MOON WETTER THAN SAHARA
I read the original report from NASA, it states:"If astronauts were to visit this crater, they might be able to use eight wheelbarrows of soil to melt 10 to 13 gallons of water. The water, if purified, could be used for drinking, or broken apart into hydrogen and oxygen for rocket fuel — to get home or travel to Mars."
That is enough to flush a toilet ten times. Travel to Mars? These are merely ice crystals separate from the dirt there...go to the NASA site, the crater is the size of a swimming pool. It was probably a bunch of martians peeing after a party up there......why do people get so excited about nothing....people, we are stuck here.
Read the article COMPUTERWORLD/NASA:Moon may have enough water for human base
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NASA is forgetting some of the laws of physics...ice water will sublimate under the pressures and temperatures found on the moon. The escape velocity of a water molecule from a mass as small as the moon means it's not there, nor was it ever.
Why didn't the Apollo missions find water? Oh, right, none could be detected. Plenty of press releases throughout the 60's saying no water. So NASA is now saying their own scientific evidence collected from instruments which were placed ON THE MOON are wrong? Ok. that's logical.
So the laws of physics plus data collected directly from the source is overruled by long distance detection of emission lines which are not necessarily the emission lines of water....hmmmm. lol
Read the article COMPUTERWORLD/NASA:Moon may have enough water for human base
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No sign of any of this from the stuff brought back in the 60s and 70s? All the good stuff must be in the craters!
I was 6 when they "walked" on the moon, still waiting for the re-run. Fed up with the economic and "been there done it" arguments, with what we know now and the advances made in the last 40years, if it was possible then, it should be easy now.
As far as I am aware, no human being has travelled more than 400 miles up since "Apollo" (when of course 250,000 miles was regularly achieved!) and that was to repair Hubble. Normal shuttle missions are around 250 miles altitude.
Manned space exploration must be about the only area of technology that has regressed over the last four decades.
Read the article TELEGRAPH/Moon really is 'silvery' NASA discovers
WHAT FACEBOOK APPS SEE RAISES NEW PRIVACY QUESTIONS
People need to understand that if you post something online it is not private. And people also need to remember that not everything in life, that includes the internet, is free.
Facebook, and all these app companies are trying to make money. Since they are not charging you to use the service they must rely on advertising. They can make more money by collecting a database and selling it, or using it to show potential advertisers the demographic they reach.
I for one do not care if third party companies get my information. What are they going to do with it? Track what I buy and then put ads for similar things? Big deal. Plus I use ad blocking software so I don't even see 95% of the ads on the internet anyway. When you sign up to use an app it tells you what information it is going to use. You have the option to not use it.
Read the article WALL STREET JOURNAL/Facebook in privacy breach
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You are missing the point. The problem isn't that these business models rely on collecting information to pay the bills. The problem is the a combination of a lack of transparency and consumer choice.
Most people know that information is being collected, but how many people know exactly what info is being collected, how exactly it is being collected, how it is being used, who is collecting it, who it is being shared with, etc?
Privacy is important to a lot of people and many have very good reasons to value it. Privacy is also a choice. You are not forced to maintain it, but you should always be given the choice to either keep or maintain it.
Privacy is also about personal responsibility. How can one make an informed responsible decision to protect their privacy if they don't know the details about all of this information sharing? These days, it is not about simply choosing to use or choosing not to use Facebook, Google, etc. With all of the tracking services out there by simply visiting a website it has come to a point that you either have to be a master security specialist or cease using the internet entirely.
Transparency regarding internet privacy is nearly dead and choice is gone. That's the problem.
Read the article NPR/Facebook not so private
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What does anyone expect from Facebook.
You don't become a Billionaire in your mid-20s by not providing marketing leads to companies that pay you for promotion purposes.
This is not some exclusive club that holds privacy in high regard, it's Facebook, the new age vanity promotion. In the 1970s it was discos and foreign sports cars, in the 1980s it was BMWs and country clubs, the 1990s it was Hummers and Nasdaq, in the 2000s it is Priuses and having a million Facebook friends.
How do you have that many friends and expect your information to be private, grow up all you narcissists. Starving for attention will bring you attention, some you can control, others you can't. To avoid the problem, drop your Facebook account and find out the world goes on without it.
Read the article WALL STREET JOURNAL/Facebook in privacy breach
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When I first signed up for Facebook 3 years ago, it was common knowledge that applications (apps) had access to your personal information and USED that information for marketing/advertising purposes.
This is exactly why I never added any applications to my account!
This "breach" is nothing new, and technically is not even a breach at all... It was a "feature" for app programmers...
For instance, the creators of an app called something like "Where i've Been" were able to sell what they had done for millions – simply because the application (in which users input places on a world map where they had been to) had access to users personal information as well as their travel habits – information that was VERY valuable for marketers/advertisers of vacation travel...
CNN/Facebook slammed for privacy breach
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Privacy is not black and white. It is not simply private vs public. Each site is a different shade of gray and even then each user's experience can differ depending on how they browse the net (for example, some browser add-ons provide a lot more privacy).
Everyone has a limit when it comes to privacy. Some people are more strict than others which is fine. That doesn't matter. What matters is that we should all be in a position where we are able to make our own responsible and informed decisions about our privacy.
The Internet is not 100% public. Yeah sure...one can simply assume that so there are no surprises, but why should we have to assume it? Why can't we simply be clear informed of the details of what is being collected, who is it is being shared with, how it will be used, etc?
Privacy policies are near useless. They are often highly generic and vague. I am not looking for a 100% private internet. I simply want an internet which I can be confident that I know where my privacy stands so that I can make my own informed choices about what to use and what not to use on it.
Read the article NPR/Facebook not so private
"LOOK MA, NO HANDS" -- GOOGLE'S DRIVERLESS CARS DO 140,000 MILES ON THE ROAD
The most noticeable thing in the article is that hyper-wealthy Google pays people $15/hour in one of the most expensive places in America.
What these cars cannot do is plan adequately for the unplanned. They can be no better than the abilities and driving sensibilities of the programmer/drivers. They can be programmed for varying traffic laws, but not for behavior that is different in different places, that depends on instantaneous judgments of probabilistic functions (yes, stereotyping) which base our driving anticipations on type of car, driver characteristics (both appearance and how they have been driving while in your purview), and evaluation of human behavior in general.
In any case, if the system counts on the ability of manual override, it is almost certain that the "drivers" would be less aware and responsive than they are now, if they get used to most of the driving being done automatically. In addition, at the speed cars travel, the delay added by a sensor notifying the unaware driver and the drivers then having to direct their attention to the problem can be fatally problematic.
How will the system determine whether you should hit the dog that runs out or swerve to avoid it? And what algorithm will decide whether you should hit one person to avoid the possibility of hitting several?
Not to mention hackers.
Read the article NEW YORK TIMES/Google cars drive themselves, in traffic
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This is one of those articles that leaves me wondering: Is this dumb or smart, cool or ridiculous?
On the one hand, it's helpful for people with disabilities and can help curb drunk driving; on the other hand, do we really need more ways to for people to drive cars around the country, as opposed to spending the $ and technology on mass transit?
I know the argument (often given when discussing NASA) that these technologies will have wider applications in other fields, but how ethical is it for us to be building futuristic cars when so many of the planet's population still doesn't have clean drinking water? Sure, we can do both at the same time ... but are we?
Read the article NEW YORK TIMES/Google cars drive themselves, in traffic
DRIVERLESS CARS - WIKIPEDIA
If this technology ever comes to fruition, it will mean the loss of jobs for a sizable chunk of the work force. Every truck driver, taxi driver, fed ex driver, mailman, bus driver and delivery person will be unemployed.
I am not a hopeless luddite, but this is a ridiculous. If labor continues to be replaced by capital at the rate that we are currently experiencing (barring a future acceleration as predicted by Ray Kurzweil), then we are looking at a future of massive unemployment and more and more resources going to the people who control the technology.
I just get a bad feeling about the future techno utopia envisioned by these tech guys. If people are not working and not feeling valued, then will not take ownership over their communities and we will all be worse off as a result. We are entering exciting but also dangerous territory.
Read the article NEW YORK TIMES/Google cars drive themselves, in traffic
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Legal hurdles? Imagine having an accident and instead of lies, threats, police judgement and all the associated costs, the cars simply upload their driving data to DMV servers instantly, where the accident is virtually reconstructed and who is at fault is automatically determined (based on laws and tons of other crash data). Data from road condition sensors and traffic cameras can also be used.
If it is system failure, the software company is liable. If you haven't maintained the sensors properly and that caused the accident, then you are. You can also appeal and contend that the DMV algorithm was faulty (judge error). Quite efficient, consistent and fair
Read the article CNN/Google is testing cars that drive themselves
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"A virus is suspected in the massive 500 car pileup on I-95..." DAILY TECH/Google developing self-piloted cars
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EIGHT YEARS!? I thought it was out already, I see loads of people looking down at their laps playing with cell phones on my commute now. If Google's not driving their cars, then who is? (And no, I don't live in CA). ;)
I'd use this technology now, starting today on my nearly hour long hellish commute home from work.
I don't drink and drive, I don't blab on a handheld cell phone, but I am human, and I'd feel safer with a computer driving. Hopefully the computer will be better at avoiding all the other clueless humans that I'm forced to share the road with now.
There will be a backlash from car "enthusiasts" who will argue that their right to subject everyone to their possibly deadly errors is being threatened. Hopefully they won't win the debate and keep this technology from being widely adopted.
Read the article CNN/Google is testing cars that drive themselves
These are fledgling steps.
Imagine a crowded commute. One imagines that this congested scenario would be a good application for automated driving; it doesn't infringe as much on the individual's freedom.
But then imagine the complexity: each car would have to move lane to lane in some efficient manner to allow entrances and exits and that would require lots of real time talk between cars as well as some way in which these local networks could form a greater whole that could respond to issues like detours, accidents and simply too many cars wanting to use the same exit or merge.
And then of course some people are in a hurry and the system should at least attempt to accommodate desires if it is to be more than a Big Brotherish control mechanism.
I don't see this ever happening but there are, of course, implications for things like assisted driving for the handicapped; one could imagine a system that does the basic driving for a handicapped driver with some sort of interface that allows custom control.
Read the article ECONOMIST/Google's Robocars
Ig NOBLE AWARDS - WHALE SNOT, BAT FELLATIO, BEARDED BOFFINS...
Ig NOBEL AWARDS 2010
I actually despise the Ig Noble prize, because contrary to the stated intentions, it does NOT make people think, it rather encourages the view that scientists are not doing real work but wasting taxpayer dollars.
Of course people also laughed at Galileo, and imagine Newton with the story of getting hit by an apple on the head?
But science doesn't work by only pursuing noble, dignified experiments. Science is messy and difficult, and although I too like to laugh at the more outrageous examples from the Ig Nobles, I'm afraid most of the general public gets more exposure to science through the Ig Noble prizewinners than they get from the media the rest of the year.
Read the article ARS TECHNICA/Ig Nobel prizes awarded for bat fellatio, whale snot and more..
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As a scientifically minded person I think the Ig Nobles are awesome. They demonstrate scientific thought in non traditional areas.
Collecting whale snot is awesome. So is inducing or taming asthma with roller coasters. Studying the Peter Principle is also worthwhile, even if the subject matter is less exciting than black holes or cancer.
Science is something everyone should be doing. How hungry do you get if you eat oatmeal for breakfast for a month? How about if you eat pumpkin pie? Or how about toast and jam? This is a perfect science experiment, double so if you get a lancet and measure blood sugar an hour, two hours, right before your first snack, and an hour after your first snack.
Or the socks on boots; again, something you can totally do in high school. Even robot helicopters are high school level and can be used to collect air samples over parks, over schools, over freeways, etc, at different times of the day, different days, weather, etc.
This just shows people that science is something anyone can, and should, do!
Read the article ARS TECHNICA/Ig Nobel prizes awarded for bat fellatio, whale snot and more..
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Honestly it's all in the presentation. Take the whale snot collectors. You think "who'd want to collect whale snot?" but what they were actually doing was trying to find some way of getting a sample so they could evaluate for different health factors, etc. by analysing the bacteria that's found there.
So many of these sound really stupid (slime mold for laying out transportation infrastructure?) but the more you learn about it, you wind up with a "holy shit, that actually works?!", and then wondering ... how?
Particularly illuminating was the research that concluded that "expensive" placebos are more effective than "cheap" placebos. Completely stupid, pointless research, right up to the point where you walk by the herbal supplement aisle at your local grocery store and look at the prices and go "hmm....".
Read the article ARS TECHNICA/Ig Nobel prizes awarded for bat fellatio, whale snot and more..
READ MORE COMMENTS AT THE ARCHIVES: SEPTEMBER 2010
