New Blade Runner in the making? :O

http://www.forbes.com/sites/markhughes/2013/06/01/blade-runner-sequel-lines-up-screenwriter-and-harrison-ford-may-return/

Dredd: Puppet Version

This just showed up on my Facebook wall.

It's truly a thing of beauty.

Source: kotaku.com

Lightsabers!!!!!

The tittle sounds so cool. Lightsabers! Real, actual lightsabers that you can touch (but really shouldn't). But, alas, as with all scientific news, the tittle should be "Lightsabers! (kind of)". Because if you read the original 'Nature' article, you can see how what scientists actually did was create a medium where two photons (the particles light is made of) bonded. Just two. Party pooper, I know.

But given enough time, we will have our lightsabers! If they will be able to do all the stuff that they do in the movies is another story, but personally I will be satisfied if we get the 'FWOOOM' sound.

What really excites me though are the endless possibilities this opens up. We could make buildings out of light. Skittles would have to change its slogan since we would be able to literally taste the rainbow.

We could have light sculptures like in the Asimov short story 'Light Verse'. And so much more that I can't think of yet. I can't wait for the future!

PS: I wrote this weeks ago and forgot to publish it. The 'Draft' signal could be a little more flashy.

The premiere is (finally) here!

I couldn't go to today's final class, so this is the first time my video will see the light. Behold!

A book that influenced my career choice

In my list of favorite science fiction books, I really wanted to talk about my favorite book, "The gods themselves" by Isaac Asimov. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I should talk about it here.

This is my (and Asimov's) favorite book by him. In it, Asimov creates a completely new Universe, with its own physical laws and forms of life. He goes on to develop how our Universe (human beings) interact with this other one and the devastating consequences it could imply. All of this while exploring how the creatures from this other Universe live, and the great mystery of how their lives are connected with ours.

It's in this book where I've found one of my favorite quotes, which gives the book its tittle: "Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain". 

What I like the most about this book is how it portrays the first (to me) alien life. They are not just humans with bigger heads or green skin, but a truly different life form in every way.

But the part that I think influenced my career choice was its actual plot, more specifically the part that happens on Earth. If you haven't read the book yet, I would suggest you stopped reading here because SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Ahem. So, about the plot. In the book, a scientists finds a way to interact with another Universe and produce free energy that way. Obviously mankind is thrilled with this discovery. But then someone realizes that, if this invention kept functioning, everyone would die. Literally. Every person living on Earth (and the Moon) would die. 

The thing is that, even when this is made public, people don't want to believe it. No one wants to give up free energy, no matter the cost. It's in this situation when the phrase that gives the book its tittle is said: "Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain". 

So how does all of that relate to my career choice? I want to be a civil engineer mention in hydraulics. Since I was little I've been hearing about how we need to take care of water, that it's a scarce good, the vital element, that future wars will be fought over it. And in all that time I haven't seen anything being done about it. Every year underground water reserves get lower throughout the country, and there's just nothing being done to stop it. Every few years we have droughts and everyone gets worried until it rains, then its over.

The book isn't the only reason I chose this career. It showed me that people won't give up something they like until it's too late. But it also showed me a solution. By the end of the book, the protagonist invents an even better energy machine that doesn't destroy the world. I want optimize the processes where water is used in order to make them sustainable or regulate how water is used. 

I know I can't do this on my own, but I want to contribute with my grain of sand. And, if we are lucky, we ( or our children) won't all die.  Hopefully not literally.

Favorite books (so far)

The truth is I haven't really read a lot of science fiction books. One of the reasons I took this course was to get to know more books and authors in general. And it has worked great so far!
Most of the science fiction books that I've read are by Isaac Asimov. I liked his style with the Foundation series, so I started looking for more books by him. It turned out that he was one of the most prolific authors ever!, so to this day I'm still finding new material from him, not counting the books I want to read but haven't found yet.

So, without further ado, here are my favorite books:


1. The Gods Themselves, by Isaac Asimov

2. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams

3. The last Question, by Isaac Asimov (this is actually a short story, but I love it, so it goes here)

4.  Foundation, by Isaac Asimov

5.  Dune, by Frank Herbert

The joys of Time travel

In one of the earlier sessions of the course we talked about Terminator and how the original idea by James Cameron didn't involve time travel, and how it was added because at the time it would had been impossible to film a robot v/s human war.

Well, that little-known fact explains a lot about the franchise, including the inconsistencies that began to appear each time a new movie came out. I remembered I had seen something that tried to make sense of all the films. Today, I found it!
Here's a little chart that puts all this inconsistencies into graphic form. They are quite a lot.

Source: cracked.com