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Precognition, Retrocausation, and the Unconscious with Eric Wargo

Eric Wargo, PhD, is author of Time Loops: Precognition, Retrocognition, and the Unconscious. He is an anthropologist and science writer. His blog is http://thenightshirt.com/.

Here he defines time loops as akin to self-fulfilling prophecies. He asserts that they could be the very basis of the creative process. He explains that retrocausation is to physics what precognition is to parapsychology. He explores the social and psychological dynamics associated with the notion of premonitions. He reviews the experiment in time of J. W. Dunne suggesting that dreams contain much information seemingly derived from the future. He applies Dunne’s methology to dreams of Sigmund Freud.

New Thinking Allowed host, Jeffrey Mishlove, PhD, is author of The Roots of Consciousness, Psi Development Systems, and The PK Man. Between 1986 and 2002 he hosted and co-produced the original Thinking Allowed public television series. He is the recipient of the only doctoral diploma in \.

New solar desalination breakthrough makes fresh water without toxic brine

Scientists have developed a solar desalination system that turns seawater into drinking water without creating environmentally damaging brine. Special laser-textured metal panels use sunlight to evaporate water while automatically moving salt deposits away from the working surface, preventing clogging. The process was successfully tested with water from three oceans and can recover nearly all salts as solids. Those leftover materials could even become a source of valuable lithium for batteries.

New propulsion system could make tiny satellites both fast and fuel-efficient

MIT engineers are testing a new propulsion system that combines the power and speed of conventional chemical thrusters with the precision and fuel-efficiency of electrical thrusters.

The system could enable the design of nimbler, more flexible small satellites, which could perform both fast, powerful maneuvers and slower, precise adjustments, depending on the mission and moment at hand.

The key to the new system is a special propellant that can power both chemical and electrical thrusters, which traditionally have required separate, bulky fuel sources.

Sorting out a dielectric mismatch boosts perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells’ efficiency and durability

Solar cells, devices that can convert sunlight into electricity, are now widely used in many countries and are contributing to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions on Earth. While most of the solar cells on the market today are based on silicon, energy engineers have been exploring the potential of other photovoltaic materials, including a class of materials known as perovskites.

Perovskites are materials with a characteristic crystal structure; the same structure of the mineral calcium titanium oxide CaTiO3. A promising solar cell design introduced over the past decades entails the stacking of silicon and perovskite layers to produce so-called tandem cells, a type of photovoltaics that can capture a broader range of the solar spectrum than single-layer solar cells.

Perovskite/silicon solar cells have been found to exhibit remarkable power conversion efficiencies, which essentially means that they convert a higher percentage of sunlight into electricity. Nevertheless, under some conditions (e.g., when they are situated in partly shaded areas) their performance tends to rapidly degrade over time.

Critical Thalamocortical Coordination Dynamics Track Conscious State Transitions

Abstract Despite substantial progress in identifying neural correlates of consciousness, no unified quantitative framework currently derives a formally specified order parameter for conscious-state organisation from established neurophysiological principles, or links thalamocortical coordination dynamics to measurable state transitions across pharmacological, pathological, and perturbational conditions through a single computational formalism. We propose a neurocomputational theoretical framework in which conscious states are associated with metastable regimes of large-scale thalamocortical coordination operating near critical dynamical boundaries. The framework is formalised through a dynamic coordination functional Φ(t), defined as a surface integral over the thalamocortical interface and directly operationalisable from high-density EEG as a weighted combination of gamma-band power spectral density, thalamocortical coherence, and theta-gamma phase-amplitude coupling. The thalamic reticular nucleus (TRN) is identified as the anatomical implementation of the control parameter governing proximity to the critical point, grounded in a Wilson-Cowan model of TRN inhibitory gating whose bifurcation structure is characterised computationally. Numerical simulation of the linearised field equation on the thalamocortical boundary demonstrates internal consistency: the simulated system produces power-law recovery dynamics tau_rec proportional to | θ — θ _c|^v with nu consistent with model A universality class [0.5, 1.5], and a Kuramoto mean-field derivation establishes that Φ(t) emerges as the natural order parameter of coupled thalamocortical oscillators rather than being postulated. The joint (|Φ(t)|, Var[|Φ(t)|]) phase space correctly separates simulated waking, anaesthetic, ictal, and minimally conscious regimes without parameter fitting to empirical data. All simulation code is publicly available. Six quantitatively specific, independently falsifiable predictions are derived across five experimental domains: power-law Gamma Dip scaling in near-threshold EEG with a specific exponent range; causal disruption of thalamocortical coherence by selective TRN silencing; opposite EEG scaling exponent deviations in ASD versus schizophrenia; systematic Φ_est collapse under propofol anaesthesia correlated with PCI; Φ_est as a real-time consciousness biomarker in disorders of consciousness; and clinical validity of Φ_est in disorders of consciousness and ictal state discrimination by the metastability index. Each prediction is stated with quantitative thresholds and a pre-specified falsification criterion. The framework provides: the first anatomically specified and formally derived order parameter for conscious-state organisation directly operationalisable from passive EEG; a mechanistically grounded identification of the TRN as the dynamical control parameter, testable by a single optogenetic experiment; and a computationally validated, pre-registerable programme of six falsifiable predictions defining a tractable empirical agenda. Φ_est would constitute a candidate real-time consciousness biomarker if the framework’s predictions are confirmed in purpose-designed experiments.

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