Blog

Fuse me to the Moon… (with bombzzz!!1!1)

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mandelbrot_fusionPhysicist Friedwardt Winterberg has a new paper here on a possible fusion-powered spacecraft, with shades of Project Orion and Project Daedalus:

Large scale manned space flight within the solar system is still confronted with the solution of two problems: 1. A propulsion system to transport large payloads with short transit times between different planetary orbits. 2. A cost effective lifting of large payloads into earth orbit.

For the solution of the first problem a deuterium fusion bomb propulsion system is proposed where a thermonuclear detonation wave is ignited in a small cylindrical assembly of deuterium with a gigavolt-multimegampere proton beam, drawn from the magnetically insulated spacecraft acting in the ultrahigh vacuum of space as a gigavolt capacitor.

For the solution of the second problem, the ignition is done by argon ion lasers driven by high explosives, with the lasers destroyed in the fusion explosion and becoming part of the exhaust.

The key point is that it’s designed without $MAGIC_FAIRY_DUST technology and is intended to be feasible from a purely engineering standpoint.

[via Slashdot][image from SantaRosa OLD SKOOL on flickr]

Blog

Fermi Paradox solved?

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fermi images Enrico Fermi asked a question that has troubled those searching for signals from extraterrestrial civilizations ever since: if the universe is teeming with advanced civilizations (as some solutions to the famous Drake equation would indicate), were are they? (From the physics arXiv blog via Improbable Research.)

Reginald Smith of the self-established Bouchet-Franklin Institute in Rochester, New York state, says in this paper, submitted to the International Journal of Astrobiology, that something is missing from the calculations: how far a signal from an advanced civilization can travel before it becomes too faint to hear. Factoring that in, he finds that:

“Assuming the average communicating civilization has a lifetime of 1,000 years, ten times longer than Earth has been broadcasting, and has a signal horizon of 1,000 light-years, you need a minimum of over 300 communicating civilization in the galactic neighborhood to reach a minimum density.”

Which means that even if there are a couple of hundred advanced civilizations in our galaxy, it’s quite likely none of them will ever notice the others…and our efforts at searching for extraterrestrial intelligence may be doomed.

(Image: Reginald Smith.)

[tags]astrobiology,SETI,aliens,space[/tags]

Blog

Is dumping IQ a genius idea?

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Albert EinsteinThe more we learn about the nature of our own intelligence, the more our definitions of it change… but we’re still fairly fixated on the old-fashioned IQ test as a metric for judging how smart someone is. [Einstein portrait courtesy Wikimedia Commons]

George Dvorsky reports on the ideas of one Keith E. Stanovich, who recommends we expand the concept of intelligence to encompass more functions than just number-crunching, spatial logic and the more recent addition of ’emotional intelligence’:

Stanovich suggests that IQ tests should be adjusted to focus on valuable qualities and capacities that are highly relevant to our daily lives. He argues that IQ tests would be far more effective if they took into account not only mental “brightness” but also rationality — including such abilities as “judicious decision making, efficient behavioral regulation, sensible goal prioritization … [and] the proper calibration of evidence.”

Sounds to me like we should start blanket testing for those latter traits at the doors of our seats of government…

Fiction

NEW FICTION: ERASING THE MAP by Marissa Lingen

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We’ve published a lot of wild and gonzo stuff at Futurismic in recent months, but we wouldn’t want you to make the mistake that’s all we like. And here’s an example: “Erasing the Map” by Marissa Lingen, which is subtle, quietly assertive, and handled perfectly.

Its thesis: If you could have traumatic memories surgically removed, would you take the risk of losing some of the memories you treasure? Read first, then make your mind up and tell us in the comments!

“Erasing the Map”

by Marissa Lingen

There was this one time, in college. I was arguing politics with this girl. Young Republican type. She had the blonde bob and the baby blue sweater, the whole works. I’d even seen her wear penny loafers. I liked her anyway. We were arguing about gun control, and I said there was absolutely no feeling in the world worse than killing another person.

I think if it had been another circumstance, another time, she would have responded by reaming me out about all the things she could think of that were worse. But it was a party. Maybe she thought I was cute. So instead, she batted those contact-lens-blue eyes at me and said, “And how many people have you killed?”

I said, “Just the one.”

It was the wrong answer, I knew, and the flirting look went off like a switch. But it was the only answer I could give. After she stared at me for a minute, I said, “It was an accident. I was ten years old.” She still didn’t say anything, so I said, “His name was Anthony, and he was my best friend.” Continue reading NEW FICTION: ERASING THE MAP by Marissa Lingen →

Blog

Productive Nanosystems – The Movie

Most of us are aware that DNA and RNA are the molecular machinery that synthesise proteins and allow the complex reactions of life to take place, but actually visualising the processes is a considerable mental leap.

Most such visualisations rely on visual simplifications that actually present a false impression of the processes involved, but via Eric Drexler we discover the following examples by Drew Berry, which are apparently much truer to the actual processes that occur. Take the seven or so minutes needed to watch this, and you’ll be set up for your daily dose of scientific sensawunda for the rest of the week – biochemistry is incredibly awesome:

Aside from the sheer wow-factor of seeing molecules acting like high-precision machines deep at the cores of our cells, it’s worth bearing in mind that there’s no magic involved, and that we’re constantly getting better at understanding how these processes work.

Which, I expect, is why Drexler is so fascinated by them: once we know how the body’s nanomachines work, we’ll be properly equipped to start building new ones.

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