Lifeboat Foundation

Read more

What will 2018 bring? No one knows for sure. But as we did for 2017, we asked top scientists and thought leaders in innovation what they expect to see in the new year. Here, lightly edited, are their predictions.

What scientific discoveries will 2018 bring? We asked leaders in science, technology, and innovation what they think we can expect to see in the new year.

Russian tech tycoon turned-ET wayfarer Yuri Milner says he intends to beat NASA to a mission to the Saturn moon Enceladus looking for alien lifeforms.

“The one overarching question we are asking at our foundation is: ‘Are we alone in the universe?’” said Milner, who has swore over $200 million to the Breakthrough Initiative, an association he established in 2015 that observes space, and grows new methods for infinite travel.

Talking at a Seattle gathering, ‘A New Space Age’, Milner said his science group agrees there are three potential areas for additional earthly lifeforms in our close planetary system: under the surface of Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa, and “the most encouraging competitor,” Enceladus.

Continue reading “Russian Billionaire Sets up an Alien-hunting Mission to Saturn Moon” »

The recent explosion of interest in artificial intelligence and machine learning has led to writing many books about these subjects. These 7 Best Sellers Books ranked by Amazon’s Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning Books category as of Dec 30, 2017.

1. Hands-On Machine Learning with Scikit-Learn and TensorFlow: Concepts, Tools, and Techniques to Build Intelligent Systems by Aurélien Géron

Through a series of recent breakthroughs, deep learning has boosted the entire field of machine learning. Now, even programmers who know close to nothing about this technology can use simple, efficient tools to implement programs capable of learning from data. This practical book shows you how.

Continue reading “Top 7 Books in Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning” »

[This article is drawn from Ch. 8: “Pedagogical Love: An Evolutionary Force” in Postformal Education: A Philosophy for Complex Futures.]

“There is nothing more important in this world than radical love” as Paolo Freire told Joe Kincheloe over dinner.

- Joe Kincheloe. Reading, Writing and Cognition. 2006.

Continue reading “What’s Love got to do with Education?” »

We live in an age of incredible technological innovation. Innovation that has the potential to do great good or great harm to society. Prince Harry, sat down with one of the most celebrated figures in Artificial Intelligence, Demis Hassabis, British artificial intelligence researcher, neuroscientist, computer game designer, entrepreneur, the co-founder and CEO of DeepMind, to discuss the responsibility that big tech firms have to ensure that change to society is positive. The Artificial Intelligence Channel.

Each year, Science’s editors and writers highlight a top research achievement as their Breakthrough of the Year. For 2017, the honor goes to the first full observation of a neutron-star merger, made possible by detecting gravitational waves created by the stars as they spiraled into each other. But there a lot of other advances to talk about, from the oldest ice to the newest ape. Check them all out in this video rundown.

A video compilation of some of the biggest advances of 2017.

Continue reading “The biggest scientific breakthroughs of the year, now in video form!” »

Roads of the future could be lit by glowing trees instead of streetlamps, thanks to a breakthrough in creating bioluminescent plants. Experts injected specialized nanoparticles into the leaves of a watercress plant, which caused it to give off a dim light for nearly four hours. This could solve lots of problems.

The chemical involved, which produced enough light to read a book by, is the same as is used by fireflies to create their characteristic shine. To create their glowing plants, engineers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) turned to an enzyme called luciferase. Luciferase acts on a molecule called luciferin, causing it to emit light.

Continue reading “MIT Just Created Living Plants That Glow Like A Lamp, And Could Grow Glowing Trees To Replace Streetlights” »

Gene therapy is the process of replacing defective genes with healthy ones, adding new genes to help the body fight or treat disease, or deactivating problem genes. It holds the promise to transform medicine and create options for patients who are living with difficult, and even incurable, diseases. Learn how this innovative therapy works.