Lifeboat Foundation

Wed, Mar 23 at 10 PM CDT.

GUEST SPEAKERS:

Kelly fast, near-earth object observations program manager, NASA

Continue reading “Planetary Defense at NASA” »

Is he planning to burn everything down if he can’t win?

Russian President Vladimir Putin has reportedly ordered a nuclear war evacuation drill amid the war in Ukraine. A nuclear war evacuation drill is the process in which people are taken to safe places to prepare for the eventuality of nuclear war. The purported directive comes amid fears of President Putin resorting to extreme measures to force a decisive victory in the Ukraine war.
#russia #russiaukrainewar #nuclearwar.

Continue reading “Russia May Hold Nuclear Evacuation Drill l After Hypersonic Weapons, Putin To Use Nukes In Ukraine?” »

De-extinction grabbed our imagination in the 90s with Jurassic Park. Scientists have since asked: how possible is it?

According to a new study, nearly impossible. But wait—it’s not all bad news. While bringing back a faithful copy of an extinct species may be impossible, we could bring back a hybrid species that’s a genetic mix between an extinct species and its modern descendant.

Published in Current Biology, the study eschews the grandiose mammoth, instead focusing on a tiny test case: the Christmas Island rat. Hefty in size and loudly vocal when invading docked ships and their cargo, the rodents were last seen in the 1900s. With a stroke of luck, the team recovered DNA from two well-preserved museum samples and compared them against a close relative: the Norway brown rat, a popular lab model for genetic studies today.

ATLAS has already spotted more than 66 comets and 700 near-Earth asteroids (two of which actually hit Earth’s atmosphere!).

What does this actually mean in concrete terms? And is it an accurate description of Russia’s nuclear doctrine?

By Mark Episkopos

The recent round of tensions in the consistently difficult relationship between Russia and the U.S. has prompted a renewed focus on the Kremlin’s nuclear posture. For years, Western analysts have posited that Moscow adheres to what is often called an “escalate to de-escalate” approach. But what does this mean in concrete policy terms, and is it an accurate description of Russia’s nuclear doctrine?

What would come after a nuclear war and what would be the consequences for Earth´s biosphere. And would some other intelligent species eventually evolve?

Meet the Species That May Come After Humans.

Concerned about the war Ukraine? You’re not alone. Historian Yuval Noah Harari provides important context on the Russian invasion, including Ukraine’s long history of resistance, the specter of nuclear war and his view of why, even if Putin wins all the military battles, he’s already lost the war. (This talk and conversation, hosted by TED global curator Bruno Giussani, was part of a TED Membership event on March 1, 2022. Visit http://ted.com/membership to become a TED Member.)

Visit http://TED.com to get our entire library of TED Talks, transcripts, translations, personalized talk recommendations and more.

Continue reading “The War in Ukraine Could Change Everything | Yuval Noah Harari | TED” »

READER QUESTION: If humans don’t die out in a climate apocalypse or asteroid impact in the next 10,000 years, are we likely to evolve further into a more advanced species than what we are at the moment? Harry Bonas, 57, Nigeria

Humanity is the unlikely result of four billion years of evolution.

From self-replicating molecules in Archean seas, to eyeless fish in the Cambrian deep, to mammals scurrying from dinosaurs in the dark, and then, finally, improbably, ourselves—evolution shaped us.

By the time our planet was four billion years old, the rise of large plants and animals was just beginning. Complexity exploded around that time, as the combination of multicellularity, sexual reproduction, and other genetic advances brought about the Cambrian explosion. Many evolutionary changes occurred over the next 500 million years, with extinction events and selection pressures paving the way for new forms of life to arise and develop.

65 million years ago, a catastrophic asteroid strike wiped out not only the dinosaurs, but practically every animal weighing over 25 kg (excepting leatherback sea turtles and some crocodiles). This was Earth’s most recent great mass extinction, and it left a large number of niches unfilled in its wake. Mammals rose to prominence in the aftermath, with the first humans arising less than 1 million years ago. Here’s our story.