Ambient Intimacy is a term to describe that sense of connectedness that you get from participating in social tools online that allow you to feel as though you are maintaining and, perhaps in fact, increasing your closeness with people in your social network through the messages and content that you share online – be it photographs or text or information about upcoming travel.
all this social grooming may help us to raise dunbars number. and once we do, expect huge payoffs as previously zero-sum games become win-win. (for background, read nonzero by robert wright.)
the motivations, technology, and prospects for interstellar flight, while the balance deals with anthropological, genetic, and linguistic issues in crew composition for a notional mission with a crew of 200 with a flight time of 2 centuries.
We require the equivalent energy output to 400 megatons of nuclear armageddon in order to move a capsule of the gross weight of a fully loaded Volvo V70 automobile to Proxima Centauri in less than a human lifetime. That’s the same as the yield of the entire US Minuteman III ICBM force. Our entire planetary economy runs on 4TW. So it would take our total planetary electricity production for a period of 5 days to supply the necessary va-va-voom.
The Tau Zero Foundation is a volunteer group of scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, and writers who have agreed to work together toward practical interstellar flight and to use this quest to teach you about science, technology, and our place in the universe.
To design a credible interstellar probe that is a concept design for a potential mission in the coming centuries.
2011-01-06: No Interstellar Travel Before 2200. About 10^18 Joules required, more than a Kardashev type I civilization. 2011-05-20: Star Children. It might make sense to start a religion to ensure long term space travelers retain their goals.
We are seeking ideas for an organization, business model and approach appropriate for a self-sustaining investment vehicle. The respondent must focus on flexible yet robust mechanisms by which an endowment can be created and sustained, wholly devoid of government subsidy or control, and by which worthwhile undertakings—in the sciences, engineering, humanities, or the arts—may be awarded in pursuit of the vision of interstellar flight
Starship Century is a symposium coordinated by the new Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination in collaboration with Gregory and James Benford, presenting ideas from their anthology of science and science fiction. First 8 minutes most of them agree the era of interstellar starships will be 100-300 years away after there is lot of solar system development.
The petawatt Hawking radiation of γ-ray laser-created subatomic black holes (Schwarzschild Kugelblitzes or SKs) has been proposed as a propulsive and power source for interstellar starships. Production of a black hole requires concentration of mass or energy within the corresponding Schwarzschild radius. In familiar 3D gravity, the minimum such energy is 10^19 GeV, which would have to be condensed into a region of approximate size 10^-33 cm. This is far beyond the limits of any current technology; the Large hadron collider (LHC) has a design energy of 14 TeV. This is also beyond the range of known collisions of cosmic rays with Earth’s atmosphere, which reach center of mass energies in the range of 100s of TeV. It is estimated that to collide 2 particles to within a distance of a Planck length with currently achievable magnetic field strengths would require a ring accelerator ~1k light years in diameter to keep the particles on track.
2016-02-20: Interstellar Propulsion. A 100kg robotic craft could be sent to Mars in 3 days with the power levels that large rockets produce (50-100 GW)
2016-04-12: Starshot. This makes me proud of our civilization: We do stuff like this.
Milner wants his $100M to fund research that will culminate in a prototype of a probe that can beam images back to Earth. The images would arrive less than 5 years after the probe reached the star.
There are no official specs yet, but the probe would have a 2-megapixel camera, along with star-finders to help it get its bearings, after it boots up on the approach to Proxima Centauri. The probe will target one of the system’s 2 sunlike stars. It will be aimed at a planet (or planets) in the star’s habitable zone, the temperate region where oceans don’t boil or freeze, but instead flow, nurturing the kind of complex chemistry that is thought to give rise to life.
Researchers propose a new mode of transport which relies on electric-field moderated momentum exchange with the ionized particles in the interstellar medium. While the application of this mechanism faces significant challenges requiring industrial-scale exploitation of space, the technological roadblocks are minimal, and are perhaps more easily addressed than the issues presented by light sails or particle beam powered craft. This mode of space travel is particularly well suited to energy efficient space travel at velocities less than 5% of light speed, and compares exceptionally well to light sails on an energy expenditure basis. It therefore represents an extremely attractive mode of transport for slow (~multi-century long) voyages carrying heavy payloads to nearby stellar neighbors. This could be very useful in missions that would otherwise be too energy intensive to carry out, such as transporting bulk materials for a future colony around Alpha Cen A, or perhaps a generation ship.
2020-02-21: Interstellar Probe, weighing a few grams, and getting there in 20 years. 2020-09-03: Mach Effect Propulsion. Jim Woodward is investigating mach effect thrusters as part of NASA NIAC. If successful, this will get us to .xc, making humanity interstellar. 2022-08-05: Bow Shock Deceleration
Deceleration at the destination system is a huge problem for starship mission planning. A future crew, human or robotic, could deploy a solar sail to slow down, but a magsail seems better, as its effects kick in earlier on the approach. Looking at the image below, however, suggests another possibility, one using the interactions between stars and the interstellar medium to assist the slowdown. The bow shock produces 3D structures, surfaces within which one can move while shedding speed, perhaps braking via a magsail. Each star would produce its own unique deceleration environment, allowing us to brake where possible along the bow shock, the astropause (cognate to the heliopause) and the termination shock.
David Schonauer of American Photo has uncovered a rather stunning coincidence, the picture that’s been making the rounds of P.H. being hauled back to jail was taken by none other than Huynh Cong “Nick” Ut. Nick Ut, as you remember from Photo History 101, was the photographer who took one of the iconic pictures of the Vietnam war, the picture of Kim Phuc running naked down a country lane after suffering serious napalm burns. Ut’s photograph was arguably the apex of the notion of “The Concerned Photographer,” Cornell Capa’s phrase for the idea that photographs of injustices and atrocities could help correct the situations that led to them. And get this: the 2 pictures were taken exactly 35 years apart, to the day. Quite a coincidence.
In a series of experiments on earthworms, scientists have identified PHA-4, which plays a critical role in prolonging life without tapping into insulin-regulating neural pathways that also control the aging process.
I bet they are partying over at SENS. 2007-08-13: The baby boomers don’t want to die, like all prior generations. but unlike them, they have the financial means to massively fund anti-aging research like SENS. This is only the very beginning. 2008-01-09: I wonder whether CR is compatible with evolutionary fitness. 2008-05-26: Intrinsic Pluripotency
We show that extrinsic stimuli are dispensable for the derivation, propagation and pluripotency of ES cells. The discovery has major implications for large scale production of specialized cells, such as brain, heart muscle and insulin producing cells, for future therapeutic use.
Prematurely aged (shortened) telomeres appears to be a common feature of iPS cells created by current pluripotency protocols. However, the spontaneous appearance of lines that express sufficient telomerase activity to extend telomere length may allow the reversal of developmental aging in human cells for use in regenerative medicine.
Injecting pluripotent cells into your blood stream can reverse aging effects. 2013-09-18: Google used to say, cheekily, that making search faster times billions of users saves lives, so doing anti aging seems like the logical next step. I also like this because it couldn’t be further from all the web 2.0 incrementalist nonsense most startups limit themselves to. 2014-06-13: Stem cell pills
I started taking Stem Cell 100 back in 2011. It is $60 for a 1 month supply. There is now Stem Cell 100+ [$75 for a 1 month supply]. They added more ingredients and the testimonials are that it acts faster and is more powerful and more people have noticeable positive changes.
Let’s face it – any other syndrome that caused the sorts of effects that age does on our bodies would be considered a plague. But we’re used to it, and it happens to everyone, and it happens slowly. Does it have to be that way? The history of medicine is a refusal to play the cards that we’ve been dealt, and there’s no reason to stop now.
the age of an organism, or an organ like the brain, is not written in stone. It is malleable. You can move it in 1 direction or the other. It’s almost mythological that something in young organisms can maintain youthfulness, and it’s probably true.
children of centenarians, who have a good chance of becoming centenarians themselves, maintained their telomeres at a “youthful” level corresponding to 60 years of age — even when they became 80 or older. Centenarian offspring also maintained lower levels of markers for chronic inflammation.
Almost any amount and type of physical activity may slow aging deep within our cells. And middle age may be a critical time to get the process rolling, at least by one common measure of cell aging.
Nearly 10 years of research showing that Rapamycin makes mice live up to 60% longer, scientists are trying it out as an anti-aging drug in dogs and humans. Researchers gave rapamycin to 16 dogs and imaged their hearts. “It started to function better. It started to look like a more youthful heart”. Those dogs took rapamycin for only 10 weeks.
The scientists identified that the metabolite NAD+, which is naturally present in every cell of our body, has a key role as a regulator in protein-to-protein interactions that control DNA repair. Treating mice with a NAD+ precursor, or “booster,” called NMN improved their cells’ ability to repair DNA damage caused by radiation exposure or old age. “The cells of the old mice were indistinguishable from the young mice, after just 1 week of treatment”. Human trials of NMN therapy will begin within 6 months. “This is the closest we are to a safe and effective anti-aging drug that’s perhaps only 3 to 5 years away from being on the market if the trials go well”
There is much to be optimistic about and the ideas proposed by SENS over 10 years ago and widely criticized are now being eagerly explored by researchers as it becomes ever more apparent that the aging processes are amenable to intervention. What was mocked just over 10 years ago is now becoming an accepted approach to treating age-related diseases as the result continue to mount up in support of a repair based approach to aging. However we still lack complete knowledge on several age-related damages to progress to clinical trials in humans.
Targeting multiple aging pathways has the potential to significantly reduce blood pressure and stress, while significantly increasing HDL Cholesterol levels and lung capacity. Targeting multiple critical aging pathways with a single dietary supplement is a novel alternative strategy to promote overall health.
“We have already done a bunch of trials in mice and we are doing some in dogs, and then we’ll move on to humans”. The US pet industry is a $72B-a-year market.
The prolongation of human lifespan is “the biggest thing that is going to happen in the 21st century. It’s going to make what Elon Musk is doing look fairly pedestrian.”
Rejuvenate Bio has met with investors and won a grant from the US Special Operations Command to look into “enhancement” of military dogs while Harvard is seeking a broad patent on genetic means of aging control in species including the “cow, pig, horse, cat, dog, rat, etc.”
The team hit on the idea of treating pets because proving that it’s possible to increase longevity in humans would take too long. “You don’t want to go to the FDA and say we extend life by 20 years. They’d say, ‘Great, come back in 20 years with the data’”.
Aubrey De Grey discusses how all of the aspects of fighting the damage of aging have reached an investable stage. 10 years ago only stem cells were investable. Now companies have been formed to attempt to counter all of the types of aging damage.
George Church talks about reversing human aging and claims they made mice live 2x as long. Organ longevity has also been done successfully with entire mice. If the body still did not get rid of the substandard cells then work at Oisin Biotechnology and others would enable bad cells to be cleared. Oisin is extending the life of mice and has proven safety and improvement in monkeys. They will start human clinical trials in 2019. Rejuvenate Bio has 60 aging reversal gene therapies. They have mentioned but not yet published eye popping results in mice. They are testing aging reversal in dogs in 2018-2019. Human treatments could be available on a general basis by 2025.
There is increasing of pharmaceutical company engagement via disease-focused proof of concept trials. Curing all cancers would add 3.5 years to average human lifespan. If anti-aging could delay the start of aging disease from 50 or 60 by 20 or 30 years then this could be 10x better than curing cancer. $50b per year is spent on curing cancer. If medical research was allocated based upon potential impact then anti-aging should be at a funding level of $500 billion per year.
His anti aging regimen is to activate pathways to improve the body’s defenses against aging. He is testing NMN on human subjects. He describes NMN is fuel for sirtuins. NMN is related to NR. NR increases the levels of NAD. Sirtuins need NAD to work. We lose NAD as we age. We have half of the NAD by the time we are 50. He takes a gram of NMN (Nicotinamide MonoNucleotide) and takes half a gram resveratrol in the morning with yogurt. He is personally taking 1 gram of Metformin once a day at night.
the evidence as it stands weakly supports the conclusion that CR modestly extends human life. We expect that an individual engaging in 20-30% CR versus a normative, non-obesogenic diet without malnutrition might enjoy a 10%-20% increase in longevity. A 10%-15% CR relative to a normative diet may increase lifespan by perhaps 5-10%.
The treated cells appeared to be ~3 years younger on average than untreated cells from elderly people, with peaks of 3 years (in skin cells) and 7 years (in cells that line blood vessels).
Sinclair’s focus in on analog information loss, the epigenetic noise that accumulates in the methylation patterns running along our DNA and disturbing its expression. This degradation is a biological clock of aging, and today’s results “tell us the clock doesn’t just represent time—it is time. If you wind the hands of the clock back, time also goes backward.”
“Harvard Medical School scientists have successfully restored vision in mice by turning back the clock on aged eye cells in the retina to recapture youthful gene function. The achievement represents the first successful attempt to reverse glaucoma-induced vision loss, rather than merely stem its progression
2020-12-04: Most brain aging decline can be fixed overnight
Common signs of neuronal aging disappeared literally overnight: neurons’ electrical activity became more sprightly and responsive to stimulation, and cells showed more robust connectivity with cells around them while also showing an ability to form stable connections with one another usually only seen in younger mice.
Avian longevity may be linked to special adaptations in the biology of birds—including proteins to operate their highly efficient metabolisms and their remarkable ways of processing oxygen—that prevent tissue damage commonly associated with old age. In many animals, high body temperature, metabolic rates, and blood glucose levels indicate a shorter lifespan because these systems damage DNA in the mitochondria. But compared to other animals, birds are very good at protecting their mitochondrial DNA from the cellular damage associated with aging, which could contribute to their extensive lifespans. Studying birds could enhance our understanding of aging in humans, too, leading to advances in human health. “We want to know how nature has constructed things that resist aging better than we do. Otherwise, we’re left to our own ingenuity.”
2023-01-29: Epigenetic clocks have become more accurate and more universal
“A pan-tissue clock was paradoxical because methylation is supposed to control cell identity,” and remains fixed through adulthood. When Horvath and his colleagues established that epigenetic clocks counted time at the same pace across all tissues, whether that was quickly dividing blood cells or notoriously slow and highly differentiated brain neurons, the race was on to understand the fabric of time that the clocks are measuring. The universal clock, the key finding of Horvath’s 2022 paper, takes the pan-tissue clock one step further. It chimed the final stroke that unequivocally showed a predictable pattern to aging not only within the body of a single organism, but across mammals. These are clocks that hopefully are comprised of cytosines that truly have a causative role in the aging process. Of particular interest are “enhancer” regions of the genome, which exaggerate the role of certain genes by activating them to exorbitant levels.
Mass faith prospers solely in the context of the comparatively primitive social, economic and educational disparities and poverty still characteristic of the 2nd and 3rd worlds and the US.
Well, look who’s boss. After some 60 years of loyal service, Uncle Ben is being elevated from fictional cook to fictional CEO of the fictional Uncle Ben’s Inc.
unsurprisingly, sports teams are some of the last holdouts of this racist nonsense
In the 1790s the upper class was rising from bed around noon, and then eating breakfast at an hour when their grandparents had eaten dinner. They then went for “morning walks” in the afternoon and greeted each other with “Good morning” until they ate their dinner at 18:00. Then it was “afternoon” until evening came with supper, sometime between 21:00 and 2:00 The rich, famous and fashionable did not go to bed until dawn. With their wealth and social standing, they were able to change the day to suit themselves. The hours they kept differentiated them from the middle and lower classes as surely as did their clothes, servants and mansions.
Let’s say that the world is so wealthy that most people don’t need to work. Still they might be bored. They might want to work. What kinds of jobs could they buy? Under one view, the resulting jobs would always feel phony. The customers/laborers would never fear being fired. They would never have to try very hard, or could never feel that the enterprise really mattered. You might, for instance, buy a job as a blogger.
considering that technological change will get us there pretty quickly, the comments are pretty inane
Gregor J. Rothfuss 