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Peer Review...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 21, 2014 at 5:00am
Timberwood Park, San Antonio, TX: Caveat emptor

Yesterday (17 March), researchers from the Background Imaging of Cosmic Extragalactic Polarization (BICEP2) telescope at the South Pole revealed that they have detected the first evidence for the primordial B-mode polarization of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The astronomers claimed that the primordial B-mode polarization signal – which is related to primordial gravitational waves that flowed through the early universe – is the first direct evidence for cosmic inflation and has been measured to a statistical certainty of 3σ. Now, cosmologist and Perimeter Institute director Neil Turok, who worked on an inflationary model of his own with Stephen Hawking in the 1990s, urges caution and says that extensive experimental confirmation is necessary before BICEP2's results can be considered as evidence for inflation.



"If...and it's a big if...this is true, it would be spectacular evidence for what happened at the Big Bang," Turok told physicsworld.com. While he agreed that at first glance, the BICEP2 observations are in keeping with inflation "as suggested over 30 years ago, wherein space–time would resonate with the aftershocks of inflation and would ring like a bell", a closer look at the discrepancy between the new results and previous data from the Planck and WMAP telescopes is what worries Turok. Indeed, the tensor-to-scalar ratio of 0.20 that BICEP2 measured is considered to be significantly larger than that expected from previous analyses of data. But the BICEP2 researchers said in their press conference yesterday that they believe certain tweaks could be made to an extension of the ΛCDM cosmological model that could make the two results agree.



"But these tweaks would be tremendously ugly....and in fact, I believe that if both Planck and the new results agree, then together they would give substantial evidence against inflation!" exclaims Turok, further explaining that "[we] must be careful before we treat them as true".



"Extraordinary claims requires extraordinary evidence." Carl Sagan.

 Even though Tuesday's announcement was exciting news, and I really want it to be true, it might not be. After the Scientific Method, this is the rigor of peer review and the necessity of it. Without it, we march down the primrose path of pseudoscience and created entities like the Discovery Institute ("intelligent design") and World Science Database (which purports that the Special and General Theory of Relativity have been "disproved"  despite yesterday, I was discussing superconducting quantum interference devices - SQUID's). Both organizations are of "sounding brass and tinkling cymbal" to quote Corinthians. The Science Channel - when it's not suggesting UFO close encounters - promotes the tagline "question everything." We really should.



 Physics World: Neil Turok urges caution on BICEP2 results

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MISSED THE LAST "DISCUSSIONS FROM THE OTHERHOOD" SHOW? THAT'S OK - CATCH US ON iTUNES!

Posted by Penelope on March 20, 2014 at 1:09am

That's Right! The OTHER SCI FI Talkshoe Live Podcast "Discussions from the Otherhood which we record just about every Saturday at 4pm EST is now a free Podcast on iTunes!

To find us go to:

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewRoom?fcld=529293810

And initiate a Search for "Other Sci Fi" in the Podcasts section of the menu.

Listen in and maybe... just maybe you'll decide to join us one of these Saturday afternoons!

If you have any problems locating us at iTunes, contact me here or at p.flynn@otherscifi.com for additional information!

~P.Flynn

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SQUID...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 19, 2014 at 2:58pm
Micrograph of a SQUID amplifier, made at NIST in 2012, that is part of a circuit used to read signals from arrays of superconducting sensors. Small currents generated by the sensors are carried and amplified in the coils, which create magnetic fields detected by the SQUID (two small squares in the center of the image).
Credit: NIST

From humble beginnings in a series of accidental discoveries, SQUIDs have invaded and enhanced many areas of science and medicine, thanks, in part, to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).



SQUIDs—short for superconducting quantum interference devices—are the world's most sensitive magnetometers and powerful signal amplifiers, with broad applications ranging from medicine and mining to cosmology and materials analysis.



Physicists from around the world celebrated last week* to mark the 50th anniversary of the first journal paper introducing the SQUID, published in February 1964.

Celebrants heard about the use of SQUIDS to measure brain activity in Finland, discover mineral deposits leading to a large silver mine in Australia, and detect faint light from the early moments of the universe from telescopes all over the world.



SQUIDs measure magnetic fields based on quantum properties created when a superconducting circuit loop, in which electricity flows without resistance, is interrupted with one or two short sections of resistive material. The current across the resistive section varies predictably, based on the strength of the external magnetic field, making the device an exquisitely sensitive detector of magnetic fields. Typically, SQUIDs need to be cooled to cryogenic temperatures below 4 kelvins (-269 degrees Celsius) with liquid helium.



The SQUID was invented at Ford Scientific Laboratories in the 1960s but was further developed at NIST (then called the National Bureau of Standards). James Zimmerman co-invented one type of SQUID (the RF-SQUID) and coined the term while at Ford, before joining NIST where he worked in the 1970s and 1980s.



 NIST: Magnetic Attraction: Physicists Pay Homage to the SQUID at 50

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AfroFuturism?

Posted by Arnold L. Johnson on March 19, 2014 at 1:21pm

I will ask the question.

What is Afrofuturism?, the crux and purpose of it? Is it a perspective or a cultural designation?

My interest is on material culture, cultural immersion, perhaps an ideal that embraces us all but not necessarily a racial/cultural identifier.  So, what's the vibe?

I ask because I am an artist, interested in design (material culture) that we live with day to day. And I'm tired of waiting for the future to come, thinking about contrasting with the present.

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Five Sigma...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 18, 2014 at 4:30am
The 10-meter South Pole Telescope and the BICEP (Background Imaging of Cosmic Extragalactic Polarization) Telescope against the Milky Way. BICEP2 recently detected gravitational waves in the cosmic microwave background, a discovery that supports the cosmic inflation theory of how the universe began. (Photo: Keith Vanderlinde, National Science Foundation)

The detection of gravitational waves by the BICEP2 experiment at the South Pole supports the cosmic inflation theory of how the universe came to be. The discovery, made in part by Assistant Professor Chao-Lin Kuo, supports the theoretical work of Stanford's Andrei Linde.



Almost 14 billion years ago, the universe we inhabit burst into existence in an extraordinary event that initiated the Big Bang. In the first fleeting fraction of a second, the universe expanded exponentially, stretching far beyond the view of today's best telescopes. All this, of course, has just been theory.



Researchers from the BICEP2 collaboration today announced the first direct evidence supporting this theory, known as "cosmic inflation." Their data also represent the first images of gravitational waves, or ripples in space-time. These waves have been described as the "first tremors of the Big Bang." Finally, the data confirm a deep connection between quantum mechanics and general relativity.



 Stanford News:
New evidence from space supports Stanford physicist's theory of how universe began
Harvard Center for Astrophysics: First Direct Evidence of Cosmic Inflation

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Dark Matter and Dino...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 17, 2014 at 3:55pm
Artist's impression of a comet striking the Earth. (Courtesy: iStock/PaulPaladin)

Two theoretical physicists in the US have made a surprising connection between dinosaur extinction and dark matter. Lisa Randall and Matthew Reece of Harvard University believe that some of this mysterious invisible matter – which makes up 85% of all matter in the universe – could exist in a special form that affects the rate at which comets strike our planet. A comet crashing into Earth about 66 million years ago is one possible reason why these giant creatures died off.



Comets have smashed into Earth throughout its history, creating huge craters and possibly causing mass extinctions, such as that which befell the dinosaurs. Many of these comets come from the Oort cloud, which is a huge halo of small icy objects that surrounds the Sun, out to a distance of about one light year. But rather than being entirely random, there is some evidence that the frequency of comet impacts oscillates on a timescale of about 35 million years.



Although this oscillation is not certain, if it is true, there could be something on that timescale that affects the rate at which comets from the Oort cloud are sent towards Earth. Two possible explanations have been proposed so far. One – dubbed the "nemesis hypothesis" – involves the gravitational pull of an as-yet-undiscovered distant companion star to the Sun. The other involves the oscillating pull of the dense galactic disc as the solar system crosses and re-crosses the plane of the Milky Way.


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Living Well...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 16, 2014 at 10:43am


When I was in elementary school in the public schools of New York City, I distinctly remember that it was important for me to be athletic — in particular, to be able to run fast. I was encouraged by all around me. My reward was the respect and admiration of classmates and especially my streetmates.



In junior high school it was important for me, now that I was certified the “fastest on the block,” to slam-dunk a basketball. To do this you have to jump high and palm the basketball. On April 17, 1973, I was the first in my grade to slam-dunk a basketball. I then asked myself, “Is this all there is to it?” The answer is basically yes, yet one can imagine creative variations such as a 360-degree pirouette in midair preceding the dunk, but you still score only two points.



About the same time, I learned that light, traveling at 186,282 miles per second, moves too slowly to escape from the event horizon of a black hole. This was more astonishing to me than a 360-degree slam-dunk. I soon became scientifically curious and read everything I could find about the universe. I began to see myself as a future scientist — in particular, an astrophysicist. It became a deeply seated dream.



I shortly came to the shattering awareness that few parts of society were prepared to accept my dreams. I wanted to do with my life what people of my skin color were not supposed to do. As an athlete, I did not violate society’s expectations since there was adequate precedent for dark-skinned competitors in the Olympics and in professional sports. To be an astrophysicist, however, became a “path of most resistance.” I began to wonder whether I originally wanted to be an athlete more from society’s interest rather than my own. My brother, Stephen, today a professional artist, could run faster and jump higher than I could. He, too, felt these forces of society.



In high school, nobody probed further about how I became captain of the wrestling team. But when I became editor-in-chief of my school’s annual Physical Science Journal, my qualifications were constantly queried. And when I was accepted to the college of my choice, I was continually asked for my SAT scores and grade point average. Indeed, one fellow student, who worked in the office of the guidance counselor, threatened to find the file in the school records to read my scores himself, if I didn’t tell.



When I first entered graduate school, before transferring to Columbia, I was eager to pursue my dreams of research astrophysics. But the first comment directed to me in the first minute of the first day, by a faculty member whom I had just met was, “You must join our department basketball team.” As the months and years passed, faculty and fellow students, thinking that they were doing me a favor, would suggest alternative careers for me.



“Why don’t you become a computer salesman?”



“Why don’t you teach at a community college?”



“Why don’t you leave astrophysics and academia? You can make much money in industry.”



At no time was I perceived as a future colleague, although this privilege was enjoyed by others in graduate school.



When combined with the dozens of times I have been stopped and questioned by the police for going to and from my office after hours, and the hundreds of times I am followed by security guards in department stores, and the countless times people cross the street upon seeing me approach them on the sidewalk, I can summarize my life’s path by noting the following: in the perception of society, my athletic talents are genetic; I am a likely mugger-rapist; my academic failures are expected; and my academic successes are attributed to others.



 Book Excerpt: The Sky is Not the Limit, by Neil deGrasse Tyson on BillMoyers.com
Site: COSMOS: A SpaceTime Odyssey
Mother Jones: Neil deGrasse Tyson on "Cosmos" (source of podcast below)

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Hypatia...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 15, 2014 at 5:01pm
Source: http://wizewomon.blogspot.com/2011/12/hypatia-womon-of-note.html

This is Women's History Month. As a blog that promotes diversity in the sciences, I'm well aware of it. However, I received my midterm exam from Stevens University on the 28th of February. Solid State Electronics II is no less the challenge than Part I was admittedly. I had two weeks to solve, thus my time was fairly focused. I turned in my test at the deadline. I can for a moment breath on this Ides of March.



Hypatia (pronounced "hi-pay-see-a"): I read her name in the book Cosmos that I downloaded to my Kindle. I looked at the "old school" Cosmos show where Carl Sagan mentions her (starts at 3:25), and her sad fate. She's described as mathematician, astronomer, physicist, philosopher, quite lovely apparently and driver of her own chariot! She was a beloved teacher and by social practice a celibate, no doubt frustrating potential suitors of her day.

Interestingly as I predicted to some casually offline, Cosmos: A SpaceTime Odyssey has already had its detractors of the "young Earth"/humans with dinosaurs/faux debate between Evolution and so-called Intelligent Design variety. The odd and breathtaking display of hypocrisy in most of the trolls taking to the Internet - notably in 140 misspelled characters or less - created by the very science and modern physics they rail against; supporting pseudoscience in their destructive wake.



A certain part of the reptilian portion of our minds attacks instinctively that which we think challenges our belief systems - and thus us. Time and again, we've seen the razing of cities, the flaying of martyrs, the murder of not only the person, but new ideas that would take the species forward. This of course, all for adherence to a dogma. Supposedly through evangelism, it is meant as a "sell," and thus adherence is voluntary - zealotry and fanaticism turns it involuntary; totalitarian. Authoritarianism becomes our governance and its dogmatic ruling class the thought police. Sadly, I can't help but think if part of the mob that set upon Hypatia and ended her life so tragically were peopled by members of her own gender, suffering from what would in the 20th century gain the name "Stockholm Syndrome."



I often fear intolerance will rear its ugly head again and plunge us all over the abyss with it, as it did Alexandria, Egypt. They executed Hypatia...for the "crime" of thinking critically and independently of the lordship of patriarchal society. The saying goes "teach a woman  and you teach a generation." The library, like Hypatia, soon expired after her forced passing.

 For these and other reasons, I will support Dr. Tyson and the relaunch of Cosmos. As Dr. Sagan states above, we "must not let it happen again."

 "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it."
Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás, known as George Santayana



Related Links:
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The Lost Father

Posted by Gerald Dean Rice on March 14, 2014 at 10:30pm

I know it sounds like the awesome title of some new thriller (and who knows, it may yet be), but this is a song I found by chance. My wife and I go to sleep to a Music Choice channel that plays soothing music. As I was laying down Wednesday night this came on and it just grabbed me. I leapt out of bed, put my glasses back on and read the title of the song and the composer.

Listen to Kevin Keller's The Lost Father.

Did you hear that? Haunting, isn't it? That is going to inspire me to write something. I looked him up on Amazon and I think I'm going to buy the Nocturnes CD and check out his other stuff.

And you know what reads really well with a nice Kevin Keller CD? Smells Like and Where the Monsters Are. Only $0.99!

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SEEKING FREELANCE ARTIST FOR GRAPHIC NOVEL

Posted by Antwan Floyd Sr. on March 14, 2014 at 4:21pm

Hello,

My name is Antwan Floyd Sr. I am a publisher and author of several titles. I am venturing into the graphic novel genre. This will be my first title in this genre. I am currently seeking an artist to illustrate for the novel. The novel will typically be written in 15-20 pages. Not sure as to rather the book will be in black and white, color, or both. Anyone interested please leave a message in my inbox with a link to where I can see your previous work or leave a sample in in my inbox with your rates and turnaround time. 

Thank you,

Antwan Floyd Sr.

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Request for Reviews

Posted by Brandon Hill on March 14, 2014 at 3:23am

Hey there, BSFS!  

To any members who have purchased my books, thanks a million! 

I have a personal favor to ask, if any of you have purchased my latest book, "Elven Roses", or know someone who has, could you please write up, or convince said friend to write up a review of it? It's the only one of my books that doesn't have any kind of review or rating. Thanks a bunch! 

Elven Roses on Amazon.com


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the Nubian arch

Posted by Arnold L. Johnson on March 12, 2014 at 5:30pm

Went to a place on the continent we all know and love. The host told me eons ago some visitors built a large box with a glass top and buried it in the sand. We put the market on top of it, been that way ever since. It was a shanty town. Women sitting on door stoops making things to sell and kids running in the street. Ragged shantys as far as one could see. They all were similar, corrugated top, sides and an Nubian arched doorway. I thought it was an unusual feature. To spend so much effort to have such an elegant door when the rest of the house was so shabby, there must be a reason.

I stayed in the visitors sector, a hotel with views overlooking the whole town, had everything to make a guest happy only not so big. Hey you wouldn't want to out shine the locals too much now would you? I asked the clerk, why the people were so content in such obvious poverty. He chuckled and under his breath he said practice. He said out loud talk to my host which I did.

My host Carl was a fine man with the most mischievous children, I still think he was running game on me. His youngest picked my pocket, was off down the street with my wallet. Carl laughed, I was not amused and dashed after him. He ran into a twisted rusted old shack, I was dead on his heels. Through the arch of the doorway he went and just as he was a few feet on the other side I let out a gasp that would startle a herd of camels. Opulence, colors, bright colors, flowing curtains, a sweet breeze instead of rusted iron air and birds singing. I felt the tiny hand push my wallet into my hand and the small voice apologized. Carl came in he couldn't contain himself, doubled over in laughter. This is our space via the arch. It folds space so that we each can have as much space as we want. I asked, is it virtual, or something he put in my food? He showed me many rooms all laid out and a spacious court yard and a deck over the sea. We came back through the arch, same old dusty street. I tore away, ran back into the shack to see if I was dreaming. Crashed into a table not far from the door in the middle of the shack. A stack of pots I knocked over made a terrible racket. When I came out Carl was in fits. His neighbor smiled and said the arch teaches great wisdom too. Permission to enter is by it's owner only.

I never told a soul, till today.

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Optical Cavity...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 12, 2014 at 2:58pm
A rendering shows a beam of light interacting with an optical nanocavity. The nanocavity boosts light absorption in ultrathin semiconductors. Credit: Advanced Materials

By Cory Nealon



Release Date: March 5, 2014



BUFFALO, N.Y. – Associated with unhappy visits to the dentist, “cavity” means something else in the branch of physics known as optics.



Put simply, an optical cavity is an arrangement of mirrors that allows beams of light to circulate in closed paths. These cavities help us build things like lasers and optical fibers used for communications.



Now, an international research team pushed the concept further by developing an optical “nanocavity” that boosts the amount of light that ultrathin semiconductors absorb. The advancement could lead to, among other things, more powerful photovoltaic cells and faster video cameras; it also could be useful for splitting water using energy from light, which could aid in the development of hydrogen fuel.



The team, comprised of faculty and students from the University at Buffalo and two Chinese universities, presented its findings Feb. 24 in the journal Advanced Materials. The paper, called “Nanocavity enhancement for ultra-thin film optical absorber,” is available here: http://bit.ly/1bGGIbO.



 University of Buffalo: An (optical) cavity that you want

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when I sleep with my face to the wall

Posted by Arnold L. Johnson on March 11, 2014 at 4:23pm

It creeps into the background of my thoughts. After months of watching uTube vids, scholarly works, reading scripture and Facebook Afrocentric friendly posts. Like the biblical children of Israel (not saying we are them), a people carried off into captivity, made slaves. The ones remaining beat down and neutralized, colonized. One day the children of them all wake up to remember. Only whispers of the past remain but that knowledge spreads via the Internet and the hunger to know. Several ones had the nerve to return, but who is today's Daniel, Nehemiah. Who finds and reads the book into all our ears to cause us to choose to stay or return. The book is a metaphor that fits sometimes, bends sometimes and misleads sometimes. Who stirs the hearts to return in mass to rebuild a people.

Now what will they face in their return, a colonized land for sure. But the cry has been made, both the returning and the ones on the land need a restoration, nobody knows what that looks like. The spirit is there, the minds are confused, all requires experience to work it out. And that's the enigma, we have always worked it out, it's recorded in stone.

There are cities, modern cities to move to. The question with us are we brave enough to go and blend with the sons of Africans, are they brave enough to receive us. Can we accommodate each other long enough to have a new generation that binds us? Not just business, but family? Can we bare the same stake in the land and in each other? I'm an old man, it's my job to ask these questions and dream like this. I am so ill-equipped to convey this to the young ones as I have only discovered the weight of this in my old age. I lost contact with my contemporaries of the discovered mind. Been of that god cult, professing god, not having god in reality. There is no unity of mind, heart and matter. You must have your people and your land for that.

So consider that equation in your stories, what will it look like, construct possibilities, then step into them.

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The Matter of Matter...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 11, 2014 at 5:28am
A faux historical account of Earth "pre-warp"

Warp drive, as enthusiastically a Trekkie I am, was a plot device created by Gene Roddenberry to get his astronauts from "here-to-there" in a reasonable amount of time to tell a story in an hour or less. NASA on the other hand, needs something other than chemical rockets that once the fuels expended to get the rocket into orbit - Newton's Laws dominate. Which is why currently a manned trip to Mars would take ~ 7 months to 300 days, and have astronauts with muscles of mush and bone mass of jello. VASIMR may get us there one day, thanks to the diligent research of people like Franklin Ramón Chang Díaz, PhD.



Abstract



The Alcubierre warp drive allows a spaceship to travel at an arbitrarily large global velocity by deforming the spacetime in a bubble around the spaceship. Little is known about the interactions between massive particles and the Alcubierre warp drive, or the effects of an accelerating or decelerating warp bubble. We examine geodesics representative of the paths of null and massive particles with a range of initial velocities from -c to c interacting with an Alcubierre warp bubble travelling at a range of globally subluminal and superluminal velocities on both constant and variable velocity paths. The key results for null particles match what would be expected of massive test particles as they approach +/- c. The increase in energy for massive and null particles is calculated in terms of v_s, the global ship velocity, and v_p, the initial velocity of the particle with respect to the rest frame of the origin/destination of the ship. Particles with positive v_p obtain extremely high energy and velocity and become "time locked" for the duration of their time in the bubble, experiencing very little proper time between entering and eventually leaving the bubble. When interacting with an accelerating bubble, any particles within the bubble at the time receive a velocity boost that increases or decreases the magnitude of their velocity if the particle is moving towards the front or rear of the bubble respectively. If the bubble is decelerating, the opposite effect is observed. Thus Eulerian matter is unaffected by bubble accelerations/decelerations. The magnitude of the velocity boosts scales with the magnitude of the bubble acceleration/deceleration.



As you read through the paper, please note the possibility of incinerating the star system/planet/people we'd be trying to hurry up and visit ("we come in peace" \\//_?).



I think - as even Star Trek alludes to - our first interstellar space faring will likely be at sub light speed in sleeper ships. Better to crawl first before running: 1/3 c to begin.



Someone will just have to invent inertial dampers since the Higgs Boson has been discovered so we don't kill ourselves or anyone else out there (another convenient plot device to avoid describing space faring humans as "street pizza" due to rapid acceleration).

 In light of crawling, colonizing the moon, mining the asteroid belt and establishing a permanent base on Mars would be a good 1st start. Sagan mentioned terraforming the Red Planet or Venus in his book "The Cosmic Connection," which would be a practical solution on a global economy based on consumption. On the Kardashev scale, we are primitive.

 Eventually, our toy/sandbox will be empty on the sandlot we're accustomed to playing in. Staying earthbound as a species will soon be the equivalent of not accepting potty training at the age and maturity one ought to be. Kind of gross, too.



 Physics arXiv: The Alcubierre Warp Drive: On the Matter of Matter

Brendan McMonigal,∗ Geraint F. Lewis,† and Philip O’Byrne‡
Sydney Institute for Astronomy, School of Physics
A28, The University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia

 Related:
Amazon: The Physics of Star Trek, Beyond Star Trek; Lawrence Krauss

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Why Black People Need Science Fiction

Posted by Anthony L. Carter on March 10, 2014 at 12:54pm

"As soon as a character of color is introduced in a story, imagination stops". Toni Morrison

As a young boy, I loved The Twilight Zone, The Planet of the Apes and anything that provided insight into other worlds and possibilities.

It is only as we age, that we learn dreaming and committing to difference, exploration and comfortability with difference can and often does make you an outsider.

A young black child who loves Science Fiction is asking for a heap of trouble and ridicule.

Collectively, we (black folks) have been tortured and brutalized as a result of "difference" and should look to new worlds as places that not only allow dreaming but adamantly encourage it.

Black folks need all the thinking and devotion to self defining that Sci Fi will allow.

As a teacher to young Black and Hispanic teenagers in an alternative high school, I discovered what prevented several of my students from expecting and striving for excellence. None of them had ever seen anyone who looked like them leading a revolution, being self defining or self creating.

It is difficult to design a life of forward movement if there is no tangible example of what is possible.

My baby sister is a lawyer.

She has watched her mother and several family friends attend law school and obtain jobs in their chosen field.

Dreaming of and then becoming an attorney was not an impossibility for her.

We all need vivid and tangible examples of accomplishments and what the price is for achieving our life's objectives.

Science Fiction lets our imaginations soar. We need creativity that reinvents us and what we can achieve.

At 27, I finally got around to reading Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower.

In this wonderful book, the protagonist, a young black girl of fifteen invents a religion, leads a sojourn and makes herself the center of a movement based in love, communion with others, a sharing of resources and the questioning of God.

Many black folks I know associate the Sci Fi world with whiteness, green little men, silver suits and the questioning of the definition of God given to us by the Judeo Christian ethic we were all reared in.

I once had a very intense debate with my sister about the demons, witches , etc in the Harry Potter series. Apparently, magic, sorcery and all the rest of that "mess" was something that our young people shouldn't read. My argument was that as long as a child is reading does it matter what the material is if it opens his mind and leads to more reading and knowledge hunger.

When the adults around me lied, were irrational or flat out denied reality, it was this genre and all reading that provided solace and sanity.

It was clear that there were other ways of living and being.

The Twilight Zone forced me to consider other worlds where the rules were different. This brilliant show also let me know about the human condition and that I could hope for and demand more in my life.

This is Sci Fi's greatest strength.

Like Shakespeare's work, it illuminates humanity and all its complicated and endlessly annoying traits and foibles. It allows us to examine our lives and our choices through the lenses of another time and space. We are encouraged to move beyond voyeuristic consumption of other worlds.

It forces us to imagine our lives and whether we harm or help others when certain situations arise.

As a young kid unable to hide his homosexuality, I was bullied from childhood through college. I learned to thrive amidst a world and people bent on destroying me.

As I began my teaching career, I noticed that this part of the educational experience had not vanished or been dealt with constructively.

To combat this horrid fact, I began to introduce my favorite Science Fiction Short Stories.

My personal favorite: Those Who Walk Away From Omelas, provided my young students with a case of the "willies" and always sparked a great deal of conversation regarding domination, bullying and fair treatment for all.

So many of the themes and struggles are recognizable no matter the time period.

We must take our place in worlds wherein animals and inanimate objects speak, reason and wage war.

Is it impossible to consider worlds where we matter ? Is it impossible to imagine a world where diversity works and oppression is nonexistent ?

Visiting and dabbling in different worlds with different intelligences could provide a great deal of insight into modern day problems.

We often are able to invent solutions when the results are not life threatening.

Pick up some Octavia Butler, Margaret Atwood, Ursula Le guin and Daryl Sturgis' Solstice.

These wonderful authors are effortlessly and poignantly(brilliantly) offering us characters and worlds that could be implemented in current society and beyond.

Be fearless in your explorations and expectations.

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Holographic Memory...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 10, 2014 at 5:57am
Prototype holographic memory that uses spin waves. (Courtesy: UC Riverside)

A new type of memory device based on the interference of spin waves has been unveiled by scientists in the US and Russia. Data are stored in the form of magnetic bits and read out simultaneously as holographic images. Because the wavelengths of the spin waves are much shorter than those of light, the storage density of the memory has the potential to be much greater than systems based on optical holograms, and could someday be used to store very large amounts of information.

Conventional holography involves splitting a beam of laser light into an illumination beam and a reference beam. The illumination beam is fired at the object of interest and the deflected light is sent to a detector (or photographic film), where it is reunited with the reference beam. The detector records the interference between the two beams and this information is then used to create a 3D image of the object. As well as being used as a security feature on credit cards and banknotes, holograms also have the potential to store and retrieve large amounts of information in a very efficient way.

However, the storage densities that can be achieved using optical holograms are limited by the relatively long wavelengths of visible light – about 500 nm. Now, Alexander Khitun and colleagues at the University of California, Riverside and the Kotel'nikov Institute of Radioengineering and Electronics in Saratov, Russia, have created a holographic memory that uses spin waves, which have much shorter wavelengths.

Physics World: Data stored in magnetic holograms

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