Our Future in the Cosmos—Space
A speech given by Isaac Asimov on the future of humanity in space.
Archive: January 2nd, 2011
Nanotechnology and Space
Implications of Molecular Nanotechnology Technical Performance Parameters on Previously Defined Space System Architectures.
This paper, delivered at the 1995 Foresight Conference on Molecular Nanotechnology (sponsored by Apple Computers) shows the practical applications of diamondoid and fullerene materials not just in constructing a space elevator, but in the subsequent construction of orbital colonies
Nanotechnology - Foresight Institute
There’s still plenty of room at the bottom.
Foresight Institute’s mission is to ensure the beneficial implementation of nanotechnology.
A space elevator, for example.
SSI Sample Slides | Space Studies Institute
The dream of SSI is of a humanity free of the constraints of the Earth. In expanding outward into space, we can not only help to preserve our present biosphere, we can also seed other independent biospheres elsewhere, ensuring the continued survival of life despite any kind of planetary disaster.
Reading the street
Like many others, I was the grateful recipient of a Kindle this Christmas. I’m enjoying having such a lightweight reading device and I’m really enjoying the near-ubiquitous free connectivity that comes with the 3G version.
I can’t quite bring myself to go on a spending spree for overpriced DRM’d books with shoddy layout and character encoding, so I’ve been getting into the swing of things with the freely-available works of Cory Doctorow. I thoroughly enjoyed For The Win—actually, I read that one on my iPod Touch—and I just finished Makers on the Kindle.
The plot rambles somewhat but it’s still an entertaining near-future scenario of hardware hackers creating and destroying entire business models through the ever-decreasing cost and ever-increasing power of street-level technology.
Cracking open the case of a particularly convincing handset, he offers advice on identifying a fake: a hologram stuck on the phone’s battery is usually a good indication that the product is genuine. Two minutes later, Chipchase approaches another stall. The shopkeeper, a middle-aged woman, leans forward and offers an enormous roll of hologram stickers.
Chipchase, mouth agape, takes out the Canon 5D camera that he uses to catalogue almost everything he sees. “What are these for?” he asks, firing off a dozen photographs in quick succession. “You stick them on batteries to make them look real,” she says, with a shrug. Chipchase smiles, revelling in the discovery. “I love this!” he yelps in delight, and thanks the shopkeeper before heading off to examine the next stall.
That isn’t a passage from Makers. That’s from a Wired magazine article by Bobbie: a profile of Jan Chipchase and his predilection for Shanzai; counterfeit electronic goods on the streets of Shanghai …not unlike the Bambook Kindle clone.