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Aug 31, 2020

Full moon that happens only once every 3 years to brighten sky this week

Posted by in category: space

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (WDAF) — A full moon with a special name given only once every three years will rise this week, according to the Farmer’s Almanac.

The Corn Moon is a full moon that rises in September. The September full moon is usually called the Harvest Moon because it is normally the closest full moon to the autumn equinox.

Every third year, however, a full moon comes in October that’s even closer, making the September full moon a Corn Moon.

Aug 31, 2020

SpaceX makes first polar orbit launch from Florida in ‘decades’

Posted by in category: satellites

While SpaceX didn’t pull off a doubleheader Sunday launch like it planned, the company still managed a rare feat. Instead of launching eastward like every other Cape Canaveral rocket, the Falcon 9 headed south toward Cuba, close to populated areas on Florida’s coast (via The Verge). The “SAOCOM 1B” mission marks the first such “polar launch” from Florida since 1969, made possible by a special Air Force exemption for SpaceX.

Satellites bound for polar orbits (where a satellite passes over both the North and South Poles), usually launch from Vandenberg Air Force base in California. That way, they can head due south directly over the ocean without passing over any populated areas. By contrast, flights from Florida always head east over open seas, as southbound flights have been off-limits due to the presence of cities like West Palm Beach below.

Aug 31, 2020

Elon Musk unveils ‘Fitbit in your skull’ brain chip, demonstrates on pig

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, computing, Elon Musk, food, neuroscience

It was at this webcast that Musk unveiled the latest version of his company NeuraLink’s latest prototype, the Link VO.9 — a chip that would allow humans to control devices with their brains.

Musk said this could eventually help cure people with conditions like memory loss, hearing loss, paralysis, blindness, brain damage, depression and anxiety.

Viewers of the webcast met Gertrude, a pig that had the chip implanted in her brain two months ago. A graph shown onscreen showed the waves inside Gertrude’s brain, which fired when her brain communicated with her snout while she was eating.

Aug 31, 2020

Meet the woman who gave the world antiviral drugs

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Fifty years ago, few scientists believed a drug could fight viruses with low side effects. Then Gertrude Elion showed the doubters “what I could do on my own.”

Aug 31, 2020

Amazon’s Top Robotics Engineer Joins AI Startup Scale

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Brad Porter, who recently defended working conditions at Amazon warehouses, leaves to run Scale’s tech division.

Aug 31, 2020

The Coming Revolution in Intelligence Affairs

Posted by in categories: internet, military, robotics/AI, satellites, singularity

Adapting the Intelligence Community

As machines become the primary collectors, analysts, consumers, and targets of intelligence, the entire U.S. intelligence community will need to evolve. This evolution must start with enormous investments in AI and autonomization technology as well as changes to concepts of operations that enable agencies to both process huge volumes of data and channel the resulting intelligence directly to autonomous machines. As practically everything becomes connected via networks that produce some form of electromagnetic signature or data, signals intelligence in particular will need to be a locus of AI evolution. So will geospatial intelligence. As satellites and other sensors proliferate, everything on earth will soon be visible at all times from above, a state that the federal research and development center Aerospace has called the “GEOINT Singularity.” To keep up with all this data, geospatial intelligence, like signals intelligence, will need to radically enhance its AI capabilities.

The U.S. intelligence community is currently split up into different functions that collect and analyze discrete types of intelligence, such as signals or geospatial intelligence. The RIA may force the intelligence community to reassess whether these divisions still make sense. Electromagnetic information is electromagnetic information, whether it comes from a satellite or an Internet of Things device. The distinction in origin matters little if no human ever looks at the raw data, and an AI system can recognize patterns in all of the data at once. The division between civilian and military intelligence will be similarly eroded, since civilian infrastructure, such as telecommunications systems, will be just as valuable to military objectives as military communications systems. Given these realities, separating intelligence functions may impede rather than aid intelligence operations.

Aug 31, 2020

Mathematicians Report New Discovery About the Dodecahedron

Posted by in category: mathematics

Three mathematicians have resolved a fundamental question about straight paths on the 12-sided Platonic solid.

Aug 31, 2020

Amazon wins FAA approval for Prime Air drone delivery fleet

Posted by in categories: drones, robotics/AI

Amazon received federal approval to operate its fleet of Prime Air delivery drones, the Federal Aviation Administration said Monday, a milestone that allows the company to expand unmanned package delivery.

The approval will give Amazon broad privileges to “safely and efficiently deliver packages to customers,” the agency said. The certification comes under Part 135 of FAA regulations, which gives Amazon the ability to carry property on small drones “beyond the visual line of sight” of the operator.

Amazon said it will use the FAA’s certification to begin testing customer deliveries. The company said it went through rigorous training and submitted detailed evidence that its drone delivery operations are safe, including demonstrating the technology for FAA inspectors.

Aug 31, 2020

Conscious World Citizens Academy

Posted by in category: futurism

Conscious World Citizens Welcome to Conscious World Citizens · WATCH THE TRAILER ‘Waking up & Growing Up · The Essential Shift · Read the Book ‘An Urgent Plea from the Future’ · CWC Academy · SDGs & SDGAs · Youth Leaders · Story · Contact.

Aug 31, 2020

Amazon Prime Air lands FAA approval for drone deliveries

Posted by in categories: drones, health, robotics/AI

Amazon Prime Air has cleared a regulatory hurdle, moving the online retail giant one step closer to dropping packages off at your doorstep with drones. The US Federal Aviation Administration on Saturday issued Amazon Prime Air a “a Part 135 air carrier certificate,” allowing it to begin commercial drone deliveries in the US.

“Amazon Prime Air’s concept uses autonomous [unmanned aircraft systems] to safely and efficiently deliver packages to customers,” said a spokesperson for the FAA on Monday. “The FAA supports innovation that is beneficial to the public, especially during a health or weather-related crisis.”


Amazon and other companies are trying to make drones the future of deliveries.