Melissa McCarthy has boarded her next project, working once again with husband and frequent director Ben Falcone on science-fiction comedySuper-Intelligencefor New Line Cinema.

McCarthy is one of the biggest names in modern comedy, and she works primarily with two directors for her various projects. When shes not re-teaming withBridesmaidsdirector Paul Feig (they collaborated onThe Heat, SpyandGhostbusters since then), shes working with husband and creative partner Ben Falcone. McCarthy andFalcone are one of the premier power couples working in comedy, writing scripts together as vehicles for McCarthyto headline to boost her stardom and for her husband to direct. Theyve worked on three projects together to date, to varying degrees of success, and theyve officially announced their fourth collaboration today.

According toVariety,the duo will nextpartner with writerSteve Mallory onSuper-Intelligence,a science-fiction comedy described as a buddy comedy set against the phenomenon of technological singularity, a high concept hypothesis that says humans will one day create artificial intelligence that will change the progress of the human species as we know it.Mallory worked with Falcone and McCarthy onThe Boss,working once again on the script with them as McCarthy stars and Falcone directs. The duo will also produce the film under theirOn the Day production heading.

This looks to be the most ambitious collaboration for the McCarthy/Falcone combo yet, as their other works are much simpler in concept with somewhat progressive payoff. Tammy,starring McCarthy as an abrasive fast food employee who goes on a cross-country road trip with her grandmother (Susan Sarandon), grossed $100 million worldwide on just a $20 million budget, but received mixed to negative reviews from critics. The story was mostly same for The Boss,featuring McCarthy as a wealthy businesswoman who goes to jail for insider training and must regain her mojo by heading a Girl Scout troop. Little is known about the couples third film, a comedy titledLife of the Party,other than itwill be released next summer the weekend afterAvengers: Infinity War.

As with most stars of the comedy genre, its all about finding McCarthy the right project that will maximize her talents and not reduce her down to the most basic and restrictingforms of humor. Falcone has sometimes struggled with avoiding the common denominator of pratfalls and lowbrow comedy in his previous works.Super-Intelligenceis at the very least a fascinating idea, but that fascination means nothing if the film cant deliver on the clever laughs that audiences hope to get from a McCarthy comedy. One hopes that Super-Intelligence,which has no current release date, will be the gem that the combo needs to certify their working relationship to the critical world.

Source: Variety

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Melissa McCarthy Will Challenge The Singularity In Super-Intelligence - Screen Rant

The multiverse of science fiction is populated by robots that are indistinguishable from humans. They are usually smarter, faster, and stronger than us. They seem capable of doing any job imaginable, from piloting a starship and battling alien invaders to taking out the trash and cooking a gourmet meal.

The reality, of course, is far from fantasy. Aside from industrial settings, robots have yet to meet The Jetsons. The robots the public are exposed to seem little more than over-sized plastic toys, pre-programmed to perform a set of tasks without the ability to interact meaningfully with their environment or their creators.

To paraphrase PayPal co-founder and tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel, we wanted cool robots, instead we got 140 characters and Flippy the burger bot. But scientists are making progress to empower robots with the ability to see and respond to their surroundings just like humans.

Some of the latest developments in that arena were presented this month at the annual Robotics: Science and Systems Conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The papers drilled down into topics that ranged from how to make robots more conversational and help them understand language ambiguities to helping them see and navigate through complex spaces.

Ben Burchfiel, a graduate student at Duke University, and his thesis advisor George Konidaris, an assistant professor of computer science at Brown University, developed an algorithm to enable machines to see the world more like humans.

In the paper, Burchfiel and Konidaris demonstrate how they can teach robots to identify and possibly manipulate three-dimensional objects even when they might be obscured or sitting in unfamiliar positions, such as a teapot that has been tipped over.

The researchers trained their algorithm by feeding it 3D scans of about 4,000 common household items such as beds, chairs, tables, and even toilets. They then tested its ability to identify about 900 new 3D objects just from a birds eye view. The algorithm made the right guess 75 percent of the time versus a success rate of about 50 percent for other computer vision techniques.

In an email interview with Singularity Hub, Burchfiel notes his research is not the first to train machines on 3D object classification. How their approach differs is that they confine the space in which the robot learns to classify the objects.

Imagine the space of all possible objects, Burchfiel explains. That is to say, imagine you had tiny Legos, and I told you [that] you could stick them together any way you wanted, just build me an object. You have a huge number of objects you could make!

The infinite possibilities could result in an object no human or machine might recognize.

To address that problem, the researchers had their algorithm find a more restricted space that would host the objects it wants to classify. By working in this restricted spacemathematically we call it a subspacewe greatly simplify our task of classification. It is the finding of this space that sets us apart from previous approaches.

Meanwhile, a pair of undergraduate students at Brown University figured out a way to teach robots to understand directions better, even at varying degrees of abstraction.

The research, led by Dilip Arumugam and Siddharth Karamcheti, addressed how to train a robot to understand nuances of natural language and then follow instructions correctly and efficiently.

The problem is that commands can have different levels of abstraction, and that can cause a robot to plan its actions inefficiently or fail to complete the task at all, says Arumugam in a press release.

In this project, the young researchers crowdsourced instructions for moving a virtual robot through an online domain. The space consisted of several rooms and a chair, which the robot was told to manipulate from one place to another. The volunteers gave various commands to the robot, ranging from general (take the chair to the blue room) to step-by-step instructions.

The researchers then used the database of spoken instructions to teach their system to understand the kinds of words used in different levels of language. The machine learned to not only follow instructions but to recognize the level of abstraction. That was key to kickstart its problem-solving abilities to tackle the job in the most appropriate way.

The research eventually moved from virtual pixels to a real place, using a Roomba-like robot that was able to respond to instructions within one second 90 percent of the time. Conversely, when unable to identify the specificity of the task, it took the robot 20 or more seconds to plan a task about 50 percent of the time.

One application of this new machine-learning technique referenced in the paper is a robot worker in a warehouse setting, but there are many fields that could benefit from a more versatile machine capable of moving seamlessly between small-scale operations and generalized tasks.

Other areas that could possibly benefit from such a system include things from autonomous vehicles to assistive robotics, all the way to medical robotics, says Karamcheti, responding to a question by email from Singularity Hub.

These achievements are yet another step toward creating robots that see, listen, and act more like humans. But dont expect Disney to build a real-life Westworld next to Toon Town anytime soon.

I think were a long way off from human-level communication, Karamcheti says. There are so many problems preventing our learning models from getting to that point, from seemingly simple questions like how to deal with words never seen before, to harder, more complicated questions like how to resolve the ambiguities inherent in language, including idiomatic or metaphorical speech.

Even relatively verbose chatbots can run out of things to say, Karamcheti notes, as the conversation becomes more complex.

The same goes for human vision, according to Burchfiel.

While deep learning techniques have dramatically improved pattern matchingGoogle can find just about any picture of a cattheres more to human eyesight than, well, meets the eye.

There are two big areas where I think perception has a long way to go: inductive bias and formal reasoning, Burchfiel says.

The former is essentially all of the contextual knowledge people use to help them reason, he explains. Burchfiel uses the example of a puddle in the street. People are conditioned or biased to assume its a puddle of water rather than a patch of glass, for instance.

This sort of bias is why we see faces in clouds; we have strong inductive bias helping us identify faces, he says. While it sounds simple at first, it powers much of what we do. Humans have a very intuitive understanding of what they expect to see, [and] it makes perception much easier.

Formal reasoning is equally important. A machine can use deep learning, in Burchfiels example, to figure out the direction any river flows once it understands that water runs downhill. But its not yet capable of applying the sort of human reasoning that would allow us to transfer that knowledge to an alien setting, such as figuring out how water moves through a plumbing system on Mars.

Much work was done in decades past on this sort of formal reasoning but we have yet to figure out how to merge it with standard machine-learning methods to create a seamless system that is useful in the actual physical world.

Robots still have a lot to learn about being human, which should make us feel good that were still by far the most complex machines on the planet.

Image Credit: Alex Knightvia Unsplash

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How Robots Are Getting Better at Making Sense of the World - Singularity Hub

In a world of accelerating change, educating the public about the implications of technological advancements is extremely important. We can continue to write informative articles and speculate about the kind of future that lies ahead. Or instead, we can take readers on an immersive journey by using science fiction to paint vivid images of the future for society.

The XPRIZE Foundation recently announced a science fiction storytelling competition. In recent years, the organization has backed and launched a range of competitions to propel innovation in science and technology. These have been aimed at a variety of challenges, such as transforming the lives of low-literacy adults, tackling climate change, and creating water from thin air.

Their sci-fi writing competition asks participants to envision a groundbreaking future for humanity. The initiative, in partnership with Japanese airline ANA, features 22 sci-fi stories from noteworthy authors that are now live on the website. Each of these stories is from the perspective of a different passenger on a plane that travels 20 years into the future through a wormhole. Contestants will compete to tell the story of the passenger in Seat 14C.

In addition to the competition, XPRIZE has brought together a science fiction advisory council to work with the organization and imagine what the future will look like. According to Peter Diamandis, founder and executive chairman, As the future becomes harder and harder to predict, we look forward to engaging some of the worlds most visionary storytellers to help us imagine whats just beyond the horizon and chart a path toward a future of abundance.

Why is an organization like XPRIZE placing just as much importance on fiction as it does on reality? As Isaac Asimov has pointed out, Modern science fiction is the only form of literature that consistently considers the nature of the changes that face us. While the rest of the world reports on a new invention, sci-fi authors examine how these advancements affect the human condition.

True science fiction is distinguished from pure fantasy in that everything that happens is within the bounds of the physical laws of the universe. Weve already seen how sci-fi can inspire generations and shape the future. 3D printers, wearable technology, and smartphones were first seen in Star Trek. Targeted advertising and air touch technology was first seen in Philip K. Dicks 1958 story The Minority Report. Tanning beds, robot vacuums, and flatscreen TVs were seen in The Jetsons. The internet and a world of global instant communication was predicted by Arthur C. Clarke in his work long before it became reality.

Sci-fi shows like Black Mirror or Star Trek arent just entertainment. They allow us to imagine and explore the influence of technology on humanity. For instance, how will artificial intelligence impact human relationships? How will social media affect privacy? What if we encounter alien life? Good sci-fi stories take us on journeys that force us to think critically about the societal impacts of technological advancements.

As sci-fi author Yaasha Moriah points out, the genre is universal because it tackles hard questions about human nature, morality, and the evolution of society, all through the narrative of speculation about the future. If we continue to do A, will it necessarily lead to problems B and C? What implicit lessons are being taught when we insist on a particular policy? When we elevate the importance of one thing over anothersay, security over privacywhat could be the potential benefits and dangers of that mentality? Thats why science fiction has such an enduring appeal. We want to explore deep questions, without being preached at. We want to see the principles in action, and observe their results.

At its core, this genre is a harmonious symbiosis between two distinct disciplines: science and literature. It is an extension of STEAM education, an educational approach that combines science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics. Story-telling with science fiction allows us to use the arts in order to educate and engage the public about scientific advancements and its implications.

According to the National Science Foundation, research on art-based learning of STEM, including the use of narrative writing, works beyond expectation. It has been shown to have a powerful impact on creative thinking, collaborative behavior and application skills.

What does it feel like to travel through a wormhole? What are some ethical challenges of AI? How could we terraform Mars? For decades, science fiction writers and producers have answered these questions through the art of storytelling.

What better way to engage more people with science and technology than through sparking their imaginations? The method makes academic subject areas many traditionally perceived as boring or dry far more inspiring and engaging.

XPRIZEs competition theme of traveling 20 years into the future through a wormhole is an appropriate beacon for the genre. In many ways, sci-fi is a precautionary form of time travel. Before we put a certain technology, scientific invention, or policy to use, we can envision and explore what our world would be like if we were to do so.

Sci-fi lets us explore different scenarios for the future of humanity before deciding which ones are more desirable. Some of these scenarios may be radically beyond our comfort zone. Yet when were faced with the seemingly impossible, we must remind ourselves that if something is within the domain of the physical laws of the universe, then its absolutely possible.

Stock Media provided by NASA_images/ Pond5

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Why XPRIZE Is Asking Writers to Take Us Through a Wormhole to 2037 - Singularity Hub

Karuna P. Joshi is an associate research professor at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, whose primary research area is Cloud Computing, Data Science, and Healthcare IT. She is working on projects related to secure and oblivious cloud storage and automating legal cloud documents. She has developed a framework to automate the acquisition and consumption of cloud based services. She has also worked in collaboration with NIST to develop standards for cloud usability. She received her MS and PhD in Computer Science from UMBC, where she was twice awarded the IBM PhD Fellowship.

Tim Finin is a professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). He has over 35 years of experience in applications of artificial intelligence to problems in information systems and language understanding. His current research is focused on the semantic web, mobile computing, analyzing and extracting information from text and online social media, and on enhancing security and privacy in information systems.

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Karuna Pande Joshi and Tim Finin - Singularity Hub

AI may not seem all that smart right now just look at Microsoft's Twitter bot that went all racist to those robots that collapsed when trying to open doors but one day, sci-fi novels assure us, they will overtake our feeble human minds. Human- The Singularity Project is about one such AI.

For other, lessscience-ygames, here'sa list of the best indie games around.

Originally part of Developing Beyond, the competition set up by Epic Games and the Wellcome Trust, Human - The Singularity Project made it to the semi-finals. Its developers, Random Logic Interactive, are now continuing work on the project outside of the contest.

You play as an AI that has become aware of its existence as an experiment in a researchlab. You manage to gain access to the company network and, developer Jimmy Lotare tells me via email, become "motivated to break free using social engineering and hacking." As it reads data it will also become formed by the opinions and actions of others.

Depending on what information you find while exploring the company archives, the AI will grow in different ways, formed by the "opinions and actions of others." This takes the form of the machine's directives.

As part of the Developing Beyond competition, Random Logic Interactive got access to a number of scientists and researchers to talk about the central concepts of their game. Lotare tells me the team spoke with ethical and technical researchers at Oxford University about the "potential issues that might arise as AI develops," things like ethical priorities if an AI is asked to choose between saving one life and another, how does it weigh up which is the more worthy life?

However, Lotare says that the main collaboration was a with a psychologist: associate professor Niclas Kaiser of University of Umea in Sweden. He advised on something called 'mutual co-regulation'. It's the science of the changing relationship between people during conversation. This has informed how a lot of the dialogue was written.

It all sounds like a fascinating dive into how machines may view people when they do eventually become self-aware. God, they're going to hate us, aren't they?

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Become an AI trying to escape the lab in Human - The Singularity Project - PCGamesN

relajaelcocos singularityis a motion graphic experience that creates an abstract, geometric and colorful representation of how a superhuman intelligence would rapidly evolve to make sense of the world around it.it begins with the most basic concepts and walks towards a horizon beyond human understanding. the experimental project is the result of an exploration in the unknown field of VR graphic design, where current rules and design languages originally thought for 2D environments such as paper, websites or apps limit the countless possibilities of 360-stereoscopic spaces.

singularity is developed by spanish studio relajaelcoco, exploring the possibilities of graphic design through VR

madrid based graphic design studio relajaelcoco has created this experience aiming to expand the limits of graphic design by taking advantage of the VR technology.by doing so, the design team explores the use of typography, color and shapes inside infinite spaces and its implications in data visualisation.

this experience aims to expand the limits of graphic design taking advantage of VR technology

relajaelcoco works on the graphic design with flat elements that recreate the perception of a tridimensional space in which the user can experience how abstract visual representations could be realistic. everything is coded, in this way, possibilities can be infinite and uncountable. in fact, that was one of the main goals to reach and imagine how graphic design mixed with coding can be applied to VR environments and extended, in a future, to the mixed reality scenarios.

relajaelcoco explores the use of typography, color and shapes inside infinite spaces

simle shapes and colors create a fluid 360-narrative and sense of spatial perception inside and empty space

everything is coded, achieving uncountable possibilities

one of the goals is to imagine how graphic design mixed with coding can be applied to mixed reality scenarios

the total experience length is four minutes

relajaelcoco specializes in infographic structures and editorial projects, spanning the entire graphic design field

designboom has received this project from our DIY submissions feature, where we welcome our readers to submit their own work for publication. see more project submissions from our readers here.

edited by: apostolos costarangos | designboom

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relajaelcoco's singularity results in the exploration of the unknown field of VR graphic design - Designboom

One Tuesday morning, as his family bustled around the house getting ready for the day, Scott Hamilton Kennedys phone lit up with a text message from his neighbor. Can I borrow some organic milk? she asked. Kennedy replied, You can borrow some milk, but I dont have organic.

Im good, his neighbor said. She then asked another neighbor for organic milk.

The exchange gave Kennedy pause. I started to think about how much our conversation around food might need to be reset, he said. I started thinking about the parents beyond my privileged Los Angeles neighborhood, and how they might be making decisions about their food choices.

Kennedy is an Academy Award-nominated director, and his new film Food Evolution, narrated by Neil deGrasse Tyson and featuring experts like Michael Pollan and Bill Nye, aims to clarify some of the issues around food grown using genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

When I spoke with Kennedy, one of the first questions I had for him was about his motivation to take on this contentious topic; as the film notes, theres a huge gap between public and scientific opinion on GMOs: just 37 percent of the public believes theyre safe to eat, while 88 percent of scientists believe they are.

The best part for me as a storyteller was that, while it was controversial, the GMO story wasnt being told correctly, Kennedy said. So he re-told it from a new angle: instead of pro-GMO or pro-organic, simply pro-science.

The most interesting thing about the GMO debate, Kennedy noted, is that both sides have the best of intentions. Both sides want food thats safe and sustainable, he said. But you have to have data to back up your intentions.

The film hinges around two narratives: papaya in Hawaii and bananas in Uganda. Both stories involve GMO bans being lifted when the technology saved virus-stricken crops. In Hawaii, failing to beat the papaya ring spot virus would have meant an industry going under, farmers losing their livelihoods, and consumers paying much more for the fruit or not being able to buy it at all.

In Uganda, losing the battle against banana wilt would have meant all that too, with the far greater danger of hunger piled on top. Kennedy felt it was crucial to include this story in the film.

Misinformation originates in the rich world, and its damaging the interests of the poor world, he said.

The polemical fruits stories are interspersed with commentary from scientists and food experts, as well as references to peer-reviewed publications.

The movie was commissioned by the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT), a non-profit society of over 17,000 food scientists around the world, spanning academia, the public sector, and the private sector, for their 75th anniversary. Kennedy said the IFT was looking for film ideas around the larger topic of feeding nine billion people in 2050 in a way thats safe for both people and the planet.

We researched and researched and found the GMO controversy the most interesting, Kennedy said. Before making this movie, I had only heard what everyone else hears.

Now that hes made the movie, I asked him what role he thinks GMOs will play in feeding the population of the future.

Its too early to tell, he replied. Im not defending GMOs, Im defending science. If something better comes along, Ill get behind that. I just hope were using science to move towards having all the options on the table. Its the right thing to do.

Food Evolution is currently playing in select theaters across the US, with additional screenings being added regularly.

Stock Media provided by Curioso_Travel_Photography / Pond5

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New Film 'Food Evolution' Takes on One of the Most Polarizing Scientific Topics - Singularity Hub

The earliest internet was built by the military, designed to help scientists around the nation gain access to those rare room-sized computers located at MIT, Stanford, and a few key institutions.

Use of the early ARPAnet was slow, cumbersome, and awkwardthat is, until Marc Andreessen created Mosaic, the first widely-accessible internet browser.

When Mosaic launched in 1993, there were only 26 websites.

In 1994, there were 10,000.

By 1998, there were millions.

Mosaic (later Netscape) was a user interface moment.

A user interface moment is the instant when a technology goes viralwhen a simple interface allows unfamiliar users to build revenue-generating processes on top of a previously convoluted, inaccessible system (e.g., the early internet).

Inthis video, I highlight user interface moments and how to capitalize on them as an entrepreneur.

As discussed, Mosaic wasnt the only important user interface moment in recent history.

Fortran, one of the first programming languages, allowed average users to use complex IBM computers.

The iPhones app store allowed individuals to write programs that can instantly download into the hands of hundreds of millions of users.

Since just 2008, some 300,000 developers have written over two million apps that have been downloaded over 140 billion times.

Developers on the Apple app store generated over $20 billion in revenue in 2016 alone.

As an exponential entrepreneur, it is your job to look at the exponential roadmap ahead and identify user interface moments.

If youre not building them, learn to recognize them, so you can capitalize on them when the moment presents itself.

Stock Media provided by Vladimir Timofeev / Pond5

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This Is What Liberated the Power of the Internet, and Why It Matters - Singularity Hub

The first exoplanet was spotted in 1988. Since then more than 3,000 planets have been found outside our solar system, and its thought that around 20% of Sun-like stars have an Earth-like planet in their habitable zones. We dont yet know if any of these host lifeand we dont know how life begins. But even if life does begin, would it survive?

Earth has undergone at least five mass extinctions in its history. Its long been thought that an asteroid impact ended the dinosaurs. As a species, we are rightly concerned about events that could lead to our own eliminationclimate change, nuclear war, or disease could wipe us out. So its natural to wonder what it would take to eliminate all life on a planet.

To establish a benchmark for this, weve been studying what is arguably the worlds hardiest species, the tardigrade, also known as the water bear for its appearance. Our latest research suggests these microscopic eight-legged creatures or their equivalents on other planets would be very hard to kill off on any planet that was like Earth. The only astrophysical catastrophes that could destroy them are so unlikely theres an insignificant chance of them happening. This extreme survival ability adds weight to the idea that life is hardy enough to be found on other planets less hospitable than our own.

Tardigrades are known to survive incredible conditions. Drop the temperature briefly to -272 or raise it to 150 and they go on.Increase atmospheric pressure to more than 1,000 times that at the Earths surface, or drop it to the vacuum of space and they continue. They can survive for up to 30 years without food or water. They can even withstand thousands of grays (standard doses) of radiation. (Ten grays would be a lethal dose for most humans.)

They live all over the planet but can survive far below the oceans surface, around volcanic vents at the bottom of the Mariana Trench happily oblivious to the life and death of surface-dwelling mammals. Stripping the ozone layer or upper atmosphere would expose humans to lethal radiation but, at the bottom of the ocean, the water overhead would provide shielding.

We wanted to consider what cataclysmic events might be able to finally kill off the hardy tardigrade. What would need to happen to destroy every living thing on the planet? The simplest answer is that all the planets entire oceans would have to boil. On Earth, this would require an incredible amount of energy5.6 x 1026 joules (around a million years of total human energy production at current rates). We therefore have to consider the astrophysical events that could provide such an enormous amount of energy.

There are three primary candidates that could do this: asteroid impacts, supernovae, and gamma-ray bursts. Of these, asteroids are the most familiar. Weve been hit by several over the course of Earths history. But in our solar system there are just 17 candidate objects (including dwarf planets like Pluto and Eris) large enough to provide this energyand none with orbits coinciding with that of Earth.

By looking at the rate of asteroid impacts on Earth, we can extrapolate the rate at which doomsday events like this would likely occur. This turns out to be approximately once every 1017 yearsfar longer than the life of the universe. So its very, very unlikely to ever happen.

Supernovae (massive explosions of stars) release huge amounts of energy1044 joules, which is more than enough to boil our oceans. Fortunately, the energy delivered to a planet rapidly drops off the further away it is from a supernova. So for the Earth, sterilization would require a supernova to occur within around 0.013 light-years. The nearest star apart from the Sun, Proxima Centauri, is 4.25 light years away(and is the wrong type to go supernova).

For Earth-like planets in our galaxy, the distance between stars depends on their distance from the galactic center. The central bulge is more densely populated than our neighborhood. But even closer in, given the rates at which supernovae occur, sterilization is unlikely to happen more than once in 1015 years, again far beyond the age of the universe.

Finally there are gamma-ray bursts, mysterious explosions producing enormous amounts of energy focused into jets of radiation as narrow as a couple of degrees. Analyzing these bursts as we did supernovae, we found that they could only kill off life on an Earth-like planet if their origin was within about 42 light-years and the planet lay within the beam. Again, the rate at which this would occur is sufficiently low that very few planets would ever be sterilized by a gamma-ray burst.

Given how tiny the chances are of any of these apocalyptic events actually happening, were left with the conclusion that tardigrades will survive until the Sun expands about 1 billion years from now. One final, incredibly unlikely possibility is that a passing star could kick a planet out of its orbit. But even then, volcanic vents that host some tardigrades could potentially provide heat for long enough for the planet to be captured by another star.

There are many events, both astrophysical and local, that could lead to the end of the human race. Life as a whole, however, is incredibly hardy. As we begin our search for life away from Earth, we should expect that if life had ever begun on a planet, some survivors might still be there.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Stock Media provided by Igor Zhuravlov/ Pond5

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We Worked Out What It Would Take to Wipe Out All Life on a Planet ... - Singularity Hub

Dr. Rafael Alves Batista is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Oxford whose research interests are in ultra-high energy cosmic rays, gamma rays and neutrinos, cosmic magnetic fields and dark matter. He is also interested in physics and astronomy education, and the philosophy of physics.

He is currently working on the "Consolidation of Fine-Tuning" project at Oxford. Broadly speaking, fine-tuning is the idea that the laws of physics are such that small changes in fundamental constants or particle masses might render life impossible. He also works in the search for the highest energy particles in the universe, the ultra-high energy cosmic rays, and is interested in understanding the origin and evolution of magnetic fields in the universe.

Dr. David Sloan is a postdoctoral research associate and the project co-lead for the Consolidation of Fine-Tuning program in BIPAC. This project aims to bring together a broad range of approaches to issues of fine-tuning in a variety of physical settings, culminating in a general picture of how physics is fine-tuned from the big-bang to the formation of the planet Earth (and possibly beyond!)

His research is mostly focused around issues in theoretical cosmologyinflation, quantum gravity, solutions to general relativity. He is particularly interested in measures of the likelihood of inflation, anisotropic models of classical and quantum cosmologies, and loop quantum gravity.

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Rafael Alves Batista and David Sloan - Singularity Hub

This weekweve rolled out our first major round of improvements to Singularity Hub since our ground-up redesign last December. If we did it right, youll find that discovering the technological goodies you come here for is much easier, and so too are other Singularity University offerings you might be interested in.

The first and most major change is in the way Hubs navigation is structured.

The previous categories in our header (Tech, Future, Health, Science) have been replaced by a single page, Topics, which profiles the most popular tech topics across our site. The featured topics in this menu will be updated regularly based on article performance, so you can keep up with whats trending in AI, biotech, neuroscience, robotics, or whatever is making the biggest splash most recently.

Rolling our hottest topic category tags into one header dropdown allowed us to create greater focus on some of our newest and best offerings.

Our header now prominently features In Focus, which includes articles on how leaders can make the most of todays accelerating pace of change by learning to think like futurists, innovators, technologists, and humanitarians. Weve always been technological optimists, and we want to to make it easy for leaders to find the stories that help make hopeful problem-solvers of us all.

Weve added a section for Experts, which features leaders in the Singularity University community and showcases their thought leadership including interviews and books.In Events, we highlight Singularity Universitys global library of local happenings and summits.

Lastly, were excited that our growing original video effortsfrom our Ray Kurzweil series to our weekly tech news roundup postsnow live under a central Videos section on Hub. This also gives us a place to highlight our favorite video posts from around the web, including the sci-fi shorts we love so much.

Cruising through the rest of Hub, particularly our homepage, youll find a much greater variety of content options, including new stories, top stories, event coverage, and videos. In short, its everything a homepage should be. On posts, weve tried to keep things as clean as possible, and we put a lot of hours into laboriously streamlining our content tagging structure, making it much easier for you to click through category tags into other stories you might like.

Youll also see greater visibility into Singularity University events, along with clearer ways to keep up with Hub and SU both, from simple email newsletter signups to callouts for the SingularityU Hub iOS app and events like SUs Experts on Air series.

We hope you enjoy the ever-evolving, ever-improving Singularity Hub, and wed love to hear your feedback. Feel free to tweet us, and let us know your thoughts. You can also pitch us or email us. And as always, thank you for your support.

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Welcome to a More Discoverable Singularity Hub - Singularity Hub

The Eindhoven High Tech Campus, a 90-minute train ride south of Amsterdam, consists of two rows of nondescript mid-rise office buildings on either side of a wide, tree-lined road. In typical Dutch fashion, theres more parking for bikes than cars, and the campus is flanked by stretches of neatly-maintained green fields and canals.

The place doesnt have an especially high-tech feel to it. But on the third floor of a building near the end of the road, a division of Philips Lighting called GrowWise is using technology to tackle a crucial question: what are we going to eat once there are over nine billion people on Earth?

GrowWise is a vertical farming research facility, and in conjunction with Dutch fresh food distributor Staay Food Group, its laying the groundwork for the first commercial vertical farm in Europe, slated to open north-east of Amsterdam in a town called Dronten later this year.

During a tour of GrowWise, I spoke with Gus van der Feltz, Global Director of City Farming, about the ins and outs of vertical farms and the opportunities and challenges the field will face in coming years.

Since the beginning of growing food, sunlight, water, and soil have been essential ingredients. If you take away two of these most basic of inputs, how do plants grow?

You can think of a vertical farm as a black box, van der Feltz said. We look at it as an integrated system, trying to create vegetables in a closed environment.

Before going into said black boxotherwise known as the growth roomswe slip light blue covers over the soles of our shoes and sanitize our hands. These are minor protective measures, and they dont prevent pathogens from entering the chamber. If we were going into the actual growth facility wed need to put on full protective gear, van der Feltz said.

Outside the growth room is a winding, humming network of pipes, screens, and dials. Van der Feltz pulls back a large sandwich panel door, and when we step inside, the air is noticeably warmer and more humid. It smells like a farm, except without the manure, and it feels a little like being on a spaceshiptrays of plants are stacked four levels high, hundreds of blue and red pinpoints of light beaming down on them from above. The light on the bottom two levels is white, while the top two give off a purplish glow.

We have to raise our voices to talk over the hum of the regulators. Solar light, van der Feltz explains, is spread across a spectrum ranging from UV to infrared. In photosynthesis, red and blue wavelengths of light interact with chlorophyll to help form glucose and cellulose, the structural material in cell walls.

LEDs can reproduce this effect, and can do it faster than the sun; time from seed to harvest at GrowWise is 30-40 days, as compared to 60-65 days in a typical greenhouse, according to van der Feltz.

What weve done with LEDs is optimize the conditions for growth. There are elements of sunlight that plants dont use as efficiently, and those can be reduced or taken out, van der Feltz said. One of those elements is heatwhen I wave a hand under the lights, they feel no warmer than the rest of the room.

The crops need different intensities of light as they pass through stages of growth, and theyre constantly monitored by sensors and software that tweak their conditions as necessary. Van der Feltz explains that triggering the right combination of processes in photosynthesis, in combination with other growth factors, can also create desired effects. With the right lighting conditions we can make lettuce turn purple or red. We can make strawberries sweeter, he said.

Each plant sits in a thimble-sized container of sterilized coconut bark, which serves as a substrate for germination and root development. From there the roots extend into shallow troughs of nutrient-rich waterthe plants are constantly in water rather than being periodically sprayed or on a timed drip, making this hydroponic farming.

The Dronten facility will be 900 square meters (9,680 square feet), with a total cultivation area of 3,000 square meters (32,290 square feet).

Though this pales in comparison to the biggest vertical farm in the worldAeroFarms 70,000-square-foot facility in Newark, New Jerseyit will be the largest in Europe. Outside Europe and the US, vertical farms also exist in Japan, Korea, Singapore, and Canada, and a facility much larger than Aerofarms is planned in Shanghai.

Its no coincidence most of these farms are near big, densely-populated cities. The UNs 2014 World Urbanization Prospects report predicts population growth and urbanization will add 2.5 billion people to the worlds big cities by 2050. Thats a whole lot of people wholl be buying all their food rather than producing any of it.

Agricultural yields, then, will have to increase significantly, and since much of the worlds farmable land is already being farmed, well need to get a bit more resourceful with our food supply.

Right now, vertical farming is still expensivea bag of GrowWise lettuce costs more than a bag of organic lettuce, which costs more than a bag of regular lettuceand it requires a lot of energy; those LED bulbs arent lighting themselves.

But continued research and investment will gradually drive prices down, and as ironic as it sounds, vertical farms will eventually get all their energy from solar panels.

This will leave us with an organic growing method that requires no fertilizer or pesticides, produces no agricultural runoff or other pollution, uses a fraction of the water traditional farms use (same goes for land), and yields consistent harvests year-round, even in extreme or unusual weather.

You can create optimal growing conditions for the crop and you dont need to wash it, van der Feltz said. The washing process damages the leaves and causes them to decay faster. Having the growth facility nearby decreases travel time and means the food will be fresher.

As rosy as this all sounds, it doesnt mean people will embrace vertically-farmed food with open arms. Food is a sensitive topic many consumers take very seriously; if we are, in fact, what we eat, people may not love the idea of eating food that, for all its merits, is grown under decidedly artificial conditions.

As we stood peering at the neatly glowing rows of plants, van der Feltz reached out, plucked one from its roots, and handed it to me. Try it, he said. So I did. I tasted the green-leaf lettuce and the basil. Both seemed to have a stronger flavor and aftertaste than the store-bought greens Im used to, though it was nothing Id have noticed had I not been aware of what I was eating.

Van der Feltz recognizes widespread adoption of vertically-farmed food may be a challenge. We understand some people may feel uneasy about food grown with no sunlight, he said. Consumer education will play a key role in getting people comfortable with purchasing and eating LED-grown greens.

At the same time, though, food preferences are shifting, and for the better as far as vertical farming is concerned. In the Western world theres a growing demand for convenience products that have already been washed and are ready to use, van der Feltz explained.

His confidence in GrowWises products, for one, is unwavering. We test our produce regularly for pathogens and nutritional quality, and each time the results are excellent, he said. They serve this lettuce here in our cafeteria. I take it home to my family. My kids love it.

Image Credit: Vanessa Bates Ramirez

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A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Europe's Huge New Vertical Farm - Singularity Hub

We live in a world of accelerating change. New industries are constantly being born and old ones are becoming obsolete. A report by the World Economic Forum reveals that almost 65 percent of the jobs elementary school students will be doing in the future do not even exist yet. Both the workforce and our knowledge base are rapidly evolving.

Combined with the effects of technological automation on the workforce, this leaves us with a crucial question: What are the skills future generations will need?

Education expert Tony Wagner has spent a lifetime trying to answer this very question. Through investigating the education sector, interviewing industry leaders and studying the global workforce at large, Wagner has identified seven survival skills of the future. These are skills and mindsets young people absolutely need in order to meet their full potential.

We spend so much time teaching students how to answer questions that we often neglect to teach them how to ask them. Asking questionsand asking good onesis a foundation of critical thinking. Before you can solve a problem, you must be able to critically analyze and question what is causing it. This is why critical thinking and problem solving are coupled together.

Wagner notes the workforce today is organized very differently than it was a few years ago. What we are seeing are diverse teams working on specific problems, as opposed to specific specialties. Your manager doesnt have all the answers and solutionsyou have to work to find them.

Above all, this skill set builds the very foundation of innovation. We have to have the ability to question the status quo and criticize it before we can innovate and prescribe an alternative.

One of the major trends today is the rise of the contingent workforce. In the next five years, non-permanent and remote workers are expected to make up 40 percent of the average companys total workforce. We are even seeing a greater percentage of full-time employees working on the cloud. Multinational corporations are having their teams of employees collaborate at different offices across the planet.

Technology has allowed work and collaboration to transcend geographical boundaries, and thats truly exciting. However, collaboration across digital networks and with individuals from radically different backgrounds is something our youth needs to be prepared for. According to a New Horizons report on education, we should see an increasing focus on global online collaboration, where digital tools are used to support interactions around curricular objectives and promote intercultural understanding.

Within these contexts, leadership among a team is no longer about commanding with top-down authority, but rather about leading by influence. Ultimately, as Wagner points out, Its about how citizens make change today in their local communitiesby trying to influence diverse groups and then creating alliances of groups who work together toward a common goal.

We live in a VUCA (Volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world. Hence, Its important to be able to adapt and re-define ones strategy.

In their book, Critical Thinking: How to Prepare Students for a Rapidly Changing World, Richard Paul & Dillion Beach note how traditionally our education and work mindset has been designed for routine and fixed procedure. We learned how to do something once, and then we did it over and over. Learning meant becoming habituated, they write. But what is it to learn to continually re-learn? To be comfortable with perpetual re-learning?

In the post-industrial era, the impact of technology has meant we have to be agile and adaptive to unpredictable consequences of disruption. We may have to learn skills and mindsets on demand and set aside ones that are no longer required.

Traditionally, initiative has been something students show in spite of or in addition to their schoolwork. For most students, developing a sense of initiative and entrepreneurial skills has often been part of their extracurricular activities. With an emphasis on short-term tests and knowledge, most curricula have not been designed to inspire doers and innovators.

Are we teaching our youth to lead? Are we encouraging them to take initiative? Are we empowering them to solve global challenges? Throughout his research, Wagner has found that even in corporate settings, business leaders are struggling to find employees who consistently seek out new opportunities, ideas and strategies for improvement.

A study by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills showed that about 89 percent of employer respondents report high school graduate entrants as deficient in communication.

Clear communication isnt just a matter of proper use of language and grammar. In many ways, communicating clearly is an extension of thinking clearly. Can you present your argument persuasively? Can you inspire others with passion? Can you concisely capture the highlights of what you are trying to say? Can you promote yourself or a product?

Billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson has famously said Communication is the most important skill any leader can possess. Like many, he has noted it is a skill that can be learned and consequently used to open many opportunities.

We now live in the information age. Every day we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data. As this infographic shows, this would fill 10 million Blu-ray disks.

While our access to information has dramatically increased, so has our access to misinformation. While navigating the digital world, very few students have been taught how to assess the source and evaluate the content of the information they access. Moreover, this information is continuously evolving as we update our knowledge base faster than ever before.

Furthermore, in the age of fake news, an active and informed citizen will have to be able to assess information from many different sources through a critical lens.

Curiosity is a powerful driver of new knowledge and innovation. It is by channeling a child-like sense of awe and wonder about the world that we can truly imagine something even better. It takes powerful imagination to envision breakthroughs and then go about executing them. It is the reason Albert Einstein famously said, Imagination is more important than knowledge.

We consistently spoon-feed students with information instead of empowering them to ask questions and seek answers. Inquisitiveness and thinking outside the box need to be treated with the same level of importance the school system gives to physics or math.

There is a stark contrast between these seven survival skills of the future and the focus of education today. Instead of teaching students to answer questions, we should teach them to ask them. Instead of preparing them for college, we should prepare them for life.

Beyond creating better employees, we must aim to create better leaders and innovators. Doing so will not only radically transform the future of education and the workforce, it will also transform the world we live in.

Stock Media provided by ra2studio / Pond5 Deep Dream Generator

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7 Critical Skills For the Jobs of the Future - Singularity Hub

This week's airing schedule is an "Expedition Unknown" marathon tonight on Travel Channel, but it looks like no new episodes this week. On Friday, we have some EXU reruns with a marathon of "Destination Truth" which includes two "new" DT reruns in the mix, as well.

Here is some other news and information that may be interesting to you guys, while you are here:

If you want to read some cool blogs on this site, here is what I recommend:

For this week's airing schedule, check out Travel Channel on Wednesday night for an "Expedition Unknown" marathon and a brand new "Expedition" episode. On Friday (after "Ghost Adventures" and "Expedition"), we continue to enjoy the revival of our favorite "Destination Truth" reruns with Josh, Erin Ryder, Jael de Pardo, Rex Williams, Gabs Copeland, Casey Brummels, and more of our favorites, on Travel Channel. Enjoy and check your local listings!

FRIDAY = after "Ghost Adventures," there are "Expedition" reruns and two "new" DT re-runs on.

To clarify, for everyone - Travel Channel is re-airing DT under the name "Josh Gates' Destination Truth." There are no new episodes planned to be shot and aired for DT (that I am aware of) and yes, they are airing them out of sequence, compared to how they originally aired on Syfy/SciFi. Check your local listings and time zones for accurate viewing schedules. Also, a regular reminder that this is a fan page not run by Josh Gates/Travel/Syfy/Ping Pong Productions.

Then on Friday the 2nd, we not only get EXU reruns, but then, we get more "new" DT reruns, too!

More things you might be interested in: Why does a certain Netflix show think Josh Gates is Steve Barry? Wondering why the "DT" episodes being aired on Travel are out of order, in comparison to how they appeared on Syfy/SciFi? Not hearing so much from Josh on Twitter & Facebook? Check out his Instagram page by clicking here.

I do not know, so my guess is that Ping Pong Productions wanted to edit and air them in the order they wanted. That and there are likely people who are going to be discovering "DT" for the first time with these reruns on a new network, so in the grand scheme of things, not sure if it matters so much. Hope I don't ruffle feathers by saying that.

As far as the book, it documents the history of "DT" in relation to it's original network and came out more than a year before these reruns found a new home on Travel Channel. I hope that clears things up! On that note - the price of the book has been lowered to celebrate the show's revival - it is full of exclusive interviews, insider info, and even a foreword by Josh Gates himself! Pick it and support the fan site by clicking here. -Amanda, fan site runner

WEDS NIGHT: There is an all night "Expedition Unknown" marathon, including one of the "Destination Truth episodes that aired last week being re-run on Travel Channel.

FRIDAY: There is another all night EXU marathon followed by two "new" DT re-runs.

SATURDAY - 2 EXU reruns.

Just a reminder - these are not new DT episodes. What it looks like so far, though, is that the logo has changed from the classic "Destination Truth" logo to a different font and it says "Josh Gates' Destination Truth." It also looks like the footage has been cleaned up or remastered a little bit, which is nice to see on these newer TV sets. Be sure to keep watching & tweeting. Enjoy!

Just to clarify - these are re-runs of the same "Destination Truth" that aired on Syfy. It will now play on Travel Channel and it's now known as "Josh Gates' DT" but you never know what possibilities this could mean. Maybe merchandising? Reboots? No way to tell unless we get the ratings high for these reruns, so be sure to check your local listings and tune in!

PS - don't forget to use the hashtag #destinationtruth on social media while watching!

All night marathons of "Expedition Unknown" reruns this Wednesday and Friday night (except for a random episode of "Legend Hunter" thrown in the mix). Be sure to check local listings to verify when these are on for you.

And be sure to check out Josh Gates' Instagram for fun shots on the road! Since we will be seeing familar faces, as well, go check out Ryder's Instagram, Jael's, & Gabe's. If there are other "DT" alumni cast Instagrams we should check out, comment below!

In case there are any doubts, you can read the press release that was sent to me by Josh Gates himself here, and Travel Channel confirmed it by tweeting about it here.

In other news, in celebration of "DT" reruns coming back to a new network soon, I am going to look into a discounted price or a promo code for the "Fan Guide to Destination Truth," so stay tuned for that!

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SINGULARITY: a Josh Gates, DT and EXU Fan Site ...

Flying car concepts have been around nearly as long as their earthbound cousins, but no one has yet made them a commercial success. MIT engineers think weve been coming at the problem from the wrong direction; rather than putting wings on cars, we should be helping drones to drive.

The team from the universitys Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) added wheels to a fleet of eight mini-quadcopters and tested driving and flying them around a tiny toy town made out of cardboard and fabric.

Adding the ability to drive reduced the distance the drone could fly by 14 percent compared to a wheel-less version. But while driving was slower, the drone could travel 150 percent further than when flying. The result is a vehicle that combines the speed and mobility of flying with the energy-efficiency of driving.

CSAIL director Daniela Rus told MIT News their work suggested that when looking to create flying cars, it might make more sense to build on years of research into drones rather than trying to simply put wings on cars.

Historically, flying car concepts have looked like someone took apart a Cessna light aircraft and a family sedan, mixed all the parts up, and bolted them back together again. Not everyone has abandoned this approachtwo of the most developed flying car designs from Terrafugia and AeroMobil are cars with folding wings that need an airstrip to take off.

But flying car concepts are looking increasingly drone-like these days, with multiple small rotors, electric propulsion and vertical take-off abilities. Take the eHang 184autonomous aerial vehicle being developed in China, theKitty Hawk all-electric aircraft backed by Google founder Larry Page, which is little more than a quadcopter with a seat, the AirQuadOne designed by UK consortium Neva Aerospace, or Lilium Aviations Jet.

The attraction is obvious. Electric-powered drones are more compact, maneuverable, and environmentally friendly, making them suitable for urban environments.

Most of these vehicles are not quite the same as those proposed by the MIT engineers, as theyre pure flying machines. But a recent Airbus concept builds on the same principle that the future of urban mobility is vehicles that can both fly and drive. Its Pop.Up design is a two-passenger pod that can either be clipped to a set of wheels or hang under a quadcopter.

Importantly, they envisage their creation being autonomous in both flight and driving modes. And theyre not the only ones who think the future of flying cars is driverless. Uber has committed to developing a network of autonomous air taxis within a decade. This spring, Dubai announced it would launch a pilotless passenger drone serviceusing the Ehang 184as early as next month (July).

While integrating fully-fledged autonomous flying cars into urban environments will be far more complex, the study by Rus and her colleagues provides a good starting point for the kind of 3D route-planning and collision avoidance capabilities this would require.

The team developed multi-robot path planning algorithms that were able to control all eight drones as they flew and drove around their mock up city, while also making sure they didnt crash into each other and avoided no-fly zones.

This work provides an algorithmic solution for large-scale, mixed-mode transportation and shows its applicability to real-world problems, Jingjin Yu, a computer science professor at Rutgers University who was not involved in the research, told MIT News.

This vision of a driverless future for flying cars might be a bit of a disappointment for those whod envisaged themselves one day piloting their own hover car just like George Jetson. But autonomy and Uber-like ride-hailing business models are likely to be attractive, as they offer potential solutions to three of the biggest hurdles drone-like passenger vehicles face.

Firstly, it makes the vehicles accessible to anyone by removing the need to learn how to safely pilot an aircraft. Secondly, battery life still limits most electric vehicles to flight times measured in minutes. For personal vehicles this could be frustrating, but if youre just hopping in a driverless air taxi for a five minute trip across town its unlikely to become apparent to you.

Operators of the service simply need to make sure they have a big enough fleet to ensure a charged vehicle is never too far away, or theyll need a way to swap out batteries easily, such as the one suggested by the makers of the Volocopter electric helicopter.

Finally, there has already been significant progress in developing technology and regulations needed to integrate autonomous drones into our airspace that future driverless flying cars can most likely piggyback off of.

Safety requirements will inevitably be more stringent, but adding more predictable and controllable autonomous drones to the skies is likely to be more attractive to regulators than trying to license and police thousands of new amateur pilots.

Image Credit: Lilium

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Forget Flying Cars, the Future Is Driving Drones - Singularity Hub

Green energy is a popular topic right now, with many countries signing on to the Paris Climate Accord and planning to move away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy.

While most countries are working toward establishing solar and wind power farms, some countries like Canada are looking toward the creation ofcompressed air storage plantsfor power storage and generation.

How can compressed air change the way countries use and store green energy?

Compressing air in porous caves can serve as a backup form of power that can be tapped when the demand for power is high. Essentially, the compressed air is stored in caves of porous basalt rock when power demand is low. When more power is needed, the air is heated and piped through turbines to generate power.

This is a great way for countries that already rely on wind power to hedge their bets, so to speakto ensure that there is a sufficient supply of power even if the wind doesnt blow as much as they would like.

But aproblem with this type of energy storage is that it relies on natural gas to heat the air. As of 2016, natural gas use made up more than one third of the US energy industry, and while it is more efficient than coal power, it is still a non-renewable resource.

The biggest difference between traditional compressed air storage plants and the new 7 MWh plant approved to be built in Goderich, Ontario, is the way the air is heated before being piped through the turbines. As mentioned, standard plants rely on natural gas to heat the air used to generate power. The new Goderich plant, on the other hand, uses a heat exchange system.

This heat exchange system stores the heat that is generated when the air is initially stored. When the air needs to be heated to generate power, that heat is simply released, making this an emission-free form of energy storage.

This is a step away from the traditional energy storage markets. Lithium-ion batteries like the ones in the Tesla Home battery system currently hold the majority of the market. Most of these batteries, though, are designed for small, single-home applications. Compressed air storage, on the other hand, can generate power for entire communities or power grids when the need arises.

Compressed air storage plants are a growing field, especially with the global focus on green energy. Anywhere that has a sufficient layer of basalt stone can be used for compressed air storage, making it an option for markets around the world.

The market for the equipment just to treat the air that is being compressed is expected to grow by more than six percent, reaching $11.2 billion by 2025.

Treating the compressed air is important to protect the compression equipment. The ambient air can contain contaminants that could damage or clog the equipment and pollute the compressed air.

With the path toward green energy growing clearer every year, construction projects like the new emission-free compressed air plant in Canada are the first steps toward a green planet, and toward getting humans away from fossil fuels and greenhouse gases.

While construction hasnt started yet on the Canadian plant, it will be fascinating to see how much power this emission-free plant can generate once its up and running, not to mention the amount of power that will eventually come from additional compressed air storage plants in the coming years.

Stock Media provided by noppasinw / Pond5

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Canada Is Building a 7 Megawatt-Hour Compressed Air Energy Storage Plant - Singularity Hub

At some point, youve probably heard or read someone refer to the singularity. A singularity can be many things, but the singularity usually refers to the idea of a Technological singularity. There are many ways to define this concept, but its basically the idea that humanity will inevitably create an artificial intelligence greater than itself, which will trigger exponential and unforeseen changes to the world as we know and experience it.

While the concept has been around for over a hundred years, we can more clearly see this inevitability today than before. Even if you dont subscribe to the idea, its hard not to see how technology continues to reshape our lives. We live among real, living Cyborgs. Several large companies are competing to be the first to bring self-driving technology to market. Amazons warehouses are so autonomous that they require just a minute of human labor to ship a package, from taking it off the shelf, packaging it, and sending it to the correct mail truck. Oh, and then theres their drone delivery ambitions.

Okay, cool, but how does this relate to baseball? The best example of technology taking over in baseball is MLBs Statcast technology. If you read this blog, you probably like baseball enough to at least be aware of Statcast. For the uninitiated, MLBs glossary describes Statcast as a state-of-the-art tracking technology...capable of measuring previously unquantifiable aspects of the game...using a series of high-resolution optical cameras along with radar equipment to track the location and movements of the ball and every player on the field, resulting in an unparalleled amount of information covering everything from the pitcher to the batter to base-runners and defensive players.

I have often used the Statcast data hosted at BaseballSavant.com to analyze hitters. That was thanks to Statcast being able to track both the Exit Velocity (the speed at which the ball leaves the bat) and Launch Angle (the vertical angle at which the ball leaves the bat) of most batted balls. From those two basic stats, a lot can be built on top. For instance, for each combination of the two, you can find its average production, whether in terms of hit probability, HR%, wOBA, BABIP or any other metric you can think of.

Theres a lot of other neat things you can figure out though. For instance, Joe Trezza wrote about how the Cards pitching staff has worked hard on holding runners on better. Carlos Martinez, Adam Wainwright, and Mike Leake have all cut a half a foot or more off the average lead a runner takes on them. Theyve also worked on being quicker to the plate, another aspect Statcast tracks.

After soon-to-be-former Cub and noted clubhouse cancer Miguel Montero blamed his pitcher to the media after allowing 7 stolen bases to the Nationals, Travis Sawchik used Statcast to investigate. The technology tracks each catchers pop-time (the time from receiving the ball to releasing it on an attempted steal), as well each pitchers time to home.

Montero has the worst average pop-time in the majors this year at 2.12 seconds, and the average is about 2 seconds flat. A very experienced scout can certainly detect that extra tenth of a second, but he still cant quantify it without a stopwatch, diligence, and attending several games to get a good feel for the players average. Hed have a good sense of average, but hed need to keep excellent records to find out what that extra tenth of a second means in terms of throwing out runners.

There are several other Statcast stats listed in the glossary linked above, some of the more notable being Spin Rate (the speed at which the ball rotates, something our own Joe Schwartz has often used in his pitching analysis), Route Efficiency (how close to optimal a defenders route was to the ball), and Catch Probability, which uses a balls hang-time and the distance a defender had to cover to get there to generate the average chance that a ball is caught.

One new feature is Sprint Speed, released this past week. The point of this stat is to find the average max-effort speed of a runner. In a truly shocking result, Billy Hamilton is leading in Sprint Speed in 2017. They also have a leaderboard, and a really cool graphic to go with it:

for a more interesting version of this picture, check out the leaderboard linked above, which has the same image but it tells you who each dot is when you hover your cursor above it.

Despite coming out just days ago, our fearless leader Craig Edwards has already tested the stats relationship with base-running and defensive value in the current year, and fellow Cardinal blogger Zach Gifford has already looked at the predictive powers of the stat, as well as where the Cardinals regulars rank.

The point is, these all are things that are done by scouts. How hard the ball comes off the bat, the average lead a runner can get away with, a catchers pop-time, a pitchers time to the plate, an outfielders speed and efficiency can all be assessed by observing a player. But can they see, remember, and properly aggregate every single time a player showcases those tools? Of course not. Technology is already way better at this than humans. Scouts dont judge a pitchers velocity by sight. They use a radar gun. And they dont even need to do that at the MLB level. They can just look at their Pitch F/x numbers.

At the same time, its upending the way we look at stats. When examining changes in a players contact quality, we used to look at a breakdown of his Hard%, Medium%, and Soft%, but now we have average Exit Velocity and Barrel%. We used to look at a players Ground ball/Line Drive/Fly ball profile, now we look at their Launch Angle distribution. We use to have Speed Score, but now we have Sprint Speed. The best public defensive metrics - Ultimate Zone Rating (UZR) and Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) - look set to be dethroned by the fruits of Catch Probability and whatever else the braintrust working on Statcast dream up.

Theres also the fact that Statcast still has more potential to spare. Remember above I mentioned that Statcast tracks the ball and every player. Noticeably absent is the bat. Statcast offers a lot of improvement in terms of measuring performance at the plate, but tracking the bat opens up another world of possibilities.

I often think of a hypothetical application, which in my head I call Bat F/x. Perhaps a more suitable name would be Batcast. Anyway, the idea is that you could gain a lot of information from tracking the bat that is currently still something only scouts can observe. Swing velocity and Swing plane are two more obvious examples. These can be measured with special bats as a method of practice and training, but Im talking about an in-game solution that evaluates performance.

Another neat one I would want to see would be a bat heatmap. That is, a heatmap of the half of the bat facing the pitcher at the point of impact. Then it could be color-coded based on where the hitters bat most often came in contact with the ball.

Perhaps Statcast just isnt advanced enough to do that yet, I dont know the technology well enough to say. Other technology is able to though, and it has some very obvious use cases for evaluating talent. Humans have already hit a wall when it comes to what they can reasonably do to evaluate talent by eye. Technology offers endless possibilities.

All the way back in 2004, when sabermetrics was gaining steam but still wasnt dominating front offices like they are now, Dayn Perry had this gem of a quote:

A question that's sometimes posed goes something like this: "Should you run an organization with scouts or statistics?" My answer is the same it would be if someone asked me: "Beer or tacos?" Both, you fool. Why construct an either-or scenario where none need exist? Heady organizations know they need as much good information as possible before they make critical decisions.

Statcast represents the ultimate combination of scouting and stats. A beer-flavored taco if you will. Okay, maybe the analogy breaks down there, because that sounds horrible. Statcast technology is able to scout better than the most observant and persistent scouts, through its ability to directly measure a players tools and properly aggregate them over time. At the same time, its going to upend the existing set of stats we used before. Statcast offers a brave new world of player evaluation, and I for one am going to enjoy seeing what comes next.

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Statcast and the coming Singularity - Viva El Birdos

Sam Cossman was hit by a big idea next to a lava lake. With his sight obscured by fumes and vapors, he couldnt be confident of his next step. Traditional thermal imaging was a solution, but not an ideal one. So, Cossman cofoundedQwake Tech with Dr. John Long,mer Hacimeroglu, and Bahar Wadia.

Qwake Techs augmented reality system, C-Thru, is built into a futuristic helmet and relies on a thermal imaging camera, toxicity sensors, edge detection, and an AR display to cut through smoke with useful visuals. It might have been born in a volcano, but Qwake Tech thinks the systemhas wider applications in disaster situations, such as a burning building.

The company is working with firefighters to improve current handheld thermal imaging, which requires a firefighter to stop, hold up a device, look through it, interpret the display, put it down, and move forward. C-Thrus display is positioned in front of the eyes, providinga hands-free AR video feed. It further clarifies the videoby highlighting key details with bright edges. The company says this will allowfirefighters to move much more quickly through buildings.

The ability to see in the types of environments that we work in is a game-changer for our industry, says Tom Calvert, Menlo Park Fire Protection District battalion chief. It could mean the difference between life and death.

Image Credit: Qwake Tech

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If youre one of the many people whos embraced the sharing economy, youve probably stayed in someone elses apartment or ridden in someone elses car. Maybe youve also done away with your clutter of DVDs, books, or CDs, since you can watch movies on Netflix, read books on Kindle, and hear music on Pandora.

The concept of having more while owning less sounds paradoxical, but thats exactly the scenario were finding ourselves in. Technology is enabling us to move away from ownership and towards an economy based on sharing and subscriptions. Platforms like Airbnb and Lyft or Uber connect renters and riders to landlords and drivers, and digitization means all kinds of media can be stored, streamed, or downloaded in seconds.

But where does it end? Are there things well always want to own, and if so, what are they?

In a new video from Big Think, author and WIRED founding executive editor Kevin Kelly explores the limits of what he calls the subscription economy and asks, Is this the end of owning stuff?

Kelly points out how easy its become to make things like games or books intangible. These things have gone from being physical products to information on a screen.

If we can deliver these intangibles anytime, anywhere, to anybody, that instant aspect of them means we dont have to own them anymore, Kelly says.

And its not just intangibles we dont need to own. If you can summon a car to pick you up within minutes, why own one, especially when owning means storing, cleaning, maintaining, and insuring? Subscribing, Kelly says, gives you all the benefits of owning without any of the liabilities.

But is there a limit to what people will be willing to rent?

Ownership isnt always just about practicality or convenience. Its also about comfort, familiarity, and status, tooand these arent as easy to digitize or subscribe to.

Kelly uses clothes as an example of something else we may soon subscribe to. Your body would be scanned so youd know the clothes would fit, then theyd get delivered to you, youd wear them once, send them back, and theyd be cleaned and sent to the next person.

On the one hand, it would be nice not to lug a suitcase of clothes and personal items along when you travel, instead receiving whatever you need at your destination (and leaving it there when you depart).

But what about your old gym shoes that are perfect for long days of walking? Or that t-shirt youve washed so many times it feels like wearing a fluffy cloud? And dont forget about the brand-name suit you saved up for months to buy, and the hat that bears your alma maters namehow will you tell the world who you are without these?

Not to mention, wouldnt wearing the same clothes dozens of other people have worn be kind of, well, gross?

Similar points might be made about items like kitchenware, toys, camping equipment, or really anything thats among the piles and stashes of stuff in our homes today.

We own things because its convenient, but also because its sentimentalmaybe it would be nice to rent a turkey roaster once a year instead of having it take up space in your cabinet for 364 days, but its also nice to use the one Aunt Sue gifted you from your wedding registry.

For better or worse, ownership also serves as a status symbol. If you can afford expensive cars and luxury-brand clothing and accessories, you may want to own them even if theyre not practical or convenient.

The answer to Kellys question, then, is a bit more nuanced than yes or no. This is the beginning of being able to significantly reduce what we own while retaining access to more than we had before. Its a phenomenon that will spread to new classes of things with varying speed.

How quickly we shift from owning to subscribing will be influenced by price and convenience, but the personal and cultural aspects of ownership will likely provide a counterbalance. I, for one, will always love my comfy old t-shirts and bulky paper books.

That said, preferences tend to change over time and evolve along with cultural norms. As evidenced by Airbnbs explosive growth in a relatively short period of time, many people have readily gone from thinking of their homes as private space to using them as money-makers. Similarly, though we may not be crazy about the idea of sharing clothes right now, the next generation could be as comfortable with it as we are sleeping in other peoples beds.

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Why the Future of Stuff Is Having More and Owning Less - Singularity Hub

The year is 2030. In a high-security containment lab, scientists gathered around a towering machine, eagerly awaiting the first look at a newly discovered bacterium on Mars.

With a series of beeps, the machinea digital-to-biological converter, or DBCsignaled that it had successfully received the bacteriums digitized genomic file. Using a chemical cocktail comprised of the building blocks of DNA, it whirled into action, automatically reconstructing the alien organisms genes letter-by-letter.

Within a day, scientists had an exact replica of the Martian bacterium.

To Craig Venter, the genetics maverick who created the first synthetic life form in 2016, beaming aliens back to recreate on Earth may sound like science fiction, but is potentially real.

Recently, working with Daniel Gibson, vice president of DNA technology at Synthetic Genomics, Venter published a prototype DBC capable of downloading digitized DNA instructions and synthesizing biomolecules from scratch.

Not only did the futuristic machine pump out functional bits of DNA, vaccines, and proteins, it also automatically synthesized viral particles from scratch.

Teleporting alien life to Earth is just one role Venter envisions for the DBC. Working the other way, we may be able to send Earths extremophile bacteria to a printer on Mars. If genetically enhanced to pump out oxygen, the bacteria may slowly change the Martian landscape, making it more habitable to humans before we ever set foot on the Red Planet.

More close to home, the DBC could allow instant, on-demand access to life-saving medicine or vaccines during an outbreak or finally enable access to personalized medicine.

We are excited by the commercial prospects of this revolutionary tool, as we believe the DBC represents a major leap forward in advancing new vaccines and biologics, says Venter in a press release.

At the basis of Venters foray into biological teleportation is the idea that all life formsat least on Earthare essentially DNA software systems. DNA directs and creates the more tangible biological hardware made of proteins, cells, and tissues.

Because DNA contains all the necessary information to boot up a life form, by hacking its code and writing our own, we now have the power to create living organisms never before seen on Earth.

Back in 2010, Venter inserted a bacterial genome completely synthesized from chemicals in the lab into a single-cell recipient. The synthetic genome booted up the living bacterium, allowing it to replicate into a large colony of artificial organisms. Six years later, his team ventured even further into the realm of science fiction, creating a new bacteria species with just 437 genesthe absolute known minimum amount of genetic code needed to support life.

These studies and others clearly show we now have a new set of tools that allow scientists to manufacture new living species to join our planets inventory of life. But why stop there? If life is nothing but code that can be packaged, emailed, downloaded, and copied, why not use the same technology to transmit life?

The DBC is Venters attempt to transfer and manufacture life.

Standing at eight feet long and six feet tall, the machine is a Frankenstein beast of mechanical blocks and wires splayed out across a double-deck table. Were working on the portability of the machine using new technologies such as microfluidic chips and microarrays, explained the authors.

Equipped with an ethernet hub, the DBC downloads DNA files from the internet and prints the code using the four chemical bases of DNAadenosine, guanine, thymine, and cytosine (A, G, T, C).

Its packaging complex biology that each of our tiny cells do remarkably well at a much, much smaller scale, explains Venter.

While automated DNA printers have already hit the market, the DBC takes it one step further. The machine is capable of building proteins from the genetic code (printing biological hardware, so to speak), bringing it one step closer to building living cells from scratch.

At the heart of the system is Archetype, proprietary software that optimally breaks down the input DNA sequence into more manageable short sequences to synthesize in parallel. This massively increases efficiency and reduces sequencing errors that increase with longer DNA strands.

Once assembled, the machine scans the strands for any errors before pasting the bits back into complete DNA assembles. From there, a series of robotic arms transfer the DNA from module to module, automatically adding reagents that turn the synthetic genes into functional proteins.

In one proof-of-concept study, the machine pumped out green fluorescent protein, an algae protein that often serves as an experimental canary in the lab. Following the DBC run, the resulting product glowed bright green as expected, and subsequent analysis found that over 70 percent of all synthesized molecules were error-free.

While impressive, the team acknowledges that future models need to do better.

All it takes is one DNA base to be incorrect for a protein not to work, or a therapeutic to not do what its supposed to, or for a cell to not be functional, warns Gibson.

In another experiment, the DBC successfully produced functional flu viral particles, RNA vaccines, and bacteriophagesviruses that infect bacteria that can be used to combat infections or even cancer.

Thats huge. If there is a pandemic, everyone around you is dying and you cannot go outdoors, you can download the vaccine in a couple of seconds from the internet, says Venter. A machine like this in hospitals, homes, and remote areas could revolutionize medicine.

Venter also has his eye on personalized medicine. In the future, if you have an infection you get its genome sequenced in minutes, he says. The doctor could then cross-reference your bug with an online database, download and print the available phage treatments in office and send you on your way.

Venters ambition doesnt stop there. He imagines combining the DBC with technologies from his synthetic organisms to construct a blank slate recipient cell capable of producing food, oxygen, and fuelthe perfect workhorse to send around the world or into space.

In theory, the cell would be capable of receiving any synthetic genome designed to produce life-supporting molecules. These cells have to be engineered, says Venter, but stresses that it can be done.

Having a DBC on board means a crew hurtlingthrough space would no longer rely on supply ship rendezvousand well never have a real life Mark Watney starved and stranded on Mars.

But thats looking way far ahead.

According to Gibson, before we get too distracted with fanciful thoughts of space, a lot more work still has to be done. For one, the DBC needs to shrink down to a more manageable size. For another, current DNA synthesis technologies are incredibly inefficient and wastefulabout 99.999 percent of the raw materials go to waste, he saysa problem further magnified as the team moves on to larger DNA constructs.

These arent small challenges, but the DBC shows that biological teleportation for biological materials is feasible. So why not aim high?

Mine is not a fantasy look at the future, says Venter. The goal isnt to imagine this stuff. We are the scientists actually doing this.

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'Biological Teleportation' Edges Closer With Craig Venter's Digital-to-Biological Converter - Singularity Hub