In this TEDx talk at Harvard College, Charlie Jane Anders (Science Fiction author and co-founder of io9) discusses something near and dear to my heart – how a person manages to be optimistic about the future of mankind while, simultaneously, acknowledging that there are some catastrophes on the horizon. There are a few points where…
Why someone needs to make a “Cosmos” style show for emerging technology
If you watched Neil DeGrasse Tyson’s Cosmos reboot last year, or even the original with Carl Sagan you heard a lot about human curiosity. It is true that we’re a curious species with a deep desire to understand the world and the universe we live it. That curiosity, however, is not simply a love of…
Even if the warnings by Musk and Hawking are valid, not much can be done to slow artificial intelligence
Recently two very intelligent and well known individuals, Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, have made headlines by warning us about the ‘dangers’ of artificial intelligence (AI). While I hate to disagree with such brilliant people, I’m not as worried about the future of AI. However, even if I was, I know that there isn’t much…
Technology may not have revolutionized education yet, but it should have
There is a great deal of debate about whether or not technology will revolutionize education. To me the debate itself points out a problem. With the number of free and low-cost educational resources that technology has made available it should have, at least to an extent. The fact that it hasn’t points to a problem…
What if all of the dystopian stories are wrong and things turn out really great?
Sometimes, when I’m discussing the potential of future science and technology, I find myself thinking that I sound like a Bond villain. More and more though I’m ok with that, because this isn’t a Bond story. We are conditioned by fiction to think that conspiracies abound and that science and technology are bound to destroy…
Drone footage of a humpback whale and her calf
Drones get a bad rap. Yes, the kind with bombs are evil but pretty much anything “with bombs” is going to suck. However, they can be put to good use, capturing images that humans can’t. Take, for example, this footage of an active volcano or this plan for capturing images from the surface of Venus.…
Why your daughters need more Star Trek
There has been a great deal of discussion, for many years, about the lack of women in science and technology and how to fix it. Although I haven’t been able to find any actual studies or surveys on the topic, I’d like to propose a hypothesis: The lack of women in science and technology begins…
When will robots take over the world? They already have (video)
There is (probably) no reason to fear the robot uprising. As this video from The Atlantic points out, the robots have already taken over. They currently run our communications systems, our banking systems, parts of our military and more. We’ve happily let them take over and we will continue to. In fact, as time goes on, the…
FCC site has crashed just hours ahead of Net Neutrality comment deadline (keep commenting anyway)
Demand Progress (Demandprogress.org) is reporting that the Federal Communications Commission’s comment site has crashed from the influx of traffic. The deadline to submit comments, which the FCC encouraged, is midnight tonight. However, that doesn’t mean that you’ve lost your chance. Demand Progress and their allies at battleforthenet.com are storing comments so that they can be passed along…
Short animation explains how your immune system works
Ok, sure, your immune system puts the US Dept. of Homeland Security to shame. To be fair though, it did evolve over millions of years instead of being crammed together over a few months in a bill so large that no one actually read it. This 6 minute animation from Kurzgesagt explains just part of…