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Dec 2, 2023

How AI and quantum physics link up to consciousness

Posted by in categories: quantum physics, robotics/AI

Will artificial intelligence serve humanity — or will it spawn a new species of conscious digital beings with their own agenda?

It’s a question that has sparked scores of science-fiction plots, from “Colossus: The Forbin Project” in 1970, to “The Matrix” in 1999, to this year’s big-budget tale about AI vs. humans, “The Creator.”

The same question has also been lurking behind the OpenAI leadership struggle — in which CEO Sam Altman won out over the nonprofit board members who fired him a week earlier.

Dec 2, 2023

Pneumonia: Pneumonia is an infection in one or both of the lungs

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, health

It causes the air sacs of the lungs to fill up with fluid or pus. It can range from mild to severe, depending on the type of germ causing the infection, your age, and your overall health.

What causes pneumonia?

Bacterial, viral, and fungal infections can cause pneumonia.

Dec 2, 2023

NASA’s Fermi mission rewrites astrophysics with discovery of 294 gamma-ray pulsars

Posted by in categories: physics, space

Published on Monday, Nov. 27, in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement, the catalog serves as a collaborative effort involving 170 scientists globally.

Dec 2, 2023

The Universe in a lab: Testing alternate cosmology using a cloud of atoms

Posted by in categories: cosmology, information science, particle physics, quantum physics, space travel

In the basement of Kirchhoff-Institut für Physik in Germany, researchers have been simulating the Universe as it might have existed shortly after the Big Bang. They have created a tabletop quantum field simulation that involves using magnets and lasers to control a sample of potassium-39 atoms that is held close to absolute zero. They then use equations to translate the results at this small scale to explore possible features of the early Universe.

The work done so far shows that it’s possible to simulate a Universe with a different curvature. In a positively curved universe, if you travel in any direction in a straight line, you will come back to where you started. In a negatively curved universe, space is bent in a saddle shape. The Universe is currently flat or nearly flat, according to Marius Sparn, a PhD student at Kirchhoff-Institut für Physik. But at the beginning of its existence, it might have been more positively or negatively curved.

Dec 2, 2023

SpaceX’s New Design for Lunar Starship Unveiled

Posted by in category: space travel

New SpaceX renderings reveal that the design of the company’s Starship lunar lander has evolved significantly. We analyze the numerous improvements to the vehicle, including stretched fuel tanks, rotating solar arrays, and a new docking port.

Dec 2, 2023

Amazon Taps SpaceX For Satellite Launch Despite Jeff Bezos’ Rocket Company: Elon Musk Says It Will Be ‘Fair And Square’

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, internet, satellites

Billionaire CEO Elon Musk on Friday said that his rocket manufacturing company SpaceX launched the satellite systems of its rivals without favoring their own.

The CEO took to X to clarify the same after SpaceX entered into a contract to launch Amazon.com Inc’s AMZN Kuiper satellites, aimed at providing satellite internet along the lines of SpaceX’s Starlink.

What Happened: Under the newly announced contract, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will launch thrice to deliver Kuiper satellites to low-Earth orbit starting mid-2025. Project Kuiper is a project by the e-commerce giant aimed at providing broadband with the help of a network of satellites in low-Earth orbit like Starlink.

Dec 2, 2023

Tim Cook lays out what he looks for in an Apple employee—and no, a college degree isn’t necessary

Posted by in category: futurism

Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, has laid out the characteristics he likes to see in new hires.

Dec 2, 2023

‘The great wealth transfer’ is here: Billionaires set to give trillions to their kids

Posted by in category: business

In recent months, the world’s new billionaires made more of their fortunes from inheritance than from entrepreneurship, according to the UBS Billionaire Ambitions Report.

It marked the first time in the nine-year history of the report that newly minted billionaires accumulated more wealth from inheritance than starting a business.

Fifty-three heirs inherited a total of $150.8 billion in the 12 months ending in April, exceeding the total of $140.7 billion accumulated by 84 new self-made billionaires, according to the Swiss bank’s report. The shift is likely to continue: The report said more than 1,000 billionaires are expected to pass $5.2 trillion to their children over the next 20 or 30 years.

Dec 2, 2023

Mercury is home to exotic glaciers of salt, and they may host life beneath them

Posted by in category: space

Life on Mercury?


Salt glaciers uncovered on Mercury, the second planet from the sun, could have implications for the habitability of this tiny planet and similar worlds beyond the solar system.

Dec 2, 2023

Amazon taps SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket to help launch Kuiper satellites

Posted by in categories: business, Elon Musk, internet, satellites

Dec 1 (Reuters) — Amazon (AMZN.O) on Friday said it booked three Falcon 9 launches with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to help deploy the ecommerce giant’s Project Kuiper satellite network, tapping a rival in the satellite internet business for its multi-billion dollar launch campaign.

Amazon aims to build Kuiper as a constellation of 3,236 satellites in low Earth orbit to beam broadband internet globally and compete with SpaceX’s Starlink network, which already has some 5,000 satellites providing nearly global coverage.

Amazon, which vowed in 2019 to invest $10 billion into the project, will put an unspecified number of Kuiper satellites on three Falcon 9 rockets from SpaceX beginning in mid-2025, the company said Friday.