Lifeboat Foundation

Hawking is being interred at Westminster Abbey on Friday, with a thousand members of the public (selected through a lottery system) present for the ceremony. The physicist’s remains will be placed between those of Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin.

His voice will be broadcast into space after the service honoring his life.

Hawking’s words “have been set to an original score by composer Vangelis, most famous for his Chariots of Fire film theme,” the BBC reports.

Continue reading “Stephen Hawking’s Voice Is Being Broadcast Into Space” »

Herpes Viruses And Alzheimer’s: A Possible Link : Shots — Health News Two herpes viruses that cause skin rashes in toddlers may accelerate Alzheimer’s disease when they infect brain cells. The finding suggests antiviral drugs might help protect the brain.

A 16-year-old Florida boy is the first person known to have become infected, researchers say. Symptoms in humans include a rash and mild fever.

Apple’s ARKit and Google’s ARCore may have multi-million-user installed bases, but so does Niantic’s Pokémon Go, the first hit augmented reality game. Now Niantic plans to offer its custom AR software to other developers as the Real World Platform, and is teasing advanced features that go beyond the capabilities of Apple’s and Google’s development kits.

Already used in Pokémon GO, Ingress, and Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, the Real World Platform is an evolving software engine that adds digital characters and shared social experiences to real-world map data. Niantic has recently bolstered the AR platform’s development team by acquiring computer vision specialist companies Escher Reality and Matrix Mill (which also has machine learning expertise).

Continue reading “Niantic will offer AR platform to third parties, including AI object recognition” »

The probe will map the surface, deploy rovers and collect pristine samples that could contain clues about the origins of life on Earth.

• By Elizabeth Tasker on June 29, 2018

Astronomers used radio & infrared telescopes to image the distant eruption of this cosmic duel. Details: https://go.nasa.gov/2JMkZWF

“The actual path of a raindrop as it goes down the valley is unpredictable, but the general direction is inevitable,” says digital visionary Kevin Kelly — and technology is much the same, driven by patterns that are surprising but inevitable. Over the next 20 years, he says, our penchant for making things smarter and smarter will have a profound impact on nearly everything we do. Kelly explores three trends in AI we need to understand in order to embrace it and steer its development. “The most popular AI product 20 years from now that everyone uses has not been invented yet,” Kelly says. “That means that you’re not late.”

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world’s leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). Look for talks on Technology, Entertainment and Design — plus science, business, global issues, the arts and much more.

Continue reading “How AI can bring on a second Industrial Revolution | Kevin Kelly” »

Based on posts I’ve seen from techies, militarizing space is a total fail. However, space is already militarized — Nothing goes into air space without Air Force approval… ANY organization developed to “regulate” Space has the potential for corruption whether that be collaborative, international entities which always panders to herd think, or stale governmental organizations. I’m undecided on this.

The White House, Air Force and Defense Secretary James Mattis had disapproved of creating a sixth branch of the military last year.

Neuroscientists have studied treadmill runners, ultramarathon athletes – and a number of lab animals – to investigate the effects of running on grey matter.

Ben Martynoga