“A space station is a rangy monstrosity, a giant erector set built by a madman.”–Mary Roach
Oh, how jaded we’ve become. Remember Skylab? When it became the first orbiting space station to crash back to earth, away back in 1979, it provoked a wide range of bizarre cultural outcroppings, from Skylab crash parties to insurance against it landing on your head. This time? Not so much. If the cable news channels can’t politicize it, they won’t give it much mention.
While you’re reading about all this week’s future-related news, don’t forget that you can subscribe to Seeking Delphi™ podcasts on iTunes, PlayerFM, or YouTube (audio with slide show) and you can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook
Chinese Space Station: look out below!
Space–The Chinese space station will hurtle back to earth this weekend. Time Magazine reports that you don’t have to worry–much–about it landing on you.
—According to a paper by Gregory Matloff, published in Centauri Dreams, the combination of the SpaceX Falcom Heavy rocket, a Bigelow inflatable habitat, and huge solar sail, would be the perfect combination for manned expeditions to near earth objects in the 2020’s.
–NASA’s next Mars rover isn’t scheduled for launch until 2020. In advance of that, today they’re testing the parachute designed to deploy at supersonic speeds and drop it gently to the Martian surface.
James Webb telescope or Klingon battleship? Image Credit: NASA
—Speaking of NASA, they’ve delayed the launch of the James Webb Space Telescopte–again. The successor to Hubble is now scheduled for launch in May of 2020. Anyone taking bets?
Electric Vehicles–Speaking of betting on late deployment, FedEx has apparently ordered 20 of Tesla’s new electric semi-trucks. The scheduled roll out for these is 2019. Based on Mr. Musk’s timetable track record, I’d set an over-under on actual delivery to Fedex at January 2021.
Artificial Intelligence—According to Mashable, NVIDIA’s new supercomputer will create A.I. that’s “terrifyingly smart.” Well, maybe not–most experts believe we won’t AGI–artifiicial general intelligence–for least 15-30 years, if ever. But even they don’t agree.
Automation/Future of Work–Hardly a week goes by without some new forecast of an automation driven job-killing apocolypse. The latest one, from Bain Consulting, foresees 50% of current jobs eventually going away, and specifically forecasts that U.S. employers will need 20-25% fewer workers by 2030.
Extreme Bionics–In case you missed it, here’s the link to the final Seeking Delphi™ podcast from SXSW 2018, on Extreme Bionics: The Future of Human Ability. It feature two bilateral amputees, paralympian and actrees Aimee Mullins (Stranger Things, Unsane) and MIT Media lab associate professor, Hugh Herr. (YouTube slide show link below).
You can subscribe to Seeking Delphi™ podcasts on iTunes, PlayerFM, or YouTube (audio with slide show) and you can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook
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