Lifeboat Foundation

Computer scientists have found that robots evolve more quickly and efficiently after a virtual mass extinction modeled after real-life disasters such as the one that killed off the dinosaurs. Beyond implications for artificial intelligence, the research supports the idea that mass extinctions actually speed up evolution by unleashing new creativity in adaptations.

Photo credit: Joel Lehman.

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Stem cells are a daily feature of science news nowadays and related fields are creating an astonishing array of advancements within regenerative medicine. Unfortunately unlesss you have a scientific background the differences between types can be terribly confusing. We are here to help.

The term stem cell can encompass:

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The Hyperloop sounds like science fiction, Elon Musk’s pipe dream: leapfrog high speed rail and go right to packing us into capsules that fling us across the country in hours using what are, essentially, pneumatic tubes. It sounds crazy, when you think about it.

It’s starting to look a little less crazy. Read more

The only thing that this article made me want to delete was the article itself. Considering how absurdly cheap data storage (and cloud based storage) systems are nowadays, there’s no reason NOT to save all that information and entertainment. If you don’t believe me, just ask the NSA! THEY seem to think it’s a good idea…
err.. wink

You may not be a physical hoarder, but are you a digital hoarder?

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Imagine having a tattoo in your body that you can control from your own smartphone. Change up your tattoo art, show important messages, or just erase your tattoo altogether for that important job interview. Well, the future has arrived… thanks to groundbreaking subdermal E Ink technology, we have been able to develop the world’s first E Ink tattoo.

Electronic Ink is an incredible technology. Prior to E Ink’s development, a dynamic image display required a constant current of electricity, inevitably tying the longevity of the display to the power source. Like any other implantable wearable technology, adding a display to our body has been limited by the requirement on battery power. E Ink changed this by providing a medium that consumes energy only when the content of the display changes, not requiring a current to maintain the image on its display. The result is that we can create a screen on our skin that displays information with very little energy usage.

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In the first documented attack of its kind, the Internet of Things has been used as part of an attack that sent out over 750,000 spam emails. .

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It’s becoming clear that increased automation as well as the rise of artificial intelligence is threatening ever more jobs. Now economists are starting to seriously consider a universal basic income.

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Within the coming decades we’ll have the ability to create computers with greater than human intelligence, bio-engineer our species and redesign matter through nanotechnology, what will it mean to be human? Acclaimed as “a large-scale achievement in its documentation of futurist and counter-futurist ideas” and “the best documentary on the Singularity to date,” THE SINGULARITY is rich with insight, while remaining accessible to mainstream audiences. Some of the world’s leading thinkers, futurists and counter-futurists are interviewed, including Ray Kurzweil, Leon Panetta, Bill McKibben and Richard A. Clarke. THE SINGULARITY is an engaging tool for critical thinking about future technologies.

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Researchers from Samsung and MIT have developed a new solid electrolyte that they say will enable batteries to last indefinitely. They see it as a power storage “game changer.”

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