Tan explains that, although biologists will alter DNA for scientific purposes for example, altering a vegetable to make it heartier or to taste better artists change genes with artistic concepts or metaphors in mind.

For instance, artists may try to represent social or political issues, says Tan, who adds that it is still against international standards to change human embryo DNA. People will ask, Why do you create? Its because artists need to express themselves.

The other form, says Tan, is called general bioart, which includes anything made from biological elements or symbolizing bio concepts. For instance, he says, a bioart installation may use computer animation to make cells move.

Some people would argue that this isnt bioart, but others agree that it is because it presents biological movement and elements regardless of whether they are living or still, he says.

Tan describes how he created a conceptual bioart installation wherein he grew plants on the top of large central processing units the electrical circuitry of computer systems in the shape of a square. The creation didnt use soil and relied on humidity in the air.

My main concept is that the Earths soil is not the only mother carrier of the plant, says Tan, who, for more than two decades, focused his art on ink-brush drawing on rice paper before being introduced to computers in the early 1990s. CPU technology has the potential to replace it gradually. In other words, technology would be the carrier of life evolution in the near future.

The RutgersCamden artist notes that, while previous books have defined and explored bioart, design, and education, his book looks toward the future to consider how technological singularitys impact on conceptual and live bioart raises many thought-provoking and sometimes controversial issues.

Tans 2018 book explores the impact of technological singularity, the notion that artificial superintelligence will trigger runaway technological growth, resulting in previously unforeseen changes to human civilization.

Among these points of discussion, Tan shares his personal philosophy that, as an artist and creator, technology shouldnt be utilized solely to change the tools and media that artists employ, but to change the very nature of what it means to be human.

Technology is going to change your life construction; the inside of your body, he explains. So if you change the human body, it will change ones creativity as well.

He adds that genetics for non-human species will be altered as well and a human-dominant view of life and civilization will be altered forever.

Humans have dominated society for nearly 6,000 years and we treat animals as a lower species, he says. Technology will enable non-human species to have consciousness and creativity as well, and give animals the opportunities to change and become equal to humans. So then, how will we define beauty and what is considered art? Those definitions will totally reconstruct.

He warns that no one person will be able to hold back technological progress and, with that, safeguard international, ethical standards that come along with these changes. With this inevitability, says Tan, its up to people everywhere to the change the world responsibly.

That is a positive way that we can embrace these changes, he says.

However, Tan readily admits, the debate as to what is considered a responsible and ethnical approach will continue. Some people, he notes, believe that a humanoid has already been programmed with deeper learning.

In the end, says the RutgersCamden artist and researcher, technological advances continue to be made at an unfathomable rate, so its up to people as humans and artists to realize their untapped potential.

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Artist and Researcher's Book Explores World of Subversive Bioart - Rutgers-Camden NewsNow

Will AI Be Fashion Forwardor a Fashion Flop? – Singularity Hub

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The narrative that often accompanies most stories about artificial intelligence these days is how machines will disrupt any number of industries, from healthcare to transportation. It makes sense. After all, technology already drives many of the innovations in these sectors of the economy.

But sneakers and the red carpet? The definitively low-tech fashion industry would seem to be one of the last to turn over its creative direction to data scientists and machine learning algorithms.

However, big brands, e-commerce giants, and numerous startups are betting that AI can ingest data and spit out Chanel. Maybe its not surprising, given that fashion is partly about buzz and trendsand theres nothing more buzzy and trendy in the world of tech today than AI.

In its annual survey of the $3 trillion fashion industry, consulting firm McKinsey predicted that while AI didnt hit a critical mass in 2018, it would increasingly influence the business of everything from design to manufacturing.

Fashion as an industry really has been so slow to understand its potential roles interwoven with technology. And, to be perfectly honest, the technology doesnt take fashion seriously. This comment comes from Zowie Broach, head of fashion at Londons Royal College of Arts, who as a self-described old fashioned designer has embraced the disruptive nature of technologywith some caveats.

Co-founder in the late 1990s of the avant-garde fashion label Boudicca, Broach has always seen tech as a tool for designers, even setting up a website for the company circa 1998, way before an online presence became, well, fashionable.

Broach told Singularity Hub that while she is generally optimistic about the future of technology in fashionthe designer has avidly been consuming old sci-fi novels over the last few yearsthere are still a lot of difficult questions to answer about the interface of algorithms, art, and apparel.

For instance, can AI do what the great designers of the past have done? Fashion was about designing, it was about a narrative, it was about meaning, it was about expression, according to Broach.

AI that designs products based on data gleaned from human behavior can potentially tap into the Pavlovian response in consumers in order to make money, Broach noted. But is that channeling creativity, or just digitally dabbling in basic human brain chemistry?

She is concerned about people retaining control of the process, whether were talking about their data or their designs. But being empowered with the insights machines could provide into, for example, the geographical nuances of fashion between Dubai, Moscow, and Toronto is thrilling.

What is it that we want the future to be from a fashion, an identity, and design perspective? she asked.

Silicon Valley and some of the biggest brands in the industry offer a few answers about where AI and fashion are headed (though not at the sort of depths that address Broachs broader questions of aesthetics and ethics).

Take what is arguably the biggest brand in fashion, at least by market cap but probably not by the measure of appearances on Oscar night: Nike. The $100 billion shoe company just gobbled up an AI startup called Celect to bolster its data analytics and optimize its inventory. In other words, Nike hopes it will be able to figure out whats hot and whats not in a particular location to stock its stores more efficiently.

The company is going even further with Nike Fit, a foot-scanning platform using a smartphone camera that applies AI techniques from fields like computer vision and machine learning to find the best fit for each persons foot. The algorithms then identify and recommend the appropriately sized and shaped shoe in different styles.

No doubt the next step will be to 3D print personalized and on-demand sneakers at any store.

San Francisco-based startup ThirdLove is trying to bring a similar approach to bra sizes. Its 20-member data team, Fortune reported, has developed the Fit Finder quiz that uses machine learning algorithms to help pick just the right garment for every body type.

Data scientists are also a big part of the team at Stitch Fix, a former San Francisco startup that went public in 2017 and today sports a market cap of more than $2 billion. The online personal styling company uses hundreds of algorithms to not only make recommendations to customers, but to help design new styles and even manage the subscription-based supply chain.

E-commerce giant Amazon has thrown its own considerable resources into developing AI applications for retail fashionwith mixed results.

One notable attempt involved a styling assistant that came with the companys Echo Look camera that helped people catalog and manage their wardrobes, evening helping pick out each days attire. The company more recently revisited the direct consumer side of AI with an app called StyleSnap, which matches clothes and accessories uploaded to the site with the retailers vast inventory and recommends similar styles.

Behind the curtains, Amazon is going even further. A team of researchers in Israel have developed algorithms that can deduce whether a particular look is stylish based on a few labeled images. Another group at the companys San Francisco research center was working on tech that could generate new designs of items based on images of a particular style the algorithms trained on.

I will say that the accumulation of many new technologies across the industry could manifest in a highly specialized style assistant, far better than the examples weve seen today. However, the most likely thing is that the least sexy of the machine learning work will become the most impactful, and the public may never hear about it.

That prediction is from an online interview with Leanne Luce, a fashion technology blogger and product manager at Google who recently wrote a book called, succinctly enough, Artificial Intelligence and Fashion.

Academics are also sticking their beakers into AI and fashion. Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, and Adobe Research have previously demonstrated that neural networks, a type of AI designed to mimic some aspects of the human brain, can be trained to generate (i.e., design) new product images to match a buyers preference, much like the team at Amazon.

Meanwhile, scientists at Hong Kong Polytechnic University are working with Chinas answer to Amazon, Alibaba, on developing a FashionAI Dataset to help machines better understand fashion. The effort will focus on how algorithms approach certain building blocks of design, what are called key points such as neckline and waistline, and fashion attributes like collar types and skirt styles.

The man largely behind the universitys research team is Calvin Wong, a professor and associate head of Hong Kong Polytechnic Universitys Institute of Textiles and Clothing. His group has also developed an intelligent fabric defect detection system called WiseEye for quality control, reducing the chance of producing substandard fabric by 90 percent.

Wong and company also recently inked an agreement with RCA to establish an AI-powered design laboratory, though the details of that venture have yet to be worked out, according to Broach.

One hope is that such collaborations will not just get at the technological challenges of using machines in creative endeavors like fashion, but will also address the more personal relationships humans have with their machines.

I think who we are, and how we use AI in fashion, as our identity, is not a superficial skin. Its very, very important for how we define our future, Broach said.

Image Credit: Inspirationfeed / Unsplash

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Will AI Be Fashion Forwardor a Fashion Flop? - Singularity Hub

Getting to the bottom of what civilization means in Japan – The Japan Times

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Progress: good, or bad? Bad, thought Confucius, who for hundreds of years taught Japan to seek its ideals in the ancient past. Good, thought 19th-century modernizers, who redirected the nations gaze to the future.

Prominent among modernizers was Yukichi Fukuzawa (1835-1901), for whom civilization and progress were one and whose 1875 book, An Outline of a Theory of Civilization, dazzles us with a bright future indeed: Instead of cannons, men will build telescopes; schools will replace jails; soldiers and criminals will be seen only in old pictures. The whole country will be like one family, each household like a temple. The parents will be the head priests and the children their disciples.

How naive that sounds today. Progress foundered on 20th-century rocks: war, revolution, nuclear catastrophe, ecological catastrophe. It advances apace all the same, unstoppable. Sometime around 2045 something extraordinary will happen a singularity. The machines weve built to serve us will think better than we do. Who will be serving whom?

It is said, Fukuzawa wrote in An Encouragement of Learning (1872-76), that heaven does not create one man above or below another man. Any existing distinction between the wise and the stupid, between the rich and the poor, comes down to a matter of education. With that in mind, he founded Keio University.

What would he think, coming back to life today? Deeply intellectual but no snob, he might pick up a September issue of Spa magazine and see the headline, The darkness of the new gap society gap being that between rich and poor. Or, thumbing through the Asahi Shimbun (Sept. 8), he might be struck by a warning sounded by best-selling Israeli scholar Yuval Noah Hariri. Artificial intelligence, Hariri says, will turn more than half of us into a useless class.

First, Spa. Its a good life, if you have money. It buys everything: a long healthy life; a dignified, youthful old age; children without (if so desired) the nuisances of pregnancy; an education for them that will enable them to enjoy similar advantages. On the other side of the fence are an estimated 2.9 million households in Japan that cant afford basic health insurance.

Too bad for them. Very much so. A 39-year-old call center functionary named (pseudonymously) Iida earns 2.5 million a year. A year ago, he dropped out of the national health plan; he couldnt afford the premium. He doesnt feel well but doesnt consult a doctor. If it gets worse, hell grit his teeth harder.

In central Tokyo theres a facility called the Grand Himedic Club, whose rates, Spa says, run to 500,000 a month, after a 3 million admission fee. Its like a luxury hotel, the magazine says, but the raison detre is a medical checkup so thorough, so technologically avant-garde, that you almost feel you can live forever. Here, cancer is detected in earliest incipiency. If surgery is required, youre dispatched at once to the most expert specialists. If not, you can stay for the anti-aging treatments. You may want to stay forever.

How equal should people be? All of the people are equal under the law, says the Constitution, and all people shall have the right to receive an equal education. A generation ago that seemed to work out to a rough economic equality, which has now been lost. The steadily declining birthrate tells the story of young people who feel economically unable to marry and raise families. Then there are those who want children and can afford them whatever it may take to bring them into the world including renting bellies of women in poorer countries who save the infertile from infertility and the beauty-conscious from the scars of pregnancy. One husband and father proudly tells Spa hes fathered three children that way, at a cost of 6-10 million each time.

A childs future career depends on education; the better the latter, the better the former. A rough indication: A male university graduate aged 40-44 earns on average 7.16 million a year, versus 5.21 million for a senior high school graduate.

Thus the attraction of private schools they provide a higher leg up. Or do they? Their classrooms are growing as crowded as public school classrooms: 40-odd kids per class. Better still: boarding school in Europe. Cost: 10 million a year. Poor families struggling to see their children through ordinary high school must be left to their silent resentment.

They may have the last laugh, however. Hariri, the Israeli historian and futurist, writes in his 2018 book, Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow, Since we do not know how the job market would look in 2030 or 2040, already we have no idea what to teach our kids. Most of what they currently learn at school will probably be irrelevant by the time they are 40.

The useless class whose advent he dreads has been foreseen before by Japans Nomura Research Institute, among others, which figured in 2015 that, by 2030, 49 percent of all jobs would be done by computer systems. Leaving humans where?

The coming technological bonanza, writes Hariri, will probably make it feasible to feed and support these useless masses. But what will keep them occupied and content? People must do something or they go crazy. What will they do all day? One answer might be drugs and computer games. Unnecessary people might spend increasing amounts of time within 3D virtual-reality worlds that would provide them with far more excitement and emotional engagement than the drab reality outside.

Whats wrong with that? Progress that raises excitement and emotional engagement to a pitch beyond drab reality is progress indeed. Yet such a development, Hariri continues, would deal a mortal blow to the liberal belief in the sacredness of human life and of human experiences.

Fukuzawa would surely agree. What, then, he asks in An Outline of a Theory of Civilization, does civilization mean? I say that it refers to the attainment of both material well-being and the elevation of the human spirit.

Hed shudder to see what progress has wrought.

Big in Japan is a weekly column that focuses on issues being discussed by domestic media organizations. Michael Hoffmans latest book is an essay collection titled Fuji, Sinai, Olympos.

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TV Review: A Little Late with Lilly Singh – Variety

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Lilly Singh is well aware of her unique place in late night. After kicking off her first episode with a rap dedicated to the fact that she is not, unlike every other network late-night host, a straight white man, Singh walks out onto her own stage and addresses it with her audience directly. I get itIm not your traditional talk show host, she says, grinning in a bright red suit. The medias mentioned that Im a bisexual woman of color so much that I feel like I should just change my name. At this point, the graphic above her shoulder shifts from A Little Late with Lilly Singh to A Little Late with Bisexual Woman of Color.

Its a fair shot. Singhs inauguration as the latest comedian to take a stab at hosting a network late night show has led to many emphasizing those biographical points about her over and over again, to the point where it was impossible to tell from the conversation what Singh is actually like as a performer. Thats obviously proven a little frustrating for her, but she also knows that being A Bisexual Woman of Color not to mention one whos only just about to turn 31 years old is a huge distinction and draw. Late night as its traditionally been done for decades has become less relevant as platforms like YouTube and new streaming services give comedians different ways to express themselves. (As Singh says to those watching who may not know her: Television is dying and the internet is thriving I guarantee your kids know who I am.) On top of its being historic, Singh coming into the most traditional of late night spaces, even at 1:30 a.m., reveals a new network tactic. So its fitting that Singhs first week of shows emphasized her singularity, both for who she is and what she does.

Singh is better known to her longtime fans as Superwoman, the name of her wildly popular YouTube channel where shes been uploading comedic skits, commentary, and collaborations for almost a decade. Shes brash, blunt, and completely herself a combination thats served well on YouTube, where grabbing peoples attention is half the battle. In hosting her own late-night show, though, Singh has to find a way to translate her online energy into TV gold, which, as other social media mavens like Grace Helbig and Busy Phillipps have learned the hard way, is trickier than it seems. Theres only so much someone can morph the talk show format, and for people who came up through platforms like YouTube or Instagram, not being able to edit themselves to create their own particular rhythms can be a huge disadvantage.

Singh seems to be taking that challenge in stride. A Little Late purposefully sidesteps politics (as she says in her opening rap: I aint talking bout Donald unless his last name is Glover), and in fact, barely touches anything super topical at all. Dodging the constantly changing news cycle is no doubt a practical fix to help the show shoot evergreen segments, but its also a smart move for someone whose initial success hinged on making sure people could find and laugh at videos posted minutes or months before. Singhs opening monologues operate more like abbreviated stand-up sets, tackling broad topics like marijuana legalization and not getting the sex talk from her parents. The rest of the half-hour episodes belong to extended celebrity interviews and videos that feel too much like saggy SNL sketches rather than Singhs own.

In fact, whats most interesting (and promising) about the first week of A Little Late is how much works because of Singhs in the moment stage presence. Shes an engaged interviewer capable of steering the conversation where it needs to go, even when the occasional games she tries to play with guests mostly end up more confusing than entertaining. There are definitely times when her age and advanced knowledge of what it means to Be Online clash with celebrities who are so used to late night softballs from smiling forty-something men (its no coincidence that her best interview of the week is the one with Tracee Ellis Ross, an extraordinarily game guest and bona fide Instagram savant in her own right). But even when the show isnt totally on point, Singhs ability to adapt and crack spontaneous jokes should get A Little Late on a steadier track before too long.

A Little Late with Lilly Singh airs Monday through Thursday at 1:30 am on NBC.

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TV Review: A Little Late with Lilly Singh - Variety

Pope Francis to doctors: Assisted suicide is ‘false compassion’ – Catholic Herald Online

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Euthanasia or assisted suicide are 'hasty paths,' and not an expression of a person's freedom, Pope Francis said

Pope Francis told a group of Italian doctors Friday they must resist the temptation to participate in assisted suicide or euthanasia, which trades the dignity of the patient for a false compassion.

It is important that the doctor does not lose sight of the singularity of each patient, with his dignity and fragility. A man or a woman to accompany with conscience, with intelligence and heart, especially in the most serious situations, the Pope said on September 20.

With this attitude, one can and must reject the temptation induced also by legislative changes to use medicine to support a possible desire for death by the patient, providing assistance to suicide or causing death directly with euthanasia.

Euthanasia or assisted suicide are hasty paths, and not an expression of a persons freedom, as they might seem, he continued, adding that to be asked to help cause the premature death of a patient is a discarding of the patient and false compassion.

Quoting the New Charter for Health Care Workers, published in 2017 by the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, he said: There is no right to arbitrarily dispose of ones life, so that no doctor can be the executive guardian of a non-existent right.

The popes audience took place with around 350 members of the Italian National Federation of Orders of Surgical Doctors and Dentists.

The president of the organization, Filippo Anelli, gave a signed message to Pope Francis talking about the profound unease with which Italian doctors live their profession today, the result of a distortion of the values that sustain our society.

This is why the crisis that affects the profession today requires a special awareness and effort not only from doctors but also from all civil society in order to restore the right gradation of values, recognizing the citizens right to health and the doctors role as a professional who protects that right to the health of the citizen and his community, the message states.

Pope Francis said medicine, by definition, is service to human life, and as such it involves an essential and inalienable reference to the person in his spiritual and material integrity, in his individual and social dimension.

It is not just about the illness, he continued, adding that it is a person with a disease, not a disease with a person. It is with this integrally human vision that doctors are called to relate to the patient.

It is for the doctors to possess, together with the due technical and professional competence, a code of values and meanings with which to give meaning to the illness and to ones work and to make every single clinical case a human encounter.

Quoting St. John Paul IIs encyclical Evangelium vitae, Pope Francis said: the responsibility of health workers is today enormously increased and finds its deepest inspiration and its strongest support precisely in the intrinsic and unavoidable ethical dimension of the health profession, as the ancient and ever current Hippocratic oath, according to which every doctor is asked to commit himself to absolute respect for human life and its sacredness.

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Pope Francis to doctors: Assisted suicide is 'false compassion' - Catholic Herald Online

This Week’s Awesome Tech Stories From Around the Web (Through September 21) – Singularity Hub

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FUTURE

Protesting Climate Change, Young People Take to Streets in a Global StrikeSomini Sengupta | The New York TimesAnxious about their future on a hotter planet and angry at world leaders for failing to arrest the crisis, masses of young people poured into the streets on every continent on Friday for a day of global climate protests.

Googles Quantum Bet on the Future of AIand What It Means for HumanityKatrina Brooker | Fast CompanyThe rise of AI inside Google resembles a journey billions of us are on collectively, hurtling into a digital future that few of us fully understandand that we cant opt out of. One dominated in large part by Google. Few other companies (let alone governments) on the planet have the ability or ambition to advance computerized thought.

Biobots Made From Muscle Propelled by Neurons and LightNick Lavars | New AtlasThe biobots consist of a soft scaffold layered with skeletal muscle tissue and light-responsive motor neurons sourced from mouse stem cells. When exposed to light, the neurons fire and become actuators that kick the muscle tissue into gear and propel the robot forward.

You Can Soon Get Your DNA Sequenced AnonymouslyMegan Molteni | WiredEncrypting a whole genome is a much more computationally expensive process. Running computations on encrypted genomes even more so. But thats what Nebula is working on next. For the last year the company has been collaborating with researchers to build and test a secure computing environment, a publication about which is currently under review.

Artificial Intelligence Faces a Reproducibility CrisisGregory Barber | WiredGetting [neural networks] to perform well can be like an art, involving subtle tweaks that go unreported in publications. The networks also are growing larger and more complex, with huge data sets and massive computing arrays that make replicating and studying those models expensive, if not impossible for all but the best-funded labs.

Waymos Robotaxi Pilot Surpassed 6,200 Riders in Its First Month in CaliforniaKirsten Korosec | TechCrunchIts a noteworthy figure for an inaugural effort that pencils out to an average of 156 trips every day that month. And it demonstrates that Waymo has the resources, staff and vehicles to operate a self-driving vehicle pilot while continuing to test its technology in multiple citiesandramp up its Waymo One ride-hailing service in Arizona.

Image Credit:Matt Artz /Unsplash

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This Week's Awesome Tech Stories From Around the Web (Through September 21) - Singularity Hub

BTS’ Most Popular Album, According to Streams on Spotify – Showbiz Cheat Sheet

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This K-Pop group earned their spot as one of the biggest boy bands in the music industry, raking in millions of streams on Spotify. But which is BTS most popular album? While some collections, like Map of the Soul: Persona, only include a handful of songs, others boast over 15 tracks for fans to stream. As a result, the most popular albums for this ranking is determined by the average number of streams per song off of their respective albums.

Of course, as any BTS fan will tell you, the number of streams earned by the group changes on a daily basis. Some songs, like Lights, raked in millions of streams almost overnight. As of Sept. 15, 2019, these are BTS most popular albums, according to the average number of plays per song on Spotify.

Average number of plays per song: 84,124,427

BTS released this large chunk of music during 2018. The album is broken up into two discs and features over 25 songs, some previously released by the boy band. Some songs on this album include solo hits by the members of BTS, like Jungkooks Euphoria and Vs Singularity.

Of course, hits of the group appear on this album, including The Truth Untold, Idol, Airplane pt. 2, and Im Fine. The most popular song off of this album is Fake Love, with over 260 million plays on Spotify.

Average number of plays per song: 84,619,632

As BTS most recently released album, Map of the Soul: Persona features many recent hits popularized by the boy band. That includes songs like Boy With Luv, featuring Halsey, which earned multiple nominations at this years MTV Video Music Awards. The most popular song on this album is Boy With Luv, which received over 270 million plays on the streaming platform. During a press conference, some of the members discussed the meaning behind songs like Home.

The moment we meet our ARMYs who know us and love us is like coming home and feeling all its warmth and comfort, J-Hope said, according to NME. The song talks about the home, which is where the fans are and where our hearts are, where we want to come back to when things are hard and we feel lonely. We get strength from the people who love us and wait for us, and we come back to them so that we can return their love with even greater love.

Average number of plays per song: 87,176,067

While each BTS album has iconic songs, this album definitely holds a few favorites of the BTS army. The group performed songs like Fake Love and Airplane pt. 2 on American talk shows like The Ellen Show. The most popular song off of Love Yourself: Tear is Fake Love, which currently has almost 270 million streams on Spotify.

Average number of plays per song: 92,619,861

Coming in at the number one spot is BTS album, Love Yourself: Her, the songs earning over 90 million plays on average. While this is not the groups oldest album, it is the oldest album on this list, originally released in 2017. The most popular song on this album is DNA, which currently has over 240 million plays on Spotify.

BTS albums, including their most recently released album Map of the Soul: Persona, are available for streaming on Spotify, Apple Music and most major music platforms.

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10 Facts You Didnt Know About Mara Sov In Destiny 2 – GameRant

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Queen of the Awoken and Kell of the House Of Wolves, Mara Sov is one of the more interesting and powerful characters in Destiny 2. Her ambitions are rarely clear and her plans are complicated, but you can bet that no matter what happens she will usually find a way to come out on top and with greater power.

Related: 10 Facts You Didn't Know About Cayde-6 In Destiny 2

This pirate queen is so deeply layered that its hard to know whether she is ultimately an ally or a foe to the player. With all this subtlety, statecraft, and mystery, its understandable that players missed a few facts about this interesting woman.

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Mara Sov states in the game that she was born of Starlight and Darkness. This is in reference to when the Traveler (Starlight) and Darkness (obvious) clashed in the solar system. This conflict created a singularity that encompassed a generation ship known as Yang Liwei.

When this event occurred Mara Sov and the other Awoken were born. In reality they were once humans who through this singularity became tied to the very fabric of the universe, changing their physiology, psychology, and granting themincredible powers. It is unknown the full extent of Mara Sovs power or who she was when she was human.

One of the reasons for Mara Sovs success as a leader is that she quickly and decisively deals with every threat that presents itself to her. When the House Of Wolves were at her doorstep she immediately mustered arms and confronted them.

When the Silent Fang betrayed her and started civil war she had them brutally assassinated and when Oryx, The Taken King was gathering his forces and preparing to invade she took her fleet to Saturn and confronted him. No bureaucracy, no debate, just immediate and swift action.

Its this swift and decisive action that sparked the Reef Wars. As the other Houses of the Fallen were gathering to launch an assault on Earth, the House of Wolves were traveling through her domain. Letting them through would spare her people, but she could potentially be the next target after Earth fell and shed be facing the entire might of the Fallen.

Taking action she confronted the House of Wolves who demanded her to surrender or face destruction. Instead Mara Sov launched her forces, wiped out more than half of their forces and killed their leader. The survivors embedded themselves in the area and the Reef Wars began.

The Reef Wars is an example of Mara Sovs consistent efforts to protect The Last City and its inhabitants. The House Of Wolves had no clue the Awoken even existed when they were traveling through the Reef and she could have laid low and avoided the conflict.

Related:Destiny 2: 5 Weird Facts About The Hive

When Oryx invaded she could have stayed put and fought defensively letting him face Earth head on. Instead she took the fight to him on Saturn to give the Traveler and the Guardians enough time to muster their armies and join the fight.

Having said that, she doesnt necessarily wish to protect Earth. In the Dreaming City, she reveals that she regrets not taking the opportunity to obliterate the Traveler while it lay dormant. In her mind the Traveler seeks conflict, drawing foes like the Fallen, Oryx, and even the Darkness to the solar system in order to fight it.

She hesitated to attack it out of concern that it would bring the wrath of the humans to her doorstep and sees now that would have been a favorable fight compared to the horrors that occurred over the course of the games. While shes currently committed to safeguarding her allies to keep herself protected, its a tenuous relationship and the Traveler will always be a beacon for evil that threatens her and her people.

Interestingly even though she has avast spy network and numerous contacts throughout the solar system she had never met a Guardian until the player arrived at her court. Part of this may have been her policy of staying in the shadows and avoiding detection, but its surprising her Crows havent once brought one back for her inspection.

Related:10 Facts About The Guardians In Destiny 2 Fans Didnt Know

Even more incredulous is the fact that shes shocked when the player is revived by his Ghost, proving she had no previous knowledge of their resurrection ability. This shows that while the Queen is powerful, she is far from all knowing.

Another key to her powerful and effective leadership is her willingness and eagerness to make deals with those who prove powerful and capable. She almost always pursues the diplomatic path when confronting potential foes, seeking to strike deals or negotiate truces, but when shes turned down her claws come out.

In fact her entire relationship with the Guardian is predicated on mutual benefit. She provides the player with resources and assistance in exchange for favors. For instance after providing access to the Black Garden she had the Guardians help in overthrowing the House of Wolves rebellion.

In fact when people prove their loyalty or at the very least their usefulness she is quick and more than willing to shower them with rewards. After the Guardian helps her take down the Silent Fang she rewards them with loot and the knowledge that they are her allies.

This relationship would continue to grow as she defends the Traveler from Oryx, the Guardian assists her loyal followers following the aftermath of her apparent destruction, she rewards the player for quelling the rebellion, the Guardian assists her with the Curse Cycle plaguing the Dreaming City and she continues to reward the player.

One of Mara Sovs abilities is her fulfillment of Sword Logic, the belief that existence is the struggle to survive and any being powerful enough will continue to exist. This is proven when Oryx turns his Dreadnaughts superweapon on her ship, obliterating her body, but she doesn't die.

In spite of this setback Mara Sovs consciousness remained intact and went to the Ascendant Realm. This development supposedly played into her plans as she used her new form of existence to gather knowledge for her next steps after Oryxs death.

Which ultimately points to Mara Sovs greatest power, the ability to think and plan far, far into the future. Everyindividual she interacts with is a potential cog in her master plan. Every major development or setback is yet another cog that she can fit into the wheels and make it work for her.

Uldrens betrayel, the House of Wolves rebellion, even her own death led to her accumulating more power and control. Now as shes stuck in an infinite time loop shes taking the opportunity to meet with powerful beings like the Nine and one who despises Light to plan her next steps, whatever that may be.

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10 Facts You Didnt Know About Mara Sov In Destiny 2 - GameRant