8 shocking things we learned from Stephen Hawking's book From the idea that our universe is one among many, to the revelation that mathematician Pythagoras didn't actually invent the Pythagorean theorem, here are eight shocking things we learned from reading physicist Stephen Hawking's new book, "The Grand Design," written with fellow physicist Leonard Mlodinow of Caltech. The book, covering major questions about the nature and origin of the universe, was released Sept. 7 by its publisher, Bantam. 1. The past is possibility According to Hawking and Mlodinow, one consequence of the theory of quantum mechanics is that events in the past that were not directly observed did not happen in a definite way. Instead they happened in all possible ways. This is related to the probabilistic nature of matter and energy revealed by quantum mechanics: Unless forced to choose a particular state by direct interference from an outside observation, things will hover in a state of uncertainty. Yeah, we're still trying to wrap our brains around this. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
64 Things Every Geek Should Know - laptoplogic.com The term ‘geek’, once used to label a circus freak, has morphed in meaning over the years. What was once an unusual profession transferred into a word indicating social awkwardness. As time has gone on, the word has yet again morphed to indicate a new type of individual: someone who is obsessive over one (or more) particular subjects, whether it be science, photography, electronics, computers, media, or any other field. A geek is one who isn’t satisfied knowing only the surface facts, but instead has a visceral desire to learn everything possible about a particular subject. A techie geek is usually one who knows a little about everything, and is thus the person family and friends turn to whenever they have a question. 1. USB – Universal Serial Bus GPU – Graphics Processing Unit CPU – Central Processing Unit SATA – Serial ATA HTML – Hyper-text Markup Language HTTP – Hypertext Transfer Protocol FTP – File Transfer Protocol P2P – Person to Person data sharing 2. 3. Here’s what one looks like: 4.
7 Man-Made Substances that Laugh in the Face of Physics The universe is full of weird substances like liquid metal and whatever preservative keeps Larry King alive. But mankind isn't happy to accept the weirdness of nature when we can create our own abominations of science that, due to the miracle of technology, spit in nature's face and call it retarded. That's why we came up with... #7. What do you get when you suspend nanoparticles of iron compounds in a colloidal solution of water, oil and a surfactant? A ferrofluid is a liquid that reacts to magnetic fields in trippy ways that make you think that science is both magical and potentially evil. Tell us that didn't look like the birth of the most sinister dildo ever. What happens is that when a magnetic field is applied to the fluid, the particles of iron compound inside align to it. What the Hell is it Used For? Ferrofluids have a lot of pretty mundane uses, from lubricating and protecting hard drives to providing heat conduction in speakers, but their primary use is in looking cool. #6. #5.
Protect your privacy on Google Do you know every Google search you've ever performed is stored on the search giant's servers? And that data is cross-linked to your search data from YouTube, Google Maps and any other Google services you use. With that mountain of information, Google can tell a lot about you: where you live, your hobbies, age, health problems, religion and more. Of course, Google uses that data mostly to target you with ads. If you spend 20 minutes doing research on a gadget, for the next few weeks you'll probably be hounded by ads for that gadget wherever you go online. Because search sites and other Web services have become so ingrained in our daily digital lives, it isn't really an option to stop using them. However, you can keep a lower profile and put a little more distance between your personal data and Google. To see what forgotten secrets lurk in your Google history, go to google.com/history and sign in with your Google account information. Just don't confuse private browsing with anonymity.
Tesla: Master of Lightning "In almost every step of progress in electrical engineering, as well as radio, we can trace the spark of thought back to Nikola Tesla" - Ernst F. W. Alexanderson Tesla with one of his famous "wireless" lamps. Published on the cover of the Electrical Experimenter in 1919. Few inventors contributed more to advances in science and engineering in the early 20th century than Nikola Tesla. As fate would have it, Tesla, one of the world's greatest inventors, died penniless and in obscurity. Today, there's quite a bit of resurgence in Tesla's popularity, which is helped in part by his mystique as a "mad scientist." Tesla Company letterhead. In their book, Tesla: Master of Lightning , authors Margaret Cheney and Robert Uth tell the story of the enigmatic genius from his birth in a little village in what is Croatia today, to his lonely death in a New York hotel room. On a personal note, it has taken me far longer than I expected to write this excerpt for Neatorama Spotlight. An Old World Childhood
Free Youtube Video Downloader Quantum gas goes below absolute zero PHOTOCREO Michal Bednarek/Thinkstock Temperature in a gas can reach below absolute zero thanks to a quirk of quantum physics. It may sound less likely than hell freezing over, but physicists have created an atomic gas with a sub-absolute-zero temperature for the first time1. Their technique opens the door to generating negative-Kelvin materials and new quantum devices, and it could even help to solve a cosmological mystery. Lord Kelvin defined the absolute temperature scale in the mid-1800s in such a way that nothing could be colder than absolute zero. Physicists later realized that the absolute temperature of a gas is related to the average energy of its particles. However, by the 1950s, physicists working with more exotic systems began to realise that this isn't always true: Technically, you read off the temperature of a system from a graph that plots the probabilities of its particles being found with certain energies.
Another 20 games that make you think about life First we gave you five. Then we gave you ten. Now we are giving you 20 games that make you think about life. If you have developed a taste for games of a philosophical nature, then you should be in for a treat - we have some seriously innovative games here, everything from Elude, a game that explores the nature of depression, to Ulitsa Dimitrova, a tale about a street-urchin in Russia. As with our previous lists, we have focused mainly on free games that you can play in your browser. 1 Elude Developed by Singapore-MIT Gambit Game Lab, Elude is a dark, atmospheric game that aims to shed light on the nature of depression. The forest that you start the game in represents a normal mood. This is a gloomy underground cavern, with a sticky muddy base that sucks you down. 2 Air Pressure You will have to play through Air Pressure - a Flash port of an interactive novel by Bentosmile - more than once to truly understand the characters and themes in this game. 3 Symon 4 Ulitsa Dimitrova 5 Ute 6 Aether
5 Reasons We May Live in a Multiverse The universe we live in may not be the only one out there. In fact, our universe could be just one of an infinite number of universes making up a "multiverse." Though the concept may stretch credulity, there's good physics behind it. And there's not just one way to get to a multiverse — numerous physics theories independently point to such a conclusion. In fact, some experts think the existence of hidden universes is more likely than not. Here are the five most plausible scientific theories suggesting we live in a multiverse: 1. Scientists can't be sure what the shape of space-time is, but most likely, it's flat (as opposed to spherical or even donut-shape) and stretches out infinitely. So if you look far enough, you would encounter another version of you — in fact, infinite versions of you. View gallery Space-time may stretch out to infinity. 2. 3. Out universe may live on one membrane, or "brane" that is parallel to many others containing their o … 4. 5.
10 sitios web útiles que deberías añadir a tus marcadores Internet es vasto e infinito como el universo, si algo no está en Internet es porque no existe, o está en construcción. Para algunos de nosotros vivir fuera de la red se recuerda como un pasado lejano, tan lejano como la época en la cual no existía la televisión y las familias tenían 16 hijos. Internet puede llegar a ser un gigantesco mar de conocimiento pero de un centímetro de profundidad. Ya que cualquiera puede añadir su propia basura, la red se encuentra sumamente contaminada, pero eso no quiere decir que la web no tenga muchos sitios verdaderamente útiles, sitios llenos de información, o de herramientas que nos pueden facilitar la vida, en especial a los que pasamos el mayor porcentaje de nuestro día frente a una pantalla, y tenemos síndrome de túnel carpiano gracias al mouse. Aunque esta es apenas una muestra microscópica de todo lo que tenemos disponible, decidimos compartir con ustedes esta pequeña lista de 10 sitios web útiles que guardar en tus marcadores. Duck Duck Go Reddit
100 Very Cool Facts About The Human Body – Global One TV: A Blog for Mystics The Brain The human brain is the most complex and least understood part of the human anatomy. There may be a lot we don’t know, but here are a few interesting facts that we’ve got covered. Nerve impulses to and from the brain travel as fast as 170 miles per hour. Ever wonder how you can react so fast to things around you or why that stubbed toe hurts right away? It’s due to the super-speedy movement of nerve impulses from your brain to the rest of your body and vice versa, bringing reactions at the speed of a high powered luxury sports car.The brain operates on the same amount of power as 10-watt light bulb. Hair and Nails While they’re not a living part of your body, most people spend a good amount of time caring for their hair and nails. Facial hair grows faster than any other hair on the body. Internal Organs Though we may not give them much thought unless they’re bothering us, our internal organs are what allow us to go on eating, breathing and walking around. Bodily Functions Senses