Food: Four Short Talks brings community to the table – Dailyuw

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On Thursday, the UW Alumni Association (UWAA) hosted a diverse range of panelists to speak on the topic of food from a wide variety of perspectives. Food: Four Short Talks was an event that was the first of its kind.

The event was collaboratively built with all the panelists in order to reflect the diverse and unique experiences involved with food, according to UWAA senior director Ellen Whitlock Baker.

The whole thing is new, Baker said. Weve never done anything like this.

All of the panelists for Food Talks were either UW faculty or UW alumni. Senior lecturer Anita Verna Crofts, kicked off the night by sharing her experiences as a visual communication trainer to Syrians in Turkey. The talk also showcased speakers Laurie and Leslie Coaston, restauranteurs and former owners of The Kingfish Cafe in Capitol Hill; My Tam Nguyen, tastemaker; and Branden Born, UW professor of urban design and planning.

In her talk, Crofts shared her reflections on a comparison between her breakfast in Turkey and a students breakfast in the Syrian war zone.

In extreme circumstances, meals and the mundane take on an added significance, Crofts said. Who you eat with and what you eat defines who you are, your taste, and your kinship ties. You could also see it as an act of resolve, [as in] You can bomb my city, but Im going to start my day with my tea and my wife and my two kids.

Though the training was in Turkey, her student was stuck in Syria due to closed borders. The sense of both strength and fragility from her students breakfast perfectly captured Crofts teaching philosophy of turning what is most personal into meaningful narrative.

For these visual communication trainings, my goal is to take that vulnerability and transform it into stories that show optimism and show a certain sense of resilience in what is sometimes the most excruciating, profoundly sorrowful point in a persons life, Crofts said.

While Crofts talk focused on foods potential as fodder for compelling storytelling, Nguyens talk raised pressing questions about the local food community in Seattle.

As an immigrant from Vietnam, the Vietnamese community in Little Saigon was reminiscent of the close community Nguyen experienced in her childhood. Though the Vietnamese community in Seattle gave her a sense of a home-away-from-home as a newcomer, the local Seattle Asian American community today faces some challenges.

According to Nguyen, the recent Womens March was beautiful, but it coincided with the busiest shopping weekend for Chinatown, the International District, and Little Saigon, disrupting small businesses and restaurants.

Its a moment of reflection for our community: What happens when our values clash? Nguyen said. How can we share space and build community? How can we be intentional about building these spaces together and share this community together?

Nguyen wasnt the only panelist asking difficult questions about how to sustain food communities. Restauranteurs Laurie and Leslie Coaston enjoyed close-knit ties with The Kingfish Cafes staff and patrons for the nearly 20 years it was open, but closed it in January 2015 when their rent increased by 68 percent due to the local neighborhood development.

We were always this huge family, Coaston said. It was an amazing place to be, and Id love to see those kinds of places remain in the city. But with it being so expensive, our question is, how do you do that? How do we keep those businesses, those communities strong and vibrant?

Professor Branden Borns talk about the intricacies of the global food system concluded the night, followed by a Q&A session between audience members and panelists focusing on food citizenship.

Heres the problem: The food system, that which brings that food to you and everybody else in cities around the world every day, is super complicated, Born said. Its a really complex thing, and its not working for you.

Born emphasized the importance of being informed food citizens who know where food comes from. Some practical ways for being a good food citizen he shared were to grow your own food, learn about the food that you eat, and be aware of how the food system operates. He also encouraged audience members to support local nonprofit food organizations involved in food advocacy, such as the Food Empowerment Education Sustainability Team.

The most political decision you make every day is what you eat, Nguyen said. Be active. Show up. Be a citizen with your dollars, but also with your heart, and your hands, and your feet.

Reach contributing writer Cecilia Too at development@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @ceciliatooo

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Food: Four Short Talks brings community to the table - Dailyuw

Safe space travel: Protecting alien worlds from earthlings – and vice versa – Deutsche Welle

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The dwarf star Trappist-1 and its seven newly discovered planets are promising targets to search for alien life - but researchers might not even have to travel that far.

"We might find alien life in our own backyard of our solar system," said NASA's Kevin Peter Hand at the meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Boston this month.

Astrobiologists searching for extraterrestrial life pin their hopes on Jupiter's moons Europa, Callisto and Ganymede as well as on Saturn's moon Enceladus.

"They are covered in ice but beneath there might be oceans with rocky seafloors," said Hand, chief scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

NASA plans to launch a rocket in 2024 sending a lander to Europa which will explore the moon, take samples and possibly"find life that is alive today."

Sure, the Europa mission probably won't discover intelligent, human-like life and possibly not even fish-like life. But bacteria, which have developed there, would be just as fascinating for researchers.

Although, there is one thing they have to ensure in the first place.

Does Europa harbour life?

Avoiding hitchhikers

The worst-case scenario for astrobiologists is to one day find life on Europa or elsewhere which has been brought there by humans themselves.

"We don't want to study bacteria from Florida [on other planets]," said Norine Noonan, biologist at the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg.

Just as much as researchers have to prevent potential alien organisms from contaminating Earth, they work hard on protecting space from Earth-based life.

"Any equipment that is sent to touch down on moons or other planets is sterilized several times during its construction", Christian Gritzner of the German Aerospace Center (DLR), told DW.

Rovers, landers and other equipment that are sent to space are built in a clean facility, heated up to over 110 degree centigrade (230 degree Fahrenheit) for several hours or even days, they are irradiated with UV light and sanitized with solvents - measures to kill any bacterium or fungus that might try to get a free ride into outer space.

The Europa lander will also be wrapped in a biobarrier, NASA's Kevin Hand explained - an aluminum foil-like sheath that keeps out any contaminants until it reaches Jupiter's moon.

"The truth is still out there," Noonan pointed out. "Let's not destroy the opportunity to find it."

Protecting the ecosystem on other planets - every astronaut's challenge

Good citizens of the solar system

Protecting other worlds from Earth-based organisms is not just a voluntary moral conception which some responsible researchers cling to.It is international space law.

United Nations Outer Space Treaty which entered into force in October 1967 calls for all states to"avoid harmful contamination of space and celestial bodies."The treaty came into being in preparation of the landing on the moon.

People were afraid that a visit to the moon might bring uninvited guests to Earth, for example, a deadly microorganism that causes a catastrophic outbreak - just like in the sci-fi novel "The Andromeda Strain" by Michael Crichton.

All rock samples that were flown in from the Moon - as well as the first men on the moon - were put into strict quarantine when entering Earth.Only later, when researchers had realized there is nothing alive on the Moon, rules were relaxed.Still later, people realized that contamination works in both directions.

"NASA found strange bumps on the lens of some camera equipment of the unmanned Surveyor landers that had been sent to the Moon three years before," said Christian Gritzner. "Nobody knew what it was."

These bumps turned out to be flu viruses. They seem to have been delivered from Earth to the Moon with the help of some technician who had sneezed on the equipment, Gritzner explained.

"Even after 3 years in space, these viruses were still able to reproduce in the lab."

According to Gritzner, this was the moment that people realized how crucial planetary protection really was.

ExoMars lander Schiaparelli - particularly germ-free

Leaving Mars as it is

"It is unlikely we'll find life on Mars today," said Norine Noonan.Even if there had once been bacteria or other simple organisms, they are possibly long gone.Still, researchers might find remnants of previous life on Mars and get to know how it emerged and what it was like.

Unlike the Moon and many other celestial bodies in our universe, Mars has an atmosphere and a surface that can harbor life - that makes traveling there even more complicated.

"Any hitchhiker we might deliver there can spread," said NASA's Kevin Hand.According to the European Space Agency ESA, the ExoMars project which tries to find life on Mars, even built a new cleanroom in which to construct itslander Schiaparelli.The landing module even had a portable "clean tent" which traveled with it to its launch site in Baikonur.

"We cannot bake humans"

The challenge to avoid contamination gets even harder when astronauts join their equipment on its travel to Mars - i.e. on a manned spaceflight.

"We are spewing fountains of bacteria," said Norine Noonan, adding that it is impossible to sterilize humans: "We cannot put them into an oven and bake them."

It will still be a long way to figure out which measures will protect Mars from life on Earth during such a journey.

"Maybe a habitat on Mars will have a sanitizing air lock spraying disinfectants," Gritzner said. Astronauts would have to pass the lock every time they enter the Mars surface from their space settlement.

But there will be time enough to figure that out, Gritzner adds, as "a manned spaceflight to Mars is still a long way off."

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Safe space travel: Protecting alien worlds from earthlings - and vice versa - Deutsche Welle

Forget SpaceX: 10 companies that will change space travel in 2017 & 2018 – Geektime

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The first Axiom Module (lower right, with body-mounted solar panels) to join the International Space Station (rendering by Axiom).

SpaceXs announcement that they will launch two tourists on a trip around the moon has captured imaginations with renewed speculation about the future of space travel and accessibility to the beyond. We are excited to announce that SpaceX has been approached to fly two private citizens on a trip around the moon late next year. []

SpaceXs announcement that they will launch two tourists on a trip around the moon has captured imaginations with renewed speculation about the future of space travel and accessibility to the beyond.

We are excited to announce that SpaceX has been approached to fly two private citizens on a trip around the moon late next year. They have already paid a significant deposit to do a moon mission, Musk wrote in their announcement. Like the Apollo astronauts before them, these individuals will travel into space carrying the hopes and dreams of all humankind, driven by the universal human spirit of exploration.

However, it really is not fair to a number of other companies that are revolutionizing space travel all the same but dont have the substantial resources or notoriety of Elon Musks gargantuan company. Musks celebrity status makes his every tweet a news story (not totally unlike, but in many ways extremely unlike, the newest US president). With that sort of figure, it is hard to capture peoples attention if you are running one of SpaceXs pretenders and competitors. The Hawthorne, Cali company not only operates its own mission services using rockets it built itself, but also sells those rockets to other launch providers.

SpaceX is playing with an optimistic clock in terms of travel to Mars. Whether or not they do make it, and there is no reason to doubt they cant beat the likes of NASA to the Martian surface, there is still a lot of ground to cover to ensure a sustainable space industry for the United States and beyond.

This years Lunar XPRIZE contest sponsored by Google will likely kick off a new era in space-bound venture capital and entrepreneurship as a flock of phoenixes rise from the sands of 2017s moonshots. But plenty of other companies not looking to land rovers on nearby celestial bodies (sometimes more distant ones, or none at all) will also likely benefit from a sector that is overdue for an investment boom, including a growing number of firms building their own rockets with sleeker and more compact designs than the SpaceX Falcon 9.

This is a non-exhaustive list of 10 companies mirroring, challenging, or augmenting the work SpaceX is doing by following through on the next steps to getting humanity into space on a more regular basis:

SpaceILs resdesigned lunar probe, which may make Israel only the 4th country to land a rover on the moon (SpaceIL)

SpaceIL is also worth mentioning here, but not for the same reasons as Moon Express. They are also part of the Google Lunar XPrize contest, but whetheror not they winthey will have enabled a team of some 250 people to get stronger in skill sets that will likely serve as the base of an entirely new ecosystem for space-faring technology. Being located in Israel and with enormous notoriety, its a foregone conclusion that simply being associated with this team will pay dividends for SpaceIL veterans.

They will also have major connections to the local startup ecosystems most influential leaders and top investors, eager to underwrite any entrepreneurship coming from the team. Expect that the end of the decade will see as many if not more space ventures come from Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and Haifa as you will see from San Mateo, Palo Alto, and Menlo Park.

SpaceIL shows off their latest and greatest model for their lunar lander, scheduled to go up in 2017 with SpaceX (image: Geektime/Gedalyah Reback)

With those kinds of networks in hand and numerous well-connected government connections the team has made since launching the project, theres a good chance this team will spawn a new sub-sector of the space startup scene: landers and probes. For the foreseeable remainder of 2017, nanosatellites will remain the booming sector for space, but talk of new missions across the solar system in addition to efforts to reach the moon will propel competition in the rover industry.

The first Axiom Module (lower right, with body-mounted solar panels) to join the International Space Station (rendering by Axiom).

Founded by CEO and President Michael T. Suffredini, former manager of the International Space Station for 10 years and instrumental in the ISSs development, Axiom is developing thefirst private version of an ISS, which will become extremely important when the ISS is retired in the next few years.

Axioms plan is to attach the basis of the new station to the old ISS, making it independent when the original station is decommissioned. Once operating, the station will host 60-day-long astronautical missions, 7-to-10-day space tourist trips, on-orbit research and manufacturing (microgravity is ideal for production of bacteria for example, according to startup SpacePharma), and exploration systems testing with eyes on customers like Moon Express or SpaceX, which are considering plans for manned missions to the surfaces of the Moon and Mars.

Axiom Space concept for private ISS (rendering by Axiom)

It sports a stacked team with BizDev run by space shuttle mission specialist Michael Lopez-Alegria, Intuitive Machines CEO and Deputy Director of NASA Johnson Space Center Stephen Altemus, and Space Angels Network Managing DirectorAmir Blachman running strategic development.

Axioms missions are tentatively scheduled to begin by 2019.

Screenshot of the Space Nation app against a backdrop of an astronaut (courtesy)

Launching a contest to go on a space vacation is the stuff of Total Recall, but the first true iteration of it is coming out of Finland this year. The effort is backed by a consortium of companies that includes the aforementioned Axiom Space. Equal partners include space media company Cohu Experience, new Space and education company Edge of Space, and Finnish education company Fun Academy.

Theyear-plus-long contest to recruit a new astronaut is itself a long-term test of brains, brawn and fortitude that begins with the release of a free-to-download app in the fall of 2017. After several months of open competition with brain games and challenges through the app, 130 semi-finalists will be invited for a two-week intensive course at a yet-to-be-chosen location. After that, 12 finalists will face off in a three-month-long battle to win the worlds first astronautical prize. The trip wont be a vacation, as the winner be he or she a scientist or not will be trained to do experiments aboard the International Space Station. From there, one would presume the world is the winners oyster and a budding number of career opportunities will come their way.

Kalle Vh-Jaakkola, CEO of the Cohu Experience and Space Nation. Photo credit: Courtesy

Back in the 90s I began to wonder, Why arent we on Mars? Why arent we back to the Moon? Cohu Experience Founder and CEOKalle Vh-Jaakkola told Geektime recently. The golden age of startups has spurred his childhood dreams and an opportunity for a yet-to-be-found rookie astronaut. We wouldnt have founded this company and this venture, without this empowerment and all that entrepreneurial movement that anything is possible.

DSI is the only team on this list that is dead set on mining asteroids. Asteroid composition varies for a number of reasons and contain untold quantities of chemical and metallic resources from sulfur to gold. They are planning to reach so-called Near Earth Asteroids (NEAs) before daring to venture further out to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The company explains many NEAs are smaller in mass, meaning their gravity will not be an obstacle to reaching the rocks and extracting resources.

Of course like any mining operation there will be a timeline. Probes would have to conduct prospecting, then harvest ore and process it. Thats without the task of returning the extracted material to Earth.Those initial prospecting missions are supposed to start soon with the launch of small probes like the Prospector-X, which will be tested in LEO with the co-sponsorship of the government of Luxembourg. Following what they hope are successful tests, a suped-up probe called Prospector-1 will be deployed to an NEA.

Prospector-X, a joint project with Luxembourg (DSI)

DSI is developing Prospector-1 both for its own asteroid mining ambitions, as well as to bring an extremely low-cost, yet high-performance exploration capability to the market,Grant Bonin, chief engineer at Deep Space Industries, explains on the company website.We hope to enable both existing and new public and private organizations to explore the inner solar system using this affordable platform.

But the most innovative idea here might not be in plans to dig up gold, platinum, or perhaps Rare Earth metals like lithium. They are targeting water-and-ice-rich asteroids first, which they claim will be in abundance among NEAs. The reason is simple: water will be the engine propellant the probes will use, thus initial missions will also save precious mass by refueling via its resource-extraction tests.

Concept of Deep Space Industries asteroid capture plan (DSI)

That plan resolves issues of feasibility. If their probes can successfully collect a resource and deploy it on the same trip, that would lend credence to ideas of using similar concepts with liquid methane lakes on the surface of Saturns moon Titan or processing metals on site to construct replacement pieces for on-board computer hardware. Its a robotic and engineering challenge that could pay bigger dividends for DSI than even the resources themselves.

Bigelow Aerospace is one of the companies making strides building portable habitats for astronauts. Their first model, BEAM, was successfully attached to the International Space Station in spring 2016. The inflatable room was put together in seven hours by NASA astronaut Jeff Williams. At 13 feet long and 10.5 feet wide (4 x 3.2 meters), its definitely small, but this is just the companys first deployment since receiving a $17.8 million contract from NASA back in 2013 to design and deploy an inflatable habitat.

It sounds sort of like popcorn in a frying pan starts up, Williams said at the time, reflecting the immediate effect pumped air had in the vacuum of space when BEAM was deployed.The goal is ultimately to extend these sorts of dwellings to locations beyond the ISS with the surfaces of the Moon and Mars first and foremost in the minds of the companys executives and engineers.

Expandable habitats significantly decrease the amount of transport volume for future space missions, said NASAs BEAM project manager, Rajib Dasgupta, said last year. These expandables take up less room on a rocket, but once set up, provide greater volume for living and working. After thorough testing, we believe crews traveling to the Moon, Mars, asteroids or other destinations could use them as habitable structures or as labs or work areas.

Creating a puncture-proof habitat would be critical for emergencies. Presumably, a long-term surface habitat would not be made only of inflatables, but these would serve astronauts in the field exploring Mars away from home base or as temporary fixes for fully-fledged and more complex astronaut homes in the future.

Founded by Paul G. Allen in 2011, Vulcans subsidiary Stratolaunch Systems has been pushing for a more flexible and more cost-effective model for orbital launches that relies on using specially-designed high-atmospheric planes to deploy small payloads into low-Earth orbit (LEO). Deploying payloads by plane in theory will grant a lot of flexibility in terms of launch location and launch windows.

Without getting specific about the materials used to design their plane, Vulcan has commissioned Scaled Composites to build it. It will be 238 feet long and have a wing span of 385 feet, propelled by 6X Pratt & Whitney PW4056 engines with a maximum takeoff weight of 1.3 million pounds.

The stratolaunch plane design (Vulcan Aerospace)

They also reached a multi-year agreement in October 2016 with public aerospace and defense company Orbital ATK to use the latters Pegasus XL air-launch vehicles attached to Vulcans space-ward planes.

Orbital ATK President Scott Lehrsaid at the time, The combination of our extensive air-launch experience and the Stratolaunch aircraft has the potential to provide innovative and cost-effective options for commercial launch customers.

Vulcan stratospheric launches concept (Vulcan)

Their investment arm Vulcan Capital also took part in a $20 million Series B funding round for Spaceflight Industries back in March 2015.

While their concept is not new, it remains more logistically familiar than using rockets. Rocket reusability is also a novel and still unperfected concept. The durability and multi-usability of planes makes this an attractive option.

Named after the Greek goddess of pain, Odyne is trying to make it cheaper to get nanosatellites into space by continuously working on more efficient rockets for smaller amounts of cargo. They certainly have the minds to meet needs for mettle. The company was founded by mechanical engineer and systems architect Eric Ward of MIT, who is also a co-founder of the MIT New Space Age Conference.

He will work in tandem with embedded systems expert and entrepreneur Andrew Greenberg, whose other companies have dealt with medical devices. Hes also the founder of the Portland State Aerospace Society (PSAS), whose acronym must be an allusion to the pizzazz the two hope to bring to the industrial space ecosystem.

Space is Hard, but we wont make it harder. We consider ourselves Rocket Engineers not Rocket Scientists, Odynes website explains. Humans have been launching liquid-fueled rockets for almost a century, and the foundational science has already been done. We combine this science and knowledge into simple, effective and reliable rockets, to launch micro- and nano-satellites to orbit.

Theyre advised by Accion Systems Co-Founder and CEO Natalya Brikner as well as MIT School of Management lecturer Shari Loessberg.

The more the merrier when it comes to new rocket concepts. The talent behind this project is what gets it on the list, as there has been no proof of concept or even a design provided yet by Odyne. Ward is a prime example of the new kind of entrepreneur hitting the skies, as seen in this feature by Fast Company.

An American-Kiwi company, Rocket Labis the brainchild of New Zealander Peter Beck and just recently sent its Electron rocket for testing in February 2017 to its own launching station. Theyve developed their own engine, the4,600lbf (pound force inch), turbo-pumped LOX/RP-1 Rutherford. Their first rocket, dubbed somewhat lazily Its a Test, should get the all-clear to go to space later in 2017.

Its an important milestone for our team and for the space industry, Beck said about the final pre-launch testing. In the past, its been countries that go to space, not companies. Through the innovative use of new technologies our team has created a launch vehicle designed for manufacture at scale. Our ultimate goal is to change our ability to access space.

Theyve raised an undisclosed amount of investments from Bessemer Venture Partners, K1W1, Khosla Ventures and even Lockheed Martin. Where those investors are excited is the service of selling the rockets themselves, which were projected back in 2015 to have an eventual price tag of a mere $4.9 million each. Thats about a tenth the price of a SpaceX Falcon 9. Their limit comes in the lighter payload.

You can infer that they have raised in the tens of millions of dollars at least, since New Zealands government will provide up to $5 million in matching investments for R&D with hi-tech businesses through theCallaghan Innovation Growth Grants program that Rocket Lab benefited from in 2014.

Ixion concept attached to the ISS (bottom) (image via Ixion Initiative)

Not to be confused with the design-similar Axiom, Ixion is another joint effort making the list and yet another new venture that has already secured a deal with NASA. Backed by NanoRacks, Space SystemsLoral (SSL) and the United Launch Alliance, Ixion will endeavor to figure out the best way to convert the upper stages of rockets into long-term habitats. That would circumvent the issue of throwing a habitat into a cargo hold or building one from scratch using 3D-printing-like machines on the surface of the Moon or Mars.

Ixion will enter theNext Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships-2 (NextSTEP-2) program and start by testing their projects in LEO. They will try to demonstrate its proof of concept by converting a Centaur rockets upper stage, then attaching it to the International Space Station. Like Bigelow, they have their eyes set on the surfaces of not-so-distant moons and the rest of the Suns planets.

Our plan is to dramatically lower the proposed costs for habitats to allow for the largest customer base, both commercial and government, says NanoRacks CEOJeffrey Manber. With Loral and NanoRacks working together, we have the knowledge base to assure a solid commercial use of tomorrows habitats via re-purposed ULA Centaur platforms.

The ISS will support three of the companies on this list in the near future, illustrating how important Axioms private space station project will be for future habitability tests and support. Expect more companies to enter that fray eventually as it becomes one the one hand more feasible to build alternative private space stations and more experts from agencies like NASA with ISS experience enter the business world.

a href=http://www.fireflyspace.com>Firefly wants to make space launches ubiquitous, and they see that happening through their proprietary light rocket design. Theyre looking to capitalize on projected, meteoric growth in the small satellites industry that has seen companies like Planet launch massive (88-strong) constellations as recently as February 2017. That launch included other projects though from small nanosat companies and even universities. With demand expected to grow and payloads regularly hosting more than 100 nanosatellites at a time, there will be a race to provide fast and efficient service. This rocket is thin. Stage 1 (the bottom part) is only 6 feet in diameter while Stage 2 (the top part) is 5 feet in diameter.

It can hold a 200 kg payload and uses an aerospike booster, which the company says is more efficient across the range of pressures in rocket flight than traditional bell nozzles.They recently announced $300 million worth of preliminary orders (which they refer to as letters of intent/LOI) from prospective customers that would fill their launch schedule through 2021.

That would include 42 launches, with another 35 launches worth $280 million anticipated between 2022 and 2025.With a NASA deal in hand, expect their first NASA launch to take place in March 2018.

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Forget SpaceX: 10 companies that will change space travel in 2017 & 2018 - Geektime

What You Need to Know About Elon Musk’s Plan to Fly People to the Moon – Singularity Hub

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What

On February 27, Elon Musks SpaceX announced plans to fly two non-astronauts, or private citizens, on a loop around the moon.

No one except Elon Musk and the two moon-explorers-to-be know who they are yet. SpaceX has stated only that the individuals approached the company asking to be flown around the moon (as opposed to the company recruiting them), that theyre not linked to Hollywood in any way, and that theyll be paying SpaceX a large sum for the journey.

Since Apollo 8, the first voyage to the moon in 1968, only 24 people have flown to the moon, and 12 have walked on its surface. Theyve all been American, and theyve all been men. If either of the moon mission passengers are female, SpaceX will make history in more than one way.

Interestinglyand terrifyinglyMusk said the mission will be completed on autopilot, without a trained astronaut or technician on board. The two passengers will be on their own.

Passengers will ride in SpaceXs Dragon 2 capsule, powered by itsFalcon Heavy rocket.

At 230 feet high, 40 feet wide, and more than five million pounds of thrust at liftoff, the company claims Falcon Heavy will be the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two.

Its important to note, though, that the rocket hasnt been tested yetthats scheduled to happen this summer.

Dragon 2 is similar to the Dragon capsule SpaceX currently uses to deliver cargo to and from the International Space Station (ISS).

The mission will need a license from the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Falcon Heavy will launch from the Kennedy Space Center near Cape Canaveral, Florida.

More specifically, it will take off from launch pad 39A, which was used by the Apollo program for its lunar missions in the late 60s and early 70s.

The flights estimated distance is 300,000-400,000 miles into space, which would put humans farther from Earth than ever before.

SpaceX is aiming for the mission to take place as soon as late 2018. But this timeline is highly ambitious. As noted above, Falcon Heavy has yet to be tested. Anything short of a seamless performance would likely push the moon mission back by months, if not years.

Similarly, the crew version of Dragon is scheduled to make its first voyage at the end of this year, in automatic mode and without any passengers on board. Pending success of that trip, a manned flight would travel to the ISS in the second quarter of 2018.

Even if these tests are successful, it would seem more time would be needed to prepare both rocket and capsule for the much-longer moon orbit.

Though exact figures havent been disclosed, Musk called the cost comparable to that of sending astronauts to the International Space Station. That number was recently estimated to be over $70 million per person, going up to $81 million by 2018. The cost went up dramatically after NASA retired its own fleet in 2011 and began contracting with private companies and the Russian space agency to send people and cargo to and from the ISS.

In 2001, American multimillionaire Dennis Tito became the worlds first space tourist, booking a trip on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to the ISS for an estimated price tag of $20 million. Since then, six more wealthy individuals have gone to space because, well, they wanted to, and they could.

Besides being a high-profile test of its ability to get beyond Earth orbit, SpaceX's moon mission could serve as a stepping stone for future Mars missions. The unmanned Red Dragon Mars mission also plans to use a Falcon Heavy rocket and Dragon 2 capsule.

Theres a lot of speculation that the SpaceX announcement will set off the first public/private space race, pitting private companies against NASA. But SpaceX stated that NASA has encouraged private missions, as through them long-term costs to the government decline and more flight reliability history is gained, benefiting both government and private missions." NASAs Commercial Crew Program funded Dragon 2s development.

However, NASA did announce that it will be looking to put non-astronauts on its Space Launch System rocket, and the associated crew capsule, Orion.

If a public/private space race does ensue, NASA has decades of experience under its belt. But private companies like SpaceX have the advantage of less oversight, and manufacturing thats not politically-driven.

Space race or no space race, forget formerly exotic-seeming places like Bali or Fijiit seems the moon is set to become mankinds coveted tourist destination of the future.

Banner Image Credit: SpaceX

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What You Need to Know About Elon Musk's Plan to Fly People to the Moon - Singularity Hub

Does Zapping Your Brain Actually Help You Learn Faster? – Singularity Hub

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From time to time, the Singularity Hub editorial team unearths a gem from the archives and wants to share it all over again. It's usually a piece that was popular back then and we think is still relevant now. This is one of those articles. It was originally published March 6, 2016.We hope you enjoy it!

A cognitive neuroscientist and his team at HRL Laboratories in Malibu, California, seem to have achieved the impossible.

According to a press release, the team measured the brain activity patterns of six commercial and military pilots, and then transmitted these patterns into novice subjects as they learned to pilot an airplane in a realistic flight simulator.

If youre picturing people downloading knowledge directly into the brain Matrix-style, sorry to hand you the blue pill its utter nonsense.

Which is a total shame, because the brain-boosting technique used in the study transcranial direct current stimulation, or tDCS, is nothing short of fantastical.

Hook up some wires with a 9-volt battery, and you have a state-of-art thinking cap that activates select regions of the brain of your choosing. By directly tinkering with the brains electrical field no surgery required tDCS has the potential to treat depression, anxiety, chronic pain, OCD and motor symptoms in Parkinsons disease.

A handful of small studies including the HRL Laboratories research also tantalizingly suggest that it could heighten creativity, enhance spatial learning, boost math skills and language acquisition and even trigger lucid dreams sometimes weeks after the initial stimulation.

It seems to give you any kind of benefit you want, says Dr. Flavio Frohlich, a neurobiologist at the University of North Carolina and expert in tDCS-assisted cognition.

Sound too good to be true? Perhaps. Ask its doubters, and the only thing that tDCS is good at is giving people a nasty electrical burn.

Its high-tech brain gain riding the hype cycle train. Herere the facts and the fiction lets see how deep the rabbit hole goes.

The short answer: no one really knows.

The techniques brain-boosting effects were discovered serendipitously. At the turn of the last century, Drs. Walter Paulus and Michael Nitsche at the University of Gttingen in Germany popularized the technique while studying motor learning and working memory. They carefully placed two electrodes over motor regions of the brain, using gel to ensure full contact with the scalp. This generates a weak electrical current about 1 or 2 milliamps, low enough to be powered by a 9-volt battery.

To the teams surprise, participants receiving the stimulation learned faster than those who received only sham stimulation a placebo zap to trick them into thinking they were getting the treatment. Almost all later studies followed this protocol, including the aforementioned flight simulator study.

So whats happening to the brain?

The tDCS current itself is too weak to activate neurons; instead, it changes the ability of neurons to respond to stimuli, such as learning a new task. There are two types of stimulation: anodal stimulation primes neurons to be more excitable and thus more likely to fire, boosting signal; cathodal stimulation makes it harder for neurons to fire, decreasing noise.

In this way, tDCS can modulate the signal-to-noise ratio in a select brain region and tweak information processing. The word tweak here is key. tDCS doesnt transfer meaningful information it only improves the ability of subjects to learn.

At the same time, the current jolts plasticity-related molecules into action in neurons, changing their ability to respond to neurotransmitters.

But it goes even deeper than that. In another study, scientists at the Office of Naval Research found that tDCS in mice strips away certain molecular markers on their DNA. This causes neurons to pump out more BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor), a major vitality-boosting protein that promotes synaptic plasticity and the birth of new neurons and nurtures the brain.

These molecular changes could be why tDCS has long-lasting effects that linger for weeks, suggested the authors in their paper.

That said, its currently impossible to precisely target neural networks with tDCS in the way that optogenetics can. The current only flows in superficial layers of the cortex, rarely reaching deeper brain regions such as the hippocampus, a central hub for learning and memory.

And what happens to the rest of the brain during stimulation? Your guess is as good as mine.

Given the uncertainty in how tDCS works, its perhaps not surprising that it doesnt always work.

Several past meta-analyses cast serious doubt on the techs brain-boosting powers. Two such papers, both from the University of Melbourne, found that single-session tDCS had little-to-no reliable effect on executive function, language or memory in healthy young volunteers.

There are also disheartening reports that in some cases, zapping the brain impedes cognition.

Last year, Frohlich and colleagues published a report suggesting stimulation lowers IQ scores. His team measured the IQ of 40 healthy volunteers, then zapped them with either sham or real tDCS for 20 minutes over frontal areas of the brain specifically, the prefrontal cortex involved in flexible thinking and higher reasoning. When retested, people receiving tDCS performed worse than the non-stimulated controls.

Another team found that although tDCS could speed up the learning process associating Egyptian-like symbols with numbers it impaired the volunteers from automatically using this new knowledge in subsequent tests. The authors dubbed their finding the mental cost of cognitive enhancement.

Despite potential perils, optimism for the tech remains sky high.

The promise is so great that tDCS was featured in the prestigious academic journal Nature this week, with scientists warning against overzealous DIY use, already commercially available to biohackers for about $150 a pop.

Stimulating is easy, but doing it right is not, said Frohlich. Commercially available units arent regulated, and it takes at least some training to be able to correctly place the electrodes without injuring the scalp.

And since we still dont understand the long-term effects (not to mention potential side-effects) of tDCS, its far too early to call the technique totally safe.

People may well be damaging their brains, said Frohlich.

For now, the benefits arent worth the risk. As the story continues, however, that could change.

Electrodes get smaller all the time, making it increasingly possible to more precisely modulate brain activity. Although at the moment its hard to imagine targeting only a handful of neural networks using tDCS, its conceivable that next-gen non-invasive brain stimulation could dramatically improve in specificity.

More specific brain stimulation means more specific behavior outcomes.

There are already hints of this possibility: transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), which uses magnetic fields to modulate brain activity, is already used in brain-to-brain communication, where scientists stimulate a receivers brain with EEG waves recorded from an encoder performing simple tasks.

Theres a hell lot of controversy, but preliminary (published) results show that the encoders brain waves contain enough information to cause specific motor responses in the receiver, such as moving his hand in a certain way.

Now imagine an experts brain waves teaching a novice on complicated tasks.

Here, tDCS will prime the novices brain to better encode and retrieve new information. This is, in fact, what the press release mentioned earlier hinted at: that expert pilots brain waves helped newbies master a flight simulator.

Thats not the case the tDCS used in that study was run-of-the-mill steady currents, not fancy EEG recordings. But in a few decades? We probably still wont be able to download knowledge or program learning directly into our brain.

Well just be learning really, really fast.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock.com

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Does Zapping Your Brain Actually Help You Learn Faster? - Singularity Hub

TRON: Ascension – ComingSoon.net

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Release date:TBD

Studio:Walt Disney Pictures

Director:Joseph Kosinski

MPAA Rating:N/A

Screenwriters:David DiGilio, Eddy Kitsis, Adam Horowitz, Jesse Wigutow

Starring:Garrett Hedlund, Olivia Wilde

Genre:Action, Sci-Fi, Adventure

Official website:Disney.com/TRON

In the 2010 film, Garrett Hedlund played Sam Flynn, the son of the original TRON's Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges). Although a specific plot has not yet been revealed, the next chapter was said earlier to involve an exploration of life and death in the digital realm.

TRON 3 was called, "TRON: Ascension," the concept, which is an invasion movie from inside the machine coming out as opposed to one weve usually seen. So we hinted at that at the end of Legacy with Quorra coming out, but the idea for Ascension was a movie that was, the first act was in the real world, the second act was in the world of TRON, or multiple worlds of TRON, and the third act was totally in the real world. And I think that really opens up, blows open the concept of TRON in a way that would be thrilling to see on screen. But theres also a really interesting character study in Quorra and a Stranger in a Strange Land, trying to figure out where she belongs having lived in the real world for a few years, and where does she fit in.

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TRON: Ascension - ComingSoon.net

Ascension to host water justice conference – Thousand Oaks Acorn

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Ascension Lutheran Church will be a partner site for Trinity Institutes 46th National Theological Conference on Water Justice from March 22 through 24 at the church, 1600 E. Hillcrest Drive, Thousand Oaks.

The conference will provide guidance for churches and individuals wishing to take unified, faithbased action on the front lines of the water justice movement that assures all people have access to clean, safe drinking water.

At the conference, activists, scholars, authors and experts will offer guidance on the issue.

Conference participation is open to anyone interested in a practical, theological perspective on water justice.

The live global conference will be held at Trinity Church in New York City and webcast across the world.

As a partner site, Ascension will offer all aspects of the conference, including on-site reflection groups to help participants explore the issue and what they can do about it.

Speakers at this years conference include former California Sen. Barbara Boxer, a national leader on environmental protection who served in the House of Representatives for 10 years before becoming a U.S. senator in 1993.

After four terms as senator, she stepped down in 2017 and continues to advocate for environmental justice.

Other speakers are Maude Barlow, a political activist, author, policy critic and a former United Nations senior adviser; Winston Halapuais, the archbishop and primate of the Diocese of Polynesia and Aotearoa New Zealand; Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist and director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University; Christiana

Peppard, an expert on the ethics of fresh water and problems of climate change, social justice and sustainability; and Thabo Makgoba, archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa.

For more information about attending the conference at Ascension, email Stacy Smith at ssmith@alcto.org, call (805) 495-0406 or visit http://www.alcto.org.

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Ascension to host water justice conference - Thousand Oaks Acorn

Charlie’s Place II to open in Ascension Parish Spring 2017 – Donaldsonville Chief

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Quality care in a home-like experience for individuals with Alzheimers and dementia-related disorders

Charlies Place II Respite and Activity Center, the first expansion of the Alzheimers Services of the Capital Areas nationally recognized Charlies Place, is scheduled to open in early April 2017. It will be located on Purpera Road in The Arc of East Ascensions building in Gonzales. The person-centered respite care program will begin operations two days per week, six hours per day. CP II will offer a purposeful day out for mild to moderate Alzheimers affected individuals, as well as provide a much-needed break for their caregivers.

A four-time recipient of the Alzheimers Foundation of America Excellence in Dementia Care Distinction, the original Charlies Place, located on North Boulevard in Baton Rouge, has provided socialization and engaging activities to affected individuals, since it opened in 2007. Area physicians at St. Elizabeths Hospital are also very supportive, having repeatedly identified respite care as a serious community need.

With the aging of Americas baby boomers, Alzheimers and Dementia are on the rise, and scientific research is rapidly expanding across the country. In 2015, Scott Wilks, Ph.D., of the LSU School of Social Work, reported that CP Is benefits to both affected individuals and their caregivers were markedly discernible. The Caregiver Control Group not received respite support had a 67% higher stress rate than those using CP Is services. In addition, results also indicated that over 18 months the CP I Care Group showed no significant decline in their cognition and socialization. In other words, high quality, compassionate respite care does make a significant difference.

Charlies Place II already has the help and support of many people, organizations and companies, including the Lamar and Dixon Foundation, which have pledged $100,000 of matching funds to inspire other foundations and donors in support of CP II. However, the best endorsements undoubtedly will come from the people CP II will serve.

Since my mom has been going to Charlies Place or her social club, she has improved in every area," a caregiver who uses CP I for her mother, enthusiastically said. "Shes so excited to go, even though she cannot tell me much about her experience. I think she feels part of society or the world once again.

Alzheimers Services of the Capital Area is a local, non-profit organization which provides education and support programs to those affected by Alzheimers disease or dementia in ten civil parishes surrounding the Greater Baton Rouge area, including Ascension, Assumption, East and West Baton Rouge, East and West Feliciana, Iberville, Livingston, Pointe Coupee and St. Helena. Alzheimers Services is not affiliated with a national organization, which allow all funds raised to support families in the local community.

For more information about CP I and II programs and fees, please visit http://www.alzbr.org or call (225) 334-7494.

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Charlie's Place II to open in Ascension Parish Spring 2017 - Donaldsonville Chief

Slidell 37, East Ascension 35: Tigers upset top-seeded Spartans in Class 5A playoffs – NOLA.com

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On paper, it wasnt supposed to happen, but the young Slidell Tigers stuck with the game plan andupset top-seeded East Ascension 37-35 on the road in the second round of the Class 5A playoffs.

We have a very young team and they realize the importance of playing together, Slidell coach Dale Chimento said by phone Tuesday night. They are playing more intelligent and this was a good example believing in the team concept.

The 16th-seeded Tigers will travel on Friday to take on ninth-seeded Bonnabel, a 68-54 winner at eighth-seed Ruston.

Tylor Harris led the Tigers with 12 points, while Travis Harrington added six and Jonathan Merriman followed with five.

Slidell (24-7) was effective in not allowing East Ascension (27-7) to score in transition, which had been one of their primary strengths during the regular season. In fact, going into the half, the Tigers were in front, 17-16. The message was calm and simple as to what needed to happen the rest of the way.

I told them I thought we could play better in the second half and not turn the ball over as much, said Chimento. We focused on improving.

Just as they did in the first half, Slidell outscored East Ascension by one in the second half. It was even in the third with seven points each, but the Tigers outscored the Spartans 13-12 in the fourth to hang on for the win.

Our goal was to not let them get penetration, said Chimento. They have a really good point guard and we had to keep him from getting into a flow.

Slidell had gotten off to a fast start in the 2016-17 season, winning 10 of their first 11 games and then endured a stretch where they lost three of their next four. They finished by winning seven of their last nine in the regular season, including a 67-64 upset of District 6-5A champion St. Pauls, ending the Wolves' 28-game winning streak in league play.

Slidell has not faced any of the teams remaining in the Class 5A playoffs during the regular season. That list includes No. 2 Ouachita Parish, No. 3 Natchitoches Central, No. 4 Chalmette, No. 9 Bonnabel, No. 10 West Monroe, No. 21 Helen Cox and No. 22 Landry-Walker.

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Slidell 37, East Ascension 35: Tigers upset top-seeded Spartans in Class 5A playoffs - NOLA.com

Disruptive by Design: Siri, Tell Me a Joke. No, Not That One. – Signal Magazine

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Ask Siri to tell you a joke and Apples virtual assistant usually bombs. The voice-controlled systems material is limited and profoundly mediocre. Its not Siris fault. That is what the technology knows.

According to a knowledgeable friend, machines operate in specific ways. They receive inputs. They process those inputs. They deliver outputs. Of course, I argued. Not because I believed he was wrong, but because I had a lofty notion of the limitations of machines and what artificial intelligence (AI) could become.

My friend was not wrong. That is what machines do. For that matter, that is what all living beings do. We take external data and stimuli, process it and react as we see fit, based on previous experiences. The processing of inputs is what expands intelligence. Machines, on the other hand, process within specified parameters determined by humans. For a machine, output is limited by programming and processing power.

What is the upper limit of what a machine can learn? We do not yet know, but we do know that today, it takes repetition in the hundreds of thousands for artificial neural networks to learn to recognize something for themselves.

One day, machines will exceed the limits of human intelligence to become superintelligence, far surpassing any human in virtually all fields, from the sciences to philosophy. But what really will matter is the issue of sentience. It is important to distinguish between superintelligence and sentience. Sentience is feeling and implies conscious experiences.

Artificial neural networks cannot produce human feelings. There is a lack of sentience. I can ask Siri to tell me a joke thousands of times, and the iOS simply will cycle through the same material over and over. Now, consider superintelligence or an advanced form of AI. Does the potential exist for a machine to really learn how to tell a joke?

The answer depends on whether we think these machines will ever reach a stage where they will do more than they are toldwhether they will operate outside of and against their programmed parameters. Many scientists and philosophers hold pessimistic views on AIs progression, perhaps driven by a growing fear that advanced AI poses an existential threat to humanity. The concept that AI could improve itself more quickly than humans, and therefore threaten the human race, has existed since the days of famed English mathematician Alan Turing in the 1930s.

There are many more unanswered questions. Can a machine think? A superintelligence would be designed to align with human needs. However, even if that alignment is part of every advanced AIs core code, would it be able to revise its own programming? Is a code of ethics needed for a superintelligence?

Questions such as these wont be pertinent for many years to come. What is relevant is how we use AI now and how quickly it has become a part of everyday life. Siri is a primitive example, but AI is all around you. In your hand, you have Siri, Google Now or Cortana. According to Microsoft, Cortana continually learns about its user and eventually will anticipate a users every need. Video games have long used AI, and products such as Amazons personal assistant Alexa and Nest Labs family of programmable, self-learning, sensor-driven, Wi-Fi-enabled thermostats and smoke detectors are common household additions. AI programs now write simple news articles for a number of media agencies, and soon well be chauffeured in self-driving cars that will learn from experience, the same way humans do. IBM has Watson, Google has sweeping AI initiatives and the federal government wants AI expertise in development contracts.

Autonomy and automation are todays buzzwords. There is a push to take humans out of the loop wherever possible and practical. The Defense Department uses autonomous unmanned vehicles for surveillance. Its progressive ideas for future wars are reminiscent of science fiction. And this development again raises the question: Is a code of ethics needed?

These precursory examples also pose a fundamental question about the upper limits of machine learning. Is the artificial intelligence ceiling a sentient machine? Can a machine tell an original joke or be limited to repeating what it knows? Consider Lt. Cmdr. Data from Star Trek, arguably one of the more advanced forms of benevolent AI represented in science fiction. Occasionally, he recognizes that someone is telling a joke, usually from context clues and reactions, but fails to understand why it is funny.

Just maybe, that is when we will know we are dealing with sentient AIwhen machines are genuinely and organically funny. The last bastion of human supremacy just might be humor.

Alisha F. Kelly is director of business development at Trace Systems, a mission-focused technology company serving the Defense Department. She is president of the Young AFCEANs for the Northern Virginia Chapter and received a Distinguished Young AFCEAN Award for 2016. The views expressed are hers alone.

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Disruptive by Design: Siri, Tell Me a Joke. No, Not That One. - Signal Magazine

Softbank CEO: The Singularity Will Happen by 2047 – Futurism

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Sons Predictions

The CEO of Japanese telecommunications giant and internet multinational Softbank is at it again. Masayoshi Son has been consistent with his predictions as to when the technological singularity will occur. This time, Son predicted that the dawn of machines surpassing human intelligence is bound to occur by 2047 during a keynote address at the ongoing Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Son famously made the same prediction at the 2016 ARM TechCon, when he revealed that Softbank is looking to make the singularity happen.

One of the chips in our shoes in the next 30 years will be smarter than our brain. We will be less than our shoes. And we are stepping on them, Son said during his MWC address. In fact, he expects that a single computer chip will have an IQ equivalent to 10,000 by that point in time. Thats far beyond what the most intelligent person in the world has (roughly 200). What should we call it? he asked. Superintelligence. That is an intelligence beyond peoples imagination [no matter] how smart they are. But in 30 years, I believe this is going to become a reality.

Sound like every single human-vs-machine sci-fi flick youve seen? Son doesnt quite think so.

Instead of conflict, he sees a potential for humans to partner with artificial intelligence (AI), echoing the commentsElon Musk madein Dubai last month: I think this superintelligence is going to be our partner, said Softbanks CEO. If we misuse it, its a risk. If we use it in good spirits, it will be our partner for a better life.

Already, individuals are working to ensure thatthe coming age of super synthetic intelligences is, indeed, one that is beneficial for humanity. Case in point,Braintree founder Bryan Johnson is investing $100 millionto research the human brainand, ultimately, make neuroprostheses that allow us to augment our own intelligence and keep pace with AI. This will be accomplished, in large part, by making our neural code programmable.

Johnson outlinesthe purpose of his work, stating that its really all about co-evolution:

Our connection with our new creations of intelligence is limited by screens, keyboards, gestural interfaces, and voice commands constrained input/output modalities. We have very little access to our own brains, limiting our ability to co-evolve with silicon-based machines in powerful ways.

To that end,Johnsons company, Kernel, wants to ensure that we have a seamless interface with our technologies (and our AI).

Son isnt alone in expecting the singularity around 2047 Google Engineering director and futurist Ray Kurzweil shares this general prediction. As for his predicted machine IQ, Son arrived at that figure by comparing the number of neurons in the human brain to the number of transistors in a computer chip. Both, he asserts, are binary systems that work by turning on and off.

By 2018, Son thinks that the number of transistors in a chip will surpass the number of neurons in the brain, which isnt unlikely considering recent developments in microchip technology overtaking Moores Law. Its worth pointing out, however, that Son put the number of neurons in the brain at 30 billion, which is way below the 86 billion estimatemade by many.

That doesnt matter, Son said. The point is that mankind, for the last 2,000 years 4,000 years has had the same number of neurons in our brain. We havent improved the hardware in our brain, he explained. But [the computer chip], in the next 30 years, is going to be one million times more. If you have a million times more binary systems, I think they will be smarter than us.

Will these super intelligent machines trample over humankind? We dont know. But Son is convinced that, given our abundance of smart devices, which include even our cars, and the growth of the internet of things (IoT), the impact of super intelligent machines will be felt by humankind.

If this superintelligence goes into moving robots, the world, our lifestyle, dramatically changes, said Son. We can expect all kinds of robots. Flying, swimming, big, micro, run, two legs, four legs, 100 legs.

And we have 30 years to prepare for them all. Fortunately, a number of innovators are already working on solutions.

Disclosure: Bryan Johnson is an investor in Futurism; he does not hold a seat on our editorial board or have any editorial review privileges.

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Softbank CEO: The Singularity Will Happen by 2047 - Futurism

Tech Leaders Raise Concern About the Dangers of AI – iDrop News

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In the midst of great strides being made in artificial intelligence, theres a growing group of people who have expressed concern about the potential repercussions of AI technology.

Members of that group include Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking, and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates. I am in the camp that is concerned about super intelligence, Gates in a 2015 Reddit AMA, adding that he doesnt understand why some people are not concerned. Additionally, Gates has even proposed taxing robots that take jobs away from human workers.

Musk, for his part, was a bit more dramatic in painting AI as a potential existential threat to humanity: We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes, Musk tweeted, adding that Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by philosopher Nick Bostrom was worth reading.

Hawking was similarly foreboding in an interview with the BBC, stating that he thinks the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. Specifically, he said that advanced AI could take become self-reliant and redesign itself at an ever-increasing rate. Human beings, limited by biological evolution wouldnt be able to keep up, he added.

Indeed, advances in artificial intelligence once seen as something purely in the realm of science fiction is more of an inevitability than a possibility now. Tech companies everywhere are seemingly in a race to development more advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning systems. Apple, for example, is reportedly doubling-down on its Seattle-based AI research hub, and also recently joined the Partnership on AI, a research group dominated by other tech giants such as Amazon, Facebook and Google.

Like every advance in technology, AI has the potential to make amazing things possible and our lives easier. But ever since humanity first began exploring the concept of advanced machine learning, the idea has also been closely linked to the trope of AI being a potential threat or menace. SkyNet from the Terminator series comes to mind. Even less apocalyptic fiction, like 2001: A Space Odyssey, paints AI as something potentially dangerous.

As Forbes contributor R.L. Adams writes, theres little that could be done to stop a malevolent AI once its unleashed. True autonomy, as he points out, is like free will and someone, man or machine, will eventually have to determine right from wrong. Perhaps even more worryingly, Adams also brings up the fact that AI could even be weaponized to wreak untold havoc.

But even without resorting to fear-mongering, it might be smart to at least be concerned. If some of the greatest minds in tech are worried about AIs potential as a threat, then why arent the rest of us? The development of advanced artificial intelligences definitely brings about some complicated moral and philosophical issues, even beyond humanitys eventual end. In any case, whether or not AI will cause humankinds extinction, it doesnt seem likely that humanitys endeavors in the area will slow down anytime soon.

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Tech Leaders Raise Concern About the Dangers of AI - iDrop News

Netflix Movie ‘Okja’ Teases Uncontrolled Genetic Modification | Inverse – Inverse

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The potential and power of genetic engineering looms over the first trailer released for the upcoming Netflix film Okja. Directed by Snowpiercers Bong Joon-ho, the films star is a genetically modified animal who is friends with a young girl and is being hunted by a multinational company. This companys business is genetic modification, and its headed by an icy-blond Tilda Swinton. While Okja is being pegged as science fiction, the fictional part of this film is actually pretty slim: The science that it would take to make such a creature is already in the works.

I took nature and science, Swintons character says in the trailer, clasping her hands. And I synthesized. Shes talking about the massive animal at the heart of the story.

We dont know too much about it: Den of Geek reports that the animal was an experiment that is now growing rapidly, while the films description in Korean describes Okja as somewhere between human and animal. The new trailer only gives us a small look at the creature, whose shape appears to be a pig-hippo crossover with tender brown eyes.

That genetic modification would create a massive creature is not preposterous: Scientists have already used CRISPR technology to increase the size and mass of common animals. In 2015, biotech company AquaBounty Technologies revealed that it genetically modified Atlantic salmon by adding a growth hormone gene and a promoter of an antifreeze gene to the fish. This created much larger salmon that grow at a speed two times faster than average. Double-muscled beagles broke into the CRISPR scene in early 2016, when Chinese researchers from the Guangzhou Institute of Biomedicine and Health announced they used CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing technology to delete the myostatin gene from the normally small-muscled dogs. These beagles not only look like theyre on steroids theyre stronger and can run faster than their unmodified peers.

Real-life animals that seem more suited for a fantasy novel arent out of the question either: In a 2016 essay in The American Journal of Bioethics, professors Hank Greely and R. Alta Charo argue that creating a dragon yes, a dragon wasnt impossible with CRISPR technology. Sure, physics would prevent it from actually spitting out fire, but a very large reptile that looks at least somewhat like the European or Asian dragon (perhaps with flappable if not flyable wings) could be someones target of opportunity, they write.

And if Okja is indeed somewhere between human and animal and this is a literal explanation, rather than an anthropomorphic sentiment the science is almost there as well. At the end of January, scientists declared they had created pig-human chimeras. These embryos were less than 0.001 percent human and were created with the hope that they could one day allow us to grow human organs inside animals not actual pig-humans. Still, its proof that what seemed like science fiction only decade prior can actually become a reality. Okja the film may seem like science fiction when its released this June, but it could very well be pegged as a documentary in the years to come.

Photos via Giphy/YouTube

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Netflix Movie 'Okja' Teases Uncontrolled Genetic Modification | Inverse - Inverse

FDA, EPA approve 3 types of genetically engineered potatoes – CBS News

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BOISE, Idaho -- Three types of potatoes genetically engineered to resist the pathogen that caused the Irish potato famine are safe for the environment and safe to eat, federal officials have announced.

The approval by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration late last week gives Idaho-based J.R. Simplot Company permission to plant the potatoes this spring and sell them in the fall.

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The company said the potatoes contain only potato genes, and that the resistance to late blight, the disease that caused the Irish potato famine, comes from an Argentine variety of potato that naturally produced a defense.

The three varieties are the Russet Burbank, Ranger Russet and Atlantic. Theyve previously been approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

All three varieties have the same taste and texture and nutritional qualities as conventional potatoes, said Simplot spokesman Doug Cole.

Late blight thrives in the type of wetter conditions that led to the Irish potato famine in the 1840s. Potatoes were a main staple, but entire crops rotted in the field. Historical records say about a million people died of starvation and disease, and the number of Irish who emigrated might have reached several million.

Potatoes in modern times are considered the fourth food staple crop in the world behind corn, rice and wheat. Late blight continues to be a major problem for potato growers, especially in wetter regions. Fungicides have been used for decades to prevent the blight.

Simplot says the genetically engineered potatoes reduce the use of fungicide by half.

The company said the potatoes will also have reduced bruising and black spots, enhanced storage capacity, and a reduced amount of a chemical created when potatoes are cooked at high temperatures thats a potential carcinogen.

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Conventional potatoes can turn a dark color when cooked after they were kept cold for too long, a problem Simplot said the three new varieties reduce. The company also said the enhanced cold storage will likely have significant ramifications for the potato chip industry by reducing trucking costs.

There is no evidence that genetically modified organisms, known as GMOs, are unsafe to eat, but for some people, altering the genetic code of foods presents an ethical issue. McDonalds continues to decline to use Simplots genetically engineered potatoes for its French fries.

Simplot often notes the potatoes contain only potato genes, and not DNA from an unrelated organism. Organisms that contain DNA from an unrelated organism are defined as transgenic.

The Washington state-based Non-GMO Project that opposes GMOs and verifies non-GMO food and products said Simplots new potatoes dont qualify as non-GMO.

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By some estimates, 80 percent of all processed foods - cereals, baby formula, canned soups and more - contain at least one genetically-modified o...

There is a growing attempt on the part of biotechnology companies to distance themselves from the consumer rejection of GMOs by claiming that new types of genetic engineering ... are not actually genetic engineering, the group said in a statement.

The most recent federal approvals apply to Simplots second generation of Innate potatoes. The first generation that went through the federal approval process didnt include protection from late blight or enhanced cold storage.

The first generation of Innate potatoes has been sold in stores under the White Russet label. Cole said the company hasnt decided how it will market the second generation.

The company is currently at work on a third generation that Cole said will have protections against additional strains of late blight, all coming from genes within the potato species.

2017 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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FDA, EPA approve 3 types of genetically engineered potatoes - CBS News

Genetically Engineered Super Pigs Could Make Your Bacon Better – Gizmodo

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These piglets could be protected from an infection that costs the swine industry billions each year. Image: Laura Dow, The Roslin Institute

For pig farmers, Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome is a disaster. Once dubbed the mystery swine disease, it emerged in the late 1980's on farms in Europe and the US and spread rapidly, causing piglets to die and adult pigs to be afflicted with fever, lethargy, and respiratory distress. It is a major problem facing pig farmers, costing the industry billions each year.

Now the same research organization that brought us Dolly the sheep thinks it may have a solution: Scientists at University of Edinburghs Roslin Institute have genetically engineered pigs to be resistant to the virus that causes the disease.

In a new paper published in PLOS Pathogens, the scientists reported that they used the genetic engineering technique CRISPR-Cas9 to delete a small slice of one particular gene that previous studies have shown plays a key role in enabling the PRRS virus to establish an infection. The edits were made early in the embryonic stage, removing the bit of gene in a laboratory while the piglets were still merely zygotes then implanting the embryos into mother pigs. Litters of healthy piglets with that genetic tweak have since been born, and some have even gone on to have their own litters with the inherited edit.

Early tests found that cells from the pigs were entirely resistant to infection from both major strains of the virus. The next step will be to test whether the pigs themselves are resistant to infection when actually exposed to the virus.

The study builds on earlier research that has showed pigs that entirely lack a protein called CD163 do not become ill when exposed to the PRRS virus. CD163 exists on the surface of immune cells called macrophages, and its presence seems to help PRRS take hold in a pigs body and spread. So the Roslin Institute researchers simply deleted a portion of the CD163 gene. So far, it has not shown any signs of adversely affecting the pigs.

In both the US and Europe, regulations and attitudes toward GMOs could make it hard to make such pigs commercially available. But if it works, the super pigs are sure to be in demand among both pig farmers and lovers of bacon.

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Genetically Engineered Super Pigs Could Make Your Bacon Better - Gizmodo

What is the fascination with space exploration? – Grand Valley Lanthorn

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By Jake Keeley | 3/1/17 11:23pm

There are many things that I do not understand, but I do not think I am alone when I say that I do not understand the fascination with space. Im sure if we surveyed elementary aged children, one of the most frequent occurring desired occupations would be an astronaut. Aside from a police officer, or a fireman, kids love astronauts. And I cant totally blame them, as I too enjoy spacecrafts. In fact I have designed and engineered over 100 spacecrafts using LEGOs alone.

And certainly I can remember emulating life without gravity as I was taking big, moon-bouncing strides just yesterday. However, I cant help but ask whats next? There are so many unanswered questions that even if we got an answer, Im not sure we would know what to do with it. Is there life other than us? If the answer is yes, how does that change what we do on a day-to-day basis? If the answer is somehow figured out to be a firm no, does that change our approach either?

NASA couldnt care less about what we think because they are moving. After a long hiatus of being in the news, NASA has found themselves in the headlines twice in the past week. Not only did they recently find seven potentially hospitable planets, the movie Hidden Figures, depicting the story of a team of African American women mathematicians who played a major role in the early US space program, was nominated for the best picture award.

Best picture is certainly no small feat, but seven planets is extraordinary. Not only was the finding monumental, the naming was revolutionary as well.

TRAPPIST-1 finally serves as a nod to rapper Future who not only has a mixtape called Astronaut Status, but has also dedicated an entire project to the one time ninth planet from our sun, only to be reclassified as a dwarf planet, Pluto. No, NASA cant convince me that TRAPPIST stands for The Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope, because no one in their right mind would believe that.

After spending what felt like too long roving the planet Mars with nothing really to show for it, it seems like TRAPPIST-1 presents a real opportunity with some genuine traction. NASA suggests that three of the seven planets are within the goldilocks zone, where the temperature is neither too hot to boil off water, or too cold to freeze it.

However, there is still much to be learned about any of the planets, and it is certainly much too soon to speculate on the prospect of life. The best thing about it is that it is essentially a win-win scenario, because even if we determine that the planets are uninhabitable, we have an entirely new set of planets whose aliens can potentially invade Earth in the next sci-fi thriller.

We can even derive an entirely new species based on the environment TRAPPIST-1 presents. Just think of the possibilities. I already have, and it basically culminates in a reboot of Predator, because unfortunately all Hollywood can do these days are remakes.

In leaking Futures new mixtape, NASA has again sparked our interest in the unknown. Whether it stems from our longstanding love affair with films such as E.T., Star Trek, Star Wars, and other sci-fi films, it is evident that regardless of our reasoning, our infatuation with space will continue into the future.

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What is the fascination with space exploration? - Grand Valley Lanthorn

Trump’s call for human space exploration is hugely wasteful and pointless – Los Angeles Times

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Space exploration aficionados experienced the thrill of anticipationin the hours before President Trumps speech Tuesday night, with advance word that he was going to call for a return to the human exploration of space.

Sure enough, in his closing words Trump declared that for a country soon to celebrate its 250th anniversary, American footprints on distant worlds are not too big a dream.

Trumps brief, offhand comment had the tone of an impulsive notion that, like so many of his other policy pronouncements, wont get any follow-through. Lets hope so, because the idea of sending humans to explore distant worlds is loopy, incredibly wasteful, and likely to cripple American science rather than inspire it. And thats assuming that Trumps notion doesnt have the ulterior motivation of diverting American scientists from their Job One, which is to fight climate change right here at home.

The idea of sending humans back into planetary exploration, with Mars as the prime target,has been a crowd-pleasing dream of presidents ever since Gene Cernan became the last American to set his footprints on the moon in 1972. As the author Ken Kalfus toted up the record, during the Reagan administration a congressional commission called for a return to the moon by 2005 and a Mars landing by 2015;George H.W. Bush declared that the American flag should be planted on Mars by the 50th anniversary of the first Apollo moon landing (2019);andGeorge W. Bush moved the deadlineout to a moon landing by 2020 in preparation for a leap to Mars and other destinations.

Barack Obama canceled the Constellation program that might have fulfilled the latter Bushs dream, but eased the pain by calling for sending astronauts to an asteroid by 2025, orbiting humans around Mars by the mid-2030s, and landing them on the surface soon after that within his own lifetime.

The romance of human space exploration doesnt belong only to politicians. Its been exploited, for example, by the industrialist Elon Musk, who last year unveiled a vision of human colonization of Mars to turn humankind into a multiplanet species to safeguard against an extinction event on Earth. Musks private rocket company, SpaceX, recently announced that it has taken deposits from two customers for orbital voyages around the moon.

The exhortations by presidents shareseveral assumptions. One is that the manned moon exploration programs Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo have yieldedstupendous returns in science, engineering, and economics and that the exponentially more challenging voyage to Mars will yield exponentially greater benefits. Another is that humans are needed to perform some functions in space that robots cant do. A third (seldom voiced directly) is that only the drama and romance of human spaceflight can attract the public interest and support needed for such an expensive program. At the peak of the space race, NASA commanded fully 4% of the federal budget, a share that couldonly be sustained by tapping into public excitement.

None of these assumptions is warranted, even though the scientific and economic returns from the space programs are invariably invoked as articles of faith. Typical is this claim madein October by two Trump campaign advisors, former GOP Rep. Robert S. Walker of Pennsylvania and UC Irvine economist Peter Navarro: Our past investments in space exploration have produced brilliant returns for our economy, our security and our sense of national destiny. In their article, Walker and Navarro dont actually mention any specific economic returns, brilliant or otherwise. Thats unsurprising, because its hard to identify any that would not have been produced by an unmanned moon program.

The presidential visions of human space exploration all hark back, of course, to President Kennedys 1961 call to send a man to the moon and bring him back alive by the end of that decade, a quest that was fulfilled. That was a different time, however: America was in the heat of technological and economic battle with the Soviet Union, the 1957 Sputnik flight still stung, and the Soviets had recently sent cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in orbit around Earth. Back then we were all vulnerable to the cult of the astronaut; as a kid I knew the names and personal stories of all the original seven Mercury pilots. Today few can summon up the names of shuttle astronauts with the exception of Christa McAuliffe, who is recalled chiefly because of her tragic end on the shuttle Challenger.Todays sense of the limitations of public funding of science and heightened awareness of competing demands on the federal budget closer to home didnt exist in 1961.

Are humans necessary for space exploration? Less now than ever, with the vast advances in robotics achieved since the last moonwalk in 1972. Astronomers and other scientists long have been skeptical of the need for human exploration. In 2010, then-Astronomer Royal Martin Rees of Britain said, The practical case gets weaker and weaker with every advance in robotics and miniaturization. It's hard to see any particular reason or purpose in going back to the moon or indeed sending people into space at all."

As physicist Steven Weinberg observed more than a decade ago, placing humans on a space mission makes it so much more expensive than an unmanned flight that some elements of the mission get jettisoned and those are almost always scientific projects. The public obviously considers the human participants to be indispensable, so much so that a loss of life can almost destroy a space program, as happened with the space shuttle program after two human catastrophes. Accordingly, protecting human lives and health becomes paramount; the cost of those arrangements will be much greater on a Mars flight, which is estimated to take as long as nine months.

Weinberg makes short work of the best example made for the necessity of humans in spaceflight. This is the series of repair missions on the Hubble Space Telescope performed by shuttle crews, the last time in 2009. The Hubble is one of several orbiting observatories that have added immeasurably to our knowledge of distant space. But because it was launched by the shuttle, it was also uniquely expensive. Weinberg quotes Riccardo Giacconi, the former director of the Space Telescope Science Institute, as estimating that had the telescope been launched by unmanned rockets instead of the shuttle, seven Hubbles could have been launched for the same price as the one we got. It would then not have been necessary to service the Hubble, Weinberg writes; when design flaws were discovered or parts wore out, we could just have sent up another Hubble.

What really underlies the lure of human space exploration is its romance and drama, fostered in part by decades of popular culture, including 2001: A Space Odyssey, Star Trek and Star Wars, and The Martian. The characters in these space operas are our heroes, but whats often overlooked is that many of these are disaster stories. The thrill we feel from the interplanetary rescue of the stranded astronaut of The Martian obscures the more fundamental question of why he had to get stranded up there in the first place.

Among the dangers of cavalier calls for publicly-funded human space exploration is that monumentalBig Science programs like the space race tend to suck resources away from any science left on the outside looking in. A multitrillion-dollarprogram to put an American on Mars, endorsed by a president, will get first call on the federal budget, leaving behind programs aimed at disease cures, chemistry, and physics far behind.

In the current political climate, the biggest threat is to Earth science, which is increasingly devoted to climate change. It may not be a coincidence that conservatives in Congress have been systematically trying cut NASAs Earth Science budget in favor of planetary exploration, albeit unmanned exploration. They argue that the goal is to refocus NASA on its traditional mission. But thatsa smokescreen, because research in climate science has become a major part of NASAs mission.Theyre really displaying their hostility to research that could undermine the fortunes of their patrons, the fossil fuel industry. If Trumps call for manned planetary exploration is another puff of that smokescreen, it would hardly be surprising.

Sending humans into space would give Americans a sense of mission and grandeur, but thats mostly a sign of civic immaturity. Take the same sums and spend them on curing disease whether the biological malady of cancer or the social maladies of poverty and hunger and pride will surely follow. Keep the astronauts at home, and there will be much more money available to send robots farther out than humans could ever go, and to bring back immeasurably more knowledge.

Keep up to date with Michael Hiltzik. Follow@hiltzikmon Twitter, see hisFacebook page, or emailmichael.hiltzik@latimes.com.

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Trump's call for human space exploration is hugely wasteful and pointless - Los Angeles Times

What Donald Trump Said About Space Travel During His Speech – Heavy.com

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President Donald Trump addresses a joint session of the U.S. Congress on February 28, 2017 in the House chamber of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC. (Getty)

During his address to Congress on Tuesday evening, President Donald Trump delivered a brief line suggesting that America should resume its human exploration of space.

Towards the conclusion of Trumps remarks, the president talked about Americas centennial in 1876, when citizens gathered in Philadelphia to celebrate and inventors showed offtheir creations, including the telephone and the typewriter.

Trump then looked ahead to Americas 250th anniversary, listing off a number of things that America may be able to celebrate by then, including cures to illnesses and millions being lifted from welfare.

The president then said, American footprints on distant worlds are not too big a dream.

Before Trumps address, it was reported that the president would officially call for new manned space exploration. In actuality, there was only a brief reference to space travel, and Trump did not propose anything specific or place much emphasis on this statement.

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What Donald Trump Said About Space Travel During His Speech - Heavy.com

Global Quantum Dot Display(QLED) Market 2017 Ocean NanoTech, Nanosys, QDVision – DailyHover

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Aldis is a Computer Engineer by education and a technology enthusiast by passion. He has a stint of experience in Blogging and SEO and loves to write.

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Global Quantum Dot Display(QLED) Market 2017 Ocean NanoTech, Nanosys, QDVision - DailyHover

Harvard professor describes behavioral science's effect on environmental awareness – Daily Free Press (subscription)

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Harvard professor describes behavioral science's effect on environmental awareness
Daily Free Press (subscription)
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for International Studies held a talk on Monday, featuring Harvard Law School Professor Cass Sunstein, who spoke about how behavioral science and nudges, or subtle subliminal implications, affect ...

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Harvard professor describes behavioral science's effect on environmental awareness - Daily Free Press (subscription)