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Out-of-Pocket Blog
Special Edition - WoW | Out-Of-Pocket World Of Warcraft vs. COVID-19
a year ago
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
Spiderweb Microphone Microphones convert sound into an electrical signal for subsequent amplification, as in auditorium...
4 months ago
12
4 months ago
Microphones convert sound into an electrical signal for subsequent amplification, as in auditorium public address systems; or transmission, as in landline and mobile phones. The most common types of microphones are carbon, used in early telephones, condenser, electret, dynamic,...
Math Is Still...
Physicists Finally Find a Problem That Only Quantum Computers Can Do Researchers have shown that a problem relating to the energy of a quantum system is easy for quantum...
10 months ago
35
10 months ago
Researchers have shown that a problem relating to the energy of a quantum system is easy for quantum computers but hard for classical ones. The post Physicists Finally Find a Problem That Only Quantum Computers Can Do first appeared on Quanta Magazine
nanoscale views
Items for discussion, including google's latest quantum computing result As we head toward the end of the calendar year, a few items: Google published a new result in...
3 weeks ago
42
3 weeks ago
As we head toward the end of the calendar year, a few items: Google published a new result in Nature a few days ago.  This made a big news splash, including this accompanying press piece from google themselves, this nice article in Quanta, and the always thoughtful blog post by...
Math Is Still...
‘Sensational’ Proof Delivers New Insights Into Prime Numbers The proof creates stricter limits on potential exceptions to the famous Riemann hypothesis. ...
5 months ago
49
5 months ago
The proof creates stricter limits on potential exceptions to the famous Riemann hypothesis. The post ‘Sensational’ Proof Delivers New Insights Into Prime Numbers first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Deep Sea Mining for Minerals Could Harm Environment It is an unfortunate reality that with over 8 billion people on the planet almost anything we...
a year ago
30
a year ago
It is an unfortunate reality that with over 8 billion people on the planet almost anything we collectively do has the potential to have huge environmental impacts. When the human population was in the mere millions we could treat the planet as an essentially unlimited resource....
Explorations of an...
2023 Part 4: Indonesia and Ecuador September The island of Sulawesi must be on the bucket list for any naturalist with a strong...
a year ago
15
a year ago
September The island of Sulawesi must be on the bucket list for any naturalist with a strong interest in biogeography. Though Borneo is situated only a few hundred kilometers to the west, and the Moluccas are not far to the east, the species composition of Sulawesi is...
Math Is Still...
Rational or Not? This Basic Math Question Took Decades to Answer. It’s surprisingly difficult to prove one of the most basic properties of a number: whether it can be...
2 days ago
9
2 days ago
It’s surprisingly difficult to prove one of the most basic properties of a number: whether it can be written as a fraction. A broad new method can help settle this ancient question. The post Rational or Not? This Basic Math Question Took Decades to Answer. first...
nanoscale views
APS March Meeting 2024, Day 1 There is no question that the meeting venue in Minneapolis is superior in multiple ways to last...
10 months ago
32
10 months ago
There is no question that the meeting venue in Minneapolis is superior in multiple ways to last year's meeting in Las Vegas.  The convention center doesn't feel scarily confining, and it also doesn't smell like a combination of cigarettes and desperation. Here are a few...
Math Is Still...
The Hidden Brain Connections Between Our Hands and Tongues Sticking out your tongue while doing delicate work with your hands reveals a history of evolutionary...
a year ago
29
a year ago
Sticking out your tongue while doing delicate work with your hands reveals a history of evolutionary relationships. The post The Hidden Brain Connections Between Our Hands and Tongues first appeared on Quanta Magazine
nanoscale views
The Nobels, physics and chemistry As you undoubtedly know, the 2023 Nobel in physics has been awarded to Pierre Agostini, Ferenc...
a year ago
42
a year ago
As you undoubtedly know, the 2023 Nobel in physics has been awarded to Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz, and Anne L'Huillier, for the development of techniques associated with attosecond-scale optical pulses.  Here is the more popular write-up about this (including a good handwave...
The Roots of...
Neither EA nor e/acc is what we need to build the future Over the last few years, effective altruism has gone through a rise-and-fall story arc worthy of any...
a year ago
26
a year ago
Over the last few years, effective altruism has gone through a rise-and-fall story arc worthy of any dramatic tragedy. The pandemic made them look prescient for warning about global catastrophic risks, including biosafety. A masterful book launch put them on the cover of TIME....
Explorations of an...
Heading East Into The Atlantic Forest The Atlantic Forest (Mata Atlântica in Portuguese) stretches across the southeastern coastal region...
a year ago
17
a year ago
The Atlantic Forest (Mata Atlântica in Portuguese) stretches across the southeastern coastal region of Brazil, reaching inland as far as southeastern Paraguay and northeastern Argentina. In broad terms, the Atlantic Forest is formed and continues to be maintained by...
Cremieux Recueil
The Ottoman Origins of Modernity Would we have the modern world without Islamic incursion into Southeastern Europe?
3 months ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Superconducting Kagome Metals Superconductivity is an extremely interesting, and potentially extremely useful, physical...
4 months ago
44
4 months ago
Superconductivity is an extremely interesting, and potentially extremely useful, physical phenomenon. It refers to a state in which current flows through a material without resistance, and therefore without any loss of energy or waste heat. As our civilization is increasingly run...
Drew Ex Machina
Catching Up: Talking about the Weather After an unintended four-month hiatus publishing new work on the Drew Ex Machina website, I figured...
a year ago
41
a year ago
After an unintended four-month hiatus publishing new work on the Drew Ex Machina website, I figured it was time to catch up on what I’ve been […]
Math Is Still...
The Computing Pioneer Helping AI See Alexei Efros has spent his career learning how machines see differently from humans. Now he’s...
a year ago
47
a year ago
Alexei Efros has spent his career learning how machines see differently from humans. Now he’s helping to bridge the gap. The post The Computing Pioneer Helping AI See first appeared on Quanta Magazine
brr
South Pole Arrival Flying to the bottom of the world!
over a year ago
Math Is Still...
‘A-Team’ of Math Proves a Critical Link Between Addition and Sets A team of four prominent mathematicians, including two Fields medalists, proved a conjecture...
a year ago
33
a year ago
A team of four prominent mathematicians, including two Fields medalists, proved a conjecture described as a “holy grail of additive combinatorics.” The post ‘A-Team’ of Math Proves a Critical Link Between Addition and Sets first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
How the Computer Graphics Industry Got Started at the University of Utah Animation has come a long way since 1900, when J. Stuart Blackton created The Enchanted Drawing, the...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Animation has come a long way since 1900, when J. Stuart Blackton created The Enchanted Drawing, the earliest known animated film. The 90-second movie was created using stop-motion techniques, as flat characters, props, and backgrounds were drawn on an easel or made from...
The Works in...
Does higher density cause lower birth rates? Assessing one recent claim that it does
7 months ago
Wanderingspace
Colorized View of Perseverance Landing An artificially colorized view of Jezero Crater, showing the bird’s eye view of Perseverance...
over a year ago
26
over a year ago
An artificially colorized view of Jezero Crater, showing the bird’s eye view of Perseverance screaming towards Mars’s surface. The above image was enhanced by Kevin Gill into full color, taking images captured by Perseverance’s Lander Vision System Camera just after the heat...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Exits & Outcomes Is Good | Out-Of-Pocket moar newsletters
a year ago
Math Is Still...
The Astonishing Behavior of Recursive Sequences Some strange mathematical sequences are always whole numbers — until they’re not. The puzzling...
a year ago
16
a year ago
Some strange mathematical sequences are always whole numbers — until they’re not. The puzzling patterns have revealed ties to graph theory and prime numbers, awing mathematicians. The post The Astonishing Behavior of Recursive Sequences first appeared on Quanta...
Explorations of an...
2024 (Part 1 of 2) Another year has come and gone. As is tradition, I have written a couple of blog posts documenting...
a week ago
19
a week ago
Another year has come and gone. As is tradition, I have written a couple of blog posts documenting some of my natural history highlights throughout the year.  January Pre-dawn on January 1, 2024 saw me heading south towards Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia in search of a Gray Heron,...
Asterisk
The Transistor Cliff Moore’s law may be coming to an end. What happens to AI progress if it does?
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Intuitive and Analytical Thinking Here is a relatively simple math problem:  A bat and a ball cost $1.10 combined. The bat costs $1...
a year ago
64
a year ago
Here is a relatively simple math problem:  A bat and a ball cost $1.10 combined. The bat costs $1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost? (I will provide the answer below the fold.) This problem is the basis of a large psychological literature on thinking systems in the...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Should Social Determinants Come From Payers and Providers? | Out-Of-Pocket I've got some questions
a year ago
Blog - Practical...
What Really Happened at the New Harbor Bridge Project? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In July of 2022, the Texas...
over a year ago
29
over a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In July of 2022, the Texas Department of Transportation issued an emergency suspension of work on the half-finished Harbor Bridge project in Corpus Christi, citing serious design flaws that could cause the main...
Math Is Still...
Pleasure or Pain? He Maps the Neural Circuits That Decide. The work of the neuroscientist Ishmail Abdus-Saboor has opened up a world of insights into precisely...
8 months ago
67
8 months ago
The work of the neuroscientist Ishmail Abdus-Saboor has opened up a world of insights into precisely how much pleasure and pain animals experience during different forms of touch. The post Pleasure or Pain? He Maps the Neural Circuits That Decide. first appeared on...
Beautiful Public...
Here’s All the Rocks We Hauled Back From the Moon The 12 human beings who walked on the Moon collected, catalogued and returned 842 pounds of lunar...
a year ago
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a year ago
The 12 human beings who walked on the Moon collected, catalogued and returned 842 pounds of lunar rock and soil. Each sample has been meticulously documented in NASA's Lunar Sample Catalog.
Confessions of a...
My Teaching Philosophy As mentioned previously, I need to complete a teaching portfolio over my year as a lecturing intern...
over a year ago
26
over a year ago
As mentioned previously, I need to complete a teaching portfolio over my year as a lecturing intern as part of the PTIS scheme.  Central to this portfolio is a personal teaching philosophy, detailing why teaching is important to me, what my objectives are as a teacher, what...
Damn Interesting
Capital, Punished Located 350 km (217 miles) southeast of Puerto Rico, the British island of Montserrat is sometimes...
over a year ago
10
over a year ago
Located 350 km (217 miles) southeast of Puerto Rico, the British island of Montserrat is sometimes called ‘The Emerald Isle of the Caribbean’ for its verdancy and early Irish settlers. However, far from a paradise, Montserrat also boasts an unfortunate history, and not just...
Asterisk
The Wrong Kind of City? How much can the way cities grow tell us about the economic trajectory of their countries? According...
4 months ago
8
4 months ago
How much can the way cities grow tell us about the economic trajectory of their countries? According to the father of modern sociology, quite a lot.
Math Is Still...
Dark Energy May Be Weakening, Major Astrophysics Study Finds A generation of physicists has referred to the dark energy that permeates the universe as “the...
9 months ago
29
9 months ago
A generation of physicists has referred to the dark energy that permeates the universe as “the cosmological constant.” Now the largest map of the cosmos to date hints that this mysterious energy has been changing over billions of years. The post Dark Energy May Be...
Math Is Still...
The Year in Math Landmark results in Ramsey theory and a remarkably simple aperiodic tile capped a year of...
a year ago
20
a year ago
Landmark results in Ramsey theory and a remarkably simple aperiodic tile capped a year of mathematical delight and discovery. The post The Year in Math first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The Reality of Real-World Evidence | Out-Of-Pocket Real recognize real...sort of
a year ago
Casey Handmer's blog
Potentially undervalued companies I am routinely solicited for my technical opinion on new and interesting technologies and companies...
4 months ago
9
4 months ago
I am routinely solicited for my technical opinion on new and interesting technologies and companies developing them. 90% of the time, my answer is “I don’t know” but it continues to concern me that aspects of technical feasibility are evidently not legible to financial types (and...
nanoscale views
Getting light out of plasmonic tunnel junctions - the sequel A couple of years ago I wrote about our work on "above threshold" light emission in planar metal...
over a year ago
25
over a year ago
A couple of years ago I wrote about our work on "above threshold" light emission in planar metal tunnel junctions.  In that work, we showed that in a planar tunnel junction, you can apply a bias voltage \(V\) and get lots of photons out at energies quite a bit greater than...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Clinical Pharmacists, Generative AI, and InpharmD | Out-Of-Pocket Going under the hood of a generative AI product
11 months ago
nanoscale views
Fiber optics + a different approach to fab Two very brief items of interest: This article is a nice popular discussion of the history of...
3 months ago
52
3 months ago
Two very brief items of interest: This article is a nice popular discussion of the history of fiber optics and the remarkable progress it's made for telecommunications.  If you're interested in a more expansive but very accessible take on this, I highly recommend City of...
Cremieux Recueil
Did Unions End Long Work Hours? Is it growth or organized labor that's more responsible for giving us shorter workdays?
4 months ago
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
A.I., Wine, and Beer There have been many studies using scientific instrumentation, mostly gas chromatography, in...
7 months ago
4
7 months ago
There have been many studies using scientific instrumentation, mostly gas chromatography, in attempts to find what distinguishes a superb wine from an inexpensive house wine. A typical wine can contain more than 800 different aroma compounds. One study examined two Australian...
Blog - Practical...
How This Bridge Was Rebuilt in 15 Days After Hurricane Ian [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On September 28, 2022,...
over a year ago
28
over a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On September 28, 2022, Hurricane Ian made landfall on the western coast of Florida as a Category 4 storm, bringing enormous volumes of rainfall and extreme winds to the state. Ian was the deadliest hurricane to...
brr
Doors of McMurdo Doors, in a variety of shapes and styles.
over a year ago
nanoscale views
This week in the arXiv: quantum geometry, fluid momentum "tunneling", and pasta sauce Three papers caught my eye the other day on the arXiv at the start of the new year: arXiv:2501.00098...
6 days ago
23
6 days ago
Three papers caught my eye the other day on the arXiv at the start of the new year: arXiv:2501.00098 - J. Yu et al., "Quantum geometry in quantum materials" - I hope to write up something about quantum geometry soon, but I wanted to point out this nice review even if I haven't...
Melting Asphalt
The Elephant in the Brain It's finally here! The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life — my first book,...
over a year ago
13
over a year ago
It's finally here! The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life — my first book, coauthored with Robin Hanson — is now widely available. You can find the ebook version on Kindle, Google Play, and iBooks. It's also… Read more ›
Math Is Still...
Thirty Years Later, a Speed Boost for Quantum Factoring Shor’s algorithm will enable future quantum computers to factor large numbers quickly, undermining...
a year ago
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a year ago
Shor’s algorithm will enable future quantum computers to factor large numbers quickly, undermining many online security protocols. Now a researcher has shown how to do it even faster. The post Thirty Years Later, a Speed Boost for Quantum Factoring first appeared on...
NeuroLogica Blog
Finding Common Ground on Democracy How is American democracy doing, and what can we do to improve it, if necessary? This is clearly a...
a year ago
11
a year ago
How is American democracy doing, and what can we do to improve it, if necessary? This is clearly a question of political science, and I am not a political scientist, and this is not a political blog. But there are some basic principles of critical thinking that might apply, and...
Asterisk
Shutting the California Prison System’s Revolving Door Between 2009 and 2014, California passed a series of laws to reduce the population in its prison...
6 months ago
6
6 months ago
Between 2009 and 2014, California passed a series of laws to reduce the population in its prison system, which for years had operated over capacity. Determining whether those laws worked was not a straightforward task.
Blog - Practical...
Merrimack Valley Gas Explosions: What Really Happened? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On September 13, 2018, a...
a year ago
60
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On September 13, 2018, a pipeline crew in the Merrimack Valley in Massachusetts was hard at work replacing an aging cast iron natural gas line with a new polyethylene pipe. Located just north of Boston, the...
NeuroLogica Blog
Everything Will Evaporate What will be the ultimate fate of our universe? There are a number of theories and possibilities,...
a year ago
61
a year ago
What will be the ultimate fate of our universe? There are a number of theories and possibilities, but at present the most likely scenario seems to be that the universe will continue to expand, most mass will eventually find its way into a black hole, and those black holes will...
Wanderingspace
Phobos over mount Sharp Taken by the Curiosity rover. This is one of Mars tiny moons as seen from the ground. Impressive as...
over a year ago
22
over a year ago
Taken by the Curiosity rover. This is one of Mars tiny moons as seen from the ground. Impressive as it is only 14 long and you can actually see its shape from the surface. See Phobos below for reference.
Melting Asphalt
Crony Beliefs [Note: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this essay narrated by Grognor on his excellent...
over a year ago
11
over a year ago
[Note: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this essay narrated by Grognor on his excellent podcast Second Enumerations. —Ed.]   Credits up front: This essay draws heavily from Overcoming Bias, Less Wrong, Slate Star Codex, Robert Kurzban, Robert… Read more ›
Math Is Still...
The Mathematician Who Finds the Poetry in Math and the Math in Poetry The links between math, music and art have been explored for thousands of years. Sarah Hart is now...
12 months ago
16
12 months ago
The links between math, music and art have been explored for thousands of years. Sarah Hart is now turning a mathematical eye to literature. The post The Mathematician Who Finds the Poetry in Math and the Math in Poetry first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Coal vs Natural Gas In the last 18 years, since 2005, the US has decreased our CO2 emissions due to electricity...
a year ago
42
a year ago
In the last 18 years, since 2005, the US has decreased our CO2 emissions due to electricity generation by 32%, 819 million metric tons of CO2 per year. Thirty percent of this decline can be attributed to renewable energy generation. But 65% is attributed to essentially replacing...
Blog - Practical...
The Hidden Engineering of Wildlife Crossings [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] This is the Wallis Annenberg...
3 weeks ago
40
3 weeks ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] This is the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing under construction over the 101 just outside Los Angeles, California. When it’s finished in a few years, it will be the largest wildlife crossing (*of its kind) on...
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
US Independence Day Tikalon is on a short holiday in celebration of US Independence Day, July 4, 2024. Our next article...
6 months ago
5
6 months ago
Tikalon is on a short holiday in celebration of US Independence Day, July 4, 2024. Our next article will be posted on Monday, July 15, 2024. View my version of the iconic image of George Washington's crossing of the Delaware River in which he encounters some unusually large...
NeuroLogica Blog
Fake Fossils In 1931 a fossil lizard was recovered from the Italian Alps, believed to be a 280 million year old...
10 months ago
29
10 months ago
In 1931 a fossil lizard was recovered from the Italian Alps, believed to be a 280 million year old specimen. The fossil was also rare in that it appeared to have some preserved soft tissue. It was given the species designation Tridentinosaurus antiquus and was thought to be part...
Drew Ex Machina
Epsilon Indi’s Super Jovian Exoplanet – Background & New Observations by JWST On July 24, 2024, an international team of scientists, headed by Dr. Elisabeth Matthews of the Max...
5 months ago
51
5 months ago
On July 24, 2024, an international team of scientists, headed by Dr. Elisabeth Matthews of the Max Plank Institute for Astronomy, announced that they had used […]
Chris Grossack's...
Talk -- What is Algebraic Geometry and Why Should You Care? So an embarrassing amount of time ago (Feburary 17?) I gave a talk for the undergraduate math club...
a year ago
15
a year ago
So an embarrassing amount of time ago (Feburary 17?) I gave a talk for the undergraduate math club titled “What is Algebraic Geometry, and Why Should You Care?”. I think it went quite well, and the audience seemed like they had a good time. I really wanted to have the talk...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The Ro Breakdown | Out-Of-Pocket The idea of “goal oriented care” and the big questions around direct-to-patient care
9 months ago
Melting Asphalt
Here Be Sermons I've long turned up my nose at sermons and related forms of mass moralizing. One reason, quite...
over a year ago
8
over a year ago
I've long turned up my nose at sermons and related forms of mass moralizing. One reason, quite simply, is that they bore me. Honesty good. Violence bad. My eyes glaze over. Empathy, rah! Racism, boo! Please, don't we know this… Read more ›
Asterisk
Salt, Sugar, Water, Zinc: How Scientists Learned to Treat the 20th Century’s Biggest Killer of... Oral rehydration therapy is now the standard treatment for dehydration. It’s saved millions of...
a year ago
4
a year ago
Oral rehydration therapy is now the standard treatment for dehydration. It’s saved millions of lives, and can be prepared at home in minutes. So why did it take so long to discover?
Chris Grossack's...
Building Objects with Category Theory Typically category theory is useful for showing the uniqueness of certain objects by checking that...
a year ago
9
a year ago
Typically category theory is useful for showing the uniqueness of certain objects by checking that they satisfy some universal property. This makes them unique up to unique isomorphism. However, category theory can also be used in order to show that objects exist at all, usually...
Light from Space
The Path to the Pillars of Creation Famously photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope, here's my first look at the Pillars of Creation...
over a year ago
23
over a year ago
Famously photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope, here's my first look at the Pillars of Creation in the Eagle Nebula (Messier 16). Total exposure time: 16h 5m Shot from my driveway near Tucson, AZ in April & May 2022 Telescope: William Optics RedCat 51 (250mm focal length ƒ
NeuroLogica Blog
Another UFO Whistleblower How seriously should we take the claims of David Grusch? He is an airforce veteran and former member...
a year ago
34
a year ago
How seriously should we take the claims of David Grusch? He is an airforce veteran and former member of the UAP (unidentified aerial phenomena) task force, which is enough to at least hear him out. He gave an exclusive interview to journalist Ross Coulthart from NewsNation, part...
Beautiful Public...
Wild Horses The Bureau of Land Management wants to pay you $1,000 to adopt a wild horse. But the program has...
a year ago
81
a year ago
The Bureau of Land Management wants to pay you $1,000 to adopt a wild horse. But the program has been criticized by animal rights advocates and subject to scrutiny by Congress.
The Works in...
The duplication crisis: the other replication crisis How bad publishing incentives hinder long-term thinking in computational biology research
3 months ago
Math Is Still...
What Could Explain the Gallium Anomaly? Physicists have ruled out a mundane explanation for the strange findings of an old Soviet...
6 months ago
50
6 months ago
Physicists have ruled out a mundane explanation for the strange findings of an old Soviet experiment, leaving open the possibility that the results point to a new fundamental particle. The post What Could Explain the Gallium Anomaly? first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
How Scientists Are Tackling the Tricky Task of Solar Cycle Prediction Scientists have struggled to accurately forecast the strength of the sun’s 11-year cycle — even...
a year ago
12
a year ago
Scientists have struggled to accurately forecast the strength of the sun’s 11-year cycle — even after centuries of solar observations. The post How Scientists Are Tackling the Tricky Task of Solar Cycle Prediction first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
A New Approach to Computation Reimagines Artificial Intelligence By imbuing enormous vectors with semantic meaning, we can get machines to reason more abstractly —...
a year ago
103
a year ago
By imbuing enormous vectors with semantic meaning, we can get machines to reason more abstractly — and efficiently — than before. The post A New Approach to Computation Reimagines Artificial Intelligence first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Emerging healthcare business models and the new vendors they need | Out-Of-Pocket looking for an idea to build? look at these areas
9 months ago
Chris Grossack's...
Externalizing Some Simple Topos Statements Hey all! It’s been a minute. I’ve been super busy with the UC strike and honestly I haven’t done...
over a year ago
11
over a year ago
Hey all! It’s been a minute. I’ve been super busy with the UC strike and honestly I haven’t done math in any serious capacity for almost the past month. It’s been a lot of hard work trying to get fair contracts out of the UC, but I had a lot of travel plans this December to...
Math Is Still...
Why Mathematical Proof Is a Social Compact Number theorist Andrew Granville on what mathematics really is — and why objectivity is never quite...
a year ago
77
a year ago
Number theorist Andrew Granville on what mathematics really is — and why objectivity is never quite within reach. The post Why Mathematical Proof Is a Social Compact first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
Computer Scientists Prove That Heat Destroys Quantum Entanglement While devising a new quantum algorithm, four researchers accidentally established a hard limit on...
4 months ago
41
4 months ago
While devising a new quantum algorithm, four researchers accidentally established a hard limit on entanglement. The post Computer Scientists Prove That Heat Destroys Quantum Entanglement first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
Neural Networks Need Data to Learn. Even If It’s Fake. Real data can be hard to get, so researchers are turning to synthetic data to train their artificial...
a year ago
36
a year ago
Real data can be hard to get, so researchers are turning to synthetic data to train their artificial intelligence systems. The post Neural Networks Need Data to Learn. Even If It’s Fake. first appeared on Quanta Magazine
nanoscale views
Artificial intelligence, extrapolation, and physical constraints Disclaimer and disclosure:  The "arrogant physicist declaims about some topic far outside their...
6 months ago
70
6 months ago
Disclaimer and disclosure:  The "arrogant physicist declaims about some topic far outside their domain expertise (like climate change or epidemiology or economics or geopolitics or....) like everyone actually in the field is clueless" trope is very overplayed at this point, and...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
How MainStreet gets you government $ | Out-Of-Pocket Get government tax credits for your health startup
a year ago
pcloadletter
Write code that you can understand when you get paged at 2am The older I get, the more I dislike clever code. This is not a controversial take; it is pretty-well...
7 months ago
70
7 months ago
The older I get, the more I dislike clever code. This is not a controversial take; it is pretty-well agreed upon that clever code is bad. But I particularly like the on-call responsiblity framing: write code that you can understand when you get paged at 2am. If you have never...
Blog - Practical...
Every Construction Machine Explained in 15 Minutes [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] We talk about a lot of big...
a year ago
26
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] We talk about a lot of big structures on this channel. But, it takes a lot of big tools to build the roads, dams, sewage lift stations, and every other part of the constructed environment. To me, there’s almost...
Math Is Still...
Flow Proof Helps Mathematicians Find Stability in Chaos A series of new papers describes how to fully characterize key dynamical systems with relatively...
a year ago
29
a year ago
A series of new papers describes how to fully characterize key dynamical systems with relatively little data. The post Flow Proof Helps Mathematicians Find Stability in Chaos first appeared on Quanta Magazine
symmetry magazine
Celebrating Dark Matter Day in Latin America Scientists, artists, communicators and physics fans find creative ways to mark the unofficial...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Scientists, artists, communicators and physics fans find creative ways to mark the unofficial holiday devoted to dark matter.
Andrew Fraknoi –...
Euclid Space Telescope Delivers Great Images The first images are coming in from the new Euclid Space Telescope and they are spectacular. The...
a year ago
9
a year ago
The first images are coming in from the new Euclid Space Telescope and they are spectacular. The post Euclid Space Telescope Delivers Great Images appeared first on Andrew Fraknoi - Astronomy Lectures - Astronomy Education Resources.
Beautiful Public...
1,000 Photos of Dolphin Fins Scars, scratches and wounds abound in these photos as encounters with unknown creatures and boat...
a year ago
79
a year ago
Scars, scratches and wounds abound in these photos as encounters with unknown creatures and boat propellers leave their marks, imprinting a story of close escapes and cheating death.
Math Is Still...
What Your Brain Is Doing When You’re Not Doing Anything When your mind is wandering, your brain’s “default mode” network is active. Its discovery 20 years...
11 months ago
26
11 months ago
When your mind is wandering, your brain’s “default mode” network is active. Its discovery 20 years ago inspired a raft of research into networks of brain regions and how they interact with each other. The post What Your Brain Is Doing When You’re Not Doing Anything...
Asterisk
Artificial Wombs When? What to expect when you’re expecting in 2050.
6 months ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Common healthcare questions I get | Out-Of-Pocket Some of your FAQs finally answered
a month ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Air Quality, Breathing, and Health | Out-Of-Pocket What we inhale is a public health issue
a year ago
Explorations of an...
A Quest Nature Tour Of Jamaica The Caribbean island of Jamaica is a naturalist’s paradise. Situated south of eastern Cuba, east of...
9 months ago
64
9 months ago
The Caribbean island of Jamaica is a naturalist’s paradise. Situated south of eastern Cuba, east of Honduras and north of Colombia, Jamaica has an interesting assemblage of species with different origins. Jamaica was never connected to the mainland throughout its long geological...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Circular CO2 Economy Big picture time – as I have discussed before, we have just passed 8 billion people on this planet...
a year ago
35
a year ago
Big picture time – as I have discussed before, we have just passed 8 billion people on this planet and will likely top 10 billion before populations stabilize (which is quite possible, but that’s another story).  What this means is that anything we collectively do is big. It...
Asterisk
China’s Policy Failures China’s experimental policy regime catalyzed the country’s economic ascent. Today, the system seems...
11 months ago
6
11 months ago
China’s experimental policy regime catalyzed the country’s economic ascent. Today, the system seems incapable of providing effective governance.
Math Is Still...
Can Information Escape a Black Hole? Black holes are inescapable traps for most of what falls into them — but there can be exceptions....
9 months ago
66
9 months ago
Black holes are inescapable traps for most of what falls into them — but there can be exceptions. The theoretical physicist Leonard Susskind speaks with co-host Janna Levin about the black hole information paradox and how it has propelled modern physics. The post Can...
Math Is Still...
Quaking Giants Might Solve the Mysteries of Stellar Magnetism In their jiggles and shakes, red giant stars encode a record of the magnetic fields near their...
a year ago
13
a year ago
In their jiggles and shakes, red giant stars encode a record of the magnetic fields near their cores. The post Quaking Giants Might Solve the Mysteries of Stellar Magnetism first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Explorations of an...
Frustrating Times at Parque Nacional El Palmar Parque Nacional El Palmar is located near Argentina's eastern border, a few hours north of Buenos...
a year ago
13
a year ago
Parque Nacional El Palmar is located near Argentina's eastern border, a few hours north of Buenos Aires. The main habitat found in this national park is palm savannah, a severely fragmented ecosystem found in northeastern Argentina, Uruguay and barely into southern Brazil. PN El...
The Works in...
Should you infect yourself with Zika? What life is like in a challenge trial
9 months ago
Probably...
Small percentiles and missing data Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous...
8 months ago
29
8 months ago
Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous installments are available from the Data Q&A landing page. low_percentile Bootstrapping percentiles¶ Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. I’m trying to figure out how to...
nanoscale views
Intriguing papers - exquisite thermal measurements + automated materials discovery/synthesis It's a busy time, but I wanted to point out a couple of papers from this past week. First, I want...
a year ago
8
a year ago
It's a busy time, but I wanted to point out a couple of papers from this past week. First, I want to point to this preprint on the arxiv, where the Weizmann folks do an incredibly technically impressive thing.  I'd written recently about the thermal Hall effect, when a...
Drew Ex Machina
NASA’s Viking Mission & The Search for Life on Mars: The Experiments For young space enthusiasts like myself growing up in the 1970s, NASA’s Viking mission to Mars was...
over a year ago
21
over a year ago
For young space enthusiasts like myself growing up in the 1970s, NASA’s Viking mission to Mars was one of the more exciting and memorable. The Viking […]
NeuroLogica Blog
Pentagon Report – No UFOs In response to a recent surge in interest in alien phenomena and claims that the US government is...
10 months ago
32
10 months ago
In response to a recent surge in interest in alien phenomena and claims that the US government is hiding what it knows about extraterrestrials, the Pentagon established a committee to investigate the question – the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO). They have recently...
IEEE Spectrum
What If the Worst AI Fear Is AI Fear Itself? It’s been just about a year now—a nonprofit called the Future of Life Institute posted an open...
10 months ago
65
10 months ago
It’s been just about a year now—a nonprofit called the Future of Life Institute posted an open letter reflecting people’s darkest fears about artificial intelligence. “Contemporary AI systems are now becoming human-competitive at general tasks,” it said. It called for a pause in...
Asterisk
What We Owe The Future William MacAskill’s latest book presents itself as an introduction to the burgeoning longtermist...
over a year ago
5
over a year ago
William MacAskill’s latest book presents itself as an introduction to the burgeoning longtermist movement. But his views are eccentric – even within the movement he founded.
Andrew Fraknoi –...
Good Meteor Shower This Week Wednesday evening and Thursday morning (Dec. 13-14) is the peak time for one of the best meteor...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Wednesday evening and Thursday morning (Dec. 13-14) is the peak time for one of the best meteor showers of the year – the Geminids.  The post Good Meteor Shower This Week appeared first on Andrew Fraknoi - Astronomy Lectures - Astronomy Education Resources.
NeuroLogica Blog
An Earth-like Climate is Fragile One of the biggest questions of exoplanet astronomy is how many potentially habitable planets are...
a year ago
11
a year ago
One of the biggest questions of exoplanet astronomy is how many potentially habitable planets are out there in the galaxy. By one estimate the answer is 6 billion Earth-like planets in the Milky Way. But of course we have to set parameters and make estimates, so this number can...
Damn Interesting
Devouring the Heart of Portugal On the morning of Thursday, 04 December 1924, a tall and well-dressed Dutch trader named Karel...
over a year ago
13
over a year ago
On the morning of Thursday, 04 December 1924, a tall and well-dressed Dutch trader named Karel Marang strolled along Great Winchester Street in the City of London, among the bustling crowds of bankers and brokers of the business district, unaware that the parcel he carried held...
Interaction Magic -...
Plastic archeology The history, science and engineering of Lego bricks, on the cusp between trash and treasure.
a year ago
Asterisk
The Devil in the Details: Matthew Desmond’s Poverty by America Matthew Desmond’s Poverty, by America is one of the most celebrated books on the subject....
a year ago
5
a year ago
Matthew Desmond’s Poverty, by America is one of the most celebrated books on the subject. Unfortunately, carelessness about the ways we measure poverty undercuts its main argument.
Math Is Still...
During Pregnancy, a Fake ‘Infection’ Protects the Fetus Cells in the placenta have an unusual trick for activating gentle immune defenses and keeping them...
a year ago
9
a year ago
Cells in the placenta have an unusual trick for activating gentle immune defenses and keeping them turned on when no infection is present. It involves crafting and deploying a fake virus. The post During Pregnancy, a Fake ‘Infection’ Protects the Fetus first appeared...
brr
Redeployment Part Three Off-continent after 446 days!
11 months ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
GPT healthcare startup ideas | Out-Of-Pocket and a call for some of yours
9 months ago
IEEE Spectrum
100 Years Ago, IBM Was Born Happy birthday, IBM! You’re 100 years old! Or are you? It’s true that the businesses that formed IBM...
11 months ago
63
11 months ago
Happy birthday, IBM! You’re 100 years old! Or are you? It’s true that the businesses that formed IBM began in the late 1800s. But it’s also true that a birth occurred in February 1924, with the renaming of the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Co. as the International Business...
Math Is Still...
The Year in Biology Biologists used artificial intelligence to make discoveries about molecules and the brain, and...
3 weeks ago
28
3 weeks ago
Biologists used artificial intelligence to make discoveries about molecules and the brain, and overturned long-held assumptions about the immune system and RNA. The post The Year in Biology first appeared on Quanta Magazine
symmetry magazine
A call to cite Black women and gender minorities Theoretical astrophysicist Chanda Prescod-Weinstein recently unveiled the Cite Black Women+ in...
a year ago
23
a year ago
Theoretical astrophysicist Chanda Prescod-Weinstein recently unveiled the Cite Black Women+ in Physics and Astronomy Bibliography.
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The weird CPT code process you need to understand | Out-Of-Pocket “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words are billed CPT 99245”
9 months ago
Math Is Still...
The (Often) Overlooked Experiment That Revealed the Quantum World A century ago, the Stern-Gerlach experiment established the truth of quantum mechanics. Now it’s...
a year ago
19
a year ago
A century ago, the Stern-Gerlach experiment established the truth of quantum mechanics. Now it’s being used to probe the clash of quantum theory and gravity. The post The (Often) Overlooked Experiment That Revealed the Quantum World first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Asterisk
The Myth of the Loneliness Epidemic Are we really living through a uniquely lonely moment in American history? When it comes to...
2 months ago
8
2 months ago
Are we really living through a uniquely lonely moment in American history? When it comes to friendship, this isn’t the first time that authorities have cried wolf.
wadertales
Broad-billed Sandpiper: Now a Red-listed wader A dedicated team of Scottish bird ringers has been studying breeding waders in northern Norway since...
a month ago
36
a month ago
A dedicated team of Scottish bird ringers has been studying breeding waders in northern Norway since 1993. One of the focal species of their fieldwork is the secretive Broad-billed Sandpiper, an unusual taiga wader which nests on low-lying tussocks embedded in floating mats of...
Math Is Still...
Can Thermodynamics Go Quantum? The Industrial Revolution brought us the laws of thermodynamics, and new ideas about work, energy...
3 months ago
37
3 months ago
The Industrial Revolution brought us the laws of thermodynamics, and new ideas about work, energy and efficiency. In this episode, co-host Steven Strogatz speaks with theoretical physicist Nicole Yunger Halpern about what these concepts might mean in the age of quantum mechanics....
Math Is Still...
Tracing the Hidden Hand of Magnetism in the Galaxy Susan Clark is helping to unravel the mysterious workings of the Milky Way’s magnetic field, a...
6 months ago
59
6 months ago
Susan Clark is helping to unravel the mysterious workings of the Milky Way’s magnetic field, a critical missing piece of the galactic puzzle. The post Tracing the Hidden Hand of Magnetism in the Galaxy first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
The New Math of How Large-Scale Order Emerges The puzzle of emergence asks how regularities emerge on macro scales out of uncountable constituent...
7 months ago
65
7 months ago
The puzzle of emergence asks how regularities emerge on macro scales out of uncountable constituent parts. A new framework has researchers hopeful that a solution is near. The post The New Math of How Large-Scale Order Emerges first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Works in...
The asbestos times How asbestos saved cities, before we realized its risks
12 months ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
How To Self-Publish A Children's Book and How Much You Can Expect To Make | Out-Of-Pocket spoiler: you will make very little lol
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Novel Architecture Makes Neural Networks More Understandable By tapping into a decades-old mathematical principle, researchers are hoping that Kolmogorov-Arnold...
4 months ago
32
4 months ago
By tapping into a decades-old mathematical principle, researchers are hoping that Kolmogorov-Arnold networks will facilitate scientific discovery. The post Novel Architecture Makes Neural Networks More Understandable first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Asterisk
Modeling the End of Monkeypox The journalistic and public health response to the US monkeypox outbreak was noisy and contentious....
over a year ago
7
over a year ago
The journalistic and public health response to the US monkeypox outbreak was noisy and contentious. What tools do we have for predicting its spread?
Math Is Still...
Alan Turing and the Power of Negative Thinking Mathematical proofs based on a technique called diagonalization can be relentlessly contrarian, but...
a year ago
117
a year ago
Mathematical proofs based on a technique called diagonalization can be relentlessly contrarian, but they help reveal the limits of algorithms. The post Alan Turing and the Power of Negative Thinking first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
The Social Benefits of Getting Our Brains in Sync Our brain waves can align when we work and play closely together. The phenomenon, known as...
9 months ago
35
9 months ago
Our brain waves can align when we work and play closely together. The phenomenon, known as interbrain synchrony, suggests that collaboration is biological. The post The Social Benefits of Getting Our Brains in Sync first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
Granville T. Woods: Smartest Guy in the Room Any home baker will confirm that, even if you have all the right ingredients and follow the recipe,...
a year ago
10
a year ago
Any home baker will confirm that, even if you have all the right ingredients and follow the recipe, things don’t always turn out the way you envisioned. Such was the life of inventor extraordinaire Granville T. Woods. Who was Granville T. Woods? Woods was endowed with...
Stephen Wolfram...
Can AI Solve Science? Note: Click any diagram to get Wolfram Language code to reproduce it. Wolfram Language code for...
10 months ago
42
10 months ago
Note: Click any diagram to get Wolfram Language code to reproduce it. Wolfram Language code for training the neural nets used here is also available (requires GPU). Won’t AI Eventually Be Able to Do Everything? Particularly given its recent surprise successes, there’s a somewhat...
Drew Ex Machina
Top Ten Posts of 2023 Now that we are at the end of 2023, it is time to look back at this year’s material published on...
a year ago
41
a year ago
Now that we are at the end of 2023, it is time to look back at this year’s material published on Drew Ex Machina and see […]
Probably...
Combining Risks Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous...
7 months ago
68
7 months ago
Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous installments are available from the Data Q&A landing page. combine_risk Combining Risks¶ Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. Bit of a weird one but I’m hoping you’re the...
Beautiful Public...
The United States Frequency Allocation Chart This crazy, beautiful chart illustrates the incredible complexity of managing one of our nation’s...
a year ago
27
a year ago
This crazy, beautiful chart illustrates the incredible complexity of managing one of our nation’s most crucial – and invisible – national assets: the radio spectrum.
NeuroLogica Blog
Trust in New Technology In an optimally rational person, what should govern their perception of risk? Of course, people are...
6 months ago
61
6 months ago
In an optimally rational person, what should govern their perception of risk? Of course, people are generally not “optimally rational”. It’s therefore an interesting thought experiment – what would be optimal, and how does that differ from how people actually assess risk? Risk is...
symmetry magazine
Vera C. Rubin Observatory brings the universe to everyone The Rubin Observatory is making education and outreach a top priority.
a year ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Completely new healthcare markets and what to build for them | Out-Of-Pocket that new new
9 months ago
Math Is Still...
How Failure Has Made Mathematics Stronger The topologist Danny Calegari discusses the inevitability of disappointment in math, and how to...
7 months ago
53
7 months ago
The topologist Danny Calegari discusses the inevitability of disappointment in math, and how to learn from it. The post How Failure Has Made Mathematics Stronger first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
AI-Fueled Scams Digital life is getting more dangerous.  Literally every day I have to fend off attempts at scamming...
8 months ago
40
8 months ago
Digital life is getting more dangerous.  Literally every day I have to fend off attempts at scamming me in one way or another. I get texts trying to lure me into responding. I get e-mails hoping I will click a malicious link on a reflex. I get phone calls from people warning me...
Math Is Still...
What Is the Nature of Time? Time is all around us: in the language we use, in the memories we revisit and in our predictions of...
10 months ago
61
10 months ago
Time is all around us: in the language we use, in the memories we revisit and in our predictions of the future. But what exactly is it? The physicist and Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek joins Steve Strogatz to discuss the fundamental hallmarks of time. The post What Is...
wadertales
Will head-starting work for Curlew? 83 captive-reared Curlew were released successfully in 2019, over 130 in 2021 and a similar number...
over a year ago
26
over a year ago
83 captive-reared Curlew were released successfully in 2019, over 130 in 2021 and a similar number in 2022 but this does not mean that head-starting is a solution to England’s Curlew problems. We don’t yet know the proportion of youngsters that survive the difficult ‘teenage...
Math Is Still...
How Simple Math Moves the Needle The spatial intuition behind a three-point turn offers an on-ramp to a century-old geometry problem....
a year ago
10
a year ago
The spatial intuition behind a three-point turn offers an on-ramp to a century-old geometry problem. The post How Simple Math Moves the Needle first appeared on Quanta Magazine
nanoscale views
What do we want in a conference venue? The APS March Meeting was in Las Vegas this year, and I have yet to talk to a single attendee who...
a year ago
28
a year ago
The APS March Meeting was in Las Vegas this year, and I have yet to talk to a single attendee who liked that decision in hindsight.  In brief, the conference venue seemed about 10% too small (severe crowding issues in hallways between sessions); while the APS deal on hotels was...
NeuroLogica Blog
Using AI for Neuroforecasting I’ve been following AI (artificial intelligence) news very closely, including all the controversies...
a year ago
30
a year ago
I’ve been following AI (artificial intelligence) news very closely, including all the controversies and concerns. I tend to fall on the side of – AI is a powerful tool, we should continue to develop it and use it responsibly. We don’t need to panic, and highly restrictive laws...
Explorations of an...
Marsh Birding In Ceibas And Otamendi February 18, 2023 Laura and I left Parque Nacional El Palmar and continued south towards Buenos...
a year ago
10
a year ago
February 18, 2023 Laura and I left Parque Nacional El Palmar and continued south towards Buenos Aires and beyond. We had just five days remaining in our Argentina trip, with ferry tickets purchased that would take us to Uruguay on February 23. At this point in the trip, potential...
The Works in...
The ultra-selfish gene Genetically modifying malaria-carrying mosquitoes could allow us to wipe out humanity’s most deadly...
2 months ago
26
2 months ago
Genetically modifying malaria-carrying mosquitoes could allow us to wipe out humanity’s most deadly killer.
IEEE Spectrum
The Incredible Story Behind the First Transistor Radio But that’s pretty much what Pat Haggerty, vice president of Texas Instruments, did in 1954. The...
3 months ago
46
3 months ago
But that’s pretty much what Pat Haggerty, vice president of Texas Instruments, did in 1954. The result was the Regency TR-1, the world’s first commercial transistor radio, which debuted 70 years ago this month. The engineers delivered on Haggerty’s audacious goal, and I...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Galaxy Without Dark Matter Dark matter is one of the greatest current scientific mysteries. It’s a fascinating story playing...
a year ago
12
a year ago
Dark matter is one of the greatest current scientific mysteries. It’s a fascinating story playing out in real time, although over years, so you have to be patient. Future generations might be able to binge the dark matter show, but not us. We have to wait for each episode to...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
What does longevity medicine actually mean? | Out-Of-Pocket An interview with a practicing longevity medicine doctor
2 months ago
Chris Grossack's...
Talk - Where Are The Open Sets? I was invited to give a talk at HoTTEST 2022, and was more than happy to accept! Ever since I was...
over a year ago
16
over a year ago
I was invited to give a talk at HoTTEST 2022, and was more than happy to accept! Ever since I was first learning HoTT I was curious how we could be sure that theorems in HoTT give us corresponding theorems in “classical” homotopy theory. Earlier this summer I spent a lot of...
Drew Ex Machina
Rockets Falling from Orbit: The Saturn V That Launched NASA’s Skylab In recent years, the uncontrolled reentries of the spent 22-metric ton core stages of China’s new...
over a year ago
21
over a year ago
In recent years, the uncontrolled reentries of the spent 22-metric ton core stages of China’s new Long March 5B heavy lift launch vehicle, used to orbit […]
Blog - Practical...
Which Is Easier To Pull? (Railcars vs. Road Cars) [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Imagine the room you’re in...
a year ago
30
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Imagine the room you’re in right now was filled to the top with gravel. (I promise I’m headed somewhere with this.) I don’t know the size of the room you’re in, but if it’s anywhere near an average-sized...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Pharmacies Inside-and-Out With John Capecelatro | Out-Of-Pocket How does a pharmacy actually work?
a year ago
Eukaryote Writes...
Learn to write well BEFORE you have something worth saying Lessons learned from trip reports and journal articles.
a week ago
IEEE Spectrum
This 1920 Chess Automaton Was Wired to Win The Mechanical Turk was a fraud. The chess-playing automaton, dressed in a turban and elaborate...
a year ago
9
a year ago
The Mechanical Turk was a fraud. The chess-playing automaton, dressed in a turban and elaborate Ottoman robes, toured Europe in the closing decades of the 18th century accompanied by its inventor Wolfgang von Kempelen. The Turk wowed Austrian empress Maria Theresa, French emperor...
The Roots of...
What does it mean to “trust science”? And this, my children, is why we do not say things like “I believe in science”. I mean, don’t get me...
a year ago
14
a year ago
And this, my children, is why we do not say things like “I believe in science”. I mean, don’t get me wrong, science definitely exists—I’ve seen it. But not everything that calls itself science is science, and even good science sometimes gets wrong results. –Megan McArdle Should...
NeuroLogica Blog
Apologizing for Uri Geller A recent New York Times article tries to rehabilitate the reputation of Uri Geller, famed...
a year ago
29
a year ago
A recent New York Times article tries to rehabilitate the reputation of Uri Geller, famed spoon-bending magician, by simply telling a one-sided narrative. From my perspective as a skeptic, this was a terrible article that missed the real issue, glossed over glaring defects in...
Blog - Practical...
This Bridge Should Have Been Closed Years Before It Collapsed [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On January 28, 2022, about an...
6 months ago
68
6 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On January 28, 2022, about an hour before dawn, the four-lane Fern Hollow Bridge in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, collapsed without warning. Five vehicles, including an articulating bus, fell with the bridge, and...
NeuroLogica Blog
Serial Dependence Bias As I have discussed numerous times on this blog, our brains did not evolve to be optimal precise...
a year ago
29
a year ago
As I have discussed numerous times on this blog, our brains did not evolve to be optimal precise perceivers and processors of information. Here is an infographic showing 188 documents cognitive biases. These biases are not all bad – they are tradeoffs. Evolutionary forces care...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
An update about Out-Of-Pocket | Out-Of-Pocket lemme sell some of your attention plz
a year ago
Math Is Still...
How ‘Idle’ Egg Cells Defend Their DNA From Damage How do immature egg cells maintain genetic quality for decades before they mature? Scientists find...
8 months ago
85
8 months ago
How do immature egg cells maintain genetic quality for decades before they mature? Scientists find unusual safeguards in this quiescent cell that may inform research into fertility. The post How ‘Idle’ Egg Cells Defend Their DNA From Damage first appeared on Quanta...
Math Is Still...
Researchers Refute a Widespread Belief About Online Algorithms Three computer scientists have disproved a long-standing conjecture about a fundamental problem...
a year ago
10
a year ago
Three computer scientists have disproved a long-standing conjecture about a fundamental problem involving imperfect information. The post Researchers Refute a Widespread Belief About Online Algorithms first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
Brain Size Deep thought is what distinguishes humans from other animals. The brain is the medium for thought;...
4 months ago
9
4 months ago
Deep thought is what distinguishes humans from other animals. The brain is the medium for thought; so, there's the idea that brain size is important, with larger brains allowing more profound thought. Larger brains in hominids appears to have an evolutionary advantage, but the...
nanoscale views
Chemical potential and banana waffles The concept of chemical potential is one that seems almost deliberately obscure to many.  I’ve...
a year ago
65
a year ago
The concept of chemical potential is one that seems almost deliberately obscure to many.  I’ve written about this here, and referenced this article.  What you may not realize is that the chemical potential, of water in particular, plays a crucial role in why my banana waffle...
Uncharted...
6 Questions You Asked Yourself about Solar How fast will it take over, how fast are costs shrinking, why is it so cheap, what industries will...
2 months ago
9
2 months ago
How fast will it take over, how fast are costs shrinking, why is it so cheap, what industries will it birth, how much surface will it take up, where will it appear first?
Explorations of an...
Los Amigos Biological Station: Part 2 September 21, 2022 Laura and I had arranged with the cook to have a packed breakfast this morning....
over a year ago
23
over a year ago
September 21, 2022 Laura and I had arranged with the cook to have a packed breakfast this morning. This turned out to be a great idea. The day was another scorcher, reaching a high of 36 degrees Celsius, and we appreciated having the freedom to explore the trails early in the...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Personalized Health Insurance and the Payer Stack | Out-Of-Pocket Stacks on stacks on stacks
a year ago
Beautiful Public...
The Naughty Words the FAA Removed From the Sky New FOIA records from the FAA shed light on the frantic effort in 2015 to rename navigation...
7 months ago
81
7 months ago
New FOIA records from the FAA shed light on the frantic effort in 2015 to rename navigation waypoints related to Donald Trump and reveal the list of naughty waypoint names that were changed over the years.
symmetry magazine
Life along the future DUNE beamline Unseen neutrinos, visible lives: A photographer journeys through the Midwest.
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Ninth Dedekind Number Found by Two Independent Groups The numbers count a variety of seemingly unrelated mathematical structures. The post...
a year ago
nanoscale views
Neutrality and experimental detective work One of the remarkable aspects of condensed matter physics is the idea of emergent quasiparticles,...
a year ago
13
a year ago
One of the remarkable aspects of condensed matter physics is the idea of emergent quasiparticles, where through the interactions of many underlying degrees of freedom, new excitations emerge that are long-lived and often can propagate around in ways very different than their...
Asterisk
Pew Problems A conversation about religion, fertility, and the American family.
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Chatbots Don’t Know What Stuff Isn’t Today’s language models are more sophisticated than ever, but they still struggle with the concept...
a year ago
110
a year ago
Today’s language models are more sophisticated than ever, but they still struggle with the concept of negation. That’s unlikely to change anytime soon. The post Chatbots Don’t Know What Stuff Isn’t first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
The Simple Geometry That Predicts Molecular Mosaics By treating molecules as geometric tessellations, scientists devised a new way to forecast how 2D...
a year ago
28
a year ago
By treating molecules as geometric tessellations, scientists devised a new way to forecast how 2D materials might self-assemble. The post The Simple Geometry That Predicts Molecular Mosaics first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Did They Find Amelia Earhart’s Plane Is this sonar image taken at 16,000 feet below the surface about 100 miles from Howland island, that...
11 months ago
23
11 months ago
Is this sonar image taken at 16,000 feet below the surface about 100 miles from Howland island, that of a downed Lockheed Model 10-E Electra plane? Tony Romeo hopes it is. He spent $9 million to purchase an underwater drone, the Hugan 6000, then hired a crew and scoured 5,200...
NeuroLogica Blog
DNA Nanorobot Kill Switch for Cancer How’s that for a provocative title? But it is technically accurate. The title of the paper in...
6 months ago
51
6 months ago
How’s that for a provocative title? But it is technically accurate. The title of the paper in question is: “A DNA robotic switch with regulated autonomous display of cytotoxic ligand nanopatterns.” The study is a proof of concept in an animal model, so we are still years away...
IEEE Spectrum
Edith Clarke: Architect of Modern Power Distribution Edith Clarke was a powerhouse in practically every sense of the word. From the start of her career...
6 months ago
64
6 months ago
Edith Clarke was a powerhouse in practically every sense of the word. From the start of her career at General Electric in 1922, she was determined to develop stable, more reliable power grids. During her first years at GE she invented what came to be known as the Clarke...
NeuroLogica Blog
World Events and the Conspiracy Instinct By now most people have heard that on Saturday there was a failed assassination attempt on candidate...
5 months ago
56
5 months ago
By now most people have heard that on Saturday there was a failed assassination attempt on candidate Trump at a rally. While it has only been a few days, preliminary investigation has found that 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, using a AR style rifle purchased legally by his...
Sean Carroll
George B. Field, 1929-2024 George Field, brilliant theoretical astrophysicist and truly great human being, passed away on the...
5 months ago
49
5 months ago
George Field, brilliant theoretical astrophysicist and truly great human being, passed away on the morning of July 31. He was my Ph.D. thesis advisor and one of my favorite people in the world. I often tell my own students that the two most important people in your life who you...
Light from Space
Vaporwave Crescent Shooting space with a monochrome camera means using various filters—when choosing narrowband filters...
over a year ago
26
over a year ago
Shooting space with a monochrome camera means using various filters—when choosing narrowband filters (those with only a few nanometers of bandpass) one can limit the sensor capturing only very specific wavelengths of light, namely the emissions of certain gasses (basically,...
Apoorva Srinivasan
getting started with bayesian inference In my previous post, we spoke about hypothesis testing from a frequentist perspective. This is the...
over a year ago
4
over a year ago
In my previous post, we spoke about hypothesis testing from a frequentist perspective. This is the method that is commonly taught in STAT101 classes. But for many decades, some statisticians have argued for another approach to conduct statistical analysis based on bayes...
Andrew Fraknoi –...
A Movie about a Galaxy Far, Far Away & Long, Long Ago (from Webb Telescope) Explains a new movie of distant galaxies and remote time from the Webb Telescope. The post A Movie...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Explains a new movie of distant galaxies and remote time from the Webb Telescope. The post A Movie about a Galaxy Far, Far Away & Long, Long Ago (from Webb Telescope) appeared first on Andrew Fraknoi - Astronomy Lectures - Astronomy Education Resources.
Explorations of an...
Chasing Endemics in Córdoba Córdoba is the second most populated city in Argentina, located in the Punilla Valley around 600 km...
a year ago
19
a year ago
Córdoba is the second most populated city in Argentina, located in the Punilla Valley around 600 km northwest of Buenos Aires. Laura and I spent one night in the city before our morning's birding. Our destination: the beautiful Sierras de Córdoba to the west of the city and...
Math Is Still...
Maze Proof Establishes a ‘Backbone’ for Statistical Mechanics Four mathematicians have estimated the chances that there’s a clear path through a random maze. ...
11 months ago
24
11 months ago
Four mathematicians have estimated the chances that there’s a clear path through a random maze. The post Maze Proof Establishes a ‘Backbone’ for Statistical Mechanics first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Meteostat-12 Meets Flat Earthers I know this wasn’t the purpose of sending up a €4.3bn satellite into geostationary orbit, but...
a year ago
47
a year ago
I know this wasn’t the purpose of sending up a €4.3bn satellite into geostationary orbit, but tweaking flat earthers is a fun side effect. European countries have collaborated on this project, having weather satellites in orbit since 1977. The latest iteration is Meteostat-12,...
Math Is Still...
Computation Is All Around Us, and You Can See It if You Try Computer scientist Lance Fortnow writes that by embracing the computations that surround us, we can...
7 months ago
37
7 months ago
Computer scientist Lance Fortnow writes that by embracing the computations that surround us, we can begin to understand and tame our seemingly random world. The post Computation Is All Around Us, and You Can See It if You Try first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Is Music Getting Simpler I don’t think I know anyone personally who doesn’t have strong opinions about music – which genres...
9 months ago
33
9 months ago
I don’t think I know anyone personally who doesn’t have strong opinions about music – which genres they like, and how the quality of music may have changed over time. My own sense is that music as a cultural phenomenon is incredibly complex, no one (in my social group) really...
NeuroLogica Blog
JET Fusion Experiment Sets New Record Don’t get excited. It’s always nice to see incremental progress being made with the various fusion...
11 months ago
25
11 months ago
Don’t get excited. It’s always nice to see incremental progress being made with the various fusion experiments happening around the world, but we are still a long way off from commercial fusion power, and this experiment doesn’t really bring us any close, despite the headlines....
Asterisk
Developmental Editing
5 months ago
Math Is Still...
Why Is This Shape So Terrible to Pack? Two mathematicians have proved a long-standing conjecture that is a step on the way toward finding...
6 months ago
72
6 months ago
Two mathematicians have proved a long-standing conjecture that is a step on the way toward finding the worst shape for packing the plane. The post Why Is This Shape So Terrible to Pack? first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
The Future of (Unpaid) Work If we think of the top inventions that had a positive impact on human society and our quality of...
a year ago
29
a year ago
If we think of the top inventions that had a positive impact on human society and our quality of life most lists would contain things like the printing press, the wheel, or the computer. One invention that should be on everyone’s list but is easy to overlook is – the washing...
The Roots of...
Highlights from The Industrial Revolution, by T. S. Ashton The Industrial Revolution, 1760-1830, by Thomas S. Ashton, is classic in the field, published in...
a year ago
26
a year ago
The Industrial Revolution, 1760-1830, by Thomas S. Ashton, is classic in the field, published in 1948. Here are some of my highlights from it. (Emphasis in bold added by me.) The role of chance What was the role of chance in the inventions of the Industrial Revolution? It is true...
Math Is Still...
What Is Analog Computing? You don’t need 0s and 1s to perform computations, and in some cases it’s better to avoid them. ...
5 months ago
47
5 months ago
You don’t need 0s and 1s to perform computations, and in some cases it’s better to avoid them. The post What Is Analog Computing? first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Melting Asphalt
A Natural History of Beauty A mashup of ideas from David Deutsch, Geoffrey Miller, and Richard Prum, with a little César Hidalgo...
over a year ago
10
over a year ago
A mashup of ideas from David Deutsch, Geoffrey Miller, and Richard Prum, with a little César Hidalgo thrown in for good measure. —— Of all the problems that can plague a discussion of beauty — and there are several — perhaps… Read more ›
nanoscale views
Some interesting recent papers - lots to ponder As we bid apparent farewell to LK99, it's important to note that several other pretty exciting...
a year ago
12
a year ago
As we bid apparent farewell to LK99, it's important to note that several other pretty exciting things have been happening in the condensed matter/nano world.  Here are a few papers that look intriguing (caveat emptor:  I have not had a chance to read these in any real depth, so...
NeuroLogica Blog
Latest Gallup Creationism Poll Surveys are always tricky because how you ask a question can have a dramatic impact on how people...
5 months ago
46
5 months ago
Surveys are always tricky because how you ask a question can have a dramatic impact on how people answer. But it is useful to ask the exact same question over a long period of time, because that can indicate how public attitudes are changing. This is one of the benefits of...
Probably...
PMFs and PDFs It’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous...
6 months ago
48
6 months ago
It’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous installments are available from the Data Q&A landing page. If you get this post by email, the formatting is not good — you might want to read it on the site. pmf_and_pdf PMFs and PDFs¶ Here’s...
Blog - Practical...
Where Does Grounded Electricity Actually Go? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Imagine this scenario: You...
a year ago
29
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Imagine this scenario: You have a diesel-powered generator on a stand that is electrically isolated from the ground. Run a wire from the energized slot of an outlet to an electrode driven into the ground. Don’t...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
More weird rules in healthcare | Out-Of-Pocket 3 liters of blood, sequential billing, COBRA, and more
7 months ago
IEEE Spectrum
The Meeting of the Minds That Launched AI The Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence, held from 18 June through 17...
a year ago
12
a year ago
The Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence, held from 18 June through 17 August of 1956, is widely considered the event that kicked off AI as a research discipline. Organized by John McCarthy, Marvin Minsky, Claude Shannon, and Nathaniel Rochester, it...
NeuroLogica Blog
Starship Explodes in Successful Launch A common joke in the medical world is, “The operation was a success, but the patient died.” The...
a year ago
29
a year ago
A common joke in the medical world is, “The operation was a success, but the patient died.” The irony comes from how we might define “success”. On April 20th SpaceX conducted the maiden launch of the fully assembled Starship, including a Starship rocket on top of a super heavy...
NeuroLogica Blog
Hunter-Gatherers and Childcare What is “natural” for humans? It’s often hard to say, and in my opinion this is a highly overused...
a year ago
6
a year ago
What is “natural” for humans? It’s often hard to say, and in my opinion this is a highly overused concept. Primarily this is because humans are adaptable – we adapt to our environment, our situation, and our culture. So it is “natural” for us not to have a natural state. But this...
Interaction Magic -...
The UX of LEGO Interface Panels LEGO interface panels are beautiful, iconic, and great for learning interface design basics. I...
over a year ago
6
over a year ago
LEGO interface panels are beautiful, iconic, and great for learning interface design basics. I bought 52 of them from BrickLink to explore the design, layout and organisation of complex interfaces.
Sean Carroll
The Zombie Argument for Physicalism (Contra Panpsychism) The nature of consciousness remains a contentious subject out there. I’m a physicalist myself — as I...
over a year ago
21
over a year ago
The nature of consciousness remains a contentious subject out there. I’m a physicalist myself — as I explain in The Big Picture and elsewhere, I think consciousness is best understood as weakly-emergent from the ordinary physical behavior of matter, without requiring any special...
Math Is Still...
Is It Real or Imagined? How Your Brain Tells the Difference. New experiments show that the brain distinguishes between perceived and imagined mental images by...
a year ago
263
a year ago
New experiments show that the brain distinguishes between perceived and imagined mental images by checking whether they cross a “reality threshold.” The post Is It Real or Imagined? How Your Brain Tells the Difference. first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Artificial Robotic Muscles By now we have all seen the impressive robot videos, such as the ones from Boston Dynamics, in which...
4 months ago
47
4 months ago
By now we have all seen the impressive robot videos, such as the ones from Boston Dynamics, in which robots show incredible flexibility and agility. These are amazing, but I understand they are a bit like trick-shot videos – we are being shown the ones that worked, which may not...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Application reminder, new virtual discussion, new course | Out-Of-Pocket quick housekeeping things
9 months ago
ToughSF
Space Tethers: Stringing up the Solar System All the methods we have used to reach space so far have been subject to the Tsiolkovsky rocket...
over a year ago
11
over a year ago
All the methods we have used to reach space so far have been subject to the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation - propellant must be ejected and more and more of it is needed to go further. What if we could break that equation with rotating orbital tethers? The tether I have worked...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Discussion about Biological Sex At CSICON this year I gave talk about topics over which skeptics have and continue to disagree with...
2 months ago
34
2 months ago
At CSICON this year I gave talk about topics over which skeptics have and continue to disagree with each other. My core theme was that these are the topics we absolutely should be discussing with each other, especially at skeptical conferences. Nothing should be taboo or too...
Asterisk
Why We Shut Down In international development, it’s not enough to try to do good. We need the tools to tell if a...
6 months ago
5
6 months ago
In international development, it’s not enough to try to do good. We need the tools to tell if a project is really working — and the incentive to end it if it’s not.
Math Is Still...
New Kind of Magnetism Spotted in an Engineered Material In an atomically thin stack of semiconductors, a mechanism unseen in any natural substance causes...
a year ago
18
a year ago
In an atomically thin stack of semiconductors, a mechanism unseen in any natural substance causes electrons’ spins to align. The post New Kind of Magnetism Spotted in an Engineered Material first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
Copper and Green Energy The United States Department of Energy has updated its list of critically important materials. The...
6 months ago
7
6 months ago
The United States Department of Energy has updated its list of critically important materials. The current list of 54 materials includes elements that are presently critical to a transition to green energy, such as the rare earth elements important to turbine generators, and...
nanoscale views
Reading material - orders of magnitude and difficult times Over the past couple of weeks (and more) I have found a number of things to read that I wanted to...
a year ago
58
a year ago
Over the past couple of weeks (and more) I have found a number of things to read that I wanted to pass on.  First, if you'd like a break from the seemingly continual stream of bad news in the world and enjoy good "think like a physicist"/dimensional analysis/order of magnitude...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Newsletter One + Patient Zero | Out-Of-Pocket Shall we begin?
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Mathematicians Attempt to Glimpse Past the Big Bang By studying the geometry of model space-times, researchers offer alternative views of the universe’s...
7 months ago
74
7 months ago
By studying the geometry of model space-times, researchers offer alternative views of the universe’s first moments. The post Mathematicians Attempt to Glimpse Past the Big Bang first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
How To (Properly) Text Patients | Out-Of-Pocket Do’s and don’ts + tactical tips from an actual doctor
9 months ago
Asterisk
The EA-Progress Studies War is Here, and It’s a Constructive Dialogue! We’re hoping Marc Andreessen doesn’t read this and polarize everyone again.
6 months ago
Interaction Magic -...
Interaction20 Round-up Summary of all the amazing, curious and challenging ideas from last week's IXDA Interaction 20...
over a year ago
4
over a year ago
Summary of all the amazing, curious and challenging ideas from last week's IXDA Interaction 20 conference.
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Placebos Are Getting Stronger | Out-Of-Pocket Should we incorporate them into clinical practice?
a year ago
Asterisk
China’s Silicon Future China dreams of competing with global superpowers in the semiconductor industry. Whether its efforts...
over a year ago
6
over a year ago
China dreams of competing with global superpowers in the semiconductor industry. Whether its efforts will succeed is far from clear.
Blog - Practical...
How Engineers Straightened the Leaning Tower of Pisa [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Long ago, maybe upwards of 1-2...
a year ago
67
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Long ago, maybe upwards of 1-2 million years ago, a river in the central part of what’s now Italy, emptied into what’s now the Ligurian Sea. It still does, by the way, but it did back then too. As the sea rose...
The Works in...
Links in Progress: What are children for? And how the UN’s birth rate forecasts keep getting it wrong
a month ago
Blog - Practical...
Why Locomotives Don't Have Tires [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Formula 1 is, by many...
11 months ago
54
11 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Formula 1 is, by many accounts, the pinnacle of car racing. F1 cars are among the fastest in the world, particularly around the tight corners of the various paved tracks across the globe. Drivers can experience...
NeuroLogica Blog
New Generation of Electric Robots Boston Dynamics (now owned by Hyundai) has revealed its electric version of its Atlas robot. These...
8 months ago
65
8 months ago
Boston Dynamics (now owned by Hyundai) has revealed its electric version of its Atlas robot. These robot videos always look impressive, but at the very least we know that we are seeing the best take. We don’t know how many times the robot failed to get the one great video. There...
Quantum Frontiers
Building a Visceral Understanding of Quantum Phenomena A great childhood memory that I have comes from first playing “The Incredible Machine” on PC in the...
5 months ago
55
5 months ago
A great childhood memory that I have comes from first playing “The Incredible Machine” on PC in the early 90’s. For those not in the know, this is a physics-based puzzle game about building Rube Goldberg style contraptions to achieve … Continue reading →
NeuroLogica Blog
Update on AI Art It’s been a while since I discussed artificial intelligence (AI) generated art here. What I have...
a month ago
22
a month ago
It’s been a while since I discussed artificial intelligence (AI) generated art here. What I have said in the past is that AI art appears a bit soulless and there are details it has difficulty creating without bizarre distortions (hands are particularly difficult). But I also...
The Roots of...
Developing a technology with safety in mind If a technology may introduce catastrophic risks, how do you develop it? It occurred to me that the...
a year ago
57
a year ago
If a technology may introduce catastrophic risks, how do you develop it? It occurred to me that the Wright Brothers’ approach to inventing the airplane might make a good case study. The catastrophic risk for them, of course, was dying in a crash. This is exactly what happened...
Eukaryote Writes...
Eukaryote in Asterisk Magazine + New Patreon Per-post setup Eukaryote elsewhere I have an article in the latest issue of Asterisk Magazine. After you get really...
a year ago
60
a year ago
Eukaryote elsewhere I have an article in the latest issue of Asterisk Magazine. After you get really deep into the weeds of invertebrate sentience and fish welfare and the scale of factory farming, what do you do with that information vis-a-vis what you feel comfortable eating?...
symmetry magazine
IceCube and NANOGrav open new windows onto the universe New results from a neutrino telescope and a gravitational-wave observatory show how astronomers use...
a year ago
22
a year ago
New results from a neutrino telescope and a gravitational-wave observatory show how astronomers use different forms of messengers to study the cosmos.
nanoscale views
Materials characterization techniques – a brief glossary Suppose someone has synthesized or found what they think is a new material. How do people studying...
11 months ago
26
11 months ago
Suppose someone has synthesized or found what they think is a new material. How do people studying materials (condensed matter physicists, materials scientists, materials chemists) figure out what they have and understand its properties? That's the puzzle-solving aspect of...
Math Is Still...
The Year in Biology In a year packed with fascinating discoveries, biologists pushed the limits of synthetic life,...
a year ago
9
a year ago
In a year packed with fascinating discoveries, biologists pushed the limits of synthetic life, probed how organisms keep time, and refined theories about consciousness and emotional health. The post The Year in Biology first appeared on Quanta Magazine
nanoscale views
Michio Kaku and science popularization in the Age of Shamelessness In some ways, we live in a golden age of science popularization.  There are fantastic publications...
a year ago
47
a year ago
In some ways, we live in a golden age of science popularization.  There are fantastic publications like Quanta doing tremendous work; platforms like YouTube and podcasts have made it possible for both practicing scientists and science communicators to reach enormous audiences;...
Math Is Still...
How Math Has Changed the Shape of Gerrymandering New tools make it possible to detect hidden manipulation of maps. The post How Math Has...
a year ago
Chris Grossack's...
Talk -- 2-Categorical Descent and (Essentially) Algebraic Theories A few weeks ago I gave a talk at the CT Octoberfest 2023 about some work I did over the summer that...
a year ago
10
a year ago
A few weeks ago I gave a talk at the CT Octoberfest 2023 about some work I did over the summer that I’m really proud of. Unfortunately, while writing up the result I found a 1999 paper by Pedicchio and Wood that proves the same theorem (with roughly the same proof), so I...
Probably...
Reject Math Supremacy The premise of Think Stats, and the other books in the Think series, is that programming is a tool...
3 weeks ago
37
3 weeks ago
The premise of Think Stats, and the other books in the Think series, is that programming is a tool for teaching and learning — and many ideas that are commonly presented in math notation can be more clearly presented in code. In the draft third edition of Think Stats there is...
wadertales
A Whimbrel’s year There’s a lot to fit into twelve months if you’re a Whimbrel. In the last paper from his PhD, Camilo...
over a year ago
28
over a year ago
There’s a lot to fit into twelve months if you’re a Whimbrel. In the last paper from his PhD, Camilo Carneiro assesses whether Icelandic Whimbrel can always manage to complete the annual cycle of migrate-breed-fatten-migrate-moult-fatten in just 365 days. What happens if a pair...
Sean Carroll
The Biggest Ideas in the Universe | 23. Criticality and Complexity Spherical cows are important because they let us abstract away all the complications of the real...
over a year ago
47
over a year ago
Spherical cows are important because they let us abstract away all the complications of the real world and think about underlying principles. But what about when the complications are the point? Then we enter the realm of complex systems — which, interestingly, has its own...
Asterisk
Is Cultivated Meat For Real? Cultivated meat faces a wall of scientific skepticism, but investors haven’t been deterred. A decade...
a year ago
6
a year ago
Cultivated meat faces a wall of scientific skepticism, but investors haven’t been deterred. A decade in, how close are we to seeing it on our plates?
Math Is Still...
How the Brain Protects Itself From Blood-Borne Threats To buffer the brain against menaces in the blood, a dynamic, multi-tiered system of protection is...
a year ago
32
a year ago
To buffer the brain against menaces in the blood, a dynamic, multi-tiered system of protection is built into the brain’s blood vessels. The post How the Brain Protects Itself From Blood-Borne Threats first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Works in...
Notes on Progress: An environmentalist gets lunch Why being an effective environmentalist can often feel like being a bad one
over a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Journalists Fail on UAP Story Nothing about the recent resurgence in interest in UFOs (now called UAPs for unidentified anomalous...
a year ago
12
a year ago
Nothing about the recent resurgence in interest in UFOs (now called UAPs for unidentified anomalous phenomena) is really new. It’s basically the same stories with the same level of completely unconvincing evidence. But what is somewhat new is the level of credulity and outright...
Math Is Still...
Computer Scientists Establish the Best Way to Traverse a Graph Dijkstra’s algorithm was long thought to be the most efficient way to find a graph’s best routes....
2 months ago
27
2 months ago
Dijkstra’s algorithm was long thought to be the most efficient way to find a graph’s best routes. Researchers have now proved that it’s “universally optimal.” The post Computer Scientists Establish the Best Way to Traverse a Graph first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
50 Years Later, We’re Still Living in the Xerox Alto’s World I’m sitting in front of a computer, looking at its graphical user interface with overlapping windows...
a year ago
11
a year ago
I’m sitting in front of a computer, looking at its graphical user interface with overlapping windows on a high-resolution screen. I interact with the computer by pointing and clicking with a mouse and typing on a keyboard. I’m using a word processor with the core features and...
Cremieux Recueil
Focusing on Healthcare’s Administrative Costs Is Misguided Substantial thinking about healthcare reform starts with acknowledging that administrative bloat...
a month ago
NeuroLogica Blog
AI Companions – Good or Bad? Often times the answer to a binary question is “yes”. Is artificial intelligence (AI) a powerful and...
5 months ago
54
5 months ago
Often times the answer to a binary question is “yes”. Is artificial intelligence (AI) a powerful and quickly advancing tool or is it overhyped? Yes. Are opiates useful medicines or dangerous drugs? Yes. Is Elon Musk a technological visionary or an eccentric opportunist? This is...
Math Is Still...
Unfolding the Mysteries of Polygonal Billiards The surprisingly subtle geometry of a familiar game shows how quickly math gets complicated. ...
10 months ago
34
10 months ago
The surprisingly subtle geometry of a familiar game shows how quickly math gets complicated. The post Unfolding the Mysteries of Polygonal Billiards first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Interaction Magic -...
Modelling my brain A 22 hour medical experiment breathing 12% oxygen, and the 7000 images of my brain that came out of...
over a year ago
8
over a year ago
A 22 hour medical experiment breathing 12% oxygen, and the 7000 images of my brain that came out of it.
NeuroLogica Blog
Tandem Perovskite Silicon Solar Panels Are Coming It’s pretty clear that we are at an inflection point with adoption of solar power. For the last 18...
a year ago
10
a year ago
It’s pretty clear that we are at an inflection point with adoption of solar power. For the last 18 years in a row, solar PV electricity capacity has increased more (as a percentage increase) than any power source. Solar now accounts for 4.5% of global power generation. Wind...
Wanderingspace
Triton Image from Voyager Colored Nice update to an old Voyager image with colors added based on actual colors captured in other...
over a year ago
21
over a year ago
Nice update to an old Voyager image with colors added based on actual colors captured in other images. See original post here by Jason Major.
Asterisk
Crash Testing GPT-4 Can we tell if an AI model is safe before it’s released? The group that tested GPT–4 is trying to...
a year ago
5
a year ago
Can we tell if an AI model is safe before it’s released? The group that tested GPT–4 is trying to figure out how.
Probably...
Standard deviation of a count This post is part of a new project with the working title Data Q&A: Answering the real questions...
9 months ago
54
9 months ago
This post is part of a new project with the working title Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. In each installment, I’ll take a question from Reddit’s statistics forum and answer it, using Python code to demonstrate. My answer is in a Jupyter notebook — see the...
IEEE Spectrum
The Forgotten History of Chinese Keyboards Today, typing in Chinese works by converting QWERTY keystrokes into Chinese characters via a...
7 months ago
74
7 months ago
Today, typing in Chinese works by converting QWERTY keystrokes into Chinese characters via a software interface, known as an input method editor. But this was not always the case. Thomas S. Mullaney’s new book, The Chinese Computer: A Global History of the Information Age,...
NeuroLogica Blog
Quiet Supersonic Aircraft Ready for Testing It was six years ago that I first wrote about NASA’s X-59 QueSST project, contracted to Lockheed...
a year ago
32
a year ago
It was six years ago that I first wrote about NASA’s X-59 QueSST project, contracted to Lockheed Martin. Now the plane has finally been built and is ready for testing. At the time it was reported that NASA “had a design” for a quiet supersonic jet, one that would not create a...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Silly little rules in healthcare | Out-Of-Pocket The industry is chock full of ‘em, here's 3
7 months ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Age of the Moon Revised There are a few interesting stories lurking in this news item, but lets start with the top level – a...
a year ago
13
a year ago
There are a few interesting stories lurking in this news item, but lets start with the top level – a new study revises the minimum age of the Moon to 4.46 billion years, 40 million years older than the previous estimate. That in itself is interesting, but not game-changing. It’s...
nanoscale views
Brief items - light-driven diamagnetism, nuclear recoil, spin transport in VO2 Real life continues to make itself felt in various ways this summer (and that's not even an allusion...
5 months ago
65
5 months ago
Real life continues to make itself felt in various ways this summer (and that's not even an allusion to political madness), but here are three papers (two from others and a self-indulgent plug for our work) you might find interesting. There has been a lot of work in recent...
Math Is Still...
What Makes Life Tick? Mitochondria May Keep Time for Cells Every species develops at its own unique tempo, leaving scientist to wonder what governed their...
a year ago
16
a year ago
Every species develops at its own unique tempo, leaving scientist to wonder what governed their timing. A suite of new findings suggests that cells use basic metabolic processes as clocks. The post What Makes Life Tick? Mitochondria May Keep Time for Cells first...
Andrew Fraknoi –...
Good Meteor Shower Coming August 11-12 The Perseid Meteor Shower is one of the best of the year for the untrained observer The post Good...
5 months ago
58
5 months ago
The Perseid Meteor Shower is one of the best of the year for the untrained observer The post Good Meteor Shower Coming August 11-12 appeared first on Andrew Fraknoi - Astronomy Lectures - Astronomy Education Resources.
Quantum Frontiers
Crossing the quantum chasm: From NISQ to fault tolerance On December 6, I gave a keynote address at the Q2B 2023 Conference in Silicon Valley. Here is a...
a year ago
27
a year ago
On December 6, I gave a keynote address at the Q2B 2023 Conference in Silicon Valley. Here is a transcript of my remarks. Toward quantum value The theme of this year’s Q2B meeting is “The Roadmap to Quantum Value.” I … Continue reading →
NeuroLogica Blog
Marmosets Call Each Other By Name Humans identify and call each other by specific names. So far this advanced cognitive behavior has...
4 months ago
42
4 months ago
Humans identify and call each other by specific names. So far this advanced cognitive behavior has only been identified in a few other species, dolphins, elephants, and some parrots. Interestingly, it has never been documented in our closest relatives, non-human primates – that...
NeuroLogica Blog
Indigenous Knowledge I recently received the following question to the SGU e-mail: “I have had several conversations with...
8 months ago
79
8 months ago
I recently received the following question to the SGU e-mail: “I have had several conversations with friends/colleagues lately regarding indigenous beliefs/stories. They assert that not believing these based on oral histories alone is morally wrong and ignoring a different...
brr
South Pole Signage Please close doors quietly!
a year ago
Blog - Practical...
The Most Confusing Part of the Power Grid [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In March of 1989, Earth...
7 months ago
80
7 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In March of 1989, Earth experienced one of its strongest geomagnetic storms in modern history. It all started when scientists observed a cluster of sunspots—active, magnetic areas on the sun's surface—emerging...
Interaction Magic -...
Units: the forgotten half of the statistic From the millihelen to the microcentury, via jerk, pirate-ninjas and the Mongolian vowel separator.
over a year ago
Math Is Still...
To Move Fast, Quantum Maze Solvers Must Forget the Past Quantum algorithms can find their way out of mazes exponentially faster than classical ones, at the...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Quantum algorithms can find their way out of mazes exponentially faster than classical ones, at the cost of forgetting the path they took. A new result suggests that the trade-off may be inevitable. The post To Move Fast, Quantum Maze Solvers Must Forget the Past...
pcloadletter
Surely dark UX doesn't work in the long run I was just feeling pretty good—I published my article about RSS and it's being pretty...
11 months ago
29
11 months ago
I was just feeling pretty good—I published my article about RSS and it's being pretty well-received. I decided a fitting way to celebrate was to head on over to Feedly and catch up on some reading! I clicked on an engineers blog feed to check out here latest couple posts. I...
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
Tikalon Blog Archive Tikalon Blog is now in archive mode. Here's a directory of links to easily printed and saved...
3 months ago
12
3 months ago
Tikalon Blog is now in archive mode. Here's a directory of links to easily printed and saved articles. If you're willing to wait a while for the download, a zip file of all the blog articles can be found at the link below. Note, however, that these articles are copyrighted and...
nanoscale views
APS March Meeting 2023, Day 3 There is vigorous discussion taking place on the Day 2 link regarding the highly controversial claim...
a year ago
16
a year ago
There is vigorous discussion taking place on the Day 2 link regarding the highly controversial claim of room temperature superconductivity.   Highlights from Wednesday are a hodgepodge because of my meanderings: The session about quantum computing hardware was well attended,...
Math Is Still...
Cells Across the Tree of Life Exchange ‘Text Messages’ Using RNA Cells across the tree of life can swap short-lived messages encoded by RNA — missives that resemble...
3 months ago
43
3 months ago
Cells across the tree of life can swap short-lived messages encoded by RNA — missives that resemble a quick text rather than a formal memo on letterhead. The post Cells Across the Tree of Life Exchange ‘Text Messages’ Using RNA first appeared on Quanta Magazine
ToughSF
Advanced Solar Energy in Space: Part I Solar Thermal Rockets can be efficient and have high performance. However, they remain...
over a year ago
8
over a year ago
Solar Thermal Rockets can be efficient and have high performance. However, they remain temperature-limited to an exhaust velocity of 12km/s. How do we surpass this limit? The limits NASA's Suntower concept. Solar Thermal Rockets have been shown to have great potential if...
NeuroLogica Blog
Latest Starship Launch SpaceX has conducted their most successful test launch of a Starship system to date. The system they...
2 months ago
34
2 months ago
SpaceX has conducted their most successful test launch of a Starship system to date. The system they tested has three basic components – the Super Heavy first stage rocket booster, the Starship second stage (which is the actual space ship that will go places), and the...
wadertales
Why count shorebirds? A tale from Portugal The Sado Estuary is one of Portugal’s most important wetlands – a key link in the chain of sites...
a year ago
27
a year ago
The Sado Estuary is one of Portugal’s most important wetlands – a key link in the chain of sites connecting Africa and the Arctic, on the East Atlantic Flyway. In a paper in Waterbirds, João Belo and colleagues analyse changes in numbers of waders wintering in this estuary over...
The Works in...
How to start an advance market commitment A practical guide from the founders of Frontier
7 months ago
symmetry magazine
Rap with an undercurrent of particle physics UK musician Consensus spins the big ideas of physics into rap and hip-hop tracks.
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Hopes of Big Bang Discoveries Ride on a Future Spacecraft Physicists and cosmologists will have a new probe of primordial processes when Europe launches the...
8 months ago
76
8 months ago
Physicists and cosmologists will have a new probe of primordial processes when Europe launches the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) next decade. The post Hopes of Big Bang Discoveries Ride on a Future Spacecraft first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Casey Handmer's blog
Why do we need a Department of Government Efficiency? President Trump’s recent sweeping electoral victory is a clear mandate for change. There is some...
a month ago
13
a month ago
President Trump’s recent sweeping electoral victory is a clear mandate for change. There is some urgency, and Trump has assembled the early stages of a team and coalition that can deliver it. It’s not exactly a mystery what Elon and Vivek plan for The Department of Government...
NeuroLogica Blog
Gradient Nanostructured Steel Science fiction writers, who have to think deeply about the possible nature of future technology,...
a year ago
12
a year ago
Science fiction writers, who have to think deeply about the possible nature of future technology, often invent new sci-fi materials in order to make their future technology seem plausible. They seem to understand the critical role that material science plays in advancing...
Beautiful Public...
Visualizing Rivers and Floodplains with USGS Data Using USGS elevation data to visualize stunning views of the flow of water through rivers and...
over a year ago
nanoscale views
APS March Meeting 2023, Day 2 I ended up spending more time catching up with people this afternoon than going to talks after my...
a year ago
26
a year ago
I ended up spending more time catching up with people this afternoon than going to talks after my session ended, but here are a couple of highlights: There was an invited session about the metal halide perovskites, and there were some interesting talks.  My faculty colleague...
Math Is Still...
What Can Tiling Patterns Teach Us? If you cover a surface with tiles, repetitive patterns always emerge — or do they? In this week’s...
6 months ago
40
6 months ago
If you cover a surface with tiles, repetitive patterns always emerge — or do they? In this week’s episode, mathematician Natalie Priebe Frank and co-host Janna Levin discuss how recent breakthroughs in tiling can unlock structural secrets in the natural world. The...
IEEE Spectrum
How the Designer of the First Hydrogen Bomb Got the Gig Richard Garwin is one of the most decorated and successful engineers of the 20th century. The IEEE...
4 months ago
49
4 months ago
Richard Garwin is one of the most decorated and successful engineers of the 20th century. The IEEE Life Fellow has won the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Science, France’s La Grande Médaille de l’Académie des Sciences, and is one of just a handful of people...
Drew Ex Machina
Star Way of Humanity: American Space Art During the COVID-19 shutdown three years ago, I spent a lot of my time at home digging through my...
a year ago
18
a year ago
During the COVID-19 shutdown three years ago, I spent a lot of my time at home digging through my archives discovering all sorts of items I […]
IEEE Spectrum
The Cheesy Charm of the Clapper “Clap on! Clap off! Clap on! Clap off! The Clapper!” This 1980s earworm of a jingle touted a gadget...
a year ago
89
a year ago
“Clap on! Clap off! Clap on! Clap off! The Clapper!” This 1980s earworm of a jingle touted a gadget to turn your lights, your TV, or any other electrical device on or off with the clap of your hands. If you watched any amount of American television back then, you probably saw the...
Asterisk
Beyond Staple Grains The Green Revolution saved a billion lives, but it left a legacy of homogenous diets and distorted...
a year ago
7
a year ago
The Green Revolution saved a billion lives, but it left a legacy of homogenous diets and distorted agricultural markets. What impact has this had on global health — and how can we move forward?
Math Is Still...
What Causes Giant Rogue Waves? Once dismissed as myths, monstrous rogue waves that tower over ships and appear without warning are...
a year ago
44
a year ago
Once dismissed as myths, monstrous rogue waves that tower over ships and appear without warning are real. Wave-science researcher Ton van den Bremer and Steven Strogatz discuss how rogue waves can form in relatively calm seas and whether their threat can be predicted. ...
Math Is Still...
What Is Quantum Teleportation? Teleporting people through space is still science fiction. But quantum teleportation is dramatically...
10 months ago
35
10 months ago
Teleporting people through space is still science fiction. But quantum teleportation is dramatically different and entirely real. In this episode, Janna Levin interviews the theoretical physicist John Preskill about teleporting bits and the promise of quantum technology. ...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
What's The Deal With Telemedicine? | Out-Of-Pocket we're in the weird in-between stage of adoption
a year ago
nanoscale views
A couple of links + a thought experiment about spin A couple of interesting things to read: As someone interested in lost ancient literature and also...
11 months ago
28
11 months ago
A couple of interesting things to read: As someone interested in lost ancient literature and also science, I really liked this news article from Nature about progress in reading scrolls excavated from Herculaneum.  The area around the Bay of Naples was a quite the spot for posh...
Quantum Frontiers
How I didn’t become a philosopher (but wound up presenting a named philosophy lecture anyway) Many people ask why I became a theoretical physicist. The answer runs through philosophy—which I...
9 months ago
102
9 months ago
Many people ask why I became a theoretical physicist. The answer runs through philosophy—which I thought, for years, I’d left behind in college. My formal relationship with philosophy originated with Mr. Bohrer. My high school classified him as a religion … Continue reading →
Math Is Still...
The Unraveling of Space-Time This special issue of Quanta Magazine explores the ultimate scientific quest: the search for the...
3 months ago
26
3 months ago
This special issue of Quanta Magazine explores the ultimate scientific quest: the search for the fundamental nature of reality. The post The Unraveling of Space-Time first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Asterisk
Read This, Not That: The Hidden Cost of Nutrition Misinformation Our daily lives are inundated with misleading claims about nutrition. That’s not just distracting —...
a year ago
7
a year ago
Our daily lives are inundated with misleading claims about nutrition. That’s not just distracting — it’s also harming our health.
Math Is Still...
The Electron Is So Round That It’s Ruling Out Potential New Particles If the electron’s charge wasn’t perfectly round, it could reveal the existence of hidden particles....
a year ago
58
a year ago
If the electron’s charge wasn’t perfectly round, it could reveal the existence of hidden particles. A new measurement approaches perfection. The post The Electron Is So Round That It’s Ruling Out Potential New Particles first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Cool Ideas For Dentistry + Medicine With Nisarg Patel | Out-Of-Pocket plus what actually happens in the operating room?
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
RFK Jr., Joe Rogan, and Vaccines RFK Jr., who is now running for the Democratic presidential nomination, is anti-vaccine. He will...
a year ago
26
a year ago
RFK Jr., who is now running for the Democratic presidential nomination, is anti-vaccine. He will vehemently deny this, but I don’t buy it for a second. He is simply playing the, “I’m not anti-vaccine, I am pro-safe vaccine” gambit, which is disingenuous and always has been. We...
nanoscale views
Materials labs of the future + cost The NSF Division of Materials Research has been soliciting input from the community about both the...
over a year ago
28
over a year ago
The NSF Division of Materials Research has been soliciting input from the community about both the biggest outstanding problems in condensed matter and materials science, and the future of materials labs - what kind of infrastructure, training, etc. will be needed to address...
Beautiful Public...
Mapping the Sea Floor USGS research vessels equipped with cameras, sonar and scanners created a map of 125 square miles of...
over a year ago
50
over a year ago
USGS research vessels equipped with cameras, sonar and scanners created a map of 125 square miles of the sea floor off Cape Ann, MA.
Uncharted...
10 Other Places Where Geniuses Hide Groups, networks, the Internet, IQ, state sponsorship, and many more
3 weeks ago
Explorations of an...
Argentina! Laura and I landed in Buenos Aires on the morning of January 9, a little bleary-eyed and feeling the...
a year ago
17
a year ago
Laura and I landed in Buenos Aires on the morning of January 9, a little bleary-eyed and feeling the effects from the three flights and two layovers. But we had made it. Nearly six years had passed since I last visited Buenos Aires. It had been the final port of call on my...
Sean Carroll
Proposed Closure of the Dianoia Institute at Australian Catholic University Just a few years ago, Australian Catholic University (ACU) established a new Dianoia Institute of...
a year ago
32
a year ago
Just a few years ago, Australian Catholic University (ACU) established a new Dianoia Institute of Philosophy. They recruited a number of researchers and made something of a splash, leading to a noticeable leap in ACU’s rankings in philosophy — all the way to second among Catholic...
Math Is Still...
Insects and Other Animals Have Consciousness, Experts Declare A group of prominent biologists and philosophers announced a new consensus: There’s “a realistic...
8 months ago
68
8 months ago
A group of prominent biologists and philosophers announced a new consensus: There’s “a realistic possibility” that insects, octopuses, crustaceans, fish and other overlooked animals experience consciousness. The post Insects and Other Animals Have Consciousness,...
The Roots of...
Why no Roman Industrial Revolution? Why didn’t the Roman Empire have an industrial revolution? Bret Devereaux has an essay addressing...
a year ago
12
a year ago
Why didn’t the Roman Empire have an industrial revolution? Bret Devereaux has an essay addressing that question, which multiple people have pointed me to at various times. In brief, Devereaux says that Britain industrialized through a very specific path, involving coal mines,...
Explorations of an...
Borneo: Quest for the Bornean Peacock-Pheasant October 19, 2024 Laura and I were up dark and early from our accommodations in Ranau. I filled my...
2 weeks ago
9
2 weeks ago
October 19, 2024 Laura and I were up dark and early from our accommodations in Ranau. I filled my thermos with coffee, we quickly packed (though not quietly, as every dog in the neighbourhood began barking), and we headed eastwards to the town of Telupid where we had a very...
ToughSF
The Lofstrom Loop: A Bridge to Space Imagine you could take a train ride to space. Tracks that slope up into the sky, higher and higher,...
a year ago
62
a year ago
Imagine you could take a train ride to space. Tracks that slope up into the sky, higher and higher, until you reach a plateau above the planet where it’s a straight line up to orbital velocity. That’s what’s possible with a Lofstrom Loop. But sending you into orbit is just one...