the future is jammed

You put this on your face.

This is a new helmet they are going to use to kill people with but it is really quite amazing. The helmet works by placing several cameras on the outside of a jet. The video is then fed into a real time visual display of the entire panoramic view around the plane. So instead of looking down and seeing mostly cockpit, the pilot will be able to see the entire sky around him and the ground below.
It can also feed vital flight and combat data onto the display, and the cameras are infrared equipped to handle even the darkest of midnight sorties.
At this point, the real life fighter pilots are playing video games right there in the middle of the war. That is what i call next gen.

via Daily Mail

Taking great leaps, or stuck in the present?

The future will hold a seemingly infinite number of fields of science. Pioneers will be born every day, and the new technologies and possibilities provided will drastically change every aspects of our lives. But today, however, it seems, sometimes, that we aren't pushing the boundaries enough. Science is focused today too much on three fields: transportation, energy, and sustainability. Granted, these three are possibly three of the most important fields of knowledge and research that exist or have ever existed, but would it not be better to simply find a viable solution and move on? There are many problems to overcome, and much value can be added to our society by not saturating the environment with too many extravagant solutions to few hurdles. With this in mind, here is one of the best solutions to urban transportation that I have seen theorized yet. Now lets adopt this, and get crackin on elective prosthetics, human genetic transmogrification, and corneal video databanking.

In the End

Lance's formulation of Science Patrol: "Future Science in Present Tense." The present is actually the future, which is actually a reality foreseen in Blade Runner, Total Recall, Buckaroo Banzai, or any other sci-fi film you care to mention.

So where does Dawn of the Dead come in? I add to Lance's gambit: "Futures Multiply." Every moment of your life, with every step you take, billions and billions of new futures will be created and destroyed. All possible universes are contained within the tenth dimension. And in many of these futures, zombies will eat your brains.

Thanks to Jonathan Coulton.

Why We Fight (It's for the Future)

I hadn't bothered to learn about the Writers' Strike until now. These guys need help. It's criminal what the studios are trying to get away with.



They're absolutely right. This is the perfect time to make their stand.

Coney Island to Be Rebuilt. Better. Faster. Stronger.

Da Mayor revealed his big plans for the New Coney Island. I was glad to see that it will include a new amusement park 15 acres in size: five times as large as Astroland. However, the article notes that it may not be done for 20 years. In the future our robot bodies will not tire at the end of a long day at the park. We will power-cycle our lithium cells and dance on into the night.

A lot of eulogies have been written for Coney Island's Astroland and the tragedy of its eventual destruction but in the end I will be glad to see it go. It had its own rundown charm but things that continue to run down at some point just have to make way for the new. It seems that Astroland will actually get one more summer, so I will be glad to go back and see it for the final time. I will definitely do my mourning then. The Warriors will lose their home forever, but the Techno-Warriors will self-construct their exoskeletons from the dying embers. Long Live the Future.

Moonbot Uprising Iminent

New footage of nasa's lunar robot project called Athlete.

"It is designed for lunar cargo hauling, has full stereoscopic panoramic view and six 'legs' that can be used as wheels, legs, arms, power claws, plows and drills."

They say it may hit the moon in around a decade, but with the X-Prize for lunar landing still up for grabs we might have need for him sooner than that.

Save the Planet: Samorost

Help! The planet is doomed! Not Earth mind you, that is old news. The planet in question is your home planet in the flash game Samorost. Created by Amanita Design, this flash game stands out on so many levels. It is visually striking, it offers deep exploration and experimentation to execute each level. Both Samorost 1 & Samorost 2 are availible via the links, but be sure to check out their home page for the scoop on the newest latest.

Planet System Similar to Ours Revealed

"Finding five extrasolar planets orbiting a star is only one small step," Marcy said. "Earth-like planets are the next destination."

Stop Me if You've Heard This One

Back to the Third Age

Never let it be said that Science Patrol doesn't appreciate the traditions that have come before. The lore that was passed down in the shadows of time, over a decade ago. Before we three reached manhood, we were stewards in an entirely different order, which measured heroes by the length of the hair on their feet. Yes, friends, I am speaking of...The Lord of the Rings.

We just like that shit. We are also suckers for Dungeons and Dragons, and just imagining the combination of the two actually inspired me to buy the Middle Earth Role-Playing system (MERPs). Anyway, since we like mash-ups best of all, I give you The Twenty-Sided Tale, or what Lord of the Rings would be like, if it were a role-playing campaign played by a group of dorks. (Via the excellent Blue Tea, who also recommended three other RPG-tinged humorous quest dealies that I will be reading later: Erfworld, 8-Bit Theatre, and Order of the Stick.)

Steampunk Star Wars

The idea of a steampunk version of Star Wars has been on a bunch of blogs lately. This is a freaking awesome interpretation of Vader, but what is his saber made of? It looks like red-hot metal. I found it here. The original person given credit for this idea is Eric Poulton.

The Emperor is coming here......

Yes, and he is most displeased with your apparent lack of progress. Insider sources have pointed to rumors of a scheduled visit from Lance Cardigan at Science Patrol headquarters in New York early this week. While no scientific proof has yet surfaced of such a visit, leading researchers say the theories all point in one direction. There is much speculation as to why Lance Cardigan would journey to NYC so unexpectedly. Some say it has something to do with the re-release of the film Blade Runner, while others believe that it is to discuss secret projects with other high ranking Science Patrol officials. Yanos Solong has yet to confirm or deny any allegations of such meetings. More as the story develops.

Pac-Gentleman

An inspired soul has recently unearthed one of the first penny-operated entertainment automatons, the Pac-Gentleman machine.

“When this game was first released in 1880 it was so hugely popular in taverns and inns that the bank of England was forced to mint more threepenny bits to keep up with demand. The game was created by messrs Nam & Nam and Co. as a novelty pastime for the masses. Outdoing the previous top public house game of Shove Ha’penny. “



However, that is not all! Another intrepid hacker was so inspired by this discovery that he has auto-magically "down-loaded" a disk image of this historical game and encoded it in something called "M.A.M.E." Delightful!

the Zeusaphone

You know how Tesla coils emit that crazy buzzing sound when they spark? Like God's BugZapper. Some genius at Burning Man or something figured out that you could actually program a Tesla coil to make music--especially videogame music. The original experiment from this summer was pretty awesome, but by using two coils in harmony, the awesomeness is exponentiated.

William Willett messed with your clock.

Today is Daylight Savings Time. The Time/Space continuum will no longer accept that it is Noon at noon today, and will only regard 11am as the proper time at noon. All subsequent hours will be observed on the hour previous, and that hour will fall on the hour before it. Seems tedious doesnt it. You can blame/thank William Willett for today's extra hour-as it was he who ressurected the idea from ancient societies who wanted to be around for as much of the sunlight hours as possible. Benjamin Franklin is often wrongly accredited for DST's revival, but this is incorrect as he merely mentioned the idea in an anonymous satire written in 1784.
So love it or hate it, you now have an extra hour to build that danger ray, calibrate your robots lasers, or read boring blog posts about daylight savings. See you an hour ago!

Webcomics Patrol

As a preview of the upcoming Science Patrol Blogroll, here's a look at some webcomics every scientist should enjoy. I've emphasized comics which aren't mired in continuity, so it's possible to enjoy them without being a superobsessed freak. (Although I can recommend this one Achewood comic.)


A Lesson is Learned (But the Damage is Irreversible) - Dreamlike and strange, and lamentably on indefinite hiatus, this comic is still regarded as a high-water mark in the short online history of comics. Read the archive in its entirety, and wait for the book.













Dresden Codak - A reclusive tinkerer cavorts with time-traveling robots, a tiny Carl Jung, two guys who live in a castle on the Moon, and tons of science in this lushly drawn, highly original comic that just began weekly installments.











XKCD is about the life of the mind and the weird ideas that can sometimes take over. It's also the perfect expression of romantic love in nerd's terms.

Overcompensating - This is an autobiographical comic about a shirtless, drunken comic artist who blindly stumbles through life with his best friend, the perennially stoned "rapper" Weedmaster P, his girlfriend Baby, and his secretary Tallahassee. I should also mention his amazing comic Wigu, which has fallen on hard times and an identity crisis. (It used to be a humorous comic and now it's a humorous adventure comic.)

The Perry Bible Fellowship - Visiting alternate worlds and surreal situations in a manner resembling The Far Side, Nicholas Gurewitch displays an incredible range.

Slow Wave is written by people who describe their dreams to Jesse Reklaw, who picks the best submission and adapts it each week.

Wondermark is about the characters inside old book illustrations, and the surprisingly rude and hilarious things they talk about.

That is all for Webcomics Patrol.

SODIUM

Sodium. We love us some Sodium here at Science Patrol.

42 year old Talking Chimp Dies

Okay, well maybe "talking" is a bit misleading, but Washoe, a chimpanzee was the first non-human to learn American Sign Language, and she died of natural causes earlier this week. Many of you may be thinking "wait a second, what about Koko?" Koko was a few years younger than Washoe, who was taken in by scientists in 1966. The scientists who studied Washoe had a very specific method by which a sign was entered into her vocabulary, but this (of course) is still disputed among scientists. Most notably by MIT linguist Noam Chomsky. The main argument of scientists that refute language use by non-humans is that they simply learn to use certain motions and/or noises to receive a reward, and that this is not a true acquisition of language. I have a hard time subscribing to that theory considering that the scientists at the Washoe Project attempted to make her learning environment as similar to a deaf child learning from its parents as possible. Also, Isn't observation the most vital portion of learning language? If a child were left, completely alone, with no contact at all, it wouldn't develop language. Not even Chomsky could argue that. So why are some scientists so quick to say that Washoe and Koko didn't know their 250 and 1,000 words respectively? Is it just too outlandish? Too revolutionary? Well pushawe to that says I. And much respect to the scientists who do this great work with primates, including those that give gorillas kittens. Article Here.

Bionic Will Wright presents Spore

Will Wright is a genius. He invented a whole genre of gaming called "God Games" where you control every aspect of the game world you are in-not just one character. You dont win or lose or blow stuff up or enter any blood codes or "pwn" any "noobs" when you play his games either. But you do get to use your imagination to instigate creative design. You may have heard of him from games like SimCity and The Sims.
Recently I found this video from the TED conference this year. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design and its a bunch of lectures every year which mostly covers how we are doing at combining Ts Es and Ds. This video features Mr. Wright discussing his latest project "Spore". If you havent heard of it already it is a "God Game" that starts you out on the cellular level from which you are to evolve to the intergalactic level, with complete creative control over the evolution of your character. Bionic Will does a much better job than me of explaining it, after all he did create it. He does not however, explain why he is indeed Bionic. Not even science can answer some things, folks.

Finalists in the Uncanny Valley Expo

Everyone's got an opinion about Second Life. If you ask me, this raving pack of transhumans are working on the forefront of weird to bring about some radical new technologies. Residents actually own what they create, so many virtual artists are staking a claim on this frontier. The Uncanny Valley Expo is a beauty contest of sorts for avatars. The greatest skin and mesh weavers have been nominated for the award and the polls are open.

Vote

Toy Patrol

When Science Patrol was just a wee toddler, Lance and I would take him for walkies in the East Williamsburg area and buy toys for him. Now that he's grown up a bit and he hangs out under the JMZ selling Newports, he considers himself too old to play with toys, and yet, Lance and I often find ourselves wistful for the good ol' days, when the Engrish ran free over the plain and a good cup of coffee was only a nickel. What the fignuts am I talking about? See below for the answers.

This store on Knickerbocker had some simply amazing toys, but my camera went dead after these two, so I will return and extend the scope of this investigative report.












This is Batman. He will catch all baddy.















This is Superman. His veloci-banana will catch all baddy.

Costume Patrol

Congratulations to all our featured contestants, you were all beautiful. Halloween is America's celebration of cosplay in our culture.

Did I say something wrong?

But seriously folks, in Science Patrol we are ALL winners, and nobody wanted to spend money on medals anyway, so we will instead be offering all our participants identical trophies of the most extravagant kind:


Scanning Tunnelling Electron microscopes.

Pick yours up at your local postgraduate research facility. I'm trading mine in for a Hadron collider.

There's a STM microscope simulator here.






Finally, I have a few Honorable Mentions, culled from the massive amounts of people in the West Village last night. Frontliners in the fight for science, all.