Jan 4, 2016
London to NYC in one hour courtesy of the new Airbus jet design
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in category: transportation
Have breakfast in London and lunch in New York thanks to the futuristic new jet design from Airbus.
Archive for the ‘transportation’ category: Page 583
Jan 3, 2016
LG made an 18-inch display you can roll up like a newspaper
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in categories: electronics, mobile phones, transportation
LG Display has a prototype 18-inch screen it’s showing off at the Consumer Electronics Show this week that rolls up like a piece of paper. The technology builds on LG’s forward-looking OLED work focusing on bendable, rollable, and curving displays. The company showed similar technology last year as a proof of concept, but kept images behind closed doors. Now LG looks ready to show the world.
We’ve seen this type of concept display from the likes of Sony, Samsung, Sharp, and others in the past. However, it does indicate that LG sees these types of futuristic displays as differentiation points for smartphones, tablets, and TVs. LG envisions these types of screens rolling up into our pockets or being made to wrap around interior spaces, and the company will show off a 25-inch curved screen installed on the inside of a car at its Auto Zone section on the show floor.
We’ll get a closer look at the newspaper-like screen in a couple of days, as well as a new 55-inch “paper thin” TV that has all its electronics installed independently, according to LG. So check back in with The Verge for LG coverage and everything else CES-related throughout the week.
Jan 2, 2016
The First International Beauty Contest Judged By Robots
Posted by Zoltan Istvan in categories: information science, life extension, neuroscience, robotics/AI, transportation
“You like your Tesla, but does your Tesla like you?” My new story for TechCrunch on robots understanding beauty and even whether they like your appearance or not:
Robots are starting to appear everywhere: driving cars, cooking dinners and even as robotic pets.
But people don’t usually give machine intelligence much credence when it comes to judging beauty. That may change with the launch of the world’s first international beauty contest judged exclusively by a robot jury.
Continue reading “The First International Beauty Contest Judged By Robots” »
Jan 1, 2016
Potential delay for first test flight of India’s spaceplane demonstrator
Posted by Dan Kummer in categories: space, transportation
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) may have to delay the first test flight of its experimental Reusable Launch Vehicle-Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD) spaceplane. The unmanned sub-orbital spacecraft, which is similar in design to the US Air Force’s X-37B, was scheduled to be launched in February, but technical difficulties may put back the flight to the first week of April.
According to a report in the New Indian Express, a minor leak in the flight systems of the RLV-TD led to the potential setback. K Sivan, director of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), where the craft is being developed, told the paper that the spacecraft needed to be reassembled, which could cause a significant delay if more problems occur.
The RLV-TD is a two-stage scaled prototype of India’s Avatar spacecraft designed to drastically reduce the cost of launching payloads into orbit from US$5,000 per kilogram (2.2 lb) to US$500. RLV-TD is a winged technology demonstrator for testing flight and propulsion systems that will allow the completed Avatar to return to Earth for a controlled landing like a conventional aircraft.
Dec 30, 2015
Autonomous Cars Can Now Learn to Use Landmarks While Driving
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in categories: education, robotics/AI, transportation
Cambridge scientists are “teaching machines to see” using a new smartphone-based system (or a regular camera), without GPS or a wireless connection.
This has applications in everything from driverless cars to autonomous vacuum cleaners.
Dec 30, 2015
A priest got suspended for riding a hoverboard in church
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in category: transportation
Dec 30, 2015
These Technologies Will Shift the Global Balance of Power in the Next 20 Years
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in categories: business, economics, habitats, solar power, sustainability, transportation
Governments, businesses, and economists have all been caught off guard by the geopolitical shifts that happened with the crash of oil prices and the slowdown of China’s economy. Most believe that the price of oil will recover and that China will continue its rise. They are mistaken. Instead of worrying about the rise of China, we need to fear its fall; and while oil prices may oscillate over the next four or five years, the fossil-fuel industry is headed the way of the dinosaur. The global balance of power will shift as a result.
LED light bulbs, improved heating and cooling systems, and software systems in automobiles have gradually been increasing fuel efficiency over the past decades. But the big shock to the energy industry came with fracking, a new set of techniques and technologies for extracting more hydrocarbons from the ground. Though there are concerns about environmental damage, these increased the outputs of oil and gas, caused the usurpation of old-line coal-fired power plants, and dramatically reduced America’s dependence on foreign oil.
Continue reading “These Technologies Will Shift the Global Balance of Power in the Next 20 Years” »
Dec 30, 2015
Robot Car GIF — Find & Share on GIPHY
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in categories: robotics/AI, transportation
This is Disney’s wall-riding robot.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9P9_QM8cN8
Discover & Share this Robot Car GIF with everyone you know. GIPHY is how you search, share, discover, and create GIFs.
Dec 29, 2015
Will 2015 Be Remembered as the Breakout Year for Transhumanism?
Posted by Zoltan Istvan in categories: life extension, transhumanism, transportation
My latest piece for The Huffington Post. It’s a recap of 2015 for transhumanism and includes some select stories & videos:
Last year, I wrote that 2014 was a great year for the transhumanism movement. But 2015 was simply incredible — it might end up being called a breakout year. I’m not yet willing to declare transhumanism as “mainstream,” but it’s getting quite close now. Transhumanism has become a word that is used frequently by people around the world and in major media when discussing radical science and technology changing our species.
Below is a quick recap of some select stories in English that came out this year on transhumanism and some of my efforts to bring the future closer.
Continue reading “Will 2015 Be Remembered as the Breakout Year for Transhumanism?” »
Dec 25, 2015
Think-tank dismisses leading AI researchers as luddites
Posted by Amnon H. Eden in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI, transportation
‘In a surprisingly polemic report, ITIF think-tank president Robert Atkinson misinterprets this growing altruistic focus of AI researchers as innovation-stifling “Luddite-induced paranoia.”’
The report released by the ITIF think tank suffers from many problems. It accuses Elon Musk in risking research in the “cars that Google and TESLA are testing”, missing entirely the irony. IMHO, the nomination is not the product of research in what Nick Bostrom, Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates, & Elon Musk actually say.
Each year, the ITIF produces a list of 10 groups they think are holding back technological progress with their annual Luddite award. This year, they included researchers who support AI safety research and autonomous weapons bans, and they called out Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Stephen Hawking by name. The ITIF doesn’t seem to see the irony of calling Elon Musk a luddite despite just landing a rocket, launching auto-piloted electric cars and investing in a $1Bn AI-startup. Read the response written by Stuart Russell and Max Tegmark:
