This cluster of cells is one example of the spheroidal and ellipsoidal microfossils found at the 3.4-billion-year-old.
Scientists say life thrived on Earth 3.4 billion years ago even though the world still had no oxygen. But now they say they have the world’s oldest fossils to prove it.
Continue reading… “World’s oldest fossils could give clues about life on Mars”
Manhattan at sunset.
The explosive growth of cities worldwide over the next two decades poses significant risks to people and the global environment, according to a meta-analysis published August 19 in PLoS ONE.
Researchers from Yale, Arizona State, Texas A&M and Stanford predict that by 2030 urban areas will expand by 590,000 square miles — nearly the size of Mongolia — to accommodate the needs of 1.47 billion more people living in urban areas…
Continue reading… “Growth of cities endangers global environment”
Brazil has faced hyperinflation in the past.
Twenty years ago, Brazil found itself in the grips of hyperinflation. Its inflation rate hit 80% a month, and the country was in financial free fall.
Economists at the Catholic University in Rio came up with an unlikely – but ultimately successful – plan to rescue the country. And would you believe it, the plan calls for fake money..
Continue reading… “How fake money saved Brazil”
What a strange place!
Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia is the world’s largest salt flat at 4,086 sq miles. The Salar was formed as a result of transformations between several prehistoric lakes. It is covered by a few meters of salt crust, which has an extraordinary flatness with the average altitude variations within one meter over the entire area of the Salar…
Continue reading… “The amazing Uyuni Salt Flats”
Did you know about using Control-F?
Dan Russell, one of Google’s anthropologists, conducted a largeish survey of user behavior and discovered that 90 percent of American Internet users don’t know that crtl-F will let them search documents including Web pages. I recently discovered that a smart and technologically literate friend had never heard of alt-tab for application switching; alt-tab being my single most used key combo!
It strikes me that we could probable come up with a list of ten (or even three) things you could teach to the people around you the next time you sit down to help them with a technology problem, “three things every technology user should know.”
Continue reading… “90 percent of US net users don’t know about ‘crtl-F’”
Trecking down the Amazon on your computer thanks to Google.
Google has teamed up with Amazon for a new project. Well, not Amazon, as in the company that sells the Kindle. No, we’re talking about the great, untamed wilderness of the Amazon rainforest. In a partnership with the Sustainable Amazon Foundation, Google aims to use its Street View technology to raise awareness of the world’s largest rainforest and its important ecosystems.
To do this, Google is mapping the byways of the Amazon River…
Continue reading… “Google Street View is using canoes and tricycles to map the Amazon”
Male maturity age has shifted again.
Boys are maturing physically earlier than ever before. The age of sexual maturity has been decreasing by about 2.5 months each decade at least since the middle of the 18th century. Joshua Goldstein, director of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock (MPIDR), has used mortality data to demonstrate this trend, which until now was difficult to decipher. What had already been established for girls now seems to also be true for boys: the time period during which young people are sexually mature but socially not yet considered adults is expanding…
Continue reading… “Boys reach sexual maturity younger and younger”
A new library approach from Canada.
For centuries the public library has been a great source of knowledge through books. Now one library in Canada is opening up the scope of how you acquire knowledge at the library; by offering up skilled people. Why read a history book when you can talk to a historian?
Continue reading… “Canadian library will Loan out people as well as books”
Would you believe this could be the new look of solar power?
7th grader Aidan Dwyer was walking in the woods during the winter, and looking up, he noticed something about the bare branches above him. They didn’t appear to be growing randomly. So he took some measurements of the angles of the branches, crunched some numbers, and wouldn’t you know it, he found that the ubiquitous Fibonacci Sequence was behind it all. He suspected there was a reason behind this. That trees were using this pattern to gather more light.
So he did an experiment. Using the same number of solar cells, he built two working models. One was a traditional, flat array will all of the panels on a single plane. The other used the Fibonacci Sequence to create the same spiraled pattern he observed in the trees. The results? The little man himself reports…
Continue reading… “Genius 13-Year-Old has a solar power breakthrough”
Learn more about artificial intelligence.
If you’ve ever been drawn to the idea of artificial intelligence, Stanford University School of Engineering is giving out the opportunity to learn how to build software that “reasons about the world around it.” The free class is as challenging as courses given to Stanford students and starts on October 10. So far over 100,000 students have signed up…
Continue reading… “Free artificial intelligence class”
Supercookies are not a good thing for the user.
The WSJ says that Hulu and MSN, among others, have been found using supercookies to monitor the info of those who visit their sites. Extremely difficult to detect and erase, supercookies can provide significantly more information than standard cookies.
Supercookies can be used to steal a users entire browser history, which can provide highly valuable information on their financial and health status. Microsoft claims they don’t know why supercookies were being used…
Continue reading… “Hulu and MSN caught using supercookies to track user data”
Amazon grows again.
Amazon is constantly growing and expanding its catalog of videos available for on-demand streaming. The service just reached the 100k mark with 9,000 of those available under the Prime streaming plan. The bulk of the library is set aside for à la carte renting and buying with TV titles starting at $.99 cent and movies for $3.99. With deep living room penetration, all Amazon needs to do is flip the switch, offer a reasonably-priced subscription plan open to all titles, and effectively shut down Netflix…
Continue reading… “Amazon Instant Video reaches 100,000 on-demand titles”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
Learn More about this exciting program.