experiment | M Thomas Apple Author Page

Quantum Consciousness: Incredulous or Real?

September 12, 2023
MThomas

It’s easy to see why fractals have been used to explain the complexity of human consciousness. Because they’re infinitely intricate, allowing complexity to emerge from simple repeated patterns, they could be the structures that support the mysterious depths of our minds.

But if this is the case, it could only be happening on the quantum level, with tiny particles moving in fractal patterns within the brain’s neurons. That’s why Penrose and Hameroff’s proposal is called a theory of “quantum consciousness”.
https://www.inverse.com/science/consciousness-and-quantum-physics

Quantum computers can only operate at extreme low temperatures (-272C, or -460F, which is basically colder than even the average temperature of outer space, so cold that we made up a new temperature scale called Kelvin to measure it — and no, the “Kelvin timeline” of Star Trek was not named after the temperature but after J J Abram’s grandfather).

So anyway, how is it possible that human consciousness can be considered “quantum” if we need (quite obviously) a much higher temperature to survive? (Making us controlled by classical physics and not quantum physics.)

Our brains are composed of cells called neurons, and their combined activity is believed to generate consciousness. Each neuron contains microtubules, which transport substances to different parts of the cell. The Penrose-Hameroff theory of quantum consciousness argues that microtubules are structured in a fractal pattern which would enable quantum processes to occur.

Scientists have measured electron wave functions (their quantum state) by injecting photons into two types of fractal structures, one triangular and one square-shaped (like the Sierpinski carpet pictured above). The next step would be to take quantum measurements from the brain’s microtubules.

Hmm. I think I’ve seen a shape similar to the Sierinski carpet somewhere before…

“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…

Gateway not to be used until Artemis 4

September 4, 2023
MThomas

ESA image. Gateway is planned to be much smaller and more cramped than ISS (about 1/6 the size).

NASA and its international partners see Gateway as a key platform to support the agency’s Artemis moon program and to build the technology required for future deep-space missions. Although the first elements of the small space station are expected to launch before the Artemis 3 mission lifts off in 2025 or 2026, NASA previously said that those astronauts will not use Gateway to “make that mission have a higher probability of success.”
https://www.space.com/artemis-4-first-astronauts-visit-gateway-moon-space-station

While it’s a good idea to see some planning for this, I think maybe NASA should focus on getting Artemis 1 to work properly before they go on about Artemis 3 and 4.

Taking advantage of Gateway’s orbit far away from Earth’s protective magnetic field, three instruments will study risks due to radiation from the sun and from cosmic rays. Scientists hope this knowledge can help inform future long-term missions to the moon and Mars.

Since Gateway will orbit the Moon and not the Earth, the biggest problem will be preventing astronauts (and instruments!) from getting fried by solar radiation. Scientists need to come up with materials to shield people on Gateway and the Moon, or else we’re going nowhere…

(That said, regolith – soil, basically – has already been proposed and even tested: Llamas et al. (2022). “Effectiveness of Martian regolith as a radiation shield,” Planetary and Space Science, 218, 105517 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0032063322001039)

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!

Trapping light within metamaterial = ?

August 27, 2023
MThomas

To explore new ways to control this fundamental force of nature, scientists from the City College of New York (CCNY) trapped light inside a magnetic metamaterial and made the material itself 10 times more magnetic in the process.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a44843071/scientists-trapped-light-inside-metamaterial-magnetic/

Next up, magnetic lasers and lots and lots of more magnetic memory savings.

(Note that Popular Mechanics links the phrase “magneto-optical technologies” to an article claiming that the US has somehow managed to reverse-engineer alien technology from crashed UFOs…Um…OK…)

“Superconductor”? Color me skeptical

August 11, 2023
MThomas

Superconductors are materials that allow electrical current to flow with no resistance, a property that would revolutionize power grids where energy is lost in transmission as well as advance fields such as computing chips, where electrical resistance acts as a speed limit.
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/superconductor-claims-spark-investor-frenzy-scientists-are-skeptical-rcna98123

I’ve heard claims like this before.

The hallmark of science is replicability. I.e., can two independent teams of researchers, using similar means, methods, and materials in completely different settings, replicate the findings of the original team?

So…

Researchers from at least three Chinese universities have in recent days said they produced versions of LK-99 with varying results. One team from the Huazhong University of Science and Technology posted a video purporting to show the material levitating over a magnet, which is important because true superconductors can float over a magnet in any orientation, without spinning like a compass.

But…

…another team, from Qufu Normal University, said they did not observe zero resistance, one of required characteristics of a superconductor. A third, from the Southeast University in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing, said they measured zero resistance, but only at a temperature of 110 Kelvin (-163 degree Celsius).

And…

The possible bad news for LK-99 is that the superconducting field is full of materials that hold promise at first but fall apart under scrutiny. Researchers even have a handy name for them — unidentified superconducting objects.

A.k.a “USOs.” As the linked article points out, plenty of smart, hardworking researchers have claimed to have found a “superconductor,” but then their claims simply fall apart under scrutiny.

Be careful of finding what you seek.

Chandrayaan-3 to the Moon!

July 19, 2023
MThomas

I love the helpful explanation about the scale…

“If we want to develop the Moon as an outpost, a gateway to deep space, then we need to carry out many more explorations to see what sort of habitat would we be able to build there with the locally-available material and how will we carry supplies to our people there,” Mr Annadurai says.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-66185565

Chandrayaan-1 was India’s first successful Moon launch in 2008 — it deliberately crashed in order to measure the amount of water at the South Pole.

Chandrayaan-2 was only partly successful, as it did put an orbiter around the Moon, but the rover crashed. (The orbiter is still there, sending back information on a regular basis.)

Now, Chandrayaan-3 aims to finally land a rover and do some research exploring.

Let’s hope they can get it to land safely this time…

Synthetic human embryos – yeah, now that’s not controversial…

July 7, 2023
MThomas

The synthetic embryos – only days or weeks old – could help researchers study the earliest stages of human development and explain pregnancy loss.

Nobody is currently suggesting growing them into a baby.
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-65914934

Well, that’s a relief….

This is the first time that has been achieved using human material. Although, they are not truly “synthetic”, as the starting material was cells cultured from a traditional embryo in the laboratory.

Great, but…

She has already developed synthetic mouse embryos with evidence of a developing brain and beating heart.

Come on, BBC. I think you can see where this is going…

Meanwhile, scientists in China have implanted synthetic monkey embryos into female monkeys – although, all the pregnancies failed.

Yep. Straight to the monkey house.

Seriously, did scientists actually think this was not going to cause a whole lot of people to get upset all over again?

Natural embryo (top), synthetic embryo (bottom). They look pretty similar…

This may indeed be a good way to study infertility causes and how embryos develop, but even the possibility of creating an embryo from a stem cell should have set off warning bells. 14-day limit or not, somebody’s going to get really tempted to do something else with them…

I’m thinking up all sorts of SciFi stories from this…

In search of dark energy and dark matter

July 3, 2023
MThomas

A European-built orbital satellite was launched into space on Saturday from Florida on a mission to shed new light on dark energy and dark matter, the mysterious cosmic forces scientists say account for 95% of the known universe.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/jul/01/euclid-telescope-lifts-off-in-search-of-the-secrets-of-dark-universe

Like the James Webb telescope, the Euclid will be positioned in a LaGrange point (L2, in this case), rather than in high Earth orbit.

If all goes well.

It’s interesting that the Guardian article says the telescope was “designed and built entirely by Esa,” although NASA supplied parts and its launching pad was made available and the telescope was launched using a SpaceX rocket. And ESA consists of nearly 2000 scientists from the US, Canada, and Japan as well as various European countries.

It’s a joint project. That’s how science should work in the first place.

(For more on dark matter, dark energy, gravity, and quantum mechanics, check this out.)

fMRI, GPT-1, and your brain

May 3, 2023
MThomas

Scientists have found a way to decode a stream of words in the brain using MRI scans and artificial intelligence.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/05/01/1173045261/a-decoder-that-uses-brain-scans-to-know-what-you-mean-mostly

While not perfect, this is some seriously scary stuff.

FWIW the researchers themselves did recognize this…

Although it’s nowhere near being able to decode spontaneous thoughts in the real world, the advance raises concerns that, with improvement, the technology might mimic some type of mind reading. “Our thought when we actually had this working was, ‘Oh my God, this is kind of terrifying,’” Huth recalls.
https://www.science.org/content/article/scientists-use-ai-decipher-words-and-sentences-brain-scans

Participants have to consent to being “read,” and there are ways to prevent the software from figuring out even the “gist” of what they were thinking.

Still, imagine if some nefarious criminal group (or governmental agency, if there is a difference) decided to force someone to consent to have their thoughts read.

Long distance.

Permanently.

It’s getting harder and harder to distinguish scifi from reality.

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