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Also, See Our Technology News Archives from 2004 | 2005
12/28/2005 Technology. Superconductor
Check out this video of a superconductor experiment. What makes this super conducting magnet both attract and repel? Strange.
12/19/2005 Technology Electronic paper, soon at a supermarket near you.
"The cereal aisle at your local supermarket may soon resemble the Las Vegas strip. Electronics maker Siemens is readying a paper-thin electronic-display technology so cheap it could replace conventional labels on disposable packaging, from milk cartons to boxes of Cheerios. In less than two years, Siemens says, the technology could transform consumer-goods packaging from the fixed, ink-printed images of today to a digital medium of flashing graphics and text that displays prices, special offers or alluring photos, all blinking on miniature flat screens." - wired
"They are also dirt cheap, the company says: The price tag of the display shown here would be about 30 cents."
12/15/2005 Technology / Biology / Mind. Researchers seek brain wave access to bank accounts and homes
"Try to think of nothing, try to think of nothing, try to... ""A user would simply think their password," said [ Julie Thorpe, a researcher at Carleton University in Ottawa ], who hopes to develop the first
biometric security device to read your mind to authenticate users.
... "You could use a sound or music or childhood memory as your pass. You could even flash someone an image to help them remember their passthought," she said. Thorpe must still prove that people can reproduce clear, concise signals over and over.
"Often, unconscious thoughts, maybe a song in the back of your mind, may blur a signal. There's a lot going on in people's heads," she said." - physorg
12/6/2005 Technology / Gadgets. Camera Traps.
Here is some camera trap info. My favorite camera trap picture so far is this one. Imagine checking a trap in your back yard and finding this photo.
Here is a complete system with a USB digital camera for $300. Any cheaper one? Email me if so. Perhaps someone could make a camera trap with an $11 digital one-use camera which has been hacked so you can re-use it, and a $13 motion activated nightlight. If I had the time, I'd see if I could do it for under $25. Or just spend $200, save some time and get this.
11/30/2005 Technology / Biology. Bionic hand project progresses
"A highly dexterous, bio-inspired artificial hand and sensory system that could provide patients with active feeling, is being developed by a European project. he CYBERHAND project aims to hard wire this hand into the nervous system, allowing sensory feedback from the hand to reach the brain, and instructions to come from the brain to control the hand, at least in part. Coordinated by Professor Paolo Dario with Professor Maria Chiara Carrozza leading the development of the hand, the project united researchers from Germany, Spain, Italy and Denmark. So far, the project is racking up an impressive list of achievements. It has a complete, fully sensitised five-fingered hand. The CYBERHAND prototype has 16 Degrees of Freedom (DoFs) made possible by the work of six tiny motors." - physorg
11/29/2005 Technology. Scientists drill 'smallest holes'
"Scientists at Cardiff University ... have used [precision machinery] to make holes in stainless steel that were "narrower than a human hair". The technique could have "major benefits" for medical and electronic engineering, the university claimed. .. The holes made by the scientists are as small as 22 microns (0.022mm). A human hair is between 80 microns (0.08 mm) and 50 microns (0.05mm) in thickness."
11/27/2005 Technology. Audio company makes car that jumps obstacles.
"A childlike grin spreads across 76-year-old Amar Bose's face as the vehicle does something
most can't: jump over the board, like a cat bounding over a fallen log. The sedan's experimental, Bose-designed suspension, driven by four electromagnetic motors, had quickly pulled each wheel up, then down." - msnbc
11/7-8/2005 Technology. Doors working again. Mystery signal blocking Ottawa door devices
"The world's biggest garage door manufacturer, the Chamberlain group, took the problem seriously enough to fly design engineer Rob Keller to Ottawa from its Chicago headquarters, with machinery to try to track the signal. But by the time he got here, the signal was gone. ... And people, such as Judy Dougherty, suddenly found their doors, which had been jamming for 10 days, were working just fine Thursday. " - cbc
--- Previously..."Many automatic garage doors in Ottawa have suddenly, and strangely, stopped working, due to a powerful radio signal that appears to be interfering with the remote controls that open them. ... the phenomenon began last weekend. "It affects a 25-mile radius. That's huge," said Cleroux. Angolan Ambassador Miguel Puna's operation is one of those affected
by the problem. He can no longer open his embassy's electronic gate. "Not only in this gate, but even other gates, we are having a lot of problems," said Puna. "This could cause security concerns."
Two companies that have plotted the reported problems on maps say they appear to cluster in the Byward Market area just east of Parliament Hill, and a corridor leading southeast from there. ... The signal is transmitted on the 390-megahertz band, which is used by virtually all garage door openers on the continent. That's the same frequency used by the U.S. military's new state-of-the-art Land Mobile Radio System.
Cleroux said operators have already been warned of this phenomenon by service updates from U.S. manufacturers, who started seeing the same problem around military bases last summer. The strong radio signals on the 390-megahertz band simply overpower the garage door openers. One technician likened it to a whisper competing with a yell.
"From what we hear, it is the American Embassy that's operating on 390, and they're the only ones who can block it. But I'm not 100 per cent sure, because we're all kind of up in the air until we know exactly what's going on," said Cleroux. The U.S. Embassy denies any transmissions on that frequency. So does the Canadian military". - cbc
10/29/2005 Technology. World's most powerful non-secret computer: 131,072 processors.
"The Blue Gene/L supercomputer has broken its own record to achieve more than double the number of calculations it can do a second. It reached 280.6 teraflops - that is 280.6 trillion calculations a second. ... Each person in the world with a handheld calculator would still take decades to do the same calculations Blue Gene is now able to do every second. " - bbc
Are there secret underground computers (perhaps working quantum computers) even faster than this? According to Hans Morvec the probable processing power of the human brain is around 100 teraflops or roughly 100 trillion calculations per second. Of course our brains are quite busy doing many different things at once, keeping our balance, breathing, etc. It seems the massive IBM supercomputer has now surpassed the computational power of a single human brain. Cool.
So, why not model an entire brain in one of these computers? There is such a project:
What science nerd kid hasn't dreamed of transferring his brain into a computer? Will this artificial brain become "conscious" in any sense? AI indeed.Mission to build a simulated brain begins:
"An effort to create the first computer simulation of the entire human brain, right down to the molecular level, was launched [ June 2005]. The “Blue Brain” project, a collaboration between IBM and a Swiss university team, will involve building a custom-made supercomputer based on IBM's Blue Gene design. ... For over a decade Markram and his colleagues have been building a database of the neural architecture of the neocortex, the largest and most complex part of mammalian brains. ... The end product, which will take at least a decade to achieve, can then be stimulated and observed to see how different parts of the brain behave." - newscientist
10/27/2005 Technology / Freedom / Paranoia. All US Passports to become little radios.
"American Passports will be fitted with Radio Frequency Identification Chips (RFID) from next year that will hold a digital photo of the passport's owner along with other information currently printed in passports. The US Government is planning to introduce the new passports to anyone who applies for a new one from October 2006 with older passports coming up for renewal after this date automatically getting an electronic version. ...
Technology experts have said that the data on the chips, which will be read at a short distance by electronic devices in a passport-control booth, could be electronically intercepted and potentially misused. ... Some privacy groups fear that the chips could be a prelude to tracking individuals' movements."
Next step: a law (possibly due to some "national emergency") requiring each citizen to always carry his/her passport. All citizens tracked at all times ... within the range limitations of RFID technology. Cell phone users may already be tracked.
"high-frequency devices can work at distances up to 250 feet and at relative speeds greater than 150 miles per hour." - aimglobal
"...in the extreme case some readers have a maximum power output (4 W ) that could be received from tens of kilometres away."
Note: 10 to 30 kilometers is 6 to 18 miles away. In other words, nearly eveyone might be close enough to several towers to allow triangulation so each passport becomes a point on a map.
10/26/2005 Technology / Biology. A remote control that controls humans
Control freaks of the world, start drooling.
Headset sends electricity through head, forcing wearer to move.
Prepare to be remotely controlled. I was. Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp., Japans top telephone company, says it is developing the technology to perhaps make video games more realistic.
But more sinister applications also come to mind.
I can envision it being added to militaries' arsenals of so-called "non-lethal" weapons.
A special headset was placed on my cranium by my hosts during a recent demonstration at an NTT research center. It sent a very low voltage electric current from the back of my ears through my head _ either from left to right or right to left, depending on which way the joystick on a remote-control was moved.
I found the experience unnerving and exhausting: I sought to step straight ahead but kept careening from side to side. Those alternating currents literally threw me off. The technology is called galvanic vestibular stimulation — essentially, electricity messes with the delicate nerves inside the ear that help maintain balance.
I felt a mysterious, irresistible urge to start walking to the right whenever the researcher turned the switch to the right. I was convinced — mistakenly — that this was the only way to maintain my balance. The phenomenon is painless but dramatic. Your feet start to move before you know it. I could even remote-control myself by taking the switch into my own hands.
There's no proven-beyond-a-doubt explanation yet as to why people start veering when electricity hits their ear. But NTT researchers say they were able to make a person walk along a route in the shape of a giant pretzel using this technique. It's a mesmerizing sensation similar to being drunk or melting into sleep under the influence of anesthesia. But it's more definitive, as though an invisible hand were reaching inside your brain. ...
... Indeed, a small defense contractor in Texas, Invocon Inc., is exploring whether precisely tuned electromagnetic pulses could be safely fired into people's ears to temporarily subdue them. " - more msnbc
10/25/2005 Technology. Transparent Aluminum. Military: New Aluminum Windows Stop .50-Caliber Bullet
"A new type of transparent armor made of aluminum could one day replace glass in military
vehicles. It performs better than the multilayered glass products currently in use, and its about half the weight. It is virtually scratch-resistant. "The substance itself is light-years ahead of glass," said 1st Lt. Joseph La Monica, who heads the research. Glass is still used in the new process, being sandwhiched between an outer layer of the polished aluminum oxynitride and a polymer backing. ... In a test this summer, the product held up to a .50-caliber sniper's rifle with amor-piercing bullets. Traditional glass armor did not survive the test. ... Officials hope the product will prove even more useful when considering more severe threats, such as explosives.
10/21/2005 Technology / Privacy. Secret codes in some color laser printers
This is interesting. Seems to be a way to catch people who try to use laser printers to make copies of cash.
"We've found that the dots from at least one line of printers encode the date and time your document was printed, as well as the serial number of the printer," said EFF Staff Technologist Seth David Schoen . The serial number of the printer could be used to track the customer who bought it. The code is a series of dots printed onto the pages. The dots are yellow and less than one millimeter in diameter but can be seen on the pages. ... If you want to check out how to read the dots yourself, there is a very interesting article provided by the EFF. You can view that by clicking here. - afterdawn
10/18/2005 Technology / Art . Is your computer monitor big enough?
9/21/2005 Archaeology / Technology. Italian Uses Google to Unearth Roman Remains
"An Italian computer programmer has discovered the remains of an ancient Roman villa not on an archaeological dig but by studying satellite images on the internet.
"At first I thought it was a stain on the photograph but when I zoomed in I saw that there was something under the earth," he said.
... Curious, Mr Mori made contact via the internet with archaeologists. They then surmised that the curved shape was likely to be the course of an ancient river and that the rectangular lines marked a buried structure that was most likely to be of human origin. Mr Mori contacted the National Archaeological Museum of Parma, which sent archaeologists with him to visit the area, now farmland covered with maize.
"At first they thought the site might be Bronze Age but a closer inspection turned up ceramic and stone pieces that showed it was a Roman villa built some time just before the birth of Christ" he said." - telegraph
9/16/2005 Technology / Fringe Science. Have compressed air? Get free hot and cold.
"How can you get cold air and hot air from one compressed-air stream? Lots of people have tried to explain it, including the French physicist who invented the Vortex Tube in the 1930's, Georges Ranque. Many different theories have been put forward. ...
Vortex Tubes behave in a very predictable and controllable way. When compressed air is released into the tube through the vortex generator, you get hot air out of one end of the tube and cold air out the other. A small valve in the hot end, adjustable with the handy control knob, lets you adjust the volume and temperature of air released from the cold end.
The vortex generator—an interchangeable, stationary part—regulates the volume of compressed air, allowing you to alter the air flows and temperature ranges you can produce with the tube." -airtx
Though it seems magical, this device does not violate the priciples of thermodyamics. Read Tim Cockerill's thesis. It does not separate already hot from already cold molecules (Maxwell's demon). Rather, the spiral movement creates a temperature gradient where the inside is cool and the outside hot. Unfortunately the energy you get out is about 1/12th the energy needed to compress the air in the first place.
Still, if you already have compressed air, free heating and cooling might be nice!(power out)/(power needed to compress inlet air) = 0.08
(power needed to compress inlet air) * 0.08 = (power out)
Eg. 100 Watts * 0.08 = 8 Watts out usable energy from resulting hot and cold air.
9/9/2005 Technology. Check out Google Earth
Google Earth is great fun! I'm flying all over the place. What the heck is that stuff I found in Massachusetts? Some kind of bizarre swamp stuff? Zooming in on cities is a blast. I typed in "Dick Cheney" as a city and it took me somewhere. It also went somewhere when I typed "acid reflux" and "jim kirk", but a made up name, "jim spondubious" returned no results. Hmm.
9/8/2005 Technology What they can see at my house right now...
Amazing. From aerial photos at globexplorer you can see if someone is out by my pool ... and even if someone is home in places with assigned parking. One assumes the military has even better resolution and with pattern recognition software can track where most people are most of the time. Right? Go look yourself up. Also check the disaster images. It is a bit slow, but seriously, get down with this thing. After a while you are really exploring... feels like flying!
8/27/2005 Technology. Human Performance Enhancement. Scale tall buildings, etc.
"A DEVICE that allows people to scale tall buildings in if not a single, then at least two bounds, has been developed for the US military.
The PowerQuick personal lifting device can raise or lower a load of up to 145 kilograms at the rate of one metre per second, enabling special forces, rescue services or even
construction workers to quickly ascend or escape buildings.
New Scientist magazine said the operator would shoot a rope attached to a grappling hook to the top of the building and then attach the rope to a harness-like device which hauls them up. It said one battery charge would be sufficient to climb 250 metres - the equivalent of five times the height of the Statue of Liberty.
Quoin International, the Nevada-based company that developed the device for the Pentagon's Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, said on its website the solid fuel military version was designed for hostage rescue and urban warfare. However, the battery-powered civilian version had been designed with commercial applications such as building repair, logging or window washing in mind." - news.com
"Quoins PowerQuick® Powered Ascender, developed under a Defense Advanced Research Projects (DARPA) Small Business Innovative Research program is designed to safely and easily lift a person to upper levels by simply attaching the unit to a line and flipping the thumb-switch up or down." - quointech
In the movie Spiderman, Norman Osbourne runs OsCorp, a weapons company. He steals the company's military performance enhancement suit and becomes the Green Goblin, carrying out evil acts. You thought such a company and a suit was fantasy? Read about Quointech's Turbo Impulse Robotics Actuator program:
"... performance goals require actuators that are able to provide short bursts of high power for running, jumping, throwing, lifting extra heavy objects, etc. as well as sustained power for walking and normal load-bearing field activity. "
8/12/2005 Cryptography. Messages of fear in hi-tech invisible ink.
"In 2003 the CIA falsely believed al-Qaida was sending signals to terror cells through TV. ... a megapixel-sized image could carry a secret message of 50,000 words. ... in June when US officials talked to NBC News. During the interview, the officials told how technicians at the CIA's directorate of science and technology believed they had found numbers embedded in al-Jazeera's news strip that corresponded with a hotch-potch of targets. There were dates and flight numbers, coordinates for high-profile sites such as the White House, as well as information apparently pointing to the small town of Tappahannock, Virginia. ... NBC News broke the story that the CIA's intelligence was unreliable ... somebody could be fooled ... if they didn't understand the nature of steganography". - more
Was the CIA finding false postives (like the "Bible codes") in random data by setting search criteria wrong? I bet they have some awesome computers and software, but you still have to watch for bias in experimental design. They know that, of course.
7/11/2005 Technology / Fringe Science. NASA Looks Ahead to Anti-Matter Drive
"This year NASA's Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) has selected a dozen new-fangled ideas that could lead to revolutionary changes in the way we explore the near and far solar
system. ... Need light? Mix a positron and an electron then irradiate a gas to incandescence. Need electricity? Mix another pair and irradiate a metal strip. Need thrust? Shoot those gamma rays into a propellant, heat it to outlandishly high temperatures and push the propellant out the back of the rocket. Or, shoot those gamma rays into tungsten plates in a stream of air, heat that air and jettison it out the back of an aircraft.
... And what does this mean in terms of propulsion? "Less weight, far, far, far less weight." ... the 3100 kgs of chemical propellant burdening the original 1997 probe could be reduced to a mere 310 micrograms of electrons and positrons - less matter than that found in a single atomized drop of morning mist.
... Our long-range goals are five quad-trillion positrons per second. At this rate we could fuel up for our first positron-fueled flight into space in a matter of hours." "
6/29/2005 Technology. (bbc). Google Earth, A 3D Interface to the Planet. A Must for Mapping Enthusiasts. It will be free to download here (Temporarily Delayed).
6/13/2005 Technology / Neat Inventions. Cheap Home Made Air Conditioning.
I may try it for kicks. Looks easy. You still have to pay for electricity to run the fan. Next we need a mechanical way to power the fan.I'm a student, with limited funds and a cheap house without air conditioning. To avoid dying this summer, I've built a primitive air conditioner. It's a basic heat pump, using water as the
medium.
You'll probably need to fiddle a bit with the dimensions of the supplies based on your resources and preferences. Materials: Salvage from around the house a: large fan, garbage can. Grab from Home Depot:
- 25 feet of 1/8 inch outer diameter (OD) copper tubing (~ $14)
- 20 feet of 1/8 inch inner diameter (ID) vinyl tubing (~ $6)
- a package of zipties (~ $3)
- 2 small hose clamps (~ $1)
Here's the basic setup. The garbage can is filled with ice water, which is then fed by gravity (a siphon) through the copper tubing coiled along the back of the fan.
The hot air passing through the tubing warms the cold water, cooling the air.
Waste warm water is then pumped outside. The system will cool an average room to a comfortable level in approximately 15-20 minutes.
Depending on flow rate, a full bucket of water will last approximately 1-3 hours. It doesn't rip quite as hard as central air, but for less than $30 CAD I'm not complaining.
6/3/2005 Technology Blue Gene supercomputer to be used to map a part of a brain
Hans Morvec, principal research scientist at the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University said the processing power of the human brain is about 100 terraflops. When you think of mapping the brain at the cellular level, keep in mind that all brains start out randomly wired and connections are lost and strengthened depending upon the individual's experiences. Every brain's wiring is, therefore, unique. Will it eventually be possible to take a snapshot of a specific brain and reproduce the wiring in a computer model? Will this create a duplicate of the person's thoughts? Could you ask the copy questions and get the same answers as from the original person?"... The scale of the project shows just how powerful our brains are. It will take an IBM eServer Blue Gene supercomputer containing more than 8,000 processors housed in four racks ( 22.8 trillion operations per second, or teraflops ) to model the behavior of something less than a billionth its size: a neocortical column is a cylindrical element roughly 0.5 millimeters in diameter and 2 mm long. A rat's brain contains 10,000 of them -- and the human brain around a million, according to Henry Markram, director of the Brain and Mind Institute at EPFL. " - computerworld
6/7/2005 Technology. Breathe Underwater without Air Tanks... but you'll still need batteries.
"If everything goes according to plan, in a few years the new tankless breathing system will be operational and will be attached to a diver in the form of a vest that will enable him to
stay underwater for a period of many hours. ... The system developed by Bodner uses a well known physical law called the "Henry Law" which describes gas absorption in liquids. This law states that the amount of gas that can be dissolved in a liquid body is proportional to the pressure on the liquid body. The law works in both directions – lowering the pressure will release more gas out of the liquid. This is done by a centrifuge which rotates rapidly thus creating under pressure inside a small sealed chamber containing sea water. The system will be powered by rechargeable batteries. Calculations showed that a one kilo Lithium battery can provide a diver with about one hour of diving time. "
Check out the patents for more info on how it works. It would be nice to have one with no moving parts some day.
5/23/2005 Technology / UFOs / Anti-Gravity (hfml) . British "Anti-Gravity" Breakthrough. Step Right up and See the Amazing Anti-Gravity Frog.
Saturday, May 14, 2005 -What goes up no longer has to come down. British scientists have developed an antigravity machine that can float heavy stones, coins and lumps of metal in mid-air. Based around a powerful magnet, the device levitates objects in a similar way to how a maglev train runs above its tracks.
Peter King , a physics professor at Nottingham University, said: "We can take an object and float it in mid-air because the magnetic forces
on the object are enough to balance gravity."
The device exploits diamagnetism. Place non-magnetic objects inside a strong enough magnetic field and they are forced to act like weak magnets themselves. Generate a field that is stronger below and weaker above, and the resulting upward magnetic force cancels out gravity.
Scientists have used diamagnetism to make wood, strawberries and, famously, a living frog fly. "That force is strong enough to float things with a density similar to water, but not things with the density of rocks," Prof King said.
To make their machine more powerful, the team added an oxygen and nitrogen mixture, a paramagnetic fluid. Inside the magnet, the mixture helps objects to float.
The researchers, who announce their results today in the New Journal of Physics, are working with Rio Tinto to develop the technique to sort precious stones from soil. The US space agency Nasa is also interested as it offers a cheaper way for zero gravity research. - GuardianUKThis is not really anti-gravity. Gravity is just being overcome by magnetic force, right? Still, this electrostatic levitation works with small things and has supposedly existed in man made UFO technology for many years. According to one source, however, "levitating a human would require a special racetrack magnet of almost 40 Tesla and about one GW of continuous power consumption" using the current method. Making a self contained levitating magentic system seems difficult.
5/19/2005 Technology. New Technique Could Make 300-Carat Diamonds
"The famed Hope Diamond is 45.52 carats. In theory, the [chemical vapor deposition (CVD)] technique should be able to make diamonds an inch big, or roughly 300 carats. Natural diamonds, composed of carbon, are the hardest things known. They can be billions of years old, formed under intense pressure. ... Diamond is so hard it can be used to create pressure equal to the center of the Earth. "Fundamentally there is no difference" [ between natural and synthetic diamonds, Russell Hemley of the Carnegie Institution's Geophysical Laboratory ] told LiveScience . "Both have the same crystal structure. "The diamond age is upon us," Hemley said."
5/17/2005 Technology / Health (ucdmc). Curing Cancer and Epilepsy with Exploding Molecules. Brain Doctor Edie Zusman, Director of the Bronte Epilepsy Research Program and others are working on a neat idea: find molecules that attach selectively to cancer cells or those that contribute to epilepsy in the brain, then make those molecules detonate in miniature explosions, killing only the bad cells. Far out. Trials with mice have reportedly been successful.
Dude, my brain molecules explode by themselves sometimes.
5/4/2005 Technology. Interactive Holograph Projector Invented. * The heliodisplay converts the air and does not introduce anything new into the air that does not already exist in the air.
* Colors render in the full spectrum, and eight point text shows up crisp and bright.
* Interactivity: Select and Manipulate Computer Images using your finger or hand.
* Images can be viewed from a wide viewing angle. There is no visible image when seen from the rear.More info here.
4/28/2005 Technology. An Interesting Bridge / Tunnel. From email: "The bridge (or should it be called tunnel) goes under water to allow movement of ships. In order for ships to pass, this bridge is half under the water. You drive down in the water and then come out on the other side. Truly a marvelous piece of engineering! This bridge is between Sweden and Denmark . Picture taken from the side of Sweden."
4/18/2005 Technology / People Search Find Elvis' Address, Birthdate and Phone Number (and Yours)? Yes, Elvis is living in LA these days and I have his phone number. I never call, however. What would I say? Have you given out your personal information over the years? Try ZabaSearch.com
4/12/2005 Technology / Privacy. LEXISNEXIS: DATA ON 310,000 PEOPLE FEARED STOLEN Reuters, April 12, 2005
Excerpt: Data broker LexisNexis said Tuesday that personal information may have been stolen on 310,000 U.S. citizens--nearly 10 times the number found in a data breach announced last month. An investigation by the firm's Anglo-Dutch parent Reed Elsevier determined that its databases had been fraudulently breached 59 times using stolen passwords, leading to the possible theft of personal information such as addresses and Social Security numbers. LexisNexis, which said in March that 32,000 people had been potentially affected by the breaches, will notify an additional 278,000 individuals whose data may have been stolen. ... Seisint, based in Boca Raton, Florida, uses property records and other public data to build profiles on millions of U.S. consumers, which it sells to law enforcement agencies and financial institutions."
"The company that runs the multistate Matrix law enforcement database gave the U.S. government a list of 120,000 people who scored high on a computer profile it said was designed to identify likely terrorists, a civil liberties group said ..."
4/8/2005 Technology / Mind / Brain (newsci). Real - Life Matrix, Sony Patents Ultrasound Brain Modification.
Sony has patented an idea for transmitting data directly into the brain, with the goal of enabling a person to see movies and play video games in which they smell, taste and perhaps even feel things. The patent - based only on a theory, not on any invention - marks the first step towards a "real-life Matrix", British science weekly New Scientist says.
In Sony's patent, the technique would be entirely non-invasive - it would not use brain implants or other surgery to manipulate the brain. The patent describes a device that fires pulses of focused ultrasound at the head to modify firing patterns in targeted parts of the brain, creating "sensory experiences" ranging from moving images to tastes and sounds. Patents can be found here and here.Scary. If you can trigger senses, you can also trigger ... actions. Think about that for a bit. "Hey kid, put on this headset and we'll make you sing and dance."
Actually, we really already live in the Matrix. Everything we experience is only a map of reality activating in our brains. There is no direct human experience of a flower. There is only our brain's responses to input with its vision, feeling, smell and emotion centers. One definition of 'crazy' is when our internal experiences don't correctly map to external reality. This happens with some mental illnesses. In these cases people might see or believe in invisible leopards, weapons of mass destruction, three inch high gnomes hiding in the furniture, etc. In other words, Sony's technology may be able to give sane people full-blown crazy hallucinations for entertainment purposes! Neat.
4/5/2005 Technology / Vlogging. Once Again, A Whole New World: Video Blogging – also known as Vlogging. Vlogs to be Searchable in Google.
Not enough channels on your satellite TV? Interested in reality programming? Now you can watch thousands of personal videos people have created by searching for vlogs.
"As an example of the explosion of popularity, we need only look at the devastating Tsunami that hit Asia on 26 December 2004. In the wake of this natural disaster which killed thousands and made millions more homeless, video blogs sprang up with (scary "you are there" ) amateur video footage showing the enormous power of the waves."
I've had bad dreams of being swept away by water so the tsunami vlogs (WARNING: Disturbing stuff) were really scary. For some mellow funny every day stuff see this site. (Some links don't work, you'll have to hunt around. I ended up watching some guys light firecrackers strapped to a small ceramic pig! Check out Autophobia.
Endless hours of creative people on video, new every day. Plug in to VLOGS!
3/28/2005 Technology / Alt Energy. Amazing Motor Defies Physics? Read about the Minato motor, developed in Japan. "Minato has already shipped 40,000 magnetic motors to Japanese stores. According to the laws of physics, you can't get more energy out of a motor than you put into it, but these motors seem to break that law." -unknowncountry
"... to our surprise, the acquaintance called back in early December with the news, "OK, they just got
their first big order, for 14,000 high-efficiency air conditioner fans, from Japan's second largest convenience store chain." Now we started to take notice. After all, Japanese major corporations usually have pretty good "BS filters", and here was an invention which was actually being commercialized. ...
Minato's motor on the other hand is quiet, gives off no heat (other than the rotor bearings), and is highly efficient. How efficient? According to Minato, about 930% (that's 9 times) more efficient -- which, if true, will revolutionize the electric motor industry worldwide. "
Mr. Kohei Minato, has indeed discovered a means of using powerful permanent magnets to provide "power" (what do you call work done by magnetic fields?) to drive a motor. He appears to have figured out how to stop the permanent magnets in the rotor from simply locking up when they face the opposing poles in the stator. Instead, his system kicks the poles past each other, and keeps the rotor moving. - terrie
Opposing view: "Minato Update - I spoke with two different individuals today who had engineers travel to Japan to look at Minato's motor. Both, after careful investigation, concluded that it is not an over unity device, and is not even that efficient as motors go. -- Sterling D. Allan; July 8, 2004." - freeen
3/11/2005 Technology / Safety / Conspiracy. (aircrash). Cheaper, Safer, more Efficient Jet Airplane Design Suppressed for 60 years. This story of the Burnelli Lifting Body at aircrash.org is well written and downright amazing. For over half a century we've been designing our jets the wrong way. The current design benefits the banks, not the people.
"...we've spent thousands of hours setting up this web-site to show you how a few malevolent monopolists have manipulated commerce and caused history to be falsified to cover-up their misdeeds and thereby not only deprive the public of superior technology but kill hundreds if not thousands needlessly every year. They have done this while technology has existed for over 60 years that could have spared many lives and saved the American public several astronomical fortunes -- and that is only the tip of the iceberg."
If you think about it, this design is hardly "obsolete" as some sites claim. Look at the space shuttle and our B2 stealth bombers, for example. The design works: more wing surface area = more lift = less power required to fly. Demand safer more efficient jets!
3/10 - 3/11/2005 Technology / UFO / IFO. Neat. www.flyingthingz.com has a remote controlled flying lawnmower. Watch the video. Thanks to Dr. B for the link! Sure, this is neat. But can it be built as big as a car in the shape of a triangle with the ability to hover for five hours completely silent and then "spear off out of sight" behind some trees as reported here (UFO sighting in Dubbo, Austrailia)? Follow up: The five hour triangle was a big kite. Or *was* it?
3/10/2005 Technology. Check out this demo of adding 3-dimensional objects in real time to live video. After watching this, keep in mind how easy it is fake the scenes you see on the news. He had a gun! I saw it on the video! No, I mean he had a light saber! No, it was a dangerous red flower!! Video evidence at criminal trials should now be as suspect with regard to doctoring as digital photos.
3/1-3/3/2005 Technology / Human Feats. ( coza ) Update: He Made it!
Millionaire Adventurer Steve Fossett Makes First Solo Flight Around the World. One trick was staying awake for 66 hours ( 2.75 days ).
He became the first person to fly a balloon solo around the world in 2002 after nearly dying twice in six attempts to set the record.
He has also tried to break the world gliding altitude record for the past four years in New Zealand, but has failed because of poor conditions. Now millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett has taken off on his attempt to become the first person to complete a solo trip around the world in an airplane without making a single stop. Fossett launched his GlobalFlyer from Salina Municipal Airport shortly before 7pm last night, beginning a 66-hour journey by climbing northeast into a darkening sky. Hundreds of spectators, braving a bitterly cold wind, gathered along the 3km (~ 1.8 mile) runway to watch the takeoff. Fossett hopes to return to Salina on Thursday morning. The 37000 km ( ~22,991 miles ) flight was postponed several times because of shifting jet stream patterns and bad weather.
Nearly one third of the way through! "Having flown over 6400 miles at just over 47,000ft, Steve is in good condition and is not experiencing any technical problems with the GPS or with his temperature sensor that had cut out briefly during the night."
Read details on Steve Fossett's web site and on virginatlanticglobalflyer. Check out the Mission Tracking Page (click photo) where you can see his actual location right now! Includes some live cockpit video. Read about the route here.
3/2/2005 Technology. A machine that ties a tie - in only 562 steps. "The three-foot-tall tie-tying machine, called "Why Knot?", was built by retired biomedical engineer Seth Goldstein in his basement in Bethesda, Maryland." - bookofjoe Watch the video of this machine in action here.
2/9/2005 Technology Google's New Dragable Maps Google - http://maps.google.com/
The driving directions feature ( image above) looks nice. Time will tell if the Google Directions can get you as lost as the MapQuest directions." The difference between Google Map and Mapquest is immediately noticeable. Google's maps are much more dynamic, much more interactive. It allows you to "drag" the map with your mouse, and zoom in and out with ease. Unlike other online maps, you no longer have to click an arrow and then wait for a new page to load just to see what street is around the corner. Google also helps you find businesses and shops near you. So if you wanted to go to a Chinese restaurant to celebrate the lunar new year, type in "Chinese restaurants near" and then "your location" and it comes up with red balloons showing you a few restaurants nearby. It's not a extensive listing but it works if you were craving Kung Pao chicken. (And you don't need to use quotes in your search, those are mine for emphasis.) If you click on a red balloon, you'll see the restaurant's phone number, address, driving directions to that location and even the Web site with the restaurant listing, such as the city search site or your local yellow pages. Since this is a new feature and is still in a testing phase, you may discover a few kinks."
2/18/2005 Technology (CNN) Smart Glass Reacts to Temperature
Scientists in London have created a coating for glass, which reflects or absorbs heat, depending on the temperature outside.
Professor of inorganic and materials chemistry, Ivan Parkin, and Troy Manning, both of the chemistry department at University College London, developed the intelligent window coating as part of Mr Manning's PhD studies.
The thin film is made out of a material called vanadium dioxide, and it undergoes a change depending on the weather outside.
"On cold days the "thermochromic coating" allows all sunlight in, while on hot days, once the outside temperature reaches a certain level, the film begins acting as a filter, blocking infrared rays, which are responsible for generating heat. "
2/17/2005 Technology / Privacy (msnbc). ORGANIZED CRIME DATA THEFT 6-MONTHS AGO DISCLOSED NOW: AFFECTS 145,000 NATIONWIDE
"Database giant ChoicePoint said late Wednesday that 145,000 consumers nationwide were placed at risk by a recent data theft at the company. Previously, the company had suggested the theft only affected California residents. California consumers who received the letter from ChoicePoint expressed frustration; many had never heard of the firm before receiving the alarming letter. ..."
Fraud investigation update at ChoicePoint here. A call to ChoicePoint's privacy contact (877) 301-7097 reached a recording. Authorities have already identified 750 people whose stolen personal information was used to buy jewelry, consumer electronics and computers. One man, originally from Nigeria, has been arrested.
On Thursday, the only suspect so far connected to the case, Olatunji Oluwatosin, 41, pled âÃÂÃÆâ€â„Ã&sbq
