Category Archives: Transhuman News

"Blue Origin has been lucky that nothing has happened so far."Hard Pass

A small cohort of current and former employees of Blue Origin, Jeff Bezoss spaceflight company, recently penned an article questioning the companys commitment to safety.

We wrote yesterday about the employees claims that Blue Origin harbors a shockingly sexist work culture.Another alarming takeaway from the letter, though, comes from a completely different direction, claiming that the company also has a poor safety culture around its rockets. The problems are so bad that the authors say they wouldnt feel safe riding in a Blue Origin rocket, given the chance.

Many of us have spent our careers dreaming of helping to launch a crewed rocket into space and seeing it safely touch back down on Earth, the employees wrote. But when Jeff Bezos flew to space this July, we did not share his elation. Instead, many of us watched with an overwhelming sense of unease. Some of us couldnt bear to watch at all.

Notably, the authors dont list any single safety issue with Blue Origins New Shepard rocket. Instead, they describe a work culture in which overstretched teams had more and more work piled onto them without reasonable increases in personnel or budget.

That culture, coupled with a lack of overarching safety regulations for the nascent commercial spaceflight industry, they argue, forced the staff to prioritize speed over safety, increasing the chances that safety issues flew under the radar.

Blue Origin has been lucky that nothing has happened so far, one anonymous engineer contributed to the article. Many of this essays authors say they would not fly on a Blue Origin vehicle. And no wonder we have all seen how often teams are stretched beyond reasonable limits.

READ MORE: Bezos Wants to Create a Better Future in Space. His Company Blue Origin Is Stuck in a Toxic Past. [Lioness]

More on Blue Origin: More Than 20 Blue Origin Employees Say Its a Horrible Place to Work

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Blue Origin Employees Say They Don't Think Its Rocket Is Safe, Wouldn't Ride In It - Futurism

Pharmaceutical company Merck claims its new COVID-19 pill, called molnupiravir, can reduce the risk of hospitalization and even death from the coronavirus by half, according to newly announced Phase III clinical trial results.

The company is now applying for Emergency Use Authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration.

Its a promising development for new treatments against severe cases of COVID-19 but the news should also serve as a reminder that getting vaccinated is by far the best preventative step, regardless of the availability of effective treatments.

COVID remains a highly dangerous disease. A staggering 1 in 500 Americans have now died from it.

In the trials, Merck tested the drug on participants who recently tested positive for COVID and who also had at least one additional risk factor including obesity, diabetes, heart disease or being above the age of 60.

After 29 days, 53 out of 377 participants who received the placebo were hospitalized after contracting the coronavirus. Eight of the placebo group died.

Only 28 out of 385 participants who received the drug, in contrast, were hospitalized. None of them died.

Promisingly, Merck also noted that its drug worked just as well against dangerous new strains of the virus, including the widespread delta variant.

If granted authorization, the pill would be the third antiviral drug approved by the FDA to treat COVID. Remdesivir, an injection, has also proven to be effective at staving off serious cases of COVID-19. Monoclonal antibody therapy has also shown promise.

All those treatments, though, are very expensive. According to The New York Times, a five day course of molnupiravir currently costs about $700 per patient. Two doses of the Pfizer vaccine,in contrast, cost just $39 and are available for free at locations across the United States and in many other countries worldwide.

While theres meaningful progress toward developing effective treatments for COVID, one simple fact remains: those who are unvaccinated are far more likely eleven times to be hospitalized.

Granted, breakthrough infections do happen, albeit quite infrequently. But at the end of the day, the vaccine is a great way to stay safe.

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Company Claims Pill Cuts Risk of Dying of COVID-19 in Half - Futurism

Doctors in Lithuania recently cut open a patients stomach so that they could safely remove the roughly two-and-a-half pounds of miscellaneous metal objects that he had swallowed over the course of a month.

As the story goes, the man had quit drinking, but for one reason or another replaced it with an even more destructive vice, Agence France-Presse reports. Its a bizarre case, but the doctors say that the man recovered and was resting in stable condition following the procedure.

If youre not feeling too squeamish, feel free to check out the Lithuanian-language publication LRT, which published an image of the surgical tray full of all the nails, screws, nuts, and other metal bits that the man had swallowed.

Weve never seen anything like it, head surgeon Algirdas Slepavicius told AFP.

The doctors told LRT that the surgery itself was fairly straightforward and that patients coming in after swallowing various objects all the time. But this particular surgery took a long time about three hours because of the sheer number of objects the man consumed. The doctors were also slowed down by the fact that they needed to frequently take and retake x-rays to ensure they found all of the small metal bits, which LRT reports ranged in size from two millimeters to an alarming 10 centimeters.

They also had to make sure that the sharp metal hadnt pierced through the wall of his stomach, but that didnt seem to be the case. Apparently the man hasnt said much, according to LRT, but hes currently under psychological care to try and figure out where his metal-eating habit came from and why.

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Doctors Alarmed by Man Who Quit Drinking and Started Swallowing Metal Nails and Screws - Futurism

According to developer documents and video meeting recordings obtained by Vice, the engineers behind Amazons new $999 robot arent thrilled with the finished product.

The e-retailer recently announced the Astro, a stalkerish two-wheeled robot designed to keep track of everything you do, and even spy on anybody unlucky enough to enter your home.

Even if you sign on to that troubling premise, the bots developers apparently werent happy with the final product.

Astro is terrible and will almost certainly throw itself down a flight of stairs if presented the opportunity, an unnamed developer said, as quoted by Vice. The person detection is unreliable at best, making the in-home security proposition laughable.

The device feels fragile for something with an absurd cost, the developer added.

Vices source also criticized the devices marketing as an accessibility device, telling the outlet that its at best, absurdist nonsense and marketing and, at worst, potentially dangerous for anyone whod actually rely on it for accessibility purposes.

A second source who also worked on the project called it a disaster thats not ready for release, noting that they break themselves and will almost certainly fall down stairs in real world users homes.

Senior PR manager Kristy Schmidt called the allegations simply inaccurate, telling Vice that the robot went through rigorous testing on both quality and safety, including tens of thousands of hours of testing with beta participants.

Its almost poetic: a highly invasive robot hellbent on throwing itself down a flight of stairs.

Astro represents the kind of future weve been warning about for all these years: a largely autonomous robot actively spying on strangers, developed by a company that has built its success on collecting every bit of information it can glean from its customers.

Fortunately, it isnt likely to fly off the shelves given its hefty price tag.

READ MORE: Leaked Documents Show How Amazons Astro Robot Tracks Everything You Do [Vice]

More on Amazon: Companies Are Ditching Drug Tests Because Theyre Blocking Good Candidates

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Creators of Amazon's New Robot Secretly Admitted It's "Terrible" - Futurism

The Nreal glasses don't have any outward-facing cameras.Picture-in-Picture

The augmented reality developer Nreal just announced a new, cheaper model of its AR glasses, which its calling the Nreal Air.

But unlike previous Nreal models, and just about every other mixed reality headset out there, the new system will focus solely on streaming video or displaying other media. As The Verge notes, the Nreal Air will be missing the components, like outward-facing cameras or hand-tracking tech, that would help a wearer actually interact with the world around them while using AR. Its an interesting move using AR to turn inward and binge shows or go down YouTube rabbit holes that contrasts against other developers moves to build metaverses that blur the line between virtual and tangible realities.

Because hand controls wont work, users will need to control the Nreal Air which a spokesperson told The Verge will cost a fraction of the Nreal Lights $600 pricetag through a smartphone app. Using a phone instead of actually being able to reach out and touch parts of the AR display with your hands may break some of the immersion, but that fits in with the companys goal of building a more compact, stripped-down, and especially more affordable version of AR made for watching videos.

Consumers today are seeking lighter, but longer lasting AR glasses exclusively for streaming media and working from home, Nreal founder Chi Xu said in a statement provided to The Verge.

Plus, theres the added bonus of not creeping out every single person you walk past. Without external cameras on your glasses something Facebook recently unveiled with its creepy new covert surveillance Ray-Bans AR users can go about their days without getting weird looks from strangers wondering if theyre being filmed.

READ MORE: Nreals new AR sunglasses are made for binge watching TV [The Verge]

More on AR: Facebook Is Working on an Amazingly Hideous Augmented Reality Fedora

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New AR Glasses Are for Streaming Video and Ignoring the Real World - Futurism

That pesky Sun is getting in the way of NASA's research.Laying Low

NASA and the China National Space Administration (CNSA), the only two space agencies with robotic rovers currently exploring and studying Mars, are both being forced to put their research on hold for a little while.

The problem? The Sun is literally getting in the way. A period called Mars solar conjunction, in which the Sun passes in between the two planets, is expected to begin next week on October 2, according to a NASA announcement. While its there, the space agencies decided that it would be safest to take a break and not beam any new commands to their various Mars rovers.

NASA engineers are concerned that the Suns ionizing rays could interfere with any instructions that engineers send to their respective Mars rovers, potentially corrupting the signals and prompting unexpected, possibly dangerous behavior from the off-world robots. Therefore, NASA wont send any new instructions to their rovers between October 2 and 16, according to the agencys announcement.

Similarly, the CNSA told the Chinese state-run news outlet Global Times that its Tianwen-1 space probe and Zhurong rover will pause their work and enter safe mode during the transit.

But just because the rovers arent getting any new instructions doesnt mean theyre stopping altogether.

Though our Mars missions wont be as active these next few weeks, theyll still let us know their state of health, the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratorys Mars Relay Network manager, Roy Gladden, said in the NASA announcement. Each mission has been given some homework to do until they hear from us again.

For instance, the Perseverance and Curiosity rovers will continue to record the weather on Mars, though several of their instruments will be shut off. Meanwhile, the InSight lander will continue to detect marsquakes, and NASAs Mars orbiters will continue to act as relay stations between Earth and the rovers whenever possible.

READ MORE: NASAs Mars Fleet Lies Low As Sun Moves Between Earth and Red Planet [NASA]

More on Mars rovers: It Worked! NASAs Mars Rover Definitely Scooped up Rock Samples This Time

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Every Mars Rover Is About To Go Into Safe Mode - Futurism