Tag: technology

Physics Posted on

2014: Nebraska Garage Hacker Bends Fabric of Space

By Omaha Working toward a warp drive: In his garage lab, Omahan David Pares aims to bend the fabric of space. You might call Pares a dreamer, though what he’s doing goes far beyond the realm of online chatter. You might not believe any of this stuff. But suspend your disbelief for a moment and make space for something incredible. Let’s start this past summer, when a NASA scientist named Harold “Sonny” White unveiled an artist’s rendering of a spacecraft capable of shooting across the galaxy. The spacecraft was theoretical, but the research behind it was real. For years White has been exploring the possibilities of actual “Star Trek”-like travel. He even named his ship the IXS Enterprise. There are obstacles, such as forms […] Read More

Reality Posted on

Deru’s ‘The Future Never Comes’: The Strange Loop of Techno-Anxiety

Image: Deru/Tim Navis What we know for sure is that what comes next is going to be huge and nothing will ever be the same again. This statement, possibly the dominant sentiment of the post-industrial world, is what it means to be defined by technology: neverending expectation, the assurance that this here now is insufficient, a mere stepping stone to the real future‘s future. It’s a perfect strange loop: as we progress upward through hierarchies of new and better technology, we’re also conditioned by that same new and better technology to anticipate the next wave of new and better. The real future is always just over the horizon and it’s such that we’re rarely impressed by anything, no matter how much things actually change […] Read More

Consciousness Posted on

2013: The Great Stellar Scroll

By Larry Simmons “It’s not often that anyone from earth is allowed to take this trip,” a voice said. “We’ll bring you along, but because you were unscheduled, you won’t be able to make the jump in one stage.” Alec thought he had been asleep, but this was far too real to be called a dream. The voice continued: “Halfway through the trip we’ll have to drop you off for a few moments. The place where we’ll leave you will appear very strange, but you’ll be perfectly safe. Just be sure that you wait quietly, don’t move, don’t touch anything, and don’t speak to anyone you might see.” He didn’t really know why this amazing experience was happening to him. He had no idea […] Read More

Bucky Fuller Posted on

Guinea Pig B by Buckminster Fuller

I AM NOW CLOSE TO 88 and I am confident that the only thing important about me is that I am an average healthy human. I am also a living case history of a thoroughly documented, half-century, search-and-research project designed to discover what, if anything, an unknown, moneyless individual, with a dependent wife and newborn child, might be able to do effectively on behalf of all humanity that could not be accomplished by great nations, great religions or private enterprise, no matter how rich or powerfully armed. I started out fifty-six years ago, at the age of 32, to make that experiment. By good fortune I had acquired a comprehensive experience in commanding and handling ships, first as a sailor in Penobscot Bay, Maine, […] Read More