Lifeboat Foundation

SpaceX has confirmed that the two large propellant tanks now present at its Boca Chica, Texas facilities will likely to be the last major ground tanks needed to enable the first test flights of the upper stage of its next-gen BFR rocket, known as the Big Falcon Spaceship (BFS).

Expected to begin as soon as late 2019, SpaceX executives have recently reiterated plans for a campaign of hop tests for the first full-scale spaceship prototype, in which the ship will follow in the footsteps of its Falcon 9-based Grasshopper and F9R predecessors.

Continue reading “SpaceX confirms initial BFR spaceship flight tests will occur in South Texas” »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgn7mZODnag

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In the last video in this series we discussed the ancient origins of artificial intelligence progressing forward to the beginnings of the development of modern computing based artificial intelligence, encompassing the philosophies, theories and inventions of many talented individuals and groups.

Continue reading “The Birth of Artificial Intelligence” »

Memes are not just learned, they run deeper than that, they are part of our shared experience as human beings. This is how we communicate to each other through spoken, written, and body language; this is how we participate in customs, rituals and cultural traditions. Indeed, human civilization has always been a “cultured” virtual reality. We don’t often think of cultures as virtual realities, but there is no more apt descriptor for our widely diverse sociology and interpretations than the metaphor of the “virtual reality.” In truth, the virtual reality metaphor encompasses the entire human enterprise. We should realize that all our ideologies and religions, our belief systems and models of reality are our own personal operating systems — real to us but wry to someone else — each of us lives in a seemingly shared but simultaneously private virtual world.

By Alex Vikoulov.

Continue reading “Technology and Culture: Our Accelerating Epigenetic Factor Driven Evolution” »

Exposure to toxic air both indoors and out kills some 600,000 children under the age of 15 each year, the World Health Organization warned Monday.

Data from the UN health body shows that every day, 93 percent of children under the age of 15—a full 1.8 billion youngsters, including 630 million under the age of five—breath dangerously polluted air.

This has tragic consequences: In 2016 alone, some 600,000 children died from acute lower respiratory infections caused by polluted air, the WHO report found.

Nuclear engine (aka YaEDU):

A key component of Russia’s future nuclear space propulsion system, which may revolutionize long-range exploration of the solar system, has been successfully tested, RIA Novosti reported.

Continue reading “Russia ‘tests’ key piece of nuclear space engine to revolutionize long-range missions” »

China’s aerospace industry has traditionally been the domain of state-owned institutes and enterprises, but a huge amount of investment has poured into the private sector since 2015 when Beijing announced a national strategy to integrate military and civilian businesses.

Landspace Tech’s ZQ-1 took off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre at 4pm on Saturday carrying a small satellite for state broadcaster CCTVMission failed due to problem with rocket’s third stage, company says.

The study, which appears in the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, suggests that the inability to detect false information is related to a failure to be actively open-minded.

New research provides evidence that delusion-prone individuals, dogmatic individuals, and religious fundamentalists are more likely to believe fake news. The study, which appears in the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, suggests that the inability to detect false information is related to a failure to be actively open-minded.

The rise of online social media has led to growing concerns about the spread of unsubstantiated rumors, misleading political propaganda, and blatantly false articles designed to create viral web traffic. Even the U.S. Army has become involved in efforts to understand and combat disinformation in cyberspace.

Continue reading “Study: Religious fundamentalists and dogmatic individuals are more likely to believe fake news” »

A factory where robots make robots is surely the stuff of nightmares for those living in fear of the dreaded uprising. But putting apocalyptic horrors aside for a moment, ABB’s new site could be one of the most advanced facilities of its kind when it opens in 2020 with plans to make 100,000 robots a year.

Broadband fiber-optics carry information on pulses of light, at the speed of light, through optical fibers. But the way the light is encoded at one end and processed at the other affects data speeds.