Between 2000 and 2013, robotic surgeons were involved in the deaths of 144 people, according to records kept by the FDA. There are some forms of robotic surgery that are much riskier than others: the death rate for head, neck, and cardiothoracic surgery is almost 10 times higher than for other forms of surgery.
Continue reading… “Robotic surgery involved in 144 deaths in the U.S. since 2000”
Illegal drugs from China are as easy as typing on a keyboard to order. More than 150 Chinese companies sell alpha-PVP, according to guidechem.com. alpha-PVP is also known as flakka, a dangerous stimulant that is illegal in the United States but not in China, and was blamed for 18 recent deaths in one Florida county.
Continue reading… “Illegal drugs are easy to order on China’s open online drug market”
Many college graduates are unemployed or underemployed, leading some to speculate whether college is worth it, in our post-2008/2009 slow growth recovery. Is some of the planning for college just plain wrong? How does the future look for millions of unprepared, untrained, or misdirected job seekers? Continue reading… “With many college graduates unemployed or underemployed, is college worth it?”
In the dusty khaki scrubland of South Africa’s inhospitable Northern Cape province, brightly polished mirrors flash light across the landscape as they rotate slowly to follow the sun, producing electricity for 80,000 homes. Continue reading… “The leapfrogging continent”
The latest prominent withdrawal of research results from scientific literature is the retraction by Science of a study of changing attitudes about gay marriage. And it is very likely it will not be the last. A study by Nature in 2011, found an increase of 10-fold in retraction notices during the preceding decade. Continue reading… “A growing list of retracted scientific studies”
Futurist Thomas Frey: My friend, Peter Diamandis, likes to say, “The best way to become a billionaire is to solve a billion-person problem.”
When I first heard this phrase, I had difficulty imagining what a billion-person problem looked like. Continue reading… “Solving a Billion-Person Problem”
The situation with spam has been the same for many years now and 2014 was no exception. Useless emails are still abundant, annoying, and wasteful. There was one change that happened in the last quarter, however: China eclipsed the U.S. as the biggest source of spam.
Continue reading… “China overtakes the U.S. as the biggest source of spam”
Bill and Melinda Gates have a pretty substantial to-do list. In the Gates Foundation annual letter, they have outlined their long-term, 15 year goals for the challenges they wish to solve. Continue reading… “Bill Gates wants to tackle mobile banking without bitcoin”
The use of surveillance software by abusive spouses to monitor the phones and computers of their partners secretly has reached “epidemic proportions” and police are ill-equipped to tackle it, domestic violence campaigners have warned.
Continue reading… “Abusive Spouses are Using Spyware to Track their Victims”
What will intelligent machines mean for society and the economy in 30, 50 or even 100 years from now?
That’s the question that Stanford University scientists are hoping to take on with a new project, the One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence (AI100).
Continue reading… “Stanford to Research the effects of Artificial Intelligence”
In the tech industry, we celebrate raising money as a victory second only to that of a successful exit.
And while I recognize that venture capital is often an unavoidable requirement for growing a business, most entrepreneurs, and the tech community at large — who often seem to push people into raising VC — would be better served viewing it as a necessary evil as opposed to an absolute win.
Continue reading… “Trading in your Soul for Venture Capital”
Three seismic shifts, in housing, transportation and employment, deserve blame for the fall of the American city.
Suburbs and highways, it seems, are always at the center of the conversation. The decentralization of jobs isn’t as easy to see; it has no well-worn symbol, like the green fields of subdivisions or the canyons of urban expressways. Perhaps job sprawl flies under the radar for just that reason: Skyscrapers, our most visible icons of employment, have continued to sprout even in otherwise dead downtowns like Hartford and Little Rock.
But that’s not where the jobs are anymore.
Continue reading… “Millennials and the Potential Fall of American Cities”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
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