Author: m1k3y

policymic:

Engineering company Festo is creating robots based on nature

German engineering firm Festo is creating a robot army. Sounds scary, right? But there’s no need to fear a “Skynet”-type apocalypse quite yet, because these robots want to do good by making laborious tasks easier in the factories of the future. And they’re using nature as their inspiration.

Festo summarizes the motivation behind their research on their website: “Gripping, moving, controlling and measuring – nature performs all of these tasks instinctively, easily and efficiently. What could be more logical than to examine these natural phenomena and learn from them?”

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Festo ftw

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mortisia:

Howard Phillips Lovecraft (August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937) — known as H. P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction.

Lovecraft’s guiding aesthetic and philosophical principle was what he termed “cosmicism” or “cosmic horror”, the idea that life is incomprehensible to human minds and that the universe is fundamentally inimical to the interests of humankind. As such, his stories express a profound indifference to human beliefs and affairs. Lovecraft is the originator of the Cthulhu Mythos story cycle and the Necronomicon, a fictional magical textbook of rites and forbidden lore.

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Where were my women who were forced to learn that with great power comes great responsibility? Where were my awkward school girls who were just trying to graduate high school when they found they didn’t need their glasses anymore, but could lift a school bus one-handed? Where were the funny best buddies? It’s not as though we can all be Lara Croft. Yet for a long time, she was all we had: if you were a woman, you had your place, on one end of the spectrum or the other. Why, I still ask every single time the movie is on TV, is it Kick-Ass and not Hit Girl?

Then the recent Marvel films arrived. Pepper Potts came along in her business-wear and skyscraper Louboutins and was unstoppable in her rise to CEO of Stark Industries. Black Widow slunk onto the scene and showed us that we don’t need to choose between sexy and dangerous. Jane Foster, the astrophysicist genius, still blushed when confronted with Thor’s overwhelming good looks, just the way the rest of us would, while Darcy Lewis was as concerned about her iPod as she was about the faceless government organisation behind its theft.

Maria Hill reached the very top of the male-dominated SHIELD organisation, Sif is a fully-fledged goddess of war, and Peggy Carter was a sharp-shooting, red lipstick-wearing female officer at the frontline of WW2. These aren’t the cardboard cut-out women of action movies gone by. They’re more than the girlfriends or relatives or unobtainable dream girls, more than pawns for a hero’s man-pain. They’re definitely more than a gorgeous yet robot-like tomb raider with a penchant for dressing in clothes that are so often inappropriate for the weather.

They’re you, me. The boss you want to be someday, the academic your friend aspires to. The student who just wants to listen to music and have fun. The women who can do battle, run Fortune 500 companies, wield tasers and drive questionably. Girls who can show fear but fight against the bad guys anyway, who flirt just for fun. The brainwashed Russian superspy assassin. (OK, so maybe not that last one. Then again, we do all have that one friend we wonder about.)

Marvel’s women are so much more than just eye candy 

(via peggyleads)

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warrenellis:

At The Farmhouse Sunday January 26, 6pm – 9pm @farmhouse ____ DESCRIPTION: In the intimate surroundings of The Farmhouse Barn, writer Warren Ellis sits down for a State Of The Weird, picking over the radioactive bones of 2013 and gathering the stories for a Briefing on the science-fiction condition of 2014. That night, he will be in the middle of writing a novella about futurists and a non-fiction book about the future of cities — except that they’re both also about strange history and Weird Shit — and he’s here to talk about deep time, storytelling and the weather of tomorrow. BIO:: Warren Ellis is the award-winning writer of graphic novels like TRANSMETROPOLITAN, FELL, MINISTRY OF SPACE and PLANETARY, and the author of the New York Times bestselling GUN MACHINE and the “underground classic” novel CROOKED LITTLE VEIN. The movie RED is based on his graphic novel of the same name, its sequel having been released in summer 2013. His GRAVEL books are in development for film at Legendary Pictures, with Tim Miller attached to direct. IRON MAN 3 is based on his Marvel Comics graphic novel IRON MAN: EXTREMIS. He’s also written extensively for VICE, WIRED UK and Reuters on technological and cultural matters, and is co-writing a video project called WASTELANDERS with Joss Whedon. Warren Ellis is currently working on a non-fiction book about the future of the city for Farrar Giroux Straus. His newest publication is the digital short-story single DEAD PIG COLLECTOR, from FSG Originals. A documentary about his work, CAPTURED GHOSTS, was released in 2012. Recognitions include the NUIG Literary and Debating Society’s President’s Medal for service to freedom of speech, the EAGLE AWARDS Roll Of Honour for lifetime achievement in the field of comics & graphic novels, the Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire 2010, the Sidewise Award for Alternate History and the International Horror Guild Award for illustrated narrative. The Farmhouse : Barn Talks : 1 — Warren Ellis Shane Becker

Stand Up Deep Time History slash Hauntological Philosophy dot tumblr dot doge

(Source: https://player.vimeo.com/)
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The analysis found that around 80 Icelanders in four contemporary families hailed from ancestors who lived in Iceland in 1710 and 1740. They carry a newly-discovered variant of mitochondrial DNA called C1e. Remarkably, this variant is closely related to other C1 variants that are unique to the first Indians to settle in America 14,000 years ago. It was identified in 11 contemporary Icelanders, and traced back genaeologically (American Journal of Physical Anthropology, DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.21419).

Because the variant is in mitochondrial DNA, which is only passed down the mothers’ line, the first Amerindian arriving in Iceland must have been a woman, and must have arrived centuries before 1710.

“As the island was virtually isolated from the tenth century, the most likely hypothesis is that these genes corresponded to an Amerindian woman who was brought from America by the Vikings around 1000,” says lead researcher, Carles Lalueza-Fox of Spain’s Institute of Biological Evolution in Barcelona, in a press statement from Spain’s national research council, CSIC. Lalueza-Fox analysed the DNA in collaboration with Decode Genetics, an Icelandic company in Reykjavik that stores genetic records of the Icelandic population.

To dig even deeper into the past, he is now examining DNA from more people who live in the same region that the four families hail from, near the Vatnajokull glacier in southern Iceland. The hope is to trace other ancestors who go back even further than 1710.

The findings tally with mediaeval Icelandic accounts of voyages by Vikings to the New World in the 10th century.

Short Sharp Science: Vikings brought first native American to Europe
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The eco-terrorists of the second season of Bron || Broen are in no way affiliated with the Overview Effect Enforcement Agency. They are certainly not ousted members. We have no knowledge of their actions or identity. Who is this anyway? I have to go now.

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