Astronomy and the space sciences are going through somewhat of a renaissance, in both senses of the word – not only becoming of greater interest to the general public, but undergoing revolutions of theory and methodology. For example, not only are more extrasolar planets being discovered at an ever increasing rate, but their discovery is forcing changes to the theories of how planets are formed – it now appears that the heaviest of stars are actually the most likely to form a planetary system, contrary to previous thought. As always, Centauri Dreams provides the stuff that the mainstream media doesn’t bother with – like the fact that the water in the atmosphere of Gliese 436b isn’t quite what we’re accustomed to thinking of as water here on Earth.

There are few writers of science fiction whose work I look forward to more than Rudy Rucker‘s. His playful and laid-back sense of humour lends everything he writes a unique and unmistakable tone – and that applies to his non-fiction too. If his work is unfamiliar to you, this essay by Rucker for Newsweek on the not-so-science-fictional-any-more subject of synthetic biology should give you a taste of his style. [BoingBoing]

As computing hardware becomes increasingly small and ubiquitous, one thing is for certain – technology will be watching us more than ever in years to come. Which isn’t a pretty picture for privacy – we may have to simply accept that our digital footprints will be registered whenever we are out in public. But perhaps in certain situations we will be able to fight fire with fire, and use ‘virtual walls’ to protect our secrets and confidences in a world where the real walls are what’s doing the watching.

Greenpeace have been sounding the alarm about climate change for as long as I can remember, and they show no signs of slacking off. Their latest publicity stunt, however, has a rather weird tinge to it – they’re building a replica of Noah’s Ark atop Mount Ararat in Turkey. Perhaps this is some attempt to appeal to creationist types (who seem statistically more likely to disbelieve climate science), but I can’t help feeling that the appropriation of this particular symbol may have the opposite effect to the one intended.

Self-replicating machines are an idea that will be familiar to a great number of science fiction readers – but did you know that they were first posited as genuine scientific theory by John von Neumann in 1966? And that now, in the era of nanotechnology, there are only a tiny handful of researchers enthisiastic enough about the concept to continue struggling against the lack of financial support for their work? Michael Anissimov has a potted history of self-replicating kinematic machines which will bring you up to date.