Science & TechnologyS


R2-D2

Elon Musk and other tech leaders pledge to never build killer robots


RT
Wed, 18 Jul 2018 18:41 UTC
killer robot
© Donald Iain Smith / Getty Images
Elon Musk and other tech leaders have pledged never to build killer robots, possibly halting the chances of a future a Skynet-type disaster. This is the first time AI bigwigs have pledged not to develop lethal autonomous weapons.

Musk, the three co-founders of Google's AI subsidiary DeepMind, Skype founder Jaan Tallinn, and other giants of the tech industry signed the pledge, published Wednesday at the 2018 International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Stockholm. The agreement was coordinated by the Future of Life Institute (FLI), a Boston-based organization that supports research and initiatives to safeguard life, particularly the risk faced by advanced artificial intelligence.

The letter warns that, with AI "poised to play an increasing role in military systems," citizens and lawmakers urgently need to "distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable uses of AI."
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Fire

Deep subterranean connection discovered between two active Japanese volcanoes


PhysOrg
Sat, 14 Jul 2018 15:27 UTC
japan volcano underground connection
© NASASouthern Japan on Feb. 3rd, 2011, showing the active cones of Kirishima (Shinmoedake) and Aira caldera (Sakurajima) volcanoes. While Kirishima is erupting very strongly, Aira's activity is relatively low.
Scientists have confirmed for the first time that radical changes of one volcano in southern Japan was the direct result of an erupting volcano 22 kilometers (13.7 miles) away. The observations from the two volcanos - Aira caldera and Kirishima - show that the two were connected through a common subterranean magma source in the months leading up to the 2011 eruption of Kirishima.

The Japanese cities of Kirishima and Kagoshima lie directly on the border of the Aira caldera, one of the most active, hazardous, and closely monitored volcanoes in southern Japan. Identifying how volcanoes interact is critical to determine if and how an eruption can influence the activity of a distant volcano or raise the threat of a new strong explosive event.
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Muffin

Does the discovery of 14,000-year-old toast debunk the Paleo diet?

George Dvorsky
Gizmodo
Mon, 16 Jul 2018 15:00 UTC
Shubayqa 1 site
© Alexis PantosOne of the stone structures of the Shubayqa 1 site where the ancient bread was found.
Archaeologists have uncovered the earliest evidence of bread-making at a site in northeastern Jordan. Dating back some 14,400 years, the discovery shows that ancient hunter-gatherers were making and eating bread 4,000 years before the Neolithic era and the introduction of agriculture. So much for the "Paleo Diet" actually being a thing.

Bread-making predates agriculture, according to a new study published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. That's quite the revelation, given the conventional thinking that bread only appeared after the advent of farming. The discovery means that ancient hunter-gatherers were using the wild ancestors of domesticated cereals, such as wild einkorn and club-rush tubers, to make flatbread-like food products. What's more, the new paper shows that bread had already become an established food staple prior to the Neolithic period and the Agricultural Revolution.

Comment: It's too bad the author had to take what is an interesting discovery using a new archaeological technique to try and push an agenda in "debunking" the Paleo diet (he even throws in a plug for the Heart and Stroke Foundation promoting government mandated eating regimes. Experts indeed). The discovery that people were eating bread 14,000 years ago doesn't debunk the Paleo diet (although it may provide an argument for it being misnamed). The Paleo diet is based on evidence that eschewing neolithic foods improves health and it's speculated that it does this due to their relatively new introduction to the human diet. Evidence that bread was added to the diet (slightly) earlier than previously thought does nothing to diminish the fact that the diet works.

See also:

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Recycle

Oxygen levels on early Earth rose and fell several times before "Great Oxidation Event"


Geology Page
Tue, 10 Jul 2018 12:00 UTC
Western Australia
© Roger Buick / University of WashingtonThe Jeerinah Formation in Western Australia, where a UW-led team found a sudden shift in nitrogen isotopes. “Nitrogen isotopes tell a story about oxygenation of the surface ocean, and this oxygenation spans hundreds of kilometers across a marine basin and lasts for somewhere less than 50 million years,” said lead author Matt Koehler.
Earth's oxygen levels rose and fell more than once hundreds of millions of years before the planetwide success of the Great Oxidation Event about 2.4 billion years ago, new research from the University of Washington shows.

The evidence comes from a new study that indicates a second and much earlier "whiff" of oxygen in Earth's distant past - in the atmosphere and on the surface of a large stretch of ocean - showing that the oxygenation of the Earth was a complex process of repeated trying and failing over a vast stretch of time.

The finding also may have implications in the search for life beyond Earth. Coming years will bring powerful new ground- and space-based telescopes able to analyze the atmospheres of distant planets. This work could help keep astronomers from unduly ruling out "false negatives," or inhabited planets that may not at first appear to be so due to undetectable oxygen levels.

Comment: Analysis of earth's history by mainstream science is seriously distorted by their unwillingness to accept that our planet has undergone cataclysmic changes in the recent past which, if taken into account, could dramatically change their reading of the data. What this does seem to confirm is the many naturally occurring shifts to the make-up of our planet and perhaps how well life adapts:

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Beaker

Bioethics council approves genetically-edited embryos


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 19:27 UTC
sleeping baby
© G. Lenz/ Global Look Press
Genetically modifying an embryo's DNA to prevent heritable diseases could be "ethically acceptable", a landmark report has claimed. Critics, however, say it would pave the way for 'designer babies'.

The Nuffield Council of Bioethics, an independent charitable body investigating the ethics of certain biological and medical developments, said in a report that while it does not support overhauling current legislation so that embryo gene editing can be carried out, it does not mean the UK should fall short of doing so in the future.

"Whilst there is still uncertainty over the sorts of things genome editing might be able to achieve, or how widely its use might spread, we have concluded that the potential use of genome editing to influence the characteristics of future generations is not unacceptable in itself," said Karen Yeung, a professor of law, ethics and informatics at Britain's Birmingham University, who chaired the panel.

Comment: With the CRISPR gene editing tools available, don't be surprised if the result is cancer babies.

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Gem

Soundwaves reveal over a quadrillion tons of diamonds miles beneath the Earth's surface


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 19:22 UTC
heart diamond
© Nir Elias / Reuters
There are over a quadrillion tons of diamonds waiting to be found - the only problem is that they're 160km beneath the Earth's surface, according to researchers, who used soundwaves to reveal the massive precious stone deposit.

The incredible discovery was made by scientists at MIT, Harvard and the University of California at Berkeley after they analyzed seismic records.

"Diamond in many ways is special," Dr. Ulrich Faul, a research scientist at MIT, said. "One of its special properties is that the sound velocity in diamond is more than twice as fast as in the dominant mineral in upper mantle rocks, olivine."

The team found that sound was moving much faster than expected within sections of rock known as cratonic roots. According to the study, up to two percent of these roots may be composed of diamond - meaning there could be a whopping quadrillion tons (a staggering 15 zeroes) of diamonds scattered below our planet's surface.
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Beaker

Curtains for CRISPR? New study says DNA-editing technology can cause cancer


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 18:59 UTC
gene editing
© Handout / Reuters
Researchers have raised alarm over the king of genome-editing tools, CRISPR, after major DNA deletions were detected during the gene-editing process, suggesting the risk of genetic damage is much greater than previously thought.

CRISPR/Cas9 is one of the newest genome-editing tools and is considered very powerful. It can alter sections of DNA in cells by cutting at specific points and introducing changes at that location.

While the tool is already extensively used in scientific research, it is also poised to become the gene editor of choice in clinical contexts with potential for treating diseases such as HIV, cancer or sickle cell disease.

However, this new study, carried out at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK, suggests the technique is not as safe as previously thought and could lead to dangerous changes in some cells and, potentially, even cause cancer.

Comment: See also:

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Pi

Chinese team sets new 'quantum entaglement' record


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 17:19 UTC
quantum computer
© Alfred Pasieka / Science Photo Library / Getty ImagesConceptual artwork representing how data may be controlled and stored in a quantum computer
A new 'quantum entanglement' record has been set which could see computing speeds ratcheted up. Chinese scientists successfully interwove 18 qubits - the most basic unit of quantum computing - into just six connected photons.

"It's as if you took six bits of the computer, but each of them tripled in the amount of information it could contain and can do it quite quickly and efficiently," quantum physicist Sydney Schreppler from the University of California explained.

In theory, the ability to pack in an unprecedented three qubits per photon will allow quantum computers to perform a wide range of calculations that are simply not possible with conventional computers. However, we won't know the full potential of the leap for some time as quantum computing is still in the early stages of development.
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Jupiter

Astronomers discover 12 new moons orbiting Jupiter


RT
Tue, 17 Jul 2018 17:13 UTC
jupiter moon
© NASA
Astronomers have discovered a dozen new moons orbiting Jupiter, but one could spell disaster for the others - 1km-wide "oddball" moving in the opposite direction to the other 78 objects circling the gas giant.

A team led by Scott S. Sheppard from Washington DC's Carnegie Institution for Science first spotted the moons in 2017 while on the hunt for a possible massive planet beyond Pluto. Sheppard's discovery brought the total number of objects orbiting Jupiter to 79 - but he said one discovery stood out in particular.

"Our other discovery is a real oddball and has an orbit like no other known Jovian moon," Sheppard explained. "It's also likely Jupiter's smallest-known moon, being less than 1km (0.6 of a mile) in diameter."
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Comet 2

Comet: C/2018 N2 (ASASSN)

Ernesto Guido
Remanzacco Blogspot
Mon, 16 Jul 2018 18:42 UTC
MPEC 2018-O01, issued on 2018, July 16, announces the discovery of a comet (magnitude ~16.1) in the course of the "All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae" (ASASSN) program, in images taken 2018 July 7-11 with the 14-cm "Cassius" survey telescope at Cerro Tololo. The new comet has been designated C/2018 N2 (ASASSN).

I performed follow-up measurements of this object, while it was still on the PCCP webpage. Stacking of 10 unfiltered exposures, 60 seconds each, obtained remotely on 2018, July 15.7 from Q62 (iTelescope network) through a 0.43-m f/6.8 astrograph + CCD, shows that this object is a comet with a diffuse coma about 15 arcsec in diameter.

My confirmation image (click on it for a bigger version)
Comnet C/2018 NZ
© Remanzacco Blogspot
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