Lifeboat Foundation

Paddy Neumann kind of looks like someone who’s really into brewing beer. But back when he was a third year student at the University of Sydney, the now Dr. Neumann started on a course of experimentation that would see him beat innovations by NASA’s top scientists.

For his final research project, Neumann was working with the university’s plasma discharge, mapping the electric and magnetic charges around it. He noticed the particles moving through the machine were going really fast. In fact, they were clocking in at around 14 miles per second.

“I looked at my numbers from that final year project and thought, You could probably make a rocket out of this,” he says. Particularly when you consider that conventional hydrogen-oxygen rockets only get around 2.8 miles per second.

Continue reading “How an Australian College Student Did What NASA Couldn’t” »

If you listen to the wrong people, the North American manufacturing industry is doomed.

There is no denying that the U.S. and Canada have been losing jobs to offshore competition for almost half a century. From 2000 to 2010 alone, 5.6 million jobs disappeared.

Interestingly, though, only 13 percent of those jobs were lost due to international trade. The vast remainder, 85 percent of job losses, stemmed from “productivity growth” — another way of saying machines replacing human workers.

Continue reading “Industrial robots will replace manufacturing jobs — and that’s a good thing” »

“Suppose you had access to every person’s brain,” asks Dr. Michael Persinger, “and they had access to yours?” Dr. Persinger, cognitive neuroscientist and professor at Laurentian University in Ontario, is convinced that this is not only possible but is immanent in the coming future. Why? How? In short, his pioneering research shows a strong correlation between the Earth’s magnetic field and the human brain.

If Dr. Persinger is correct, the Earth’s magnetic field is constantly interfacing with our own brains in such a manner as to influence our thoughts, emotions and behaviors. This interface, however, seems to have another effect: Dr. Persinger’s research seems to indicate that the geomagnetic field can store and transmit all the information of every human brain in history. And if we can tap into this informational reservoir, there will be no more secrets. In such a scenario, for example, we can know the true intentions of large corporations, regardless of what they may say through the media. We’d be able to feel and experience the pain of starving people in Africa. This is huge! Pay attention and enjoy!

Continue reading “No More Secrets: Scientist Says the Earth’s Magnetic Field will Enable Telepathy on a Global Scale” »

Is this possible?

A Japanese company wants to build a space elevator by 2050.

Soundtrack by: Thomas Lemmer.

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Even more criticism of the Nature article last week!

Leading scientific journal Nature reported on Wednesday about a maximum lifespan for humans. But are their statistics right?

Further criticism of the Nature article from Wednesday that suggested there was a limit to lifespan.

We’ve known there is a ‘natural’ maximal human life span for a while, but it would be extraordinarily naive to believe it will always be so

In the latest study published in Nature, researchers claim that human life span has a fundamental limit of around 115. This has been widely publicised around various news platforms, and has proved highly controversial, with many taking sides or making rather grandiose claims about future trajectories. After observing trends in survival from 1900 onwards, the team discovered that maximal life span has plateaued; forming a ceiling at around 115–120 years. Jeanne Calment is so far the longest lived (verified) person in history, passing away at an extensive 122 years. Despite dying in 1997, no one has surpassed her title in over 10 years. The research repeats previous observations and analysis suggesting that without intervention there is indeed a limit to human life span, and that it is exceedingly rare to approach this limit at all; explaining why Calment remains unchallenged.

Continue reading “Life Span Is Only Limited Without Intervention” »

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Germany isn’t content with relying on financial incentives to usher in an era of pollution-free cars. The country’s Bundesrat (federal council) has passed a resolution calling for a ban on new internal combustion engine cars by 2030. From then on, you’d have to buy a zero-emissions vehicle, whether it’s electric or running on a hydrogen fuel cell. This isn’t legally binding, but the Bundesrat is asking the European Commission to implement the ban across the European Union… and when German regulations tend to shape EU policy, there’s a chance that might happen.

The council also wants the European Commission to review its taxation policies and their effect on the “stimulation of emission-free mobility.” Just what that means isn’t clear. It could involve stronger tax incentives for buying zero-emissions cars, but it could also involve eliminating tax breaks for diesel cars in EU states. Automakers are already worried that tougher emission standards could kill diesels — remove the low cost of ownership and it’d only hasten their demise.

Not that the public would necessarily be worried. Forbes notes that registrations of diesels, still mainstays of the European car market, dropped sharply in numerous EU countries in August. There’s a real possibility that Volkswagen’s emission cheating scandal is having a delayed effect on diesel sales. Combine that with larger zero-emissions incentives and the proposed combustion engine ban, and it might not take much for Europeans to go with electric or hydrogen the next time they go car shopping.

Continue reading “Germany calls for a ban on combustion engine cars by 2030” »