Lifeboat Foundation

A team of astrophysicists has revealed an unusual discovery they say appears to challenge our current understanding of gravity based on Newton’s law of universal gravitation, according to a newly published paper.

The controversial claim, published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, appears to be consistent with alternative interpretations about one of physics’ most mysterious fundamental interactions.

In their new study, an international team of astrophysicists says that they came upon the discovery while investigating open star clusters. These formations are created as a gas cloud emerges following the birth of thousands of stars within a relatively short time, the remnants of which are ejected as these clusters of stars ignite and begin to expand, which can result in the formation of anywhere from several dozen, to several thousands of new stars.

If conditions on a distant planet allowed life to flourish, would it look anything like life here on Earth? It’s a question that’s seen a Darwinian rise of contradictory theories over the years.

Now, in an interview with the BBC’s Science Focus magazine, Simon Conway Morris, an evolutionary palaeobiologist at the University of Cambridge, says “with reasonable confidence” that human-like evolution has occurred in other parts of the universe.

Matthew Cobb is a zoologist and author whose background is in insect genetics and the history of science. Over the past decade or so, as CRISPR was discovered and applied to genetic remodeling, he started to get concerned—afraid, actually—about three potential applications of the technology. He’s in good company: Jennifer Doudna, who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2020 for discovering and harnessing CRISPR, is afraid of the same things. So he decided to delve into these topics, and As Gods: A Moral History of the Genetic Age is the result.

Summing up fears

The first of his worries is the notion of introducing heritable mutations into the human genome. He Jianqui did this to three human female embryos in China in 2018, so the three girls with the engineered mutations that they will pass on to their kids (if they’re allowed to have any) are about four now. Their identities are classified for their protection, but presumably their health is being monitored, and the poor girls have probably already been poked and prodded incessantly by every type of medical specialist there is.

The James Webb Space Telescope has released a spooky new photo of the iconic Pillars of Creation.

In a Thursday release, NASA wrote that the eerie image was taken by the $10 billion-dollar observatory’s Mid-Infrared Instrument, also known as MIRI.

The pillars of gas and Interstellar dust enshroud the thousands of stars that exist in the region.

European Space Agency · The scary sound of Earth’s magnetic field

The resulting five-minute audio includes eerie creaks and crackling sounds, as well as deep breathing-like sounds that listeners on social media described as “petrifying” and “spine tingling freaky.”

Since the discovery was revealed on October 24, loudspeakers at Solbjerg Square in Copenhagen, Denmark, have broadcasted the recording three times a day. Plans are to continue playing it each day at 8 a.m., 1 p.m., and 7 p.m. through October 30.

A newly discovered, “potentially hazardous” asteroid almost the size of the world’s tallest skyscraper is set to tumble past Earth just in time for Halloween, according to NASA.

The asteroid, called 2022 RM4, has an estimated diameter of between 1,083 and 2,428 feet (330 and 740 meters) — just under the height of Dubai’s 2,716-foot-tall (828 m) Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. It will zoom past our planet at around 52,500 mph (84,500 km/h), or roughly 68 times the speed of sound, according to NASA (opens in new tab).

A joint study by TAU and the Hebrew University, involving 20 researchers from different countries and disciplines, has accurately dated 21 destruction layers at 17 archaeological sites in Israel by reconstructing the direction and/or intensity of the earth’s magnetic field recorded in burnt remnants. The new data verify the Biblical accounts of the Egyptian, Aramean, Assyrian, and Babylonian military campaigns against the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah.

Findings indicate, for example, that the army of Hazael, King of Aram-Damascus, was responsible for the destruction of several cities—Tel Rehov, Tel Zayit, and Horvat Tevet, in addition to Gath of the Philistines, whose destruction is noted in the Hebrew Bible. At the same time, the study refutes the prevailing theory that Hazael was the conqueror who destroyed Tel Beth-Shean.

Continue reading “Geomagnetic fields reveal the truth behind Biblical narratives” »

A study has found that Eurasian jays can pass a version of the ‘marshmallow test’—and those with the greatest self-control also score the highest on intelligence tests.

This is the first evidence of a link between self-control and intelligence in birds.

Self-control—the ability to resist temptation in favor of a better but delayed reward—is a vital skill that underpins effective decision-making and future planning.

Chinese researchers have created the world’s first cloned Arctic wolf — an achievement that could help save other species from extinction and ensure the biodiversity of our planet.

Why it matters: Scottish scientists proved back in 1996 that it was possible to clone a mammal using a cell from an adult animal. Possible — but not easy. Dolly the sheep was the only successful clone in their 277 attempts.

Cloning is still a challenging process — fewer than 25 animal species have been cloned to date, so the first successful cloning of a species is still newsworthy 25+ years after Dolly’s birth.