Not a particularly substantial or well-written article, but an important topic: biotech, one of the big coming technologies. The companies profiled here have learned from computing that the first thing you want to do is build a platform that everyone wants to use, because it makes their work easier.

https://www.wired.com/story/biology-will-be-the-next-great-computing-platform/

tl;dr: You don’t have to handwave your high-res augmented/virtual reality as much anymore.

Not that I think that was stopping anyone, certainly not me.

Originally shared by Singularity Hub

Delivering VR in Perfect Focus With Nanostructure Meta-lenses https://suhub.co/2rmrnYI

The obvious next question after “Can we extend human liespans?” is “Should we?”

Originally shared by Singularity Hub

Is the Secret to Significantly Longer Life Hidden in Our Cells? https://suhub.co/2w9h9Rd

I always enjoy a vertical farming concept.

Originally shared by Greg Batmarx

This may sound a little odd, but it’s a very interesting idea. Many over populated areas around the world are having trouble supplying their population with food, and countries such as Singapore, the most densely populated country in the world, do not have the space to grow crops and are forced to import around 90 percent of their food.

Spanish architects from a design firm called JAPA may have found a solution to this problem: floating vertical farms.

They call it FRA (floating responsive architecture) and it is based on floating fish farms which have been used since the 1930s. The shape is a bit… different, but the structure is designed this way to capture the most amount of sunlight for the plants, reducing shadows and saving space.

This new innovation offers some cool features to help ensure the right productivity. Inside these towers are a large number of sensors that will help monitor the crops and send status updates to various networks in charge of looking after them. This will help guarantee that all crops are getting the right amount of water and keep track of plants that might be dying so they can be rejuvenated, or replaced to continue consistent production.

The data from these sensors will also be used to calculate the amount of food being produced and how much of this food is being purchased from stores. These sensors will suggest how much food needs to be produced on a regular basis, so over time they can adjust the production so no food goes to waste. Javier Ponce principal from JAPA, stated The system will aim for zero food waste.

Although these designs are just a concept for now, it is being proposed that a smaller set of prototypes be tested first to see what vertical farming could really be capable of. Singapore, as mentioned before being the most densely populated country, is the leading candidate for these farms as they are in the most need with China next in line. JAPA has actually already set up areas around Singapore of where vertical farming would be placed in order to help balance the distribution throughout the country.

As of now, the amount of energy needed to run the farms is being looked at, as well as the amount of food that each will be able to produce. I assume that solar energy will be a main energy source involved to ensure sustainability.

Although we may never see these floating vertical farms, this type of thinking is what we need for our world to improve.

http://www.theevolvingplanet.com/floating-vertical-farming-food-crisis/

By Peter Diamandis, which (if you’re not familiar with his stuff) means “like Cory Doctorow on really good uppers”: full-tilt, jargon-laced, and relentlessly utopian.

But setting that aside, this is a fascinating shift that the manufacturing industry is just starting to go through, which looks like taking it in the same direction as the early personal computer software industry.

If I had kids, I would be making sure they understood the basics of 3D modeling and industrial design.

Originally shared by Singularity Hub

3 Major Shifts Are About to Transform Manufacturing as We Know It https://suhub.co/2I0UxHg

Turns out training a machine to read manuscripts is difficult, but possible.

(As the article points out upfront, “Secret Archives” is a poor translation; it’s more like “Private Archives”.)

Originally shared by ExtremeTech

The archive contains the records and documents of all of the actions taken by the Catholic Church over a period of over 800 years.

http://bit.ly/2FyjWCL

And this is, to all appearances, going to be the new dominant superpower.

Originally shared by Raja Mitra

This is seriously chilling stuff and an Orwellian fantasy come true. Several other states, India in the lead are pushing actively towards implementing an all-pervasive surveillance state.

Imagine a society in which you are rated by the government on your trustworthiness. Your “citizen score” follows you wherever you go. A high score allows you access to faster internet service or a fast-tracked visa to Europe. If you make political posts online without a permit, or question or contradict the government’s official narrative on current events, however, your score decreases. To calculate the score, private companies working with your government constantly trawl through vast amounts of your social media and online shopping data.

When you step outside your door, your actions in the physical world are also swept into the dragnet: The government gathers an enormous collection of information through the video cameras placed on your street and all over your city. If you commit a crime—or simply jaywalk—facial recognition algorithms will match video footage of your face to your photo in a national ID database. It won’t be long before the police show up at your door.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/02/china-surveillance/552203/