Saving lives on the road with virtual reality http://futurism.com/videos/saving-lives-on-the-road-with-virtual-reality/?utm_campaign=coschedule&utm_source=tumblr&utm_medium=futurismnews&utm_content=Saving%20lives%20on%20the%20road%20with%20virtual%20reality
Saving lives on the road with virtual reality
This virtual simulation is convincing drivers across the country of the dangers of distracted driving.
Dark ghost shark (Hydrolagus novaezealandiae) and the pale ghost shark (Hydrolagus bemisi), both are shortnose chimaera of the family Chimaeridae, found on the continental shelf around the South Island of New Zealand in depths from 30 to 850 m.
Both ghost shark species are taken almost exclusively as a bycatch of other target trawl fisheries
video: Te Papa Research
The 7th Row of the Periodic Table is Finally Complete
And with a single announcement, millions of text books around the world have been made incomplete—out of date. This comes as four new elements are added to the periodic table, finally completing the table’s seventh row. The elements, 113, 115, 117, and 118 were discovered by scientists working in Japan, Russia, and America. Now, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC, the body that is charged with overseeing standards in the world of chemistry) has confirmed the finds. Ultimately, these are the first elements to be added to the table since 2011. They were verified in an announcement released on Dec. 30.
Learn more: http://futurism.com/links/the-7th-row-of-periodic-table-is-finally-complete/
The anthropomorphic bot is a collaboration between robotics lab Android Technics and TsNIIMash, a Russian institute for building machines, according to Sputnik International. Alexander Permyakov, Director-General of Android Technics, told the news agency that these robots will be able to “completely replace human” in certain circumstances.
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Project Oxford is Microsoft’s collection of machine-learning application programming interfaces (APIs). Now the tech giant can add emotion recognition to its API portfolio.
Note: This one was also a little off. I tried to give it an easy one (surprise). But apparently, Project Oxford thinks that I am judgy and filled with scorn.
Read more at: http://futurism.com/links/microsoft-creates-emotion-recognition-tool-upload-your-image-and-give-it-a-try/
Astronaut Scott Kelly is currently spending a year in space. Most expeditions to the space station last four to six months. By doubling the length of this mission, researchers hope to better understand how the human body reacts and adapts to long-duration spaceflight. During this one-year mission, Kelly is also participating in the Twins Study. While Kelly is in space, his identical twin brother, retired NASA Astronaut Mark Kelly, will participate in a number of comparative genetic studies.
Here are a few things that happen when astronauts go to the space station:
Follow Astronaut Scott Kelly’s Year in Space mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com
Here’s the lowdown on the most popular drugs and exactly how much you’ll probably regret taking them.
Effects:
If you drink enough of the stuff you’ll become drunk - a curious state of mind that brings with it impaired physical and mental abilities, higher confidence, increased urges to sing Kareaoke and terrible sexual judgement. If you drink even more it could cause black outs and projectile vomiting.
Repercussions:
An occasional tipple is fine but if you’re going to go all Oli Reed on the booze you’re looking at several scenarios. Best case being that you’ll wake up with a hangover that’ll range from a mild sense of irritating nausea to the type of brain pain that’ll have you searching the Yellow Pages for an exorcist. Worst case scenario is you get permanent brain damage, mental health problems and a full on alcohol dependency. Drink in moderation.
Effects:
A hazy chilled feeling that depending on your own mental steel will develop into symptoms ranging from slightly lax coordination and reflexes or stoner panic and anxiety followed by a bout of short-term depression or sleepiness. All combined with a bank balance massacred by takeaway food and Pickled Onion Monster Munch.
Repercussions:
If you’re in it for the long run you’ll end up so chilled out that your sex drive will be severely diminished, a permanent sense of drowsiness, supressed immune system and personality and mood changes. There have also been links to depression, paranoia and other mental illness.
Effects:
A bouncy gurning buzz and increased feelings of love for everybody and everything around you. All of which will leave you feeling on top of the world before you get distracted by the copious amounts of water you’re drinking and the sound of your own heart trying to remove itself from your ribcage, followed by light feelings of confusion and occasional psychosis. You’ll properly love colours and sounds and want to talk to everybody in the world about it.
Repercussions:
In complete honesty no one truly knows the exact long term effects of these drugs, owing in part to the amount of awful things it’s typically cut with. What we do know is that between 1996 and 2012 it was linked to just shy of 600 deaths and is known to cause heart, liver and kidney problems. The comedown will also feel like you’ve been punched in the face repeatedly for the previous 12 hours followed by your parents telling you they don’t love you.
Effects:
On a surface level you’ll feel like you’re slicker than a BP oil spill. You’ll be transformed into an ‘interested,’ chatty and confident social beast. Your jokes are great, you’re in no way talking too fast and no, you’re definitely not talking too loudly or too closely to people. Subconsciously you’ll have a growing sense of fear, internally asking questions like: “are people eyeballing me?” and “Why am I sweating so much?” Then your nose will start dripping and the only way back is to snort more. Thus begins the vicious circle.
Repercussions:
The next day you’ll feel like you’ve got the flu and no amount of mansize Kleenex is going to make it feel better. The more you take it, the more you’ll take which turns your heart into a hyperactive hamster in a running wheel, massively increasing your chances of a heart attack. Get through that though and you’re fine. Until your nose falls off and you become a paranoid recluse with a serious drug debt.
Effects:
Better known by science as Psilocybe Semilanceata, ‘shrooms are one trippy rollercoaster ride of a drug, falling very firmly in the hallucinogenic family. They’ll open your world into a folding kaleidoscope of colours and imagery. You’ll see the birth of the universe before your very own eyes, for a brief moment you’ll understand the meaning of life and your best friend will turn into a lovely giant teddybear. Unless you have a bad trip, in which case you’ll see horrible things you didn’t even think could be things, spilling out of your mind like it’s Pandora’s Box. You may defecate yourself.
Repercussions:
Long term users often find themselves getting flashbacks of the worse parts of their trips at the absolute worst moments. World perception becomes skewed and you cease to distinguish between reality and hallucinations. This can develop or antagonise previous mental health issues that may have gone unnoticed. There’s also the danger of accidentally ingesting one that’s poisonous, thus killing you…
Effects:
Another hallucinogen not completely dissimilar to LSD or magic mushrooms - in world culture there have been many cases of indigenous people’s traditions and religions using the substance in drinks and food to stimulate a spiritual effect, the idea being that you hallucinate some crazy cool stuff that brings you closer to your creator. Obviously bad trip rules still apply and it could definitely go horribly wrong.
Repercussions:
You can’t really tell how strong DMT is until you’ve taken it, which makes it tricky to assess your intake and then once your trip has started there’s no way to stop it. It’s like getting on a long-haul flight when you’ve got a fear of flying, you’re not getting off. Aside from the usual mental health effects, you’re also likely to vomit and feel nauseous, coupled with raised blood pressure and heart palpitations.
Effects:
The sort of junk your parents were taking en route to a Santana concert back in the good ol’ days of free love and rock and roll. It’s the granddaddy of hallucinogens. It’ll make you feel like you can control time and have the secrets of the universe stored up in your spaced out noggin. It could also flit in the blink of an eye, like the narrative of The Wizard of Oz. One second you’re floating around Candy Town and chatting to the friendly scarecrows, the next minute you’ve got flying monkeys chasing you into a forest full of angry psychopathic trees.
Repercussions:
Like all drugs of this type, if you’re knocking back a lot of this stuff it could have some seriously detrimental effects on your mental health, heightening the mood that you’re in at the precise moment of your trip. You could walk away with some serious depression, panic attacks and perpetual tiredness. Plus there’s the risk of the odd Acid Flashback, which might seem fun now but when your commute to work suddenly turns in Hiroshima you won’t be chuckling so loudly.
Effects:
Generally speaking these are synthetic opiates. Things like morphine, which is more or less the medical painkiller version of heroin. Initial benefits are things like pain relief, euphioria and lovely fuzzy feelings of well-being taking you to an uber-relaxed state. But with that comes intense sweating, itching and nausea and more worryingly, addiction. And the need for more, with which comes: fatal overdose.
Repercussions:
Serious addiction. Your life will slowly turn upside down, you’ll be stuck in a constant state of lethargy, you’ll be constipated, you’ll be itchy, dizzy and all in all you’ll probably not be a very fun person to be with. Plus there’s the constant risk of overdose and depending on how you’re taking it you could be at risk of other infections. Nasty business.
Effects:
A thoroughly ambiguous type of club drug. Effects could be anything from thinking you’re a superhero to falling in love with your best mate and believing you’re the most popular kid in town who can stay up dancing forever. Or, it’ll send you into a weird state where you’re feeling violent, sleepy, sick or on death’s door. It could be lots of things because generally speaking, you won’t know what’s in it. Which is absolutely terrifying.
Repercussions:
It really depends what’s in it. You could be looking at grim flu-like comedowns, or you could be looking at stress induced heart attack. It’s probably better to just avoid all together.
Effects:
A psychedelic drug that emanates from the seeds found in the Peyote cactus. It’s been used for thousands of years, notably by some Native Americans in Mexico as a part of spiritual ceremonies. More famously it was part of Hunter S Thompson’ contraband suitcase inFear and Loathing in Las Vegas and played a semi-large part in sending him straight to Bat Country. You’ll see the kind of scary hallucinations that don’t go away when you close your eyes and have an all-round bizarre time.
Repercussions:
If it all starts going wrong when you’re on it you’ll be stuck in a state of panic for the duration of the trip. The world will be distorted and your motor systems will be all out of sync. You could think you’re a superhero and then go on to really hurt yourself. There’s also the odd report of heart attacks and diarrhoea and vomiting. Not to mention the obvious post-traumatic stress effects on mental health.
http://drugabuse.com/
this is why we need vaccines (x) | follow @the-future-now
Watch This New Drone Capture Rogue Drones with a Net Cannon
Scientists at Michigan Tech University have made an interceptor drone that is capable of “catching” other drones using a mounted net cannon.See it in action: http://futurism.com/videos/new-drone-can-capture-rogue-drones-net-cannon/
I’m on day 321 of my #YearInSpace, and today I surpassed 500 days in space total. Let’s chat! Sat., Feb. 13 at 1:45 p.m. ET.
Liquid-metal terminators are generally something to be afraid of – but what if the substance was used to fight cancer instead of wiping out humanity?
That’s exactly what researchers in the US are working on, having developed a biodegradable liquid metal that can be used as a drug delivery technique to target cancer cells.
“The advance here is that we have a drug-delivery technique that may enhance the effectiveness of the drugs being delivered, can help doctors locate tumours, can be produced in bulk, and appears to be wholly biodegradable with very low toxicity,” said Zhen Gu, a biomedical engineer in a joint program at North Carolina’s State University and University at Chapel Hill. “And one of the advantages of this technique is that these liquid metal drug carriers – or ‘nano-terminators’ – are very easy to make.”
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