A short clip on interesting “The Big Rip” theory, and the possible end of the universe as it expands into nothingness.
The Big Rip is a cosmological hypothesis about the ultimate fate of the Universe, in which the matter of the universe, from stars and galaxies to atoms and subatomic particles, are progressively torn apart by the expansion of the universe at a certain time in the future. Technically, the scale factor of the universe becomes infinite at a finite time in the future.
Theo Jansen has been creating (growing?) “beach animals” made from commonly available tools like plastic tubing, cardboard boxes, plastic bottles, hose, tape, and all sorts of other stuff. Wired News did a pretty good article on Jansen..
Jansen is evolving an entirely new line of animals: immense multi-legged walking critters designed to roam the Dutch coastline, feeding on gusts of wind. Over the years, successive generations of his creatures have evolved into increasingly complex animals that walk by flapping wings in response to the wind, discerning obstacles in their path through feelers and even hammering themselves into the sand on sensing an approaching storm.
It’s hard to know where to begin in talking about what’s so cool about Jansen’s beach animals. They’re evolved for one thing; he worked out the optimal 11-piece leg using evolutionary algorithms on a computer but now prefers to race his animals on the beach and “breed” the most successful ones together, taking the best bits from each to make their offspring better. His animals have legs, muscles (pneumatic pistons within the plastic tubing), stomachs (plastic bottles for storing air), and nerves (collections of on/off values that work pretty much like logic gates).”
Sixteen years after he was discovered, scientists are still learning about a 5,000-year-old Neolithic hunter found in the Alps. Research now suggests the Iceman (or “Otzi”), was murdered.
Naturally mummified, Otzi’s brain, eyes, and internal organs were intact when excavated. Otzi’s time is now spent in an ice chamber which is at the same humidity and temperature level as where he was found.
INITIAL THEORIES ON HIS DEATH: Otzi was first thought to be a shepherd or a hunter who was caught in a storm and died of exposure. Another theory suggested he was ritually sacrificed in the mountains.
LATEST THEORY: Cuts on the Iceman’s hand and wrist suggest he was in a fight with members of his village and then fled. The killers shot an arrow into Otzi from behind when he stopped to rest on the mountain where he bled to death.
I dont know how these guys got a hold of all these airbags but they use them to blow stuff up. I still cant get over the final scene with them crushing that 55 gallon drum like it was a paper cup.
Researchers at Japan’s Jikei University will soon be checking the mailbox for a cool package from Siberia — the recently discovered frozen body of an ancient baby mammoth. The nearly complete body of the female calf, said to be one of the best-preserved specimens of frozen mammoth ever discovered, is estimated to have been less than one year old before it was preserved in ice about 10,000 years ago.
According to the Russian Tass news agency, a reindeer herder stumbled upon the 130 cm (4 ft 3 in) tall, 50 kg (110 lbs) frozen mammoth in May in an area of permafrost in northwestern Siberia, near the Yuribey River on the Yamal Peninsula, which extends into the Kara Sea. The mammoth, whose trunk and eyes remain intact and which still has some fur on its body, was shown to an international panel of experts that convened on July 5 in the town of Salekhard, near the discovery site.
60 queries in 0.424 sec
