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I use to hate it when my dad insisted that I read something longer than 2 paragraphs. (Something related to his interests, but not to my school work, his career or our family). That’s because it shouldn’t require a 30 minute read to determine if it piques my interest, as it does his.

But I am asking Lifeboat readers to invest 37 minutes in the video linked below. Even if you give it just 5 minutes, it will provide sufficient motive for you to stick around until the end. [continue below video]

I want you view it because we are on the threshold of something bigger than many people realize. Bitcoin and the blockchain is not just a new currency or a way of distributing books among network users. We are becoming involved with a radical experiment in applied game theory that is shockingly simple, but nascent. Opportunities abound, and the individuals who recognize those opportunities or learn to exploit them will benefit themselves as they benefit the global community. Because it is so radical (and because it clashes with deeply ingrained beliefs about authority, control mechanisms, democracy and money), it seems complex and risky—but it’s really not.

I am a Bitcoin educator and columnist. I have taught college seminars in Bitcoin and I will be keynote speaker at the 2017 Digital Currency Summit in Johannesburg. I design online courses for the most popular cryptocurrency self-learning groups. But Antonopolous runs circles around me. He is a Bitcoin evangelist extraordinaire. All of his presentations are superb, but this one provides context. It conveys an understanding that Bitcoin novices and professionals equally appreciate. It answers questions the viewer hadn’t asked, but would have.

There are hundreds of videos and PowerPoint presentations that explain how Bitcoin works. But they rarely provide context. Few of them convey why it is such an important development and why it has overtaken biotech & pharmaceuticals as the focus of VCs . Few can explain why an ethereal Bitcoin (a unit that you cannot hold) has just surpassed the value of a unit of gold. And few people realize that volatility has been abating as the increase in value and adoption is surging.

As you watch Antonopolous, you are certain to think about things that you did not previously know—or at least, that you did not reflect upon. My purpose in asking you to view it, is not to sell you on Bitcoin or the blockchain, but to provide the context that may help you to code, consult, write articles, teach, begin trading, start saving, and more.


Philip Raymond co-chairs Crypsa & Bitcoin Event, columnist & board member at Lifeboat, editor
at WildDuck and will deliver the keynote address at Digital Currency Summit in Johannesburg.

On route to Singularity with Bahai.


When I reflect on the Baha’i teachings, which stunningly prefigure many of the discoveries of modern physics, I see an interesting pattern.

As a physicist, I’ve noticed that most of the clearest scientific expressions and explanations in the Baha’i teachings come from the writings and talks of Abdu’l-Baha. Looking carefully, those explanations usually trace back to the original concept provided by Baha’u’llah. However, ultimately Abdu’l-Baha seems uniquely capable of pulling these concepts out, explaining them in clear, modern language, and rendering them intelligible to us—or at least to me.

For example on the question of the ultimate substance of matter, in Baha’u’llah’s “Tablet of Wisdom” we can see the presence of the ideas later expressed by Abdu’l-Baha:

Recently, I saw an article making big deal that a robot can now write. Ok, it only took us 253 years to enhance it a little. Meet the Automaton from Sweden that could write and was designed to look like a young boy. Made in 1774 and still writes today.

We had Automaton that did this since 1774. 1st one was from Sweden and made in 1775.


See more @ One of three surviving automata from the 18th century built by Jaquet Droz, this is ”The Writer” and is the most famou… The Writer Automaton A 240 year old doll that can write, a clockwork creation by Pierre Jaquet-Droz. Pierre Jaquet-Droz (1721−1790) was a Swiss-born watchmaker of the late eighteenth century. He lived in Paris, London, and… On you will find a DVD named ”The Jaquet-Droz androids”. This documentary tells the story of Pierre Jaquet-Droz a sw… From the bestselling children’s novel ”The Invention of Hugo Cabret” to the Oscar nominated film ”Hugo,” automatons — mechanical marvels from a time gone by… Jaquet Droz The Writer Automaton From 1774 In Action: Inspired Hugo Movie. Automato escrevendo no museu do automato e da caixinha de musica em Sainte-Croix, Suiça… identica ao automato visto no filme Hugo Automaton writing in the… A demonstration of the Maillardet’s Automaton at The Franklin Inst.

Bill and Melinda Gates say “the future will surprise the pessimists.”


They discovered childhood mortality is a symptom of other issues

Children’s deaths are often a result of lack of birth control, gender inequality, and poor women’s health. Melinda wrote, “Virtually all advances in society—nutrition, education, access to contraceptives, gender equity, economic growth—show up as gains in the childhood mortality chart, and every gain in this chart shows up in gains for society.”

Bill added, “When women in developing countries space their births by at least three years, their babies are almost twice as likely to reach their first birthday. Over time, the ability of women to use contraceptives and space their pregnancies will become one of the largest contributors in cutting childhood deaths.” In fact, the Gates Foundation reports “no country in the last 50 years has emerged from poverty without expanding access to contraceptives.”

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“As academics we can sign petitions, but it is not enough.”

As academics we can sign petitions, but it is not enough. Scott Aaronson wrote very eloquently about this issue after the initial ban was announced (see also Terry Tao). My department has seen a dramatic decrease in the number of applicants in general and not just from Iran. We were just informed that we can no longer make Teaching Assistant offers for students who are unlikely to get a visa to come here.

The Department of Homeland Security has demonstrated its blatant disregard for moral norms. Why should we trust its scientific norms? What confidence do we have that funding will not be used in some coercive way? What does it say to our students when we ask them to work for DHS? Yes, the government is big, but at some point the argument that it’s mostly the guy at the top who is bad but the rest of the agency is still committed to good science becomes just too hard to swallow. I decided that I can’t square that circle. Each one of us should think hard about whether we want to.

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Luv this.


Australian entrepreneur reveals brain-controlled telepresence robot. Teleport utilizes brain controlling interface to follow the focal point of a user’s mind and serve various fields of life.

Australian Developer has released a telepresent robot that will let the users attend school or work distantly. People, with a limited mobility of upper limb, will remotely attend tasks through this off-the-shelf mind controlling interface costing 200 UDDs.

Melbourne-based firm Aubot has created the brain controlling robot that is telepresent for doing the user’s task. The dubbed Teleport makes in using the MindWave brain controlling system to track the user’s mind focus. It works on the thinking pattern of the user when he/she focus over a particular entrance, the telepresent assistant moves.

At school you may have been taught that helium was a noble gas because it was totally unreactive.

But, new research suggests it might not be as virtuous as we first thought.

An international team of scientists has created a stable helium compound which is composed of both helium and sodium atoms, and say their discovery marks a ‘new frontier of chemistry.’

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By Jonathan Latham, PhD

Test your understanding of the living world with this simple question. What kind of biomolecule is found in all living organisms? If your answer is “DNA”, you are incorrect. The mistake is very forgiveable though. The standard English-language biology education casts DNA (DeoxyriboNucleic Acid) as the master molecule of life, coordinating and controlling most, if not all, living functions. This master molecule concept is popular. It is plausible. It is taught in every university and high school. But it is wrong. DNA is no master controller, nor is it even at the centre of biology. Instead, science overwhelmingly shows that life is self-organised and thus the pieces are in place for biology to undergo the ultimate paradigm shift.

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