Lifeboat Foundation

This next wave of automation won’t just be sleek robotic arms on factory floors. It will be ordering kiosks, self-service apps and software smart enough to perfect schedules and cut down on the workers needed to cover a shift. Employers are already testing these systems. A recession will force them into the mainstream.

Robots’ infiltration of the workforce doesn’t happen gradually, at the pace of technology. It happens in surges, when companies are given strong incentives to tackle the difficult task of automation.

Typically, those incentives occur during recessions. Employers slash payrolls going into a downturn and, out of necessity, turn to software or machinery to take over the tasks once performed by their laid-off workers as business begins to recover.

Continue reading “When the next recession comes, the robots will be ready” »

By Ian Christensen, Ian Lange, George Sowers, Angel Abbud-Madrid, Morgan Bazilian

Space has long captured the human imagination—as a source of wonder, a place of discovery, a realm for aspirations. But increasingly, space is viewed as a frontier of economic opportunity as scientists, technologists, and entrepreneurs invest their ingenuity and wealth to bring the vastness of space within human grasp.

This economic development hinges on an ability to utilize what we term “space resources.” The resources in just the inner solar system are nearly infinite compared with those on Earth. For example, one large metallic asteroid such as 16 Psyche is thought to contain enough metals to last humans for millions of years at current consumption rates. And society has barely scratched the surface in harnessing the energy of the sun. Accessing space resources is increasingly important as the world confronts the finite nature of resources and the increasing environmental and social costs to develop them.

There are 1.4 billion insects for each one of us. Though you often need a microscope to see them, insects are “the lever pullers of the world,” says David MacNeal, author of Bugged. They do everything from feeding us to cleaning up waste to generating $57 billion for the U.S. economy alone.

Today, many species are faced with extinction. When National Geographic caught up with MacNeal in Los Angeles, he explained why this would be catastrophic for life on Earth and why a genetically engineered bee could save hives—and our food supply—worldwide.

A pair of researchers from the London School of Economics and Political Science and Harvard University has published a Perspective piece in the journal Nature Human Behavior suggesting a possible solution to the replication crisis facing the psychological sciences. Michael Muthukrishna and Joseph Henrich believe the answer lies in convincing researchers to start working within a theoretical framework.

Most experts would agree that human psychology is a difficult problem. Why do people do the things they do? Why do groups behave one way or another? No one really knows the answers to such questions, though psychology and sociology researchers have been carrying out experiments for many years. In more recent times, such research has questioned because so few studies have been replicated by others. Even when research teams attempt to do so, they produce different results. This has resulted in what has come to be known as a replication crisis. In their paper, Muthukrishna and Henrich suggest solving the crisis requires researchers in the field to begin conducting experiments the way they are done with other sciences—by using a theoretical framework, or even multiple frameworks. They note that doing so would reduce the number of questions that can be asked regarding a given behavior—without such a framework, they add, there is no limit.

How will artificial intelligence, molecular manufacturing, biological engineering and distributed additive manufacturing change the economics of the production of goods and services?

Lighter than air! Stronger than steel! More flexible than rubber! No, it’s not an upcoming superhero flick: It’s the latest marvelous formulation of carbon nanotubes–at least as reported by the creators of the new super-material. Researchers working on artificial muscles say they’ve created nanotech ribbons that make our human muscles look puny by comparison. The ribbons, which are made of long, entangled 11-nanometer-thick nanotubes, can stretch to more than three times their normal width but are stiffer and stronger than steel… They can expand and contract thousands of times and withstand temperatures ranging from −190 to over 1,600 °C. What’s more, they are almost as light as air, and are transparent, conductive, and flexible [Technology Review].

The material is made from bundles of vertically aligned nanotubes that respond directly to electricity. Lengthwise, the muscle can expand and contract with tremendous speed; from side-to-side, it’s super-stiff. Its possibilities may only be limited by the imaginations of engineers. [The material’s composition] “is akin to having diamond-like behavior in one direction, and rubber-like behavior in the others” [Wired], says material scientist John Madden, who wasn’t involved in the research.

When voltage is applied to the material, the nanotubes become charged and push each other away, causing the material to expand at a rate of 37,000 percent per second, tripling its width. That’s 10 times as far and 1000 times as fast as natural muscle can move, and the material does so while generating 30 times as much force as a natural muscle [IEEE Spectrum]. The researchers put together a video to illustrate the concept, and will publish their work in Science tomorrow.

Continue reading “Carbon Nanotube Ribbons Could Give Superman a Run for His Money” »

I agree with the need to prepare.

Yea…maybe. We may see a US stock market crash this year. Truth is we are way over do for a market correction and when it does hit, this may cause a major financial crisis and recession in the US and globally. Are you prepared? 🤔

Continue reading “Economic Collapse in 2019?” »

“Very dependent on volume, but I’m confident moving to Mars (return ticket is free) will one day cost less than $500k & maybe even below $100k,” he wrote. “Low enough that most people in advanced economies could sell their home on Earth & move to Mars if they want.”

The extraordinary ambition of Musk’s prediction wasn’t lost on some Twitter users. “Fyre Festival Part Deux,” one replied.

Maybe that skepticism is why, in a follow –up reply, Musk seemed to hedge his bets.

Continue reading “Elon Musk: A Round-Trip Ticket to Mars Will Cost Just $100,000” »

The global population aged 60 or over is growing faster than all younger age groups and faces the tide of chronic diseases threatening their quality of life and posing challenges to healthcare and economy systems. To better understand the underlying biology behind healthspan — the healthy period of life before the first chronic disease manifestation — the scientists from Gero and MIPT collaborated with the researchers from PolyOmica, the University of Edinburgh and other institutes to analyze genetic data and medical histories of over 300,000 people aged 37 to 73 made available by UK Biobank.

The study published today in Communications Biology was lead by Dr. Peter Fedichev and Prof. Yurii Aulchenko. It shows that the most prevalent chronic conditions such as cancer, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, stroke, dementia, and some others apparently share the common underlying mechanism that is aging itself.

«According to Gompertz mortality law, the risk of death from all causes increases exponentially after the age of 40 and doubles approximately every 8 years», explains Peter Fedichev, founder and CSO of Gero. «By analyzing the dynamics of disease incidence in the clinical data available from UKB, we observed that the risks of age-related diseases grow exponentially with age and double at a rate compatible with the Gompertz mortality law. This close relation between the most prevalent chronic diseases and mortality suggests that their risks could be driven by the same process, that is aging. This is why healthspan can be used as a natural proxy for investigation of the genetic factors controlling the rate of aging, the “holy grail” target for anti-aging interventions».