Category Archives: Transhuman News

With rising geopolitical concerns, record unemployment and technology advancing faster than ever, it has never been more crucial for working professionals to stay ahead of the curve.

As a futurist who has helped more than 1,000 organizations adapt to change and uncertainty, I've found that, while hard skills remain important, there are five forward-thinking and often ignored soft skills that are crucial for staying relevant and equipped for a rapidly changing workforce.

Here are the skills to master before 2021, along with free online courses that can help you build upon them:

Futurist thinking is the ability to predict events and trends, and how they might impact your industry and professional development.

While this is a skill that remarkably few people have developed, it's important to note that futuristic thinking doesn't require a Ph.D. At the very least, it's about staying abreast of potential changes and thinking outside the box.

Recommended free course: Ready, Set, Future! Introduction to Futures Thinking,Highlights: Build your understanding of what futurist thinking is, how to collect and analyze signals of change, and identify historical shifts in the past to predict new changes in the future.

(Another course I highly recommend is The Future After Covid, which has received great reviews. Please note that it does charge a $495 fee.)

Even if you're not in a managerial role, developing leadership skills has never been more important. In fact, studies show that those with such skills are more likely to get a raise, promoted, or selected to take on additional responsibilities.

It's important to note that leadership isn't just about managing a team. It's also about having the courage to do things like:

Recommended free course: What Great Leaders DoCost: FreeHighlights: In this lecture that parallels his book, "Good Boss, Bad Boss," Stanford professor Bob Sutton unpacks the best habits of beloved and effective managers, and details the worst practices of those who fail to lead.

With the emergence of artificial intelligence and machine learning, the ability to recognize, understand and manage not just your own emotions, but also those of others, has become one of the top skills employers look for.

Strong emotional intelligence skills allow us to understand and interact with our feelings in a way that helps us build quality relationships and make decisions effectively.

Recommended free course: Develop Your Emotional IntelligenceHighlights: Taking a single online course won't make you an EQ whiz overnight; it takes patience, practice and commitment. But this introductory program, which explores the components of emotional intelligence and how it can be applied at work, is a great place to start.

In a world where communication is mostly taking place on digital platforms such as Slack or Zoom, knowing how to speak clearly and interact with others is key to maintaining interpersonal relationships, successful problem-solving and managing conversations.

Keep in mind that this skill isn't just about what you say or type to one another, but it's also about active listening and being attuned to feelings.

Recommended free course: Improving Communication SkillsHighlights: Taught by award-winning Wharton professor Maurice Schweitzer, you'll build on key communication skills such as how to develop trust, be persuasive, ask thoughtful questions, engage in active listening, and choose the right medium (e.g., videoconferences, phone calls, or emails) for your messages.

According to a reportfrom the World Economic Forum that looked at the future of jobs across nine different industries in 15 of the world's largest economies, employers will soon be placing more emphasis on cognitive abilities like creativity and adaptability.

Those withcognitive flexibility skills are energized by change and adapt quickly and readily to the unknown. They enjoy experimenting with new things and are able to consider multiple concepts simultaneously.

Recommended free course: Introduction to Cognitive Psychology: An Experimental ScienceHighlights: Knowledge cannot be fully digested if the information is presented out of context. The exercises in this course will not only teach you how to understand complex concepts, but also how to apply them in different settings.

Scott Steinberg is a futurist, keynote speaker on business trends, and bestselling author of "Fast >> Forward," "Think Like a Futurist," "Make Change Work for You" and "Becoming Essential." He is also an award-winning strategic consultant and has been named by Fortune magazine as a leading expert on innovation.

Correction: This article has been updated to show that the Future After Covid course charges a $495 fee.

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These are the 5 most valuable skills to learn right now, says futuristand where to find free online courses - CNBC

Gotcha!

Scientists have long assumed that about 40 percent of the universes visible matter the kind makes up everything we can see and touch was missing, never having been detected.

Now, a team of researchers from Frances National Center of Scientific Research (CNRS) says its finally found it hidden away in the diffuse filaments ofthe gigantic, galaxy-connecting cosmic web. The research, published Friday in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, revealed the missing matter after scientists took a new look at a pile of 20-year-old data.

The filaments of gas that make upthe cosmic web are thought to connect networks of galaxies across vast voids of nothingness in the universe, according to a CNRS press release. Sometimes they also serve as a source of fresh material for nearby galaxies or black holes, making the web itself even more threadbare and faint.

The French researchers suggest that its because these cosmic web filaments are so diffuse, and the signals they give off are so weak, that they went undetected for 20 years even though all the data was in plain sight.

To find the 40 percent of all the visible matter in the universe that they contain, the CNRS researchers took a look at the filaments x-ray emissions coupled with information on 15,000 filaments physical arrangement.

Through that x-ray analysis, the team was able to confirm that the filaments contained vast amounts of previously-overlooked hot gases a huge fraction of the universes matter hiding in plain sight.

READ MORE: Has the hidden matter of the universe been discovered? [CNRS]

More on the cosmic web: Heres the First-Ever Pic of Cosmic Web Connecting All Galaxies

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Scientists Say They've Found the Missing 40 Percent of the Universe's Matter - Futurism

According to team of scientists at the Carnegie Institution for Science, an additional planet located between Saturn and Uranus got flung out of the solar system while it was still in its infancy.

The theory goes that the Sun was once surrounded by a disk of gas and dust. Through countless collisions, planets started to form, orbiting our star at a relatively short distance.

The more massive planets then kicked off a series of gravitational interactions, causing the planets to reshuffle into their current arrangement.

To get a clearer picture of what that arrangement looked like before these interactions, the team conducted some 6,000 computer simulations.

We now know that there are thousands of planetary systems in our Milky Way galaxy alone, Carnegie postdoctoral fellow Matt Clement, lead author of a paper about the simulations published in the journal Icarus, said. But it turns out that the arrangement of planets in our own Solar System is highly unusual, so we are using models to reverse engineer and replicate its formative processes.

This is a bit like trying to figure out what happened in a car crash after the fact how fast were the cars going, in what directions, and so on, he added.

They found that the final arrangement of Uranus and Neptune, two icy planets furthest away from the Sun, was determined by both the mass of the Kuiper belt, a region of dwarf planets and planetoids in the far reaches of the solar system, and an ejected ice giant that was kicked out when the planetary system was still young.

This indicates that while our Solar System is a bit of an oddball, it wasnt always the case, Clement explained. Whats more, now that weve established the effectiveness of this model, we can use it to help us look at the formation of the terrestrial planets, including our own, and to perhaps inform our ability to look for similar systems elsewhere that could have the potential to host life.

READ MORE: Where were Jupiter and Saturn born? [Carnegie Institute for Science]

More on the solar system: Astronomers Want to Figure Out What the Hell Planet Nine Is Once and For All

Original post:
New Evidence: There Was Another Planet in the Solar System That Escaped - Futurism

Color Vision

A team of engineers built a system that lets people to see colors in the infrared spectrum as long as theyre looking through a camera lens.

We can see light with wavelengths within the visible spectrum, a fairly narrow band of colors that falls between ultraviolet and infrared light. But researchers from Tel Aviv University built a system that, mounted on a camera, make the colors of infrared light visible to us, according to research published in the journal Laser & Photonics Reviews. It makes a normally-expensive scientific tool more accessible to the point it could be used for photography or citizen science.

The team says that the device can be used to image gases like hydrogen, carbon, and sodium each of which can glow brightly in infrared. It can also image scenes in nature, which tend to look otherworldly under infrared light.

[Visible light is] only a tiny part of the electromagnetic spectrum, which also includes radio waves, microwaves, X-rays and more, Tel Aviv physicist Michael Mrejen said in a press release. In each of these parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, there is a great deal of information on materials encoded as colors that has until now been hidden from view.

Aside from photography and science, the scientists suggest a few slightly more consequential uses for their low-cost infrared tech.

So an environmental monitoring satellite could see a pollutant being emitted from a plant, coauthor Haim Suchowski said in the release, or a spy satellite would see where explosives or uranium are being hidden.

READ MORE: New technology allows cameras to capture colors invisible to the human eye [Tel Aviv University]

More on infrared: New Telescope Will Watch Entire Southern Sky in Infrared

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Scientists Found a Way to Make Infrared Light Visible to Humans - Futurism

The lights went out. I settled into my seat, drink in hand, anticipation building for the start of the show. But rather than watching the stage lights go up on, I clicked on a Zoom link. Welcome to theatre in the age of a pandemic, where health and safety protocols have forced theatres to drastically alter how they operate, from reducing seating to, like the Neo-Futurists, going completely virtual.

Before attending, I had heard of their show The Infinite Wrench before, but had never experienced it in real life. Essentially, they attempt to perform 30 plays in 60 minutes. Each play is about two minutes long, and the audience chooses the order in which the plays are performed. Digitally, the show is essentially the same, with the exception of audience choice. The show was streamed on YouTube, with each clip lasting around two minutes before autoplaying to the next.

via GIPHY

I came into the viewing pretty skeptical, of both The Infinite Wrenchs overall concept and its new virtual format. As far as I was concerned, theatre is supposed to be live and in-person. The performers should be so close you can hear their breathing, see their sheen under the stage lights and see their every move, even the unintended ones. I held the belief that theatre is supposed to be consumed surrounded by fellow audience members in uncomfortable seats and low lighting, where the person in the row in front of you wont turn off their phone. Instead, I spent 60 minutes watching a play from the comfort of my dorm room, and I was unexpectedly entranced.

The best thing about this digital Infinite Wrench is that it still felt like theatre. Was it just a taping of the exact same play as if they had a live audience? No. They made use of editing, animation, PowerPoints and other tools that wouldn't work in live theatre without making it feel like a series of short films. Rather, each play was a piece of theatre reimagined. Audience participation was still present, just reimagined. One play, for example, encouraged viewers to howl and scream to cover up curse words. Another asked us to text a number to vote for favorite costumes.

Above and beyond all this, the show still moved me the way only theatre can. At different points I was shocked, terrified, laughing out loud, and miserable. This show sent myself and the rest of the audience on an emotional rollercoaster, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

via GIPHY

While Zooming with some cast members after the show, Northwestern students and faculty who were in the audience got to talking about the advantages of this new online format. One that stood out is the increased accessibility of the show. In its new virtual format, The Infinite Wrench is available for lower prices, people can watch from anywhere, which opens it up to an international audience, and the show is now captioned, which improves accessibility to deaf and hard of hearing communities. Could this be the future of theatre? Will having online options be more widespread even when were back to normal? Personally, I would welcome this change. Theatre should be for everyone.

Check out the Neo-Futurists website here for more information on their shows and how you can support them during this difficult time for the arts.

*Thumbnail courtesy of the Neo-Futurists' website.

Read more here:
The Neo-Futurists: bringing theatre further into the future - North by Northwestern

Unplugged Tour

After a years-long push to automate its stores with helpful worker robots, Walmart Inc. is pulling the plug.

While Walmart plans to experiment with some kinds of robots and automated tech, according to The Wall Street Journal, the retail giant will no longer use robots to scan shelves and track inventory. It turns out that people still do the job better and were less likely to creep out both workersand customers.

It turns out that commissioning a robotics firm to develop mechanical workers just to check whether a shelf was empty wasnt the most cost effective way to keep an eye on inventory. For the foreseeable future, the WSJ reports, humans will handle the job instead.

We learned a lot about how technology can assist associates, make jobs easier and provide a better customer experience, a Walmart spokeswoman told the WSJ. We will continue testing new technologies and investing in our own processes and apps to best understand and track our inventory and help move products to our shelves as quickly as we can.

Unfortunately, the news was devastating for Bossa Nova, the robotics firm that provided Walmart with its inventory robots. The firm, a Carnegie Mellon University-born startup, laid off half of its staff as it tries to drum up replacement business.

We see an improvement in stores with the robots, Walmart told Bossa Nova, someone familiar with the deal told the WSJ, but we dont see enough of an improvement.

READ MORE: Walmart Scraps Plan to Have Robots Scan Shelves [The Wall Street Journal]

More on Walmart robots: Walmart Employees Hate Their New Robot Coworkers

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Walmart Is Giving Up on Its Inventory Robots - Futurism

Shady Money

A billion dollars worth of bitcoin linked to the long-defunct darknet marketplace Silk Road suddenly moved this week for the first time since the FBI raided the operation in April 2013.

Now we know why. The US Treasury seized the bitcoins, Wired reports,with the Department of Justice filing a civil forfeiture complaint claiming the bitcoins were stolen by a mysterious hacker named Individual X in court documents.

Its the largest seizure of cryptocurrency in the history of the US Justice Department, CNBC reports.

Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht was sentenced to a double life sentence in 2015. The successful prosecution of Silk Roads founder in 2015 left open a billion-dollar question, US Attorney David Anderson in a statement. Where did the money go?

Todays forfeiture complaint answers this open question at least in part, he added. $1bn of these criminal proceeds are now in the United States possession.

The bitcoins were stored under a single address since at least 2013 and were left untouched until this week.

Criminal investigators tracked down the address of the mysterious Individual X using a third party company that specializes in cryptocurrency tracing tools,the BBC reports.

Coincidentally, the value of bitcoin has currently climbed above $15,000, the highest its been since January 2018, according to CNBC.

READ MORE: Record $1 billion worth of bitcoin linked to the Silk Road seized by U.S. government [CNBC]

More on the story: Someone Just Moved $1 Billion in Bitcoin From a Busted Darknet Market

Originally posted here:
US Government Seizes $1 Billion in Silk Road Bitcoin - Futurism

Robot Girlfriend

Scientists from Japans Gifu University built a robot hand for men to clasp when they feel lonely.

The hand, dubbed Osampo Kanojo, which the engineers roughly translate to My Girlfriend in Walk in their research, is meant to feel and even smell like a romantic partner from the forearm down, according to CNET. The idea, supposedly, is to provide some comfort and companionship to the worlds lonely especially in isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The robot hand clasps to a users forearm so they can let go without dropping it to the ground.

The Osampo Kanojo is designed to squeeze your hand back and even release liquid through pores in its flesh-like outer layer, an approximation of your partner-in-hand-holding getting sweaty palms, SoraNews 24 reports. On top of that, the research describes a small speaker to play the sounds of a partners footsteps and the ability to vent out the smell of womens shampoo.

The bizarre robot is meant to provide companionship as well as to encourage more walk-taking for those who are working or taking classes from home. And if the current model doesnt float your boat, SoraNews 24 reports that a more masculine version could come soon.

The two robot hands would be fairly similar, except the male model would come with different scents: cologne, barbeque charcoal, and, in perhaps a too-on-the-nose twist, motor oil.

READ MORE: This pale, sweaty robot hand wants to take romantic walks with you [CNET]

More on robots: Watch the ISSs New AI Robot Companion Act Like Kind of a Brat

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Scientists in Japan Build Robot to Hold Hands With Lonely People - Futurism

A new MIT algorithm is capable of determining, with impressive accuracy, whether or not people have COVID-19 just by listening to them cough.

The algorithm, which the researchers trainedusing the sound of tens of thousands of coughs recorded over the course of the pandemic, has a 98.5 percent success rate among patients who were already diagnosed with COVID-19, BBC News reports. If they didnt have any other symptoms aside from that cough, the success rate climbed to 100 percent.

It shouldnt replace a proper lab test, the BBC suggests, but it could serve as a point-of-contact test before meeting a group or attending an event.

Other teams of scientists have tried to diagnose the coronavirus for just about as long as the pandemic has been raging. In March, Carnegie Mellon University scientists built a COVID Voice Detector app that scanned for signs of COVID-19 in the sounds of people coughing and reciting the alphabet. The healthcare developer Sonde built an app called Sonde One in July that only asked users to say ahhh before reporting whether they seemed to have coronavirus-like symptoms.

But the MIT teams algorithm described in research published in the IEEE Journal of Engineering in Medicine and Biology appears to offer a vastly more accurate result.

Theres nothing special about the algorithm the MIT scientists just got their hands on loads and loads of training data with which to refine it. Months ago, the BBC reports, the algorithm had a comparable success rate to those other apps, so it was just a matter of making the model more robust.

Its the same principle as feeding a machine a lot of X-rays so it learns to detect cancer, former BBC reporter Calum Chace, now an AI expert and author, told the BBC. Its an example of AI being helpful. And, for once, I dont see a lot of downside in this.

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MIT Algorithm Detects COVID-19 in the Sound of Your Cough - Futurism

Scientists at Columbia University have developed a nasal spray that seems to block the coronavirus from infecting the nose and lungs.

If it works on people the spray hasnt yet been tested on human subjects yet it could become an effective, low-cost preventative measure while we wait around for an effective vaccine, The New York Times reports.

Having something new that works against the coronavirus is exciting, Dr. Arturo Casadevall, immunology chair at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who didnt work on the spray, told the NYT. I could imagine this being part of the arsenal.

The team tested out the spray on cultured cells and ferrets, finding in their study which was shared online Friday but has yet to undergo peer review at an academic journal that it protected against multiple known strains of the coronavirus for a full 24 hours. In a small study, COVID-free ferrets placed in a cage with a COVID-infected ferret remained healthy, while the ferrets which were given a placebo ended up catching the coronavirus.

If it works this well in humans, you could sleep in a bed with someone infected or be with your infected kids and still be safe, Dr. Ann Moscona, study coauthor and Columbia pediatrician and microbiologist, told the NYT.

The next step would be to test the nasal spray on human volunteers, but Moscona says the team needs to raise more funding before it can.

If it does work out, the NYT reports, the spray could feasibly become a compelling in-between measure to slow the diseases spread until a vaccine is available. It seemed to totally block viral replication in studies, significantly lowering the risk of being exposed to people with COVID-19. And because it doesnt need refrigeration, the team says it would be considerably cheaper to manufacture and distribute than other, more fragile treatments.

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If This COVID-Blocking Nasal Spray Works on Humans, It Could Change the Course of the Pandemic - Futurism