163 posts
Early this morning the ISS and a piece of debris from an old Russian weather satellite almost gave one another a bro-like chest bump. Astronauts had an hour and a half to secure as many of the ISS’s individual modules and get themselves hun
At Duke University a researcher who’s pioneering brain-computer interfaces has circuited four rats’ together via their brains and created a gooey and organic “Brainet”. Miguel Nicolelis, the neurobiologist pioneering this neuroengineering a
Thomas Edison once took a break from electrocuting animals to turn his attention to making dolls for little girls. Because he was the go-to guy at the time for recording voices, he thought it might be cool to make those dolls speak. And jus
On August 9th of 2014 graduate student Daniel Bowman sent infrasound microphones into the 19 miles into the sky above Earth just out of reach of planes but well below actually being in space. For 9 hours and for over 400 miles the microphon
Ripped right out of hundreds of science fiction, comic book and horror stories comes news that a Russian man has decided to be a medical guinea pig or possibly a pioneer…. By having his head removed and attached to another body. Suffering f
The McGurk effect is something that you’ll just have to hit play on the video above to experience. It’s like some weird magic trick and the secret is that your brain, eyes and ears have to work together to make things understandable. But so
Since the first announcement of the Mars One program, people have either picked up the story and hailed it with headlines trumpeting our colonization of the red planet or they’ve been standing there with confused looks slapped on their face
The jury’s out on what’s causing the sound (which is far, far below the level of human hearing) and a whole lot of theories are being tossed around about it. Everything from magnetic fields to ionization of particles shearing themselves fro
Using nanotubes, British scientists have created a material called VantaBlack that acts like a bunch of very, very tiny blackhole when it comes to light. The material is so black that our eyes can’t discern any type of edges or features an
Scientists have been trying to find the elusive combination of instructions that would cause stems cells to become an actual living thing. That elusive secret just ran out of places to hide. University researchers were able to cause cells t
The video pretty much tells you everything you need to know about this awesome kid who’s decided to become a tween man of science instead of chasing skirts or worrying about pimples. We’re putting this little bit of text down here to let te
Nope. We know what you’re wishing and your hopes are wrong. That’s not an old rice cake that someone dropped under the couch six months ago. It’s not a urinal cake either…because even that wouldn’t be as bad. It’s exactly what your brain is
3D printng is the ‘it’ thing right now. It seems like nothing can’t be printed. We can print plastic toys, metal parts and even cell tissues using additive manufacturing. So what’s next? Food…3D-printed food. A Texas company is partnering w
Recently a group of Japanese scientists at the IEEE Virtual Reality Conference in Orlando, Florida have unveiled the latest incarnation of… (sad, loungy drumroll please) Smell-O-Vision! That’s right. Scientists have been working hard at mak
Researchers have found the tentacled god Cthulhu at last he shall walk the earth and consume us all. By earth we mean the gut of termites and by consume we mean engage in a symbiotic relationship. Oh, and this Cthulhu as described in the PL
For a LOT of the more nerdy kids out there, we’re placing bets that many of you pretended you had the ability to throw fireballs, move objects by waving your hands and occasionally even tried in vain to channel the Force. That was all fun,
‘Squirrel!’ Ever wonder what it looked like at the inception point of a thought? Like when your watching ‘fail videos’ online and you do that mental cringe at the exact moment that you’re watching someone sledding down a hill on an oil-pan
Ever leave the house knowing you forgot…something? We’re wondering what it was like when the guy who was supposed to file paperwork for 18 human heads for medical study realized that he’d forgotten to file paperwork for 18 human heads for m
While everyone sits around and debates the cost of solar power and that anything that could effectively power your home right now would cost more than feeding your family for about a year, a teenager in Nepal has come up with a solution tha
Star Wars uses tractor beams as frequently as newly graduated college kids use U-Haul trailers. Imagine if, just like in the movies, you could hook up those U-Hauls with a tractor beam instead of trying to get one of those ball-and-cup trai
We’ve seen tissues and body parts grown in petri dishes before. Nothing new, right? Now we’ve seen a human being’s own body used as a petri dish to grow a body part for her own body! Sherrie Walters, a woman from Baltimore, has become that
Clean water. For first worlders who have it on tap, access may not seem like a big deal. For 1 out of 6 people on the planet, clean water, free of parasites and pollution is an expensive luxury. Diarrhea from tainted water is the second lea
Researchers in Sweden have successfully created the illusion of people feeling sensations in three arms at the same time. In five separate laboratory experiments, 154 volunteers were seated with their hands on a table and a rubber arm was p
Our perception of the world around us could be very different than the person next to you. In extreme cases it could mean the luscious red strawberry could look like a bulbous blueberry to someone else. Even more mind altering, results of n
The UK’s Daily Mail is breathlessly reporting that leading soft drinks including Coca-Cola and Pepsi contain trace amounts of alcohol. What ramifications should this have for teetotallers and people who abstain for drinking for religious re
Something straight out of a science fiction story is becoming a reality in Yokohama, Japan right now: regenerative organs. There have been tons of attempts, theories and even a small handful of groundbreaking work concerning regenerating ne
That thing pictured over there to the right? That thing that looks like hair from your shower drain or a Giger-inspired coffee mug? It’s a living organism that just might be the future of how we harvest material for all of our tech needs. W
Gaydar, it’s not just a one liner from sassy friends in romantic comedies anymore. It’s science fact. A University of Washington study flashed faces for less than a blink of an eye and asked respondents to determine if the person was gay or
Are exploding supernovae guiding life on Earth? If a new ground breaking theory is to be believed, the answer is yes. According to the study by Henrik Svensmark published by the Royal Astronomy Society in London the explosions of stars rela
The whiz kids at io9 have put together a compilation of research that explains why we see imaginary, monstrous faces when we look in the mirror for an elongated period of time. This is the very basis for sleepover games like Bloody Mary, de
Peter Thiel has long been a heavy hitter in Silicon Valley. He was a co-founder and CEO of PayPal and made an early stage development in Facebook, even earning himself the “honor” of being portrayed in The Social Network film about the site
The big rock from the sky that crashed into Earth and proved an extinction level event for our dinosaur pals could also seed life on a far off planet. The meteorites launched into space by the impact carrying the ingredients for life itself
You just got pelted with dark matter. Don’t worry, it’ll happen again in a couple of seconds. Should you be worried? Probably not, it’s been happening your whole life, at least according to a new study by a few theoretical physicists. A dar
A new study debunks the long held myth that urine is sterile. The results, which appear in the April issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology was conducted at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine. If found evidence of b
It’s go time. The man who directed the most successful film in movie history twice is about to embark on his greatest adventure yet. James Cameron will begin his descent into the Pacific Ocean, weather permitting, sometime this weekend. His
Nokia has applied for a patent which amounts to tattoo which would accommodate customizable buzzing for your phone. Here is how it would work: The patent application describes “a material attachable to skin, the material capable of detectin
Much was made over the last few months about the apparent discovery of faster than light neutrinos at the CERN laboratories. The neutrinos appeared to travel at 60 seconds faster than the speed of light. Of course, this would stand in contr
It’s a revolution best served with pickles and onions on a sesame seed bun. The first test-tube grown hamburger will be produced this fall. Although still in the laboratory phase as of now, the experiment will eventually produces thousands
In this remarkable video, we see two Texas heart surgeons who replace a dying man’s failing heart with a turbine. This does a few remarkable things. 1) Saves the dude’s life 2) Removes his pulse, since the turbine creates a continuous flow
Researchers have long thought that hallucinogenic stimulated parts of your brain, which created insane visuals like that one time Gary down the street saw the poster melt in his hands and then was all like “Did you see that?” but you were t
The laboratory that mutated a deadly bird flu into something humans can spread are now called for a 60 day suspension of research so they can open a dialogue with the scientific community. Since their announcement, much Sturm and Drang has
A new study proves that organizing activities where a group of people move in unison can create more concrete leader-follower relationships and be used as a tool for helpful cooperation or evil deeds. In the experiment, participants were in
Listen kids. If you are reading this and you only know of Peter Parker and Spider-man because of the Sam Raimi films, let me break something to you. Peter Parker didn’t start shooting webs out of his wrists as part of an overnight biologica
The future is now. Amazing exoskeletons will be sold to consumers with spinal cord injuries for training, under doctor supervision for now, how to walk upright with the help of the device. Your job is to balance your upper body, shifting yo
Oft-maligned as disease stuffed flying rats, pigeons tend to get a bad rap. But it looks like the city birds could be much smarter than we initially thought, or at the very least able to keep track of all the people calling them disease stu
The Ross Ice Shelf is about as desolate as desolate can get. All you can hope to do is complete your research of the warming arctic water, survive and hope that one of your colleagues doesn’t turn into The Thing. Now, the first of those tas
Follow your nose! To a sexual partner not beset by disease! A Russian study found that men dealing with gonorrhea has less attractive smelling armpit sweat than those without, therefore deterring potential mates. In the study, armpit sweat
New research has shown the there are specific, consistent patterns that create the illusion of 3D images in our brains. It is created by stimulating specific nerve cells. Researchers created a 2D image designed to excite those nerves specif
Are you suffering from male pattern baldness? Would you like to feel younger, more confident and regain your youthful swagger? Why not take a note from the majestic bear! Yes, instead of turning to stem cell treatments one Dr. Cheng-Ming Ch
Are we moving closer to proving that electromagnetic fields help our brain hemispheres communicate? Neuroscientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have made a puzzling finding: people born without a corpus callosum (whi
The social hierarchy of a wasp is pretty rigid. But what if a snide little parasite made you a deal. You could live the life of a queen, no foraging for anyone but yourself, living off the fat of the land. All you have to do is become subse
Without delving into the debate on how it’s happening, most reasonable people can agree the world is getting warmer. If we want it cooler, we are going to have to do something about it. Sure, we could all drive electric cars to our self-sus
Thirsty? Astronomers have discovered a reservoir containing 140 trillion times the amount of water in all the Earth’s oceans, making it the largest mass of water ever detected in the universe. “The environment around this quasar is unique i
Well this is certainly a step in the right direction for downloading instructions on how to fly a helicopter right into your brain. Researchers have stuffed chips into rat brains that enabled them to instantly know things. They can also fli
Scientists at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston have genetically engineered the world’s first living laser. This is a living cell that can emit laser light. Based on previous Nobel winning work on Green Flu
They call them hot Jupiters. A series of gas giant planets in far off solar systems that appear to circle their star in two very peculiar ways. First, it swings perilously close. Second, a quarter of them seemingly do it backwards compared
Positrons. They are all around us. Specifically if you are standing naked in the middle of the thunderstorm taunting the Old God’s to strike you down if they indeed still hold sway over this earthly realm. “Take your sacrifice or wallow in
Wim Hof is called the Iceman. He runs up mountains like Kilimanjaro in only shorts, he sits in buckets of ice for record amounts of time and is genuinely a worldwide, five-star badass. Now, you might be able to add scientific proof that our
Physicists have just announced the discovery of something that falls outside the current understanding of particle physics. While zipping particles through Fermilab’s Tevatron collider they noticed that things were getting weird. While crea
As many of you may remember, last year J. Craig Venter and his team created the first synthetic life form by replacing the genetic code of the bacterium Mycoplasma capricolum with DNA that they created themselves. In order to create and ide
Spoiler Alert: Yeah they don’t really seem to like it that much. They like it even less when the robot warns them it is about to touch them ahead of time. [Geekologie]
Australian researchers claim that initial results of a “thinking cap” that promotes creativity by passing low levels of electricity through the brain has shown promising results. The thinking cap consists of two conductors fastened to the h
Over at his Bottom-up blog (safe for work) Cato scholar and CS PhD candidate Timothy B. Lee makes a case that we’ll *never* be able to copy the human brain in software. He argues that the human brain is too complex and living systems imposs
Technological advancement moves in strange ways. It’s often the technologies that come from just outside our mainstream field of vision that change things the most radically. The properties of semiconductors were well known decades before a
Male splendid fairy-wrens flirt using fear and sing a special song each time they hear the call of one of their predators, the butcherbirds. Although this behaviour exposes their position and puts them in danger, it has been determined that
I don’t know how this got by us in 2006, but apparently scientists have finally figured out what makes Rice Krispies snap, crackle and pop. It turns out that the fact that they’re made by frightening little Lebensborn demon elves has nothin
Researchers studying nine patients who survived swine flu during the H1N1 pandemic have noticed that they produced a wide range of antibodies that could be used to fight off other strains. Currently they’re looking to see if they can use th
One of the fascinating premises of movies like Tron and the Matrix is the idea of a computer powerful enough to simulate life itself. Although some process (like protein functions) are way beyond our current capabilities, replicating them v
“Researchers at the University of Washington have been working on extremely tiny and semi-transparent LEDs designed to be integrated into contact lenses. So far, they’ve managed to create red pixels and blue pixels, and when they can figure
Want to visit the real or imagined past and future without having a pack of wild Lybians trying to shoot you with a GD bazooka? Scientists have found evidence that you can travel through time where you comically meets a horny, teenage versi
A new finger bone fossil in Southern Siberia belonged to a young lady of an unknown human ancestor. She ain’t Neanderthal and she ain’t early human. Yes, this means we have to set an extra place at Christmas dinner. No, you don’t have to ge
Seriously though… dude… Just like solids, liquids and gases, this recently discovered condition represents a state of matter. Called a Bose-Einstein condensate, it was created in 1995 with super-cold atoms of a gas, but scientists had thoug
We’ve finally demonstrated the ability to create and sustain antimatter. In a new study, physicists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva were able to create 38 antihydrogen atoms and preserve each for more than
Japanese scientists have created a cyborg moth that can track odors by plugging a robot into the moth’s nervous system. The robot’s actions were controlled by electrodes plugged into the moth and the brain signals were rerouted to the motor
Scientists in London claim that new materials with the ability to control the speed of light would not only be capable of bending light around the object, but also creating an invisibility cloak capable of hiding in both time and space. The
CERN research scientists have stated that their Big Bang project is going along so swimmingly that, by the end of 2011, they may be able to offer the first proof of extra dimensions beyond the known four. Guido Tonelli, spokesman for one of
Did you know that male nipples need to be surgically detached and repositioned sometimes? Then you probably didn’t know that the same Golden Ratio used in modern architecture is employed to make sure a gentlemen’s chest nubs look A-OK. Scie
Researchers have discovered that all primates have an innate ability to repair spinal damage, including humans. They have never noticed this before because scientists usually use rodents in neurology experiments and rodents simply don’t pos
When legendary horse Secretariat died, the veterinary doctors performing the necropsy made a startling realization. There was a reason Big Red destroyed other horses en route to the most convincing Triple Crown win of all time, his heart wa
Researchers have discovered that they can permanently delete traumatic memories simply by removing a protein from the region of the brain responsible for recalling fear. The research focused on the nerve circuits in the amygdala where they
A complex mathematical problem known as the Travelling Salesman Problem, and which is known to take a supercomputer days to solve, is effectively being solved by bees in real time. Researchers at Queen Mary, University of London and Royal H
According to our most recent studies, fears that we are the last generation to see coral reef due to the rising acidification of our waters is unfounded. This has been a fear raised by climate change studies which suggest CO2 concentration
Is our reality really 2D? Is our concept of third dimensional space really an optical illusion? Are our eyes deceiving us to believe we are anything other than Super Mario sidescrolling through life? Is the above commercial featuring Peyton
Israeli researchers have discovered a way to assemble transparent nanospheres that unite to form the stiffest biological material the world has ever seen. This could lead to printable body armor, tougher steel and more bullet-proof bulletpr
There has been a long simmering debate in the scientific community over “the Hobbit” or Homo floresiensis by it’s fancy name. On one side is a cadre of folks who claim that the Hobbits (whose remains were first found inside a Indonesian cav
A new species of buffed-cheeked gibbon with a very distinctive call was identified by German researchers. Not only does this have implications on the heavily endangered gibbon in general, but the ape song could be the precursor to human mus
Okay, there is still no evidence that it actually happened but now science can explain a scenario in which the biblical parting of the Red Sea could have gone down. You know, without the power of a all-knowing God and stuff: A strong east w
Hell yeah. Spider silk milked from goats may be used to replace body’s strained tendons, ligaments and bones in the future. In a new experiment, Professor Lewis and his team at the University of Wyoming successfully implanted the silk-makin
All of your unconscious reactions can now be transferred to Sims like computer characters. The Singularity will arrive with a green crystal over its head. [Science Daily]
Apparently “quantum cats” are “photons (particles of light), boosting prospects for manipulating light in new ways to enhance precision measurements as well as computing and communications based on quantum physics” and not a new Saturday Mo
Who hasn’t dealt with a psychopath? You offer to help them put a sofa in the back of a van one moment, badda bing badda boom you’re putting the lotion on your skin or else you get the hose again… A new report by Scientific American’s MIND m
We told you last week about a possible new therapy hoping to regrow body parts. Unlike the ill-fated research of Dr. Curt Connors, it does not use the DNA of an animal that naturally regrows limbs so the likelihood of the recipient turning
Paging Dr. Connors… Dr. Curt Connors… Researchers at the Tufts Center for Regenerative & Developmental Biology at Tufts University are testing whether a replicated amniotic (womb fluid) environment can promote limb regeneration in adult mam
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the Cadillac of dead body retrieval technology… The system involves a small aluminum pipette that can detect trace amounts of a chemical called ninhydrin-reactive nitrogen, which collects in air pocket
Kidnapped by scientists who dress like Nazis, but aren’t actually Nazis, the trio is pushed to try a radical new procedure that would make them temporarily gay. With the life of a young child on the line, they have to confront their own con
A Polish plant biologist is suggesting that plants are capable of thought. Plants “remember” information about light, and a certain type of cell transmits that information, much like nerves do in animals. In the study, which has not yet bee
Shooting a diamond bullet at anything might be the most Bowie badass thing ever conceived of, but if, as Chinese scientists are now theorizing it can also create nuclear power then we have a new favorite source of alternative energy. [Popul
Russian legends tell of a breed of homonids who were excellent herders, tough as (the yet to be invented) nails and most importantly made a sport of fighting Griffins for caches of gold. It now appears that we have biological proof of these
Sick of using all sorts of different shapes of things only for the purpose they were initially designed for? Step right up to the bold new future named programmable matter! To make them self-folding, computer scientist Daniela Rus at MIT an
Our primate brains seem to equate seriousness with touching heavier or harder objects. For example, a resume on thick stock will be taken more serious than something printed off on fax paper. Think I’m kidding? Would someone with a business
New, real-time brain scan accurately predicted 2/3rds of study respondents would make a decision even if they told the administrator they would do the opposite. Could revolutionize advertising, education and determining if bartender at Chil
Add communal to the list of adjectives used to describe roaches. New studies show that the disgusting insects will choose to eat together even if other options present themselves. Cockroaches prefer dining as a group it seems. New research
Sure, it’s a weather phenomenon and not mystical mischief makers of lore. Still, pretty cool. [Science Daily]
Scientists want to drill deep into Antarctic ice to find life forms that haven’t been exposed to the environment in millions of years. Kurt Russell is not amused. [Science Daily]
We now know when sharks are most likely to tear us apart. Shark attacks are most likely to occur on Sunday in less than 6 feet of water during a new moon, a new study finds. And there’s good reason: That’s when a lot of surfers are in the w
If you had “strange but undeniable resulting pattern caused by a million years of whipping from Martian wind” in the What With The Bizarre Shape Of The Mars Ice Cap pool, please collect your winnings. According to a new NASA study, the deep
A new breakthrough in dental technology could revolutionize tooth implants for those who happen to take a puck to the mouth in game 4 of the Western Conference final and sprinkle the ice with seven adult teeth. Dr. Jeremy Mao, the Edward V.
What’s worse than a brutal killing machine with no remorse? An invisible brutal killing machine with no remorse. A new study claims that ten percent off all sharks are “luminous,” meaning they produce a light which combined with normal wate
A team led Dr. Craig Venter has successfully created a synthetic organism that dictates action to living cells. This opens the doors to altering cells to produce medicines, fuels and absorb greenhouse gases. “I think they’re going to potent
We are proud to introduce our new YouTube series, WeirdThingsTV. If you dig this, please feel free to subscribe on YouTube so you don’t miss an episode. Next clips will come out Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
A team of scientists visited a lush wilderness once dubbed “The Lost World” and guess what they found? No, not a disappointing sequel starring Vince Vaughn for no reason… three species that might be totally new to science! The array of new
No. Spoiler Alert. [Bad Astronomer]
A newly discovered African primate who lived 37 million years ago, is baffling researchers who can’t seem to classify it among any known family tree. The biggest mystery? The primate’s weird teeth. “It comes as a bit of a shock to find a pr
What is Transcranial magnetic stimulation? Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is an extraordinary technique pioneered by neuroscientists to explore the workings of the brain. The idea is to place a human in a rapidly changing magnetic
Science may now confirm what the dude screaming on Venice Beach has theorized for years. The center of the Earth is made of crystal. The outer core is composed mostly of liquid iron. The inner core is solid ball about 750 miles in diameter,
College football is a loud sport and in a game as verbally-dependent as football if a visiting team can’t relay their plays effectively or make last minute adjustments, it can be huge advantage for a home team. So it is no surprise that Pen
We told you about this yesterday… but be prepared to witness the heart that was restarted 24 hours after it died in a Harvard laboratory. [Singularity Hub]
Behold, the heart that lived outside a human for 10 days but WOULD NOT DIE! (thunder clap!) It could revolutionize those who are relying on organ donations! (organ music!) It hopes to be on the open market soon! (maniacal laughter!) [Pop Sc
Could this microbe be discovered under any less awesome conditions? Researchers have discovered some of the tiniest and weirdest microbes ever seen growing in a copper mine sludge that is as acidic as battery acid. Theses ultra-small microb
Autopilot! As it turns out, flies aren’t just super apt daredevils buzzing around your mighty hand as try to crush the winged pest. Nope, they just have a built in sense of autopilot that adjusts to changing wind currents faster than it wou
In an effort to make a super soldier, the Indian military has turned to a holy man who claims to have not eaten in over 70 years since he was blessed by a goddess. India’s Defense Research Development Organization thinks it may have found a
Study gave test subjects fake mustaches and wicked amish beards to see how much visual speech recognition was affected. Investigating the interference of facial hair with visual speech intelligibility poses the problem of accurately control
Cleric said boobs cause earthquake. Boobs tried to do just that. Boobs failed. Hooray science!
From Scientific American. The largest trial to date of “brain-training” computer games suggests that people who use the software to boost their mental skills are likely to be disappointed. The study, a collaboration between British research
Here on Weird Things, we’ve talked quite a bit about the strange history of animal (and human) experimentation for the benefit of medical science. But it would be silly to suggest that there aren’t strange trails that persist to this day. F
Western scientists have officially catalogued animals on the islands of the Phillipines for over a century and a half and yet, a 6-foot-long, gold flecked, colored lizard just happened to escape their attention. Until last summer. Rumors of
The always provocative h+ magazine surveyed the experts at the Artificial General Intelligence Conference to get a grasp of when they though machines would get really smart. The results are very interesting: While the median guess is the 20
Prolific Weird Things scribe Matt just posted his criticism of Avatar’s bioelectric network premise. Basically he feels that director James Cameron is trying to make it a parable of earth and our resource use – and that it’s an unfair compa
According to some scientists at the Daily Mail, the answer is yes. A long term global warming trend due to CO2 emissions doesn’t preclude the possibility of nature deciding to flip the bit at least for a few decades and make things cooler.
Sphere.com reports that the Pentagon has launched a program called Transformer X with the intent of developing flying cars for the battlefield. Awesome. The objective of the Transformer (TX) program is to demonstrate a one- to four-person t
A tangent becomes a tangent when the hosts try to stretch their feeble minds around the global warming, the energy crisis and the singularity (again) after discussing clone sex. Link: Craig Venter at TED on creating synthetic life Link: Ven
Natalie Angier at the New York Times has an interesting article that suggest if your goal in life is to avoid eating other sensitive, feeling communal creatures, going vegan isn’t enough. According to plant biologists, our leafy friends exp
In the latest Scientific American theoretical physicists Alejandro Jenkins and Gilad Perez speculate that there might be a greater chance of life developing in other universes with different physical laws and that our own may not be as fine
This week, Weird Thing Culture Reporter Matt Finley takes a look at the Homunculus, a strange idea that survived against reason and logic. Monday we looked at how long the idea has been around. Wednesday we found out how science got past th
Gizmodo reports that the brains at MIT have decided to take a new direction for creating Artificial Intelligence. They’ve thrown out some age old assumptions and are considering new alternatives to concepts line the Turing Test. We’re glad
LiveScience is reporting that the latest core sample data gives more credibility to the scientifically challenged sci-fi movie The Day After Tomorrow‘s rapid freezing scenario. Except we suspect they didn’t actually see the movie because th
So what is the Singularity? Check out Ray Kurzweil’s TED talks to get a jump start. Ray Kurzweil on how technology will transform us Inventor, entrepreneur and visionary Ray Kurzweil explains in abundant, grounded detail why, by the 2020s,
According to ScienceNews, lightning isn’t just for powering your time traveling Delorean. Using the Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope, scientists were able to detect the signature of the production of anti-matter particles in gamma ray emissi
According to an article from the October 1936 issue of Modern Mechanix, invisibility wasn’t just a possibility, it was a reality. The author credulously reports a description of an invisibility ray, but states emphatically that, “This is no
Does this sound kind of familiar? From the Detroit Tribune in 1858: We have learned the full particulars of the balloon ascension…on Thursday, its subsequent descent, and its second ascension and runaway with the aeronaut while beyond his c
Listen up Philip K. Dick fans, Total Recall (We Can Remember it For You Wholesale) is now a reality – at least for flies. According to ScienceDaily: By directly manipulating the activity of individual neurons, scientists have given flies me
A staple of science fiction is the suspended animation chamber. It’s how we send astronauts to faraway places, punish criminals (we’re not quite clear on how sending bad guys into the future where they can expect longer, healthier lives and
With the current debate over nationalized health care a lot of facts and figures are flying fast and loose. It seems like for every point of view there’s a data set to support it. In the discussion of what the ideal system should be two fac
German researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development have discovered a gene mutation in certain individuals that seems to give them enhanced mental abilities. …people graced with this genotype showed more activity in the pre
Science Daily reports that a Smithsonian research team has uncovered the first megafossils of a neotropical rainforest. Titanoboa, the world’s biggest snake, lived in this forest 58 million years ago at temperatures 3-5 C warmer than in rai
The US Defense department has green-lit a two-year $10 million dollar program to look for practical applications of the Casimir Effect. This is a quantum of effect with potential in everything from energy to levitation. It’s the quantum ver
According to Science News, hypnosis is gaining new found respect in the laboratory as experiments indicate that hypnotic suggestions actually have a measurable effect on parts of the brain. In one experiment, suggestion of a paralyzed hand
Check out this video that’s eerily remiscent of the 1980’s TV series V and District 9 (if the aliens spaceships were made from vaporous ice crystals and not actual technology…). The Sun has an article here on it: Mystery UFO halo in clouds
According to ScienceDaily it turns out those ugly yellow splotches of bug guts on your car can serve science. They use the bug guts to to do DNA sequencing to determine species distribution and other information. To gather genetic material,
Technically John P. Holdren wasn’t the science advisor when he made his dire predictions of an Ice Age and Ice Age powered super tidal waves bringing destruction upon us all in 1971. He was just trying to make sense of the data at hand back
From New Scientist comes research that sleep is even weirder than we thought. Microsleep, hallucinations and sleepwalking murder are just some of the symptoms… EARLIER this year, a puzzling report appeared in the journal Sleep Medicine. It
Ron Bailey at Reason.com attended the Singularity Summit on NYC and was presented with several scenarios of the future. Many of them were quite frightening. As the Singularity Institute’s Anna Salamon explained in her opening presentation a
Mr. Show had it first… Real story.
Recordings reportedly capturing the voices of the dead are nothing new, but we couldn’t help but wonder what some of the oddest things ever uttered via EVP were. We contacted Chris Page, the founder of Ohio Researchers of Banded Spirits to
Down, down, two miles below the surface of a Greenland glacier, in sub-zero temperatures inhospitable to most existing life, a new form of bacteria was discovered frozen in time. A team of scientists from the University of Pennsylvania play
photo credit: trodel_wiki You thought that one natural disaster was bad enough, scientists have now concluded from a five year study on the island of Taiwan, that the typhoons wreaking havoc from the sky, are also responsible for earthquake
A five-part series that tries to explain how to make the science of Star Trek real… Probably the most fascinating idea that Star Trek popularized was the idea of a warp drive. This was a concept from golden age sci-fi that went mainstream v
A five-part series that tries to explain how to make the science of Star Trek real… In an episode of Star Trek the Next Generation called the “The Chase” a long running problem in Star Trek was finally solved – Why do all the aliens in Star
A five-part series that tries to explain how to make the science of Star Trek real… Time Travel stories generally suck. There are some noteworthy exceptions – specifically stories that deal with the problems of time travel and not just time
A five-part series that tries to explain how to make the science of Star Trek real… An important part of the Star Trek mythos is the idea of mind-to-mind contact. Spock uses this to probe other people’s minds and even transplant his entire
A five-part series that tries to explain how to make the science of Star Trek real… The transporters in Star Trek are an exciting concept. Recent developments in quantum physics have made the possibility of teleporting matter a theoretical
The depraved Neural Interface Technology researchers at University of Wisconsin Madison have unleashed a device of unspeakable evil. Just to clarify: We think direct brain/computer interfaces are nifty and are important science. But with gr