As it travels through space, Pioneer 10 carries a unique payload: a 6.0 × 9.0 in gold-anodized aluminum plaque with images of two nude human figures (one male and one female) and information on the probe’s origin. It was designed by astronomers Carl Sagan and Frank Drake, just in case intelligent life finds the spacecraft. #FlipFacts
Don’t look now, but Earth is being bombarded with mysterious, invisible light. Among the typical array of radio signals and microwaves cast out by distant stars, black holes and other celestial bodies, there exists a brand of intergalactic light that consistently boggles scientists’ minds — and their instruments. These signals are known as fast radio bursts (FRBs). These ultrastrong, ultrabright radio signals last only a few milliseconds and are thought to originate from billions of light-years away, though their precise source is unknown. (Aliens have not been ruled out.)
The mystery is partially owed to a lack of data; since astronomers first discovered FRBs in 2007, only about 60 have been observed. Now, those numbers are growing fast. According to two new papers published Jan. 9 in the journal Nature, scientists working at the CHIME (Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment) radio telescope in the hills of British Columbia have detected 13 new FRBs in just a two-month span. Among these newly captured signals are seven bursts that registered at 400 megahertz — the lowest FRB frequency detected so far — and, for only the second time ever, an FRB that flashed repeatedly, six times in a row.
“Until now, there was only one known repeating FRB,” Ingrid Stairs, a member of the CHIME team and an astrophysicist at the University of British Columbia, said in a statement. “With more repeaters and more sources available for study, we may be able to understand these cosmic puzzles — where they’re from and what causes them.”
Foreword to the Syntellect Hypothesis.
I had the honour of writing the foreword of Alex Vikoulov’s recently published masterpiece and bestseller “The Syntellect Hypothesis”. Hereunder you can read my foreword:
“If you picked up this book, it is not unlikely that you may have heard of the early 20th century philosophical movement of Cosmism. This movement, which originated in Russia, was striving for conquering the planets and stars, for radical life extension, immortality and resurrection of our loved ones by the means of technology. Perhaps one of its most important pioneers was Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, whose aspirations did not only venture into the realm of the Macro, but also explored the Micro. He spoke of the atomic world as being animated and can thus be considered a kind of cosmist-panpsychist.
Continue reading “Masterpiece: ‘The Syntellect Hypothesis’” »
When astronomers search the skies for signs of alien life, they tend to focus on planets that are relatively similar to Earth. But while looking for the kinds of life we know exist is a good place to start, different conditions on different planets could have led life down paths that are completely … well, alien. To demonstrate, a NASA-funded study has successfully created a new synthetic genetic system that’s a viable alternative to DNA, made with twice as many “ingredients.”
Here’s a clip about how we’re helping farmers understand the precise irrigation needs of their crops.
Full interview: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/14/nasas-bridenstine-on-spacex-…-mars.html
Love: The Glue That Holds the Universe Together. “Love contrasts with fear, light with dark, black implies white, self implies other, suffering implies ecstasy, death implies life. We can devise and apprehend something only in terms of what it is not. This is the cosmic binary code: Ying/Yang, True/False, Infinite/Finite, Masculine/Feminine, On/Off, Yes/No… There are really only two opposing forces at play: love as universal integrating force and fear as universal disintegrating force… Like in Conway’s Game of Life information flows along the path of the least resistance influenced by the bigger motivator – either love factor of fear factor (or, rather, their sophisticated gradients like pleasure and pain) – Go or No go. Love and its contrasting opposite fear is what makes us feel alive… Love is recognized self-similarity in the other, a fractal algorithm of the least resistance. And love, as the finest intelligence, is obviously an extreme form of collaboration… collectively ascending to higher love, “becoming one planet of love.” Love is the glue that holds the Universe together…” –Excerpt from ‘The Syntellect Hypothesis: Five Paradigms of the Mind’s Evolution’ by Alex Vikoulov, available now on Amazon.
#SyntellectHypothesis #AlexVikoulov #Love
P.S. Extra For Digitalists: “In this quantum [computational] multiverse the essence of digital IS quantum entanglement. The totality of your digital reality is what your conscious mind implicitly or explicitly chooses to experience out of the infinite -\-\ a cocktail of love response and fear response.”
There’s no two-ways about it, the Universe is an extremely big place! And thanks to the limitations placed upon us by Special Relativity, traveling to even the closest star systems could take millennia.
As we addressed in a previous article, the estimated travel time to the nearest star system (Alpha Centauri) could take anywhere from 19,000 to 81,000 years using conventional methods.
For this reason, many theorists have recommended that humanity rely on generation ships to spread the seed of humanity among the stars. Naturally, such a project presents many challenges, not the least of which is how large a spacecraft would need to be to sustain a multi-generational crew.
Quantum physics sets the laws that dominate the universe at a small scale. The ability to harness quantum phenomena could lead to machines like quantum computers, which are predicted to perform certain calculations much faster than conventional computers. One major problem with building quantum processors is that the tracking and controlling quantum systems in real time is a difficult task because quantum systems are overwhelmingly fragile: Manipulating these systems carelessly introduces significant errors in the final result. New work by a team at Aalto could lead to precise quantum computers.
The researchers report controlling quantum phenomena in a custom-designed electrical circuit called a transmon. Chilling a transmon chip to within a few thousandths of a degree above absolute zero induces a quantum state, and the chip starts to behave like an artificial atom. One of the quantum features that interests researchers is that the energy of the transmon can only take specific values, called energy levels. The energy levels are like steps on a ladder: A person climbing the ladder must occupy a step, and can’t hover somewhere between two steps. Likewise, the transmon energy can only occupy the set values of the energy levels. Shining microwaves on the circuit induces the transmon to absorb the energy and climb up the rungs of the ladder.
In work published 8 February in the journal Science Advances, the group from Aalto University led by Docent Sorin Paraoanu, senior university lecturer in the Department of Applied Physics, has made the transmon jump more than one energy level in a single go. Previously, this has been possible only by very gentle and slow adjustments of the microwave signals that control the device. In the new work, an additional microwave control signal shaped in a very specific way allows a fast, precise change of the energy level. Dr. Antti Vepsäläinen, the lead author, says, “We have a saying in Finland: ‘hiljaa hyvää tulee’ (slowly does it). But we managed to show that by continuously correcting the state of the system, we can drive this process more rapidly and at high fidelity.”
