All Posts (6495)

Sort by

Henry Eyring...



Henry Eyring (February 20, 1901 – December 26, 1981) was a Mexican-born American theoretical chemist whose primary contribution was in the study of chemical reaction rates and intermediates.

A prolific writer, he authored more than 600 scientific articles, ten scientific books, and a few books on the subject of science and religion. He received the Wolf Prize in Chemistry in 1980 and the National Medal of Science in 1966 for developing the Absolute Rate Theory or Transition state theory of chemical reactions, one of the most important developments of 20th-century chemistry. Several other chemists later received the Nobel prize for work based on it, and his failure to receive the Nobel prize was a matter of surprise to many.[1] The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences apparently did not understand Eyring's theory until it was too late to award him the Nobel; the academy awarded him the Berzelius Medal in 1977 as partial compensation.[2] Sterling M. McMurrin believed he should have received the Nobel Prize but was not awarded it because of his religion.[3]

He was also elected president of the American Chemical Society in 1963 and the Association for the Advancement of Science in 1965.

Wikipedia: Henry Eyring

Read more…

Quantized Gravity...

The effect of a gravitational wave on a ring of particles, as space-time is compressed and stretched. Source

Observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) have already revolutionized modern cosmology, providing evidence that the nature of our Universe can be beautifully described by six fundamental parameters. And yet, the authors of this work say that the CMB has even more insight to offer, this time into how gravity behaves on microscopic scales. It is believed that the gravitational force is transmitted by a hypothetical, fundamental particle called the graviton, similar to how the photon carries the electromagnetic force. Unfortunately, the gravitational force is much weaker than the electromagnetic force1, and while scientists can easily measure a single photon, the prospects of detecting a single quantum of gravity are much graver. However, the authors argue that precise measurements of the CMB can do just that, proving the existence of the graviton and the quantized nature of gravity. Such a detection would provide evidence for the unification of general relativity and quantum mechanics, one of the most profound problems in current theoretical physics.

The prevailing description of the early universe involves a period of exponential expansion, known as inflation, beginning about 10-36 seconds after the Big Bang. During this expansion, which lasted just a tiny fraction of a second, the volume of the Universe increased by at least a factor of 1078, making microscopic density fluctuations astronomically large. This rapid expansion solves several problems with the standard cosmological picture, including the near-perfect uniformity of the CMB temperature and the Universe’s nearly flat spatial geometry. Astronomers have strong evidence for the occurrence of inflation; all relevant observations are consistent with the predictions of inflation, but they do not yet provide direct, conclusive evidence for inflation.

Astrobites: Detecting the Quantization of Gravity

Read more…

The Other Country - test

I got tired of there not being any good animated adventure shows on TV.

I got tired of them not featuring or, usually, even HAVING any black characters in them when they are on the air.

I also got tired of not having enough money to hire good animators to make stuff from my scripts (what I do really well is write. I have no dream to be Alex Toth or Uncle Walt.).

When I get tired of stuff like this, I get mad, usually.

When I get mad I make things.

This is phase two.

Read more…

Lemmings in Suicide Vests...

© 2 October 2013, Reginald L. Goodwin

Healthcare.gov had 1M hits 1 October 2013, before 7 AM. It is based on the state health care option Mitt Romney gave Massachusetts in '06, which is based on the public mandate championed by the conservative Heritage Foundation AND Newt Gingrich as a counter to President and Hillary Clinton's plan. 97% of Massachusetts is covered; 84% are satisfied 7 years later. (You can also register to vote, which may explain the fierce opposition to it!) Mitt and the GOP were "for it" before they were against it. So, this is opposition to THEIR idea: isn't this a form of self-immolation?

“The chickens have come home to roost”: made famous by Malcolm X, it has become a metaphor for Karma; the biblical reaping what one has sown.

It is ironic now Senator John McCain is now calling for civility after introducing us to the queen of incivility in his “game changing” maverick moment on the campaign trail (“palling around with terrorists” seems so tame to “shucking and jiving” now). “Mamma Grizzly” is de facto mother of the Tea Party, and from its aging placenta emerged Ted Cruz. It is ironic Former House Speaker Newton Gingrich suggested that a government shutdown would not work this time (as it didn’t the last time); Representative Peter King called Senator Ted Cruz of Texas “a fraud” and Representative Devin Nunes compared this nakedly government-by-terrorism-tactic “lemmings with suicide vests.”

But, that’s what happens when one goes to apocalyptic extremes, isn’t it? 9-11 was a harsh and evil day; along with the financial crisis of 2008 prophecies abounded on “the end of days,” and many prophets profited from the same utterance, an absence and deafening silence holding avarice accountable for the global crash in ’08. The rise of Occupy Wall Street – and the emptying of pews by the young – stark evidence that lack of the same zeal that once threw money changers out of the temple has turned up and coming replacement worshippers off.

It has also made many Americans skeptical of the process of government by imperfection – humans with beliefs/ideals coming to compromise and consensus to make things run. Congress’ approval rating is at an all-time low, so in protest of that August body; many of our fellow Americans in gerrymandered, quite safe-to-be-republican districts have sent a small contingency to Capitol Hill that do not believe in government or governing…or science…or election results…or reality.

Absolutism has taken control of half of the country, a “good versus evil”; “us against them” “the forces of God against the forces of the devil.” As previously tongue-in-cheek with 43rd President Bush, 44 is labeled “the Antichrist” if you can stomach trolling vulgar Internet sites. Every president one doesn’t agree with since Clinton is compared to Hitler and in league with the Illuminati, an 18th century, long dead cult by Adam Weishaupt. That requires one only to cower and fear; not think or rationally address the conspiracies blatantly broadcast in primetime: voter suppression, outsourcing, education, the war-on-drugs, and for-profit-prisons all made lucrative commodities with symbols on the NYSE. That list is a beast that seeks to destroy whom it may devour for the enrichment of a select few.

The tea party would label themselves as “Christian conservatives,” but a more apt description is authoritarian anarchists, more in common with The Dark Knight’s Joker: “Some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.” These are Ayn Rand individualists with not an ounce of charity for “the least of these” other than their wealthy benefactors; apocalyptic dominion Stepford children of “Mamma Grizzly,” Michelle “crazy eyes” Bachmann, and “Dr. Strangelove (How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)”; “my way or the highway”; “give me what I want, or I’ll burn the house/country/planet down!” a complete 180 degree dichotomy from “peace on earth; good will towards all men.” Speaking of which: he was threat to order in the Roman Empire, executed for sedition; addressed the leading lawmakers (scribes) and status quo religious leaders (Pharisees) quite affectionately:

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in [yourselves], nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged [to perform it]. Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold?” (Matthew 23:13 – 17) For that, and other feats of verbal Ju-jitsu, he life was routinely threatened; eventually executed by crucifixion.

Authoritarian anarchists are the white-washed sepulchers of his mention; Paul’s “sounding brass and tinkling symbol”; the demonic posing as angels of light; death masquerading as life. A hiker in Idaho cannot be found: park rangers are among the 800,000 government workers, NASA and the Curiosity Rover furloughed, and her blood if she expires of exposure is on the hands of lemmings in suicide vests. We will spend 40 – 80 million dollars a day of taxpayer dollars: republicans, democrats, tea party dollars! These authoritarian anarchists are guilty of pimping God in canned and practiced call-and-response sermons like a cheap prostitute, feigned Oscar-winning performance Glossolalia, kneeling in front of the Capitol devouring widows while making showy prayers; refusing to legislate and proud they are not: for 126 days of “work”; a six-figure government check and free health care!

A book by Chris Matthews called “Tip and the Gipper” reflects back to (now in comparison) halcyon days when Speaker Tip O’Neal and President Reagan resembled Warner Brother’s cartoon “Sam and Ralph” (sheepdog and wolf). They argued, they disagreed, they fought like cats and dogs (or, sheepdog and wolf)…then after six, like Sam and Ralph drank like Irishmen. When Reagan was shot, O'Neal knelt and recited the 23rd Psalm by his bedside. It wasn’t perfect by any means: it was government by imperfection; government by agreed consensus and concession; government that worked.

We now have government by Twitter, with the attention span of 140 characters. We now have government and journalism by social media, such that “truth” is judged by how many people say the same thing over and over again; not its source (Goebbels would be proud). We now have government by “reality show” where none of the contestants are trained actor/performers nor need to be (just flamboyant and outrageous enough to keep our fleeting attention span), or in this case, no grounding in philosophy, science, literature, and history to inform the positions they wish to uphold and defend. “Stick to principle”; purity tests; primary challenges within your own caucus. We now have government by borrowed rhythm, sound bites; sample songs to spit a line over; claiming a legacy of Reagan by dissecting bits and pieces of him that their own purity tests he’d fail; a government that resembles a new joint from NOLA by “Wheezy,” tattooed terrorists hopped up on "purple drank" and Wild Turkey before flushing the country Sunday – deluded, apocalyptic, science-denying “principled” lemmings in suicide vests – with no “plan B.”

Here is mine: #2014TheDayofReckoning. Vote!

This time, vote for your own self-interests and not against it, or against the country’s self-interest and continued viability. Hire people that WANT to govern.

Read more…

France Anne-Dominic Córdova...



France Anne-Dominic Córdova (born August 5, 1947) is an American astrophysicist, researcher and university administrator. She was the eleventh President of Purdue University,[1] stepping down on July 15, 2012, at the end of her 5-year term. She presently serves as the chair of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution. On July 31, 2013, President Obama announced his intent to nominate Córdova to be the Director of the National Science Foundation.[2]

Córdova was born in Paris, France, the oldest of twelve children born to a Mexican father and Irish American mother.[3] She attended high school at Bishop Amat High School in La Puente, California, east of Los Angeles and went on to Stanford University, where she graduated cum laude with a bachelor's degree in English and conducted anthropological field work in a Zapotec Indian pueblo in Oaxaca, Mexico. She earned a PhD in Physics from the California Institute of Technology in 1979.

Córdova worked at the Space Astronomy and Astrophysics Group at the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1979 to 1989, where she also served as Deputy Group Leader, and headed the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at Pennsylvania State University from 1989 to 1993. From 1993 to 1996, she became the youngest person and first woman to hold the position of NASA Chief Scientist, serving as the primary scientific advisor to the NASA administrator and the principal interface between NASA headquarters and the broader scientific community.

Córdova then went to the University of California, Santa Barbara where she was Vice-Chancellor for Research and a professor of Physics. In 2002 she was appointed Chancellor of the University of California, Riverside, where she was also a Distinguished Professor of Physics and Astronomy. Córdova led the initial steps toward establishing the UC Riverside School of Medicine.[4] Córdova became the eleventh president of Purdue University in 2007 and promoted student success and the commercialization of interdisciplinary research.[5] Her administration oversaw the establishment of Purdue's College of Health and Human Sciences and its Global Policy Research Institute.[6][7] At the end of her term, Purdue's trustees credited her with leading the school to record levels of research funding, reputational rankings, and student retention rates.[8]

Córdova's scientific career contributions have been in the areas of observational and experimental astrophysics, multi-spectral research on x-ray and gamma ray sources, and space-borne instrumentation. She has published more than 150 scientific papers, and has a current experiment on the European Space Agency's X-Ray Multi-Mirror Mission. In September 2007, she was appointed to the board of directors of BioCrossroads, Indiana's initiative to grow the life sciences through a public-private collaboration that supports the region's research and corporate strengths while encouraging new business development.

Wikipedia: France Anne-Dominic Córdova, PhD

Read more…

Family Photos...

Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (link below)

Even as he installed the landmark camera that would capture the first convincing evidence of dark energy in the 1990s, Tony Tyson, an experimental cosmologist now at the University of California, Davis, knew it could be better. The camera’s power lay in its ability to collect more data than any other. But digital image sensors and computer processors were progressing so rapidly that the amount of data they could collect and store would soon be limited only by the size of the telescopes delivering light to them, and those were growing too. Confident that engineering trends would hold, Tyson envisioned a telescope project on a truly grand scale, one that could survey hundreds of attributes of billions of cosmological objects as they changed over time.


It would record, Tyson said, “a digital, color movie of the universe.”

Tyson’s vision has come to life as the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) project, a joint endeavor of more than 40 research institutions and national laboratories that has been ranked by the National Academy of Sciences as its top priority for the next ground-based astronomical facility. Set on a Chilean mountaintop, and slated for completion by the early 2020s, the 8.4-meter LSST will be equipped with a 3.2-billion-pixel digital camera that will scan 20 billion cosmological objects 800 times apiece over the course of a decade. That will generate well over 100 petabytes of data that anyone in the United States or Chile will be able to peruse at will. Displaying just one of the LSST’s full-sky images would require 1,500 high-definition TV screens.

Simon Foundation: A Digital Copy of the Universe, Encrypted

Read more…

One Step Closer...

With the government stupidly furloughing itself, we could all use some levity...



The moment "Star Wars" fans have been waiting for might finally be here: Lightsabers are no longer just a figment of George Lucas' imagination. They could soon be more than a plastic Hollywood prop or a Halloween accessory.





In the Sept. 25 edition of the journal Nature, a team of Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) physicists explain that they've discovered a molecule that behaves exactly like the weapon made famous by Luke Skywalker.



They haven't actually created a real-life lightsaber, but understanding the physics is the first step to that ever happening. (1)

The letter in Nature is titled: "Attractive photons in a quantum nonlinear medium." The abstract reads:

The fundamental properties of light derive from its constituent particles—massless quanta (photons) that do not interact with one another1. However, it has long been known that the realization of coherent interactions between individual photons, akin to those associated with conventional massive particles, could enable a wide variety of novel scientific and engineering applications2, 3. Here we demonstrate a quantum nonlinear medium inside which individual photons travel as massive particles with strong mutual attraction, such that the propagation of photon pairs is dominated by a two-photon bound state4, 5, 6, 7. We achieve this through dispersive coupling of light to strongly interacting atoms in highly excited Rydberg states. We measure the dynamical evolution of the two-photon wavefunction using time-resolved quantum state tomography, and demonstrate a conditional phase shift8 exceeding one radian, resulting in polarization-entangled photon pairs. Particular applications of this technique include all-optical switching, deterministic photonic quantum logic and the generation of strongly correlated states of light9. (2)

The rest of the article goes on to say they weren't LOOKING to build a real-life light saber, only that the physics is there. What was once purely imagined (with a few morons almost qualifying for the Darwin Awards) may soon be possible...maybe.

Still don't want to study physics/quantum mechanics? Smiley

1. CBS: Physicists one step closer to creating real-life Lightsabers
2. Nature: Attractive photons in a quantum nonlinear medium

Read more…

Elsa Salazar Cade...

Credit: NY Hall of Governors (link below)

Elsa Salazar Cade (born 1952) is an award-winning Mexican American science teacher and entomologist.

Elsa received her undergraduate degree in elementary education at the University of Texas at Austin and her master's in public school administration at Niagara University. She is certified for New York State as a school district administrator.

A long time amateur entomologist, with her husband, William H. Cade, she discovered the first case of a parasite using the sexual signal of a host in order to locate and parasitize the host. She also was selected as one of the top ten science teachers in 1995 by the National Science Teachers Association.[1]

The Cades have done over 30 years of research on the Texas field cricket, Gryllus texensis.[2]

This research has covered the behavior of the field cricket at different densities and under parasitic pressure from the red eyed fly Ormia. She has helped develop a hands-on instructional program for middle school teachers through support from the National Science Foundation at the University at Buffalo. Wikipedia

NY Hall of Governors: Elsa Salazar Cade

Read more…

My New Novel, "Elven Roses" is Now Avaliable!

Book #2 in my World of Five Nations series is now available for Kindle at Amazon.com!  

You can find it here:  

Elven Roses - by Brandon Hill

"Aldrec was an elf who was mystery to all but himself. Keeping others at arm’s length, he lived each day staving off madness from his impossibly long and somewhat reclusive life. Mericlou was an Alerian model: an obsolete brand of android from a bygone era, lost in the monotony of the daily grind and her eccentric ‘family.’ Their friendship, born of serendipity, healed their lonely souls. Later, love entwined their lonely hearts…and nearly rekindled a shameful war."


Read more…

"From Slate To Crimson" Availability update!

Just wanted everyone to know that my novella, "From Slate to Crimson" has been re-uploaded onto Amazon.com since Whispers Press closed shop.  It is available for Kindle, and can be found here now:  

From Slate to Crimson - by Brandon Hill

"Talante, for 10,000 years has governed his clan like a father in the endless war with their hated enemy over the fate of humankind. One winter’s night, he chances to meet Amelia Grayson, a human whose blood arouses his desire, and whose presence arouses his compassion in a way no mortal ever has before. Distracted and terrified by all but alien emotions and instincts by this burgeoning bond in a prelude to what may be his clan’s most desperate hour, Talante is caught between duty and desire, until he is forced by choice and circumstance to decide whether to hold to the one he has grown to love more than his immortal life, or in spite of the cost, let go for the sake of his people and Amelia’s safety, in spite of twofold danger: one from a ravenous enemy that has hunted her kind for millennia … and the other from the seductive bond that would make her forever his, body and soul."

I hope you all enjoy it!  

Read more…

THE DARK GOD has arrived!

https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1239064380?profile=originalThe new Dark God's Gift group fan page is now up on the BSFS! Currently, the intro written by Fantasy/Sci-fi writer H. Wolfgang Porter is up for readers. Next week, Ronald T. Jones author of 'Warriors of the Four Worlds' will spin a dark and violent tale of a well meaning freelance starship captain who will take a perilous journey to renown or ruin in the short story, 'Dark God's Gift: A Dark Path'!

Read more…

A New Grant to Encourage Science Fiction Writing from Diverse Worlds

Science fiction and fantasy are full of limitless possibilities — so it only makes sense to encourage writers from diverse backgrounds to write them. A new grant aims to help "writers from backgrounds traditionally underrepresented in the genre to start and continue publishing." And you can help!

Two publicists with Hachette Group, Ellen B. Wright and Faye Bi, are going to be running the 2013 NYC Marathon as a way of raising funds to start a Diverse Worlds Grant, which would be administered by the Speculative Literature Foundation. The grant would help writers to complete works in progress, and would be administered similarly to the SLF's Older Writers Grant. And you can pledge money to support this undertaking!

From the Diverse Worlds Grant's crowdfunding page:

Science fiction and fantasy fans are a diverse bunch of people: male, female, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, gay, straight, bisexual, transgender, cisgender, queer, with and without disability; from all classes, geographical regions, and backgrounds. Especially now, when speculative fiction has taken over pop culture, and some of the most popular moviesTV shows, and books of our era — and of all time — are inarguably speculative. It’s a great time to be a geek.

But those of us who don’t fit into one particular box (and some who do) have noticed something. There’s one story that’s told in the genre over and over again. You’ve probably seen it. It’s about a straight white man, or often a bunch of straight white men, creating things with science, wielding magic, saving the world, blowing stuff up. If there are women or people of color involved, we're probably love interests orsidekicks. We probably only talk to, or about, the white male lead. We probably die first, or to provide motivation for the protagonist.

Science fiction and fantasy, whether written for adults or children, are the genres of the imagination. We ask, “What if?” So it behooves us not to be complacent about this failure of imagination; not to let stories go untold because their creators think there’s no place for them in our (and their) genre.

As you might have guessed from the above, we're geeks. We're also runners. This year, we're running the NYC Marathon — the first marathon for the both of us — and it occurred to us that this was a great opportunity to combine these two interests. This year (and every year), there have been a number of incidents in which fans have been made unwelcome or harassed online and at genre events because of their identity. This is our chance — ours and yours — to do something about it.

We've created this marathon fundraiser on Crowdrise to support the Speculative Literature Foundation, a non-profit organization that promotes science fiction and fantasy and encourages new writers of both adult and children's genre literature. They’ve agreed to use the funds we raise to create a new grant called the Diverse Worlds grant, which will help writers from backgrounds traditionally underrepresented in the genre to start and continue publishing. As good science fiction and fantasy worlds should, this grant will welcome all kinds of diversity: gender, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, class, ability level, religion, etc.

Science fiction and fantasy are full of limitless possibilities — so it only makes sense to encourage writers from diverse backgrounds to write them. A new grant aims to help "writers from backgrounds traditionally underrepresented in the genre to start and continue publishing." And you can help!

Read more…

Happy Birthday NASA...



NASA turns 55 today.

It was the response to Sputnik, the space race to the moon that so many that weren't alive then now deny it happened and its significance to the technological world it helped birth. That response was an investment in science education by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and it inspired a generation of scientists and engineers that well...produced people like me.

It was spin offs from government research, like...the DARPA project that brought us the Internet, the transistor specifically for the space program; the personal computer; calculators; remote control, cell phones; flat screens; Velcro! Those that hate government are the same that hate socialism, yet shout with shrill sincerity "don't touch my medicare/medicaid"! This so similar to the same inane illogical rants against tenets of science and Entropy; online tirades against science USING tools created by science to do it. If anyone reading this is using social media in these jeremiads, you are guilty of breathtaking hypocrisy.

 

Though Hispanic Heritage Month, I have delayed the post of the distinguished scientist and educator until tomorrow. I did not want to associate her with the unthinkable. The unthinkable happened last night for the 2nd time in 17 years. The unthinkable is now extortion tactic; government by bully; uncertainty no longer Heisenberg's principle; it is like the conclusion of a terrific series "breaking bad." Instead of Thomas Paine's"Common Sense," we edify the "Anarchist's Cookbook." The anarchists are about to affect real people, that you and I know. One is my college classmate: an electrical engineer for the US Navy in California.


There is a sickness in this nation; a disease of ignorance that is promoted and openly celebrated. Our "reality stars" need no training in acting or performance; our musicians no training in how to read or write music; our politicians no intellectual rigor in philosophy nor training in the importance of science and technology. The more ignorant you are of history, science, reality, the more you are in this American dispensation celebrated.

Happy birthday, NASA. You are now furloughed with Curiosity and 800,000 government workers.

Warp factor...none.


October 1 is our nation's space agency's 55th birthday. To celebrate, NASA employees can, well, do whatever they want, just as long as they don't do their jobs.


NASA, as President Obama put it in his afternoon remarks, will "shut down almost entirely" if a faction of congressional Republicans succeeds in preventing a clean continuing resolution to keep the government open from coming to the House floor for a vote.


According to The Washington Post, just 549 of NASA's 18,250 employees will be expected to work if the government shuts down. The remainder -- 17,701 people -- will be furloughed.

 


Even Curiosity, our rover on Mars, will face its own little robot furlough: The explorer will "be put in a protective mode" for the duration of the shutdown, and will not collect any new data during that time.

The Atlantic: Dear NASA, Happy Birthday! To Celebrate, We're Shutting You Down. Love, Congress

Read more…

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS…

TRUNCATED DEADLINE!

OCTOBER 1, 2013

(for OCTOBER 31, 2013 launch date)

“O.T.H.E.R.” SCI FI
_________


Over The Horizon Empires Rise


OTHER Sci Fi is a Magazine/Journal preparing to launch on October 31, 2013 which is dedicated to the creation and promotion of SciFi, Speculative Fiction, Horror and Fantasy works of Epic proportion focusing on diversity and featuring diverse civilizations, subcultures, worlds and universes in alternate and crafted realities.


SUBMISSIONS

We are looking for works to be included in the Premier Edition to be launched on October 31, 2013:


FEATURES


1.Focusing on Words and Artwork: We are seeking a collaboration of written word and graphic artists where two or more individuals in any of the below subgenres have come together in an effort to add a dimension of realism to their work. Both the written work (no less than 1000 and no more than 5000 words either short story or excerpt and Artwork must be submitted simultaneously. Writer and Artist short profiles and contact information will be published along with the work.


1.NOVEL EXCERPT: We are seeking an Excerpt from a Horror Novel no less than 2500 words and no more than 5000 words long. The novel must be completed and either be published (self-publishing is fine) or have a launch date set within three months of October 31, 2013. A short author profile and contact information will be published along with the excerpt.


1.NOVELIST INTERVIEW: We are seeking a Horror Novelist to interview via audio or video (but not the novelist submitting the above-mentioned excerpt). The novelist should be published (self-publication is fine) and have at least one novel length work in circulation. An author profile and contact information will be published along with the interview.


1.SHORT STORY (Horror) We are seeking a short story of no less than 1500 words and not to exceed 5000 words. We would prefer works that have not been previously published, but if a work fits our criteria and has been previously published, please let us know when and where the work has been in publication. Authors do not have to be previously published. A short author profile and contact information will be published along with the story.


1.SHORT STORIES We are seeking a short stories not less than 1500 words and not to exceed 5000 words. We are seeking short stories in the areas of Fantasy, Science Fiction, Alternative Reality and Subcultures and Civilizations. We would prefer works that have not been previously published, but if a work fits our criteria and has been previously published, please let us know when and where the work has been in publication. Authors do not have to be previously published. A short author profile and contact information will be published along with the story.

WRITERS:

THE SUBGENRES OF INTEREST FOR EXCERPTS, SHORT STORIES AND INTERVIEWS ARE AS FOLLOWS BELOW. YOU ARE ENCOURAGED TO SUBMIT IF YOUR WORKS FALL INTO ANY OF THE FOLLOWING CATEGORIES:

FANTASY: Beyond the common tropes of sprites, and knights universes of fantasy exist that have yet to be completely explored. Here is where the fantastical takes shape. Successful Fantasy submissions must focus on more alternate fantastical elements, specifically those created by diverse authors and which focus on characters and lands which show cultural divergence from the common fantasy themes.

HORROR: Digging into the fertile grounds of diverse cultural memes and backgrounds the successful submissions will explore the concept of “horror” in new and alternative universes and/or with creatures, beings, gods and monsters reflective of this world’s diverse populations.

SCIENCE FICTION: Without actual science “science fiction” is really magic or fantasy. Successful submissions in this area will focus on stories based in either hard or soft science, the issues and themes that are commonly associated with “science” fiction, space opera, etc. and reflective of this world’s diverse populations and cultures.

ALTERNATE REALITIES: One of the most intriguing areas of speculative fiction is the alternate reality construct. Successful submissions will provide readers with either people or places already known and familiar while twisting or modifying them to create a unique literary experience.

SUBCULTURES & CIVILIZATIONS: Ethnicities, species, languages, physiology, religion, geographic locations, prejudices, preferences and more all play a role in the development of cultures and subcultures. Successful submissions will create compelling cultural constructs and develop realistic cultures that we can identify with.

ARTISTS We are soliciting work from artists in all of the above-referenced areas and will consider webcomic and sequentials which fall into the above-referenced categories. All work will be credited and short bios will be published for all artists.


SEND SUBMISSIONS TO:

administrator@otherscifi.com . Please send all literary submissions in an attachment in either rtf or WORD format. Please send any artwork in tiff,jpg,png or any other recognized readable format.

All submissions not selected for use in the Premiere issue may be considered for future issues.

If you have any questions regarding the submissions process contact me at p.flynn@otherscifi.com,  penelope@penelopeflynn.com or send me a message via www.otherscifi.com

Read more…

Eloy Rodriguez...



Overview

As the James A. Perkins endowed Professor and Research Scientist at Cornell, I have devoted my professional life to the chemical biology. ecology and medicinal chemistry and toxicology of natural small molecules and glycoproteins from plants and arthropods that are important in ecological and biological interactions and human and animal health and medicine. In collaboration with Dr. Richard Wrangham at Harvard we established the discipline of zoopharmacognosy (animal self medication with plants) and Chemo-ornithology (chemical ecology of bird-inect-plant interactions) with David Rosane from CUNY. I have developed a new undergraduate course and research program on the pharmacognosy, pharmacology and nutritional biochemistry of natural substance important for the control of diabetes type 2 and breast and pancreatic cancer in underrepresented communities in the US and Mexico. I have also devoted considerable time and effort to the training of hundreds of underrepresented undergraduate and graduate minority and majority students in the sciences at Cornell and the University of California, Irvine. A plethora of these fine young women and men at Cornell and UCI are now medical doctors, health specialists, research Professors, pharmaceutical scientists, biologists and environmental ecologists. (1)

*****

James Perkins Professor of Environmental Studies at Cornell University. He was born in Edinburg, Texas.

Collaborating with primatologist Richard Wrangham, Rodriguez introduced the concept of zoopharmacognosy.

Rodriguez graduated from the University of Texas, Austin with a B.S. in 1969 and a Ph.D. in Phytochemistry and Plant Biology in 1975. Later, at the University of British Columbia, he received medical postdoctoral training in Medicinal Botany.[2] He was an Assistant Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California, Irvine from 1976 to 1994[4] before joining the faculty at Cornell.

Rodriguez is the founder of the California Alliance for Minority Participation (CAMP) program funded by the National Science Foundation. As a result the CAMP program spread from its home campus, University of California at Irvine, to the 9 other branches of the University of California.(2)

1. Faculty Page: Eloy Rodriguez, Ph.D., Cornell University
2. Wikipedia: Eloy Rodriguez, Ph.D.

Read more…

D-Wave Quantum Party...



A quantum computer made by the Canadian company D-Wave Systems has been used to solve a famous puzzle in mathematics known as the party problem – according to a team of physicists in Canada and the US that has done the work. D-Wave describes the result as one of the most significant achievements for its devices to date, but some physicists are being party poopers by remaining unconvinced there is anything to boast about.






Unlike classical computers, which store bits of information in definite values of 0 or 1, quantum computers store information in quantum bits (qubits) that exist as a fuzzy superposition of both. This mixed-up nature of quantum computing extends beyond individual qubits: multiple qubits can be entangled so that they work in unison. As a result, quantum computers should be able to solve certain problems – such as factorizing large numbers – much faster than their classical counterparts.


In principle, there are several ways that quantum computers can work. A more conventional approach is to perform a calculation by operating on the qubits one step at a time, so that in the final step the answer is encoded in the qubit states. Another way is called adiabatic quantum computing and involves letting all the qubits slowly evolve in carefully controlled conditions so that the problem is described by their web of interactions. Adiabatic quantum computing should still give the desired result in the final qubit states. However, when compared with more conventional approaches, it is less susceptible to external influences such as stray heat, which can destroy a quantum calculation.

Physics World: Has a quantum computer solved the 'party problem'?

Read more…

THE DARK GOD IS COMING....

October is the month the 'Dark God' will descend upon the BSFS and bestow a great and terrible 'Gift' upon the multiverse!

From the minds of Fantasy & Sci-Fi Authors H. Wolfgang Porter (The Gray Man, Book of Dragon's Teeth, The Priestess & The PAnd0RA Ultimatum) and Ronald T. Jones (Warriors of the Four Worlds, Chronicles of the Liberator, Subject 82-84 & Task Force Arrow) begins the saga of a Dark and powerful god's unleashing a construct of unimaginable power into the unsuspecting mortal realm.

The Dark God's construct is the epitome of an ancient twisted imagination. His fell creation is fueled by the darkest desires of those who would possess it! Unlimited power, sexual attractiveness, even invincibility are among the many, many wonders which can be bestowed by the construct known only as, 'The Trynaught'. But with great gifts, there is always a greater catch! Renown and Ruin are the Trynaught's handmaidens and they come hand in hand with the 'Dark God's Gift!'

The DARK GOD'S GIFT will be featured here at the BSFS so members will see it first! Be honored for the Dark God does not take kindly to the ungrateful....

Read more…

Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa...



Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa (also known as "Dr. Q") is a physician, author, and researcher. He practices neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital and runs a basic science research lab out of Johns Hopkins Hospital. Quiñones is Director of the Brain Tumor Surgery Program at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, Director of the Pituitary Surgery Program at Johns Hopkins Hospital and the Director of the Brain Tumor Stem Cell Laboratory at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.[1] In addition to being a professor of neurosurgery, neuroscience, oncology, and cellular and molecular medicine, Quiñones is also the author of the newly released book, Becoming Dr Q.

Early years

Quiñones, the oldest of six children, was born in a small village outside of Mexicali.[2] In 1987, at the age of 19, Quiñones-Hinojosa jumped the border fence between Mexico and the United States.[3][4][5] Once arriving in United States, Quinones could not speak English and worked on farms outside of Fresno, California.[1][6] As a farm hand, he saved enough money to take English classes.[7]

Education

Quiñones-Hinojosa started his education at San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton, California, and completed his bachelor's degree in psychology with the highest honors at University of California, Berkeley.[4] He then went on to receive his medical degree from Harvard Medical School, where he graduated with honors. He also became a US citizen during this time.[7] He then completed his residency in neurosurgery at the University of California, San Francisco, where he also completed a postdoctoral fellowship in developmental and stem cell biology.

Wikipedia: Alfredo Quinones-Hinojosa

Read more…

Five Minutes to Midnight...



Reuters

My departure from physics I reserve for Sundays. Somewhat a double entendre most days; I am aware from the stats these are my least viewed postings; I call them my "sermons slightly left of the mount." As much as I'd like to focus on science and physics exclusively, public inanity from public officials drives my rants, and unfortunately, they decide the purse strings for scientific research. That thought alone is quite scary.

I grew up in the era of the doomsday clock and inane "duck and cover" drills of an ever-pending nuclear apocalypse. Recently, climate change has been counted in our path towards self-immolation.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has released its most decisive report, and it's not good. However, what also is not good is our lack of trust of science, the convolution of pseudo controversies, of which there is a litany, but essentially: anything that threatens a bottom-line of power, profit and influence must be obfuscated.

I tend to agree with Bill Nye. I selfishly want to save the planet...for myself and my children, and their children. The planet will be here: it is arrogance to believe that we will always be.

The link to the report is below. I will most likely as I'm apt to do, print it out, highlight it and consume what the report says to be informed on its findings.

Challenge: will you?

In the US at least, our media is consolidated into six corporate behemoths, everything we see in news and entertainment. During "duck and cover" days, that was greater than 150. Profit, ratings...and control are the primacy of goals in this arrangement. Now: The stock market is almost a 70's mood ring; talk radio flourished after repeal of the Fairness Doctrine; media can legally lie to us; thus "water cooler conversations" are always orchestrated in a kind of larger hive hierarchy, and we are not at the level of Horus' eye. "Ditto head" was not meant a compliment, nor evidence of deep contemplation. "Dumb and Dumber" and "Idiocracy" were box office hits; I didn't think they'd become the operative outline for our congress. A humorous urban myth tries to define congress as a "gathering of baboons" (it literally is not, but life imitates rumored art). It was a slow road to get here, but we are here. When "Green Eggs and Ham" become part of the record on in the Senate for a "silly buster," our decent; our devolution is apparent and quite public indeed. My childhood memories are henceforth ruined.

In my challenge, I'm trying to inform your water cooler conversations beyond the Borg collective. Your emancipation is in knowledge; and that is not what the six behemoths desire for you.

I simply don't want "once upon a time" to apply to Earth in nursery rhymes for children on distant worlds...as an intergalactic proverb.

The Atlantic: Leading Scientists Weigh-In on the Mother-of-All Climate Reports
IPCC: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Report: Climate Change 2013

Read more…

Celebrate Black Speculative Fiction Month

October 2013 is Black Speculative Fiction Month. We all should participate not only to merely broaden our fan base but to start a revolution. There is no official leadership  nor central committee. Black artists, writers, and publishers support this as an extension of AFROFuturism.  Everyone can participate.

During Black Science Fiction Month we should pledge to:

  • Buy books from Black authors; and write honest reviews.  Book reviews increase sales for authors and promote the genre.
  • Respond to articles published on the Black Science Fiction Society page and other websites. Your opinions are important and help to spread the word.
  • Add web links  to any website you control; this is very important.  Send your web addresses to me and I will link them on all my websites ( http://www.africanamericansciencefiction.com )
  • Read some great books; there is a suggested reading list for October at the Black Author Showcase. Good writers are great readers. Take a look.

 

Black Speculative Fiction Month means  more than just selling Black sci-fi books; this is a civic challenge to improve all our communities by encouraging people to read and imagine what could happen if we believe in the future. Become an AFROFuturist and dedicate yourself to collaboration, contribution and concern  as we save our planet and build a better world for our children.

 

Be sure to look around the web and connect with like-minded people who enjoy sci-fi from all cultures. We are all African. Therefore, we all have similar needs and ambitions. I applaud the Black Science Fiction Society for its longevity  and commitment to promoting sci-fi.

 

Happy Black Speculative Fiction Month!

 

Read more…