M Thomas Apple Author Page

Science fiction, actual science, history, and personal ranting about life, the universe, and everything

How Star Trek helped NASA make better shuttle names

August 8, 2025
MThomas

Gorog summarised in the memo:

  • This group comprises millions of individuals who are deeply interested in our space programme
  • The name “Enterprise” is tied in with the system on which the Nation’s economic structure is built.
  • Use of the name would provide a substantial human interest appeal to the rollout ceremonies scheduled for this month in California, where the aeronautical industry is of vital importance.

It is really too bad that the shuttle looked nothing at all like the Enterprise (Constitution class).

And an odd coincidence that the original name chosen by NASA was…

…Constitution…

Gas…stations…in…space…! ⛽️

November 13, 2024
MThomas

Jas Tiruvuru, business development manager for Orbit Fab in the UK and Europe, said the company was aiming to successfully demonstrate the technology in space by 2027.

“This will essentially be the first ever satellite to satellite refuelling demonstration funded here in the UK,” she said.

“Once we’ve proven that we can refuel to two spacecrafts we’ll be able to unlock a huge market potential.”

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y3wzlvnn2o

You know, maybe it’s just me, but I think 2027 may be a little optimistic. Just like the figure given in the article for how much the satellite sector will be worth in the future.

Aren’t there too many satellites already?

I’d like to see how this would help us colonize the solar system.

Actually, I’d like to see how they plan to get fuel up there in the first place.

Maybe my novel’s idea of using certain moons of Jupiter or Saturn as giant space gas pumps might help? 🪐

Who wants to train AI for free, hands up! 🙌

July 10, 2024
MThomas

Post a comment on Reddit, answer coding questions on Stack Overflow, edit a Wikipedia entry or share a baby photo on your public Facebook or Instagram feed and you are also helping to trainthe next generation of artificial intelligence.

https://apnews.com/article/genai-training-data-stack-overflow-reddit-9d71b75ec16c78c0d2c51cc46121c1a4

Well, if they’re scrubbing my public FB page for data,

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves 

      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: 

All mimsy were the borogoves, 

      And the mome raths outgrabe.

I’ll take up my vorpal sword and

One, two! One, two! And through and through 

      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

O frabjous day!

PS I hope this helps hapless mindless office workers compose emails.

At SuShi High Tech Tokyo: A “flying” what?

May 27, 2024
MThomas

From Kyodo, who captioned the image “flying vehicle” but headlined the article with “flying car”

“I look forward to flying cars becoming a normal means of transportation.” (Gov. Koike)

https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2024/05/5d7888e5eb47-flying-car-makes-tokyo-debut-at-international-tech-event.html#google_vignette

“Normal means” for whom, exactly? I can’t imagine the average worker in Tokyo will be able to afford this thing. Even if they had a physical space to store in.

And, you know, I think I’ve seen a “flying vehicle” like this somewhere already… 🚁

(FWIW it was part of a conference on technology and sustainability, cheekily called “SuShi High Tech”: https://sushitech-startup.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/en/)

This is the prompt that never ends…

February 13, 2024
MThomas

Daily writing prompt
What were your parents doing at your age?

“I’ll take ‘Barely Surviving’ for $100, Alec.”

When AI becomes actual AI…

October 26, 2023
MThomas

We compared current scientific theories of what makes humans conscious to compile a list of “indicator properties” that could then be applied to AI systems. 

We don’t think systems that possess the indicator properties are definitely conscious, but the more indicators, the more seriously we should take claims of AI consciousness. 

https://theconversation.com/why-chatgpt-isnt-conscious-but-future-ai-systems-might-be-212860

Last year, an engineer for Google who was working on what was then called “LaMDA” (later released as “Bard”) claimed that the software had achieved consciousness. He claimed it was like a small child and he could “talk” with it.

He was fired.

Bard, ChatGPT, Baidu, and so forth are advanced chatbots built on what’s called “Large Language Models” (LLM) and can generate text in an instant.

But the programs are not AI, strictly speaking. They have no sentience.

Continue Reading

“Female” robots and other bias

September 6, 2023
MThomas

When we give AI a humanoid form, we typically choose the robot to have feminine characteristics. Are we playing on stereotypes?

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230804-is-there-a-sinister-side-to-the-rise-of-female-robots

Isn’t it blindingly obvious?

All artificial intelligence, all robots and Chatbots and everything else electronically-programmed by a human being, will inevitably have human bias.

Even women prefer women’s voices to men’s when it comes to customer service.

On the other hand, women are also historically relegated to work with lower pay, lower status, kept out of positions of power — subject to the “male gaze.”

Now, we have AI that can be treated as sex objects. Even “married.”

So it is all “sinister,” as BBC asks?

Creepy, maybe. Sad, perhaps. Entirely predictable, definitely.

As we continue to lead more and more isolated individual lives, cut off from human contact and left unable to socialize, the rise of the “AI companion” seems inevitable…

Night owl here! OK also dinner time person (is that a thing?)

August 28, 2023
MThomas

What’s your favorite time of day?

I’ve always been a night owl, always found it easier to concentrate when other brain waves were sleeping and not interfering with mine.

Now, though, I often find the most relaxing time of day is dinner time — because I get to cook for my family!

I never would have said that even five years ago. But the pandemic especially has given me a chance to try out all sorts of recipes, modifying, adding, subtracting as I go. It’s like a chemical experiment 🧪 for our digestive systems!

I can’t wait to get home from work, start up a little Cannonball Adderly, Bill Evans, or Dizzy Gillespie and fire up the grill/wok/air heater and roll up my sleeves.

Of course, I still enjoy the late late hours of a tipple 🥃 and a three-hour YouTube on the rise and fall of the Akkadian Empire (history nerd here). Not enough hours in the day!

Another day, another JAXA failure

April 12, 2023
MThomas

The bankruptcy filing by Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit Holdings Inc (VORB.O) has dealt a blow to Japan’s hopes of building a domestic space industry, with plans for a Kyushu-based spaceport designed to attract tourism on hold for lack of funding.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/virgin-orbit-bankruptcy-casts-shadow-over-japans-space-dreams-2023-04-07/

Granted, this news is from four or five days ago.

Still, it’s jarring to see TV news about JAXA and NASA doing “joint” explorations of Mars, and then see a constant failure of JAXA to do anything based in Japan.

Something is seriously wrong with this space agency. And I suspect it has nothing to do with the scientists or astronauts.

International asteroid day!

June 30, 2022
MThomas

Today is “International Asteroid Day”!

Who knew?

Asteroids hold large amounts of valuable minerals and metals. That is what International Asteroid Day is raising awareness about on 30 June.

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/science-environment-61985813
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