Writing Science Fiction

A couple of years ago while observing the relentless anti-Science diatribe coming from the conservatives. I came up with a Idea for a Science Fiction story, and it went something like this;

Many different Scientist had been ‘blackballed’ by the government in power, and removed from their jobs. Unable to work, they had taken any jobs they could get, pumping gas, fast food, and delivery people. Low pay, no respect, and no Science. While many had offers to work abroad in their fields, they were blocked from leaving the U.S. by being placed on no-fly and no-travel restrictions. The government did not want the brain drain, but they didn’t want the scientist from becoming active again, and casting doubts upon the U.S.

So here we are, science suppressed, and scientist restricted. So a group of Irish (where I currently reside) conspired with the Irish government (covertly) to create passports and travel documents for the scientist being held. Then an Irish person who could pass in appearance to a scientist, would enter the U.S. as a visitor, and assume the identity of the individual, and work their jobs, fill their roles and report to their parole boards. In the mean time, the scientists would use the created Irish identities to flee the U.S. and then sometime later the substitutes themselves would exit. The scientists would then be free, and able to resume their Scientific Research.

The story would then detail this activity for several different scientists…etc, etc, etc

Now, in the present, this is no longer a Science Fiction story, and not even really a Fiction of any sort. It is a sad telling of the near reality.

UPDATE: It’s already beginning – Make our Planet Great!

Man in the Stars

Throughout Science Fiction there is always a belief that man will be ‘Mankind’ while evoking a rational and reasoning mind. And it’s disturbing to think that reason, and considered actions will be how Humans will be perceived. If there is a considered, planned rational approach to traveling among the stars, it will be from an AI consciousness not a Human one, and there by hangs ‘humanity’ if we show who we are, we may not survive, but if we survive without all the elements that make us human, emotions, excitement, joy anger and sadness and wonder, it won’t be us. It will be ‘them’.

The next moment, a new World.

Almost all religion speaks of a next world, a heaven if you will. If their followers uphold the values that religion espouses. Christianity, Islam even Norse speaks of Valhalla. But time and space in the real world is a very different place. Each moment a branch in space-time, each moment, a new world. And while in most religions, you must die to enter heaven, in space time that is only a next moment, a new branch. You die, you don’t die, each on it’s own branch. Each a possibility, taken or not.

If you assume that each religion has fundamental elements that provide a moral framework to betterment of society, and the individual. Then each positive action that person betters, improves, does good in the world, betters the next world in the next moment. So each individual, makes the next world a heaven, or a hell of the next world in the next moment. Each branch an upward movement, or a downward one. Good, or not, betterment or not, each leading to a better or worse world for everyones next moment.

Any practitioner, priest, cleric or minister that preaches the worst elements of their religion, calling for any of mankind’s worse traits, they are wishing for the hell, striving for the worst world in the next moment for everyone. And any, who are not religious, who by their actions uplifts, that does good, that betters, are saints, and righteous for they uplift all mankind, in the next moment, in the next world.

ED:Republishing this.

The Elysium Space station.

The movie Elysum while pretty, has again demonstrated the same kind of rubbish engineering that Jurassic Park demonstrated.

There has been much awe and marvel at the open topped nature of the habitat ring on the Space Station, but while they concede that there might be some ‘leakage’ of the atmosphere they really DON’T understand how any real engineer who would built a station with the POSSIBILITY of leakage would be a fool. ANY fault that might slow the rotation of the Stanford Torus would cause the loss of the life support systems. The fully enclosed, even by something as insubstantial as aluminized film, would prevent the loss of atmosphere. While disregarding the solar radiation granted by the thick atmosphere of the Earth, shielding would need to be in place, or fry it’s inhabitants.

Continuing, who in their right minds would engineer a space station with the single point of failure, that during a ‘reboot’ of the software (computer) it would shut off all the lights on the station. What are you using a PC to control ALL the systems EVERYTHING is dependant on, from a single reboot? You must be joking, while I can see how the ‘dramatic’ nature might be a useful ‘Deus ex machina‘ moment, it just beggars disbelief and undermines the potential respect of the Movie.

Language of computing

I was reminded this Christmas Holiday season that computers do not ‘know‘ any human language, only binary, and that it takes humans to provide the translation from the machine to something human readable. And while most computer programing languages are ‘English’ like, they need not have to be in the English Language. It’s just what’s what happened first, and could be changed into another language at anytime.

This came to me in an inspired way, by listening to Carols, where non-native speakers were singing in latin, and other non-english speakers were singing in English, or German, or French. That you can sing in a language, and not know how to speak in it.

I suspect that is the same method that most non-english speakers program computers in ‘english like’ programing languages. By layering another translation over the programming, or like in singing, which uses another part of the brain, different from the part that provides language skills, another part of the brain is used to converse with computers. Thus making the point that people who program, do think with altered brains.

Underground War – Whistle Blowers strike back.

I may be the last to see this, a war, underground and undeclared, but a war. The opponents are a bit undefined but there is a clear and escalating combat in the world. I’m not talking about Terrorists, (although the establishment who is under assault may declare their attackers as such) I am talking about the the established order, The Multi-Nationals, the Big Press, Governments, Military establishments, Religious organizations. The big anonymous bodies that have been abusing their positions to detriment everyone else.

On the opposing side, are all the little people, groups and oppressed, or the perceived oppressed. Your fellow ‘pissed off’ worker setting next to you, who will explode in a fountain of Whistle blowing. A venting of frustration that will result in the next big internet explosion.

The WikiLeaks is merely the first oozing pustule on the face of the corporeal Corporations of the world. The World of Blogging has for many years undermined the world press both broadcast and print to the point that now the majority of the population now refer to the Internet for real news rather than the handful of corporation owned ‘News’ services.

Control has now slipped out of the hands of those who for years have managed the information flow. Evidence of this ‘management’ appears almost daily in the presentations of ignorance passed off as ‘News’. And where ‘Fair and Balanced’ openly bribe governments to maintain control, religious organizations openly attempt to promote such myths as Creationism at the scientific Truth.

The tide has turned, and the failing newspapers are only the start. Watch for more WikiLeaks and Whistle Blower sites springing up, more Lawsuits more Smear campaigns as the giant attempts to swat the Whistleblowers who are biting it to death.

More Pseudoscience in the Press

This video at the BBC U.S. Site that claims Technology ‘rewires’ our brains Is yet another Pseudoscience attempt to baffle with Bullshit, the viewer. It comes off all Super Tech and is really no better than claiming that “Technology destroys our Brains”. Just more Yellow journalism. The disappointing thing is, that it’s coming from the BBC. This is for the U.S. (read American) audience, so I suppose it has to be Dumbed down to that level of that group.

But it is a sorry thing to watch happen.

A Green reason for Electric Cars

I have often wondered if the use of Electric Vehicles, cars and Scooter’,s would ever become viable. And I had a revelation about how they could be more integrated into a green lifestyle. Almost everyone knows that that an electric car needs to be recharged while at the home. But what if you stop thinking of the car as a separate object from the other household equipment.

One of the biggest drawbacks from utilizing Solar electric, and wind power generators is their inconsistent output. Wind power only works in a stiff breeze and solar, only during the day. And to make matters worse, neither may happen when there is a peak requirement for the power. Power fluctuations are a bane to green power. Thus all these technologies still require power from a main grid to fill in the gaps. And while you can pump power into the grid during peak green ellipsoids, you can’t store any locally to supply yourself, or if the grid should be down.

Unless you have an electric car that is. If you stop thinking of the eAuto as a separate entity, and think of it as a portable energy storage device, the problem is partly solved. If the power storage of the eAuto were large enough it would act like a power buffer, storing power during peak green output, and supplying supplemental power back into the house during peak requirements. A power filter regulator for the green fluctuations.

Frequently when the eAuto might be needed as transportation, power requirements are at a minimum as the occupants of the house are the ones traveling. It also could be moved to a location to recharge elsewhere and return to supply power to the house, much like a bucket of water, when your pipes freeze up.

The possibilities are endless.

Gore – As cardiac stimulator to the environment

A cardiac stimulator (shock box) is not a heart rhythm but you can’t restore one without the other when it gets out of kilter. But in this nitpicky article Do-gooder Gore has it all wrong Where the author uses cherry picking statistical plucks about CO2 levels that the Media have elevated to importance;

Carbon dioxide forms only 0.04% of our atmosphere, so its molecules are widely dispersed. The space between them is almost 200 times their diameter. As altitude increases, air density decreases, which scatters them still further.

Pah!

  • Talk about the manmade pollution’s that cause increase cloud coverage that traps heat into the planet.
  • Talk about the bulk consumption of finite oil and gas as a reason to create carbon taxes.
  • Talk about the FACTS of weather, not the politics of the weather.
  • etc, etc,etc

Try and focus on the big picture, as in

THE BIG PICTURE

OK!

Displaying Toys

Conor got a cheap thrill from some of my Amazing Collection of computer Toys that I brought to the BarCampCork III meet up. I was more than happy to bring them out for an airing, although my back, and Walter’s will be thanking us later for our efforts. I would definitely offer (like in free beer) the collection to any group who would display, preserve and teach the history of these (and other) machines from my collection. And I support Conor’s idea of a computer/science/technology museum in Cork. After all, just because the UCC Computer Science Department refused the offer, doesn’t mean that citizens of The Republic of Cork should be denied the gift.


Antique_computers_Bar_CampIII

UPDATE: IS this going to be opportunity to have a Museum Cork Science Park

Give a man a fish…

Everyone has heard the old saw:

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.
Lao Tzu


But no one seems to think that it applies in the Economic Crisis facing Ireland, with the loss of low end construction and manufacturing jobs, and the multi nationals leaving, the fish are gone. Ireland needs to concentrate on educating fishermen. Or maybe better yet, high tech Developers, Designers and Programmers, Engineers, and scientist which are sorely lacking here. A major investment in education is the only lifeline for Ireland. And even if it doesn’t rescue the Irish Government, it would rescue the Irish people.

Internet to shutdown to help environment.

In this article Revealed: the environmental impact of Google searches the Times On-Line quotes from an energy researcher who has no access to Google energy data to state “A Google search has a definite environmental impact.” Much like posting his article online. Perhaps he should reflect on the old adage Without Reliable Data, I’m Just another A__Ho_e with an Opinion!

Google Rebuttals: Powering a Google Search

Dark Energy / Dark Matter The Devil incarnate

I’m just waiting for the first fundamentalist religious group to propose that mysterious dark energy and Dark Matter are manifestations of the Devil and that this Darkness is the Biblical metaphor for Hell That We in the universe of Lightness and Matter, are opposed by this Dark Energy and Anti-Matter universe.

Would this improve scientific efforts, or make Astronomy and Physics a Religion?