Agnes Cheek

(Daily Mail) The kinds of drones making the headlines daily are the heavily armed CIA and U.S. Army vehicles which routinely strike targets in Pakistan – killing terrorists and innocents alike.

But the real high-tech story of surveillance drones is going on at a much smaller level, as tiny remote controlled vehicles based on insects are already likely being deployed.

Over recent years a range of miniature drones, or micro air vehicles (MAVs), based on the same physics used by flying insects, have been presented to the public.

The fear kicked off in 2007 when reports of bizarre flying objects hovering above anti-war protests sparked accusations that the U.S. government was accused of secretly developing robotic insect spies.

Official denials and suggestions from entomologists that they were actually dragonflies failed to quell speculation, and Tom Ehrhard, a retired Air Force colonel and expert on unmanned aerial craft, told the Daily Telegraph at the time that ‘America can be pretty sneaky.’

The following year, the US Air Force unveiled insect-sized spies ‘as tiny as bumblebees’ that could not be detected and would be able to fly into buildings to ‘photograph, record, and even attack insurgents and terrorists.’

Around the same time the Air Force also unveiled what it called ‘lethal mini-drones’ based on Leonardo da Vinci’s blueprints for his Ornithopter flying machine, and claimed they would be ready for roll out by 2015.

Read the rest HERE!

What if the coolest song ever written for one cello was instead written for 8?

This video was created using the images taken by Cassini probe of the Saturnian system since 2004. I’ve read about and looked at images of Saturn my entire life. It seems familiar, something Im used to.
And then a video like this comes along and reminds me very strongly that Saturn is an alien planet, a weird and surreal place. Take a few minutes to watch this video and be reminded of that as well. Our solar system is an amazing place. It’s pretty incredible that we are allowed to exist, however precariously, within it.

The ordinary is the part of our world that is somehow the most extraordinary. Show someone first the ordinary and then show them the extraordinary and see if either one of you can tell the difference.

“It is a great adventure to contemplate the universe, beyond man, to contemplate what it would be like without man, as it was in a great part of its long history and as it is in a great majority of places. When this objective view is finally attained, and the mystery and majesty of matter are fully appreciated, to then turn the objective eye back on man viewed as matter, to view life as part of this universal mystery of greatest depth, is to sense an experience which is very rare, and very exciting. It usually ends in laughter and delight in the futility of trying to understand what this atom in the universe is, this thing—atoms with curiosity—that looks at itself and wonders why it wonders. Well, these scientific views end in awe and mystery, lost at the edge in uncertainty, but they appear to be so deep and so impressive that the theory that it is all arranged for god to watch man’s struggle for good and evil seems inadequate.” —The Meaning Of It All: Thoughts of a Citizen-Scientist, 1998

“We are at the very beginning of time for the human race. It is not unreasonable that we grapple with problems. But there are tens of thousands of years in the future. Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can, improve the solutions, and pass them on.” —What Do You Care About What Other People Think?, 1988

(Earthsky.org)  The best time to see the planet Saturn is here. April and May 2012 are when this golden world – planet of the rings – is easiest to spot and brightest. The planet Saturn is relatively easy to find in 2012, because it’s near a bright star, Spica, in the constellation Virgo. This star always returns to the early evening sky in April – spring for the Northern Hemisphere, autumn for the Southern Hemisphere. Spica stays out all night long – or nearly all night long – on April and May nights. Likewise, April or May of 2012 will also be the best time to see the ringed planet Saturn in all its glory.

Read more HERE!

You only get one life and you are the one who gets to define what that life is going to be. Make it matter, make it yours, make it amazing. I believe in our ability to inspire greatness in each other and prove that everything is possible.

Daniel Fabrycky from the Kepler science team put together a visualization of all the multiple-planet systems discovered by the Kepler spacecraft as of February of 2011. This second version illustrates the planet candidates found as of Feb 2012: 885 planet candidates in 361 systems—double the number of systems in the original Kepler Orrery. The orbit radii are to scale with respect to each other and planet sizes are to scale with respect to each other, but orbits and planet sizes are different scales. The colors are in order of semi-major axis: two-planet systems (242 in all) have a yellow outer planet; 3-planet (85) green, 4-planet (25) light blue, 5-planet (8) dark blue, 6-planet (1, Kepler-11) purple.

credit: Daniel Fabrycky

“Fall in love with some activity, and do it! Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn’t matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough. Work as hard and as much as you want to on the things you like to do the best. Don’t think about what you want to be, but what you want to do. Keep up some kind of a minimum with other things so that society doesn’t stop you from doing anything at all.” -Feynman

Billions of potentially habitable planets may exist within our galaxy, the Milky Way, raising new prospects that life could exist near Earth, a study has found.

Check it out.

Thanks Ian for sending this in!

The lesser of two weevils

Einstein was a giant. His head was in the clouds, but his feet were on the ground. Those of us who are not so tall have to choose!

https://www.facebook.com/thesaganseries The Feynman Series is a companion project of The Sagan Series working in the hopes of promoting scientific literacy in the general population. Created by @ReidGower http://twitter.com/reidgower

Your own life or even your species might be owed to a restless few drawn by craving they can hardly articulate or understand to undiscovered lands and new worlds. Each victory is only a prelude to another. And no boundaries can be set to rational hope.

If Santorum becomes president then it will no longer be Bush’s fault.  It will be Santorum’s fault.  Recently, seismologists have detected tremor patterns under Santorum’s Fault.  [see attached map]  If Santorum’s Fault erupts it could trigger a devastating tsunami.  Now, that’s what I call “a sticky situation.”

Either the campaign folks are really clever…or really clueless. This is awesome!

Flying robot quadrotors perform the James Bond Theme by playing various instruments including the keyboard, drums and maracas, a cymbal, and the debut of an adapted guitar built from a couch frame. The quadrotors play this “couch guitar” by flying over guitar strings stretched across a couch frame; plucking the strings with a stiff wire attached to the base of the quadrotor. A special microphone attached to the frame records the notes made by the “couch guitar”.

These flying quadrotors are completely autonomous, meaning humans are not controlling them; rather they are controlled by a computer programed with instructions to play the instruments.

Penn’s School of Engineering and Applied Science is home to some of the most innovative robotics research on the planet, much of it coming out of the General Robotics, Automation, Sensing and Perception (GRASP) Lab.

This video premiered at the TED2012 Conference in Long Beach, California on February 29, 2012. Deputy Dean for Education and GRASP lab member Vijay Kumar presented some of this groundbreaking work at the TED2012 conference, an international gathering of people and ideas from technology, entertainment, and design.

The engineers from Penn, Daniel Mellinger and Alex Kushleyev, have formed a company called KMel Robotics that will design and market these quadrotors.

More information: http://www.upenn.edu/spotlights/penn-quadrotors-ted

Video Produced and Directed by Kurtis Sensenig
Quadrotors and Instruments by Daniel Mellinger, Alex Kushleyev and Vijay Kumar

All my sqrt(cos(x))cos(300x)+sqrt(abs(x))-0.7)(4-x*x)^0.01, sqrt(6-x^2), -sqrt(6-x^2) from -4.5 to 4.5 to you on Valentines day!

Everyday soap bubbles were combined with exotic ferrofluid liquid to create an eerie tale, using macro lenses and time lapse techniques. Black ferrofluid and dye race through bubble structures, drawn through by the invisible forces of capillary action and magnetism.

Time-lapse sequences: Nikon D90, Nikkor 60mm macro lens and custom built intervalometer.
Motion-control: Arduino driven scanner platform and mirror rigs
Score: Ableton Live

View Compressed 01 vimeo.com/22866665
Twitter twitter.com/kpimmel

(Yahoo News via The Wrap) There may be a little more life in Brian, after all.

Monty Python-ers John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin and Terry Jones are reuniting for the science-fiction comedy “Absolutely Anything,” TheWrap has confirmed.

Eric Idle, the other surviving member of the Flying Circus, may join the project, as well, producer Mike Medavoy told TheWrap.

Graham Chapman, the other member of the troupe, died in 1989.

Jones will direct the film, with Cleese, Palin and Gilliam playing aliens and possibly several other additional roles, in true Python tradition.

In addition, Robin Williams is in talks to play a dog and a pompous Frenchman, Medavoy said.

Read the rest HERE!