The Zen of Technology & Scientific Discovery! (& Robots)

[Jundo]

As we do our best to, it often seems, end life on this planet .... fear not, for the universe which we are somehow finds a way ...

Astronomers have detected the largest organic molecule ever seen in a cloud of planet-forming dust, potentially offering new insights into the way that the building blocks of life end up on planets.

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope in Chile, researchers studied the light emitted by different molecules in the lopsided ring of dust and ice surrounding the young star IRS 48, located about 444 light-years from Earth in the constellation Ophiuchus.

Within the dusty ring, the researchers saw clear traces of an organic compound called dimethyl ether — a large molecule that's commonly detected in stellar nurseries (cold, dusty regions of space where new stars form) and is a precursor to crucial building blocks of life, such as amino acids and sugars, the team wrote in a study published Mar. 8 in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.

https://www.livescience.com/largest-...t-forming-disk

Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

The Fast and the Furious ...

Largest shock wave in the universe is '60 times larger than the Milky Way,' new study finds

The wave has been blasting through space at near-light-speed for 200 million years.

... Located about 730 million light-years from Earth, Abell 3667 is a galaxy cluster in chaos. Actually composed of two clusters (or groups) of galaxies colliding into one another, Abell 3667 contains more than 550 individual galaxies slowly stirring into one big cosmic gumbo.

It's not readily apparent to most telescopes, but this cosmic collision has created an enormous disturbance in the region — a gargantuan shock wave flaring out of either side of the merging cluster, and visible only in radio wavelengths.

Now, a new study published Feb. 7 in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics offers the most detailed picture ever captured of this enormous wave. Using the MeerKAT radio telescope array in South Africa, the researchers imaged both halves of the shock wave's radio component — also called "radio relics" — and found that the structures are far more complex than previous observations indicated.

"The shock waves act as giant particle accelerators and accelerate electrons almost to the speed of light," lead study author Francesco de Gasperin, visiting scientist at the Hamburg Observatory in Germany, said in a statement. "The waves are threaded by an intricate pattern of bright filaments that trace the location of giant magnetic field lines and the regions where electrons are accelerated."

According to the researchers, the shock wave first blasted into being about 1 billion years ago, when the two galaxy clusters that make up Abell 3667 first collided. Galaxy clusters are the most enormous gravitationally-bound structures in the universe; when two of them merge, they release the largest amount of energy in a single event since the Big Bang, the researchers said.

As the wave shot electrons into space at near-light-speed, the particles tore through magnetic fields in the region, emitting the twin arcs of radio waves seen today. The researchers found that those radio arcs each move at more than 3.3 million miles per second (5.3 million kilometers per second), are about 13 million light-years apart from each other; and each measure 60 times larger than the entire Milky Way galaxy, which spans about 100,000 light-years in diameter.
https://www.livescience.com/merging-...667-shock-wave

The northern shock wave (or "radio relic") glows in radio wavelengths as electrons blast through insterstellar space.



Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

I wonder if the Earth has achieved a state of cognizance in the past but maybe we modern humans are disrupting that. Of course the Earth may be trying to correct for our actions too

At the very least, Earth has a kind of "reset" function if we mess things up badly enough. Then, maybe the bug or bonobos or dolphins can have a go ...



I also mentioned in that interview on Buddhist futurism that, in my belief, it seems pretty obvious by now that life is probably scattered across myriad planets in our vast universe, some of it intelligent, something like seeds spaced far enough apart (for whatever reason) so as not to interfere with each other easily. Even if our civilization does not get it right, and makes a muck of our planet, our "cousins" in Alpha Centauri or someplace else will likely not make such mistakes, and intelligent life will go on. No worries, on the grand scale of things.

Gassho, J

STLah

[Tairin]

Thank you for posting these articles Jundo. I find this stuff fascinating. I was introduced to the Gaia Theory back in my university days. I recently read “Entangled Life” by Merlin Sheldrake (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/b...lin-sheldrake/) that talks about the effects mycorrhizal networks have on life. One of my next books to read is “The Hidden Life of Trees” by Peter Wohlleben (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...-life-of-trees).

I wonder if the Earth has achieved a state of cognizance in the past but maybe we modern humans are disrupting that. Of course the Earth may be trying to correct for our actions too


Tairin
Sat today and lah

[Tai Shi]

Yes, the common ancestry, and our first cities living together as one harmonious group, and then that was time. 25,000 years ago.
Gassho
sat/ lah

[Jundo]

And it is a big sky too! And everything in that sky is "you" too ... and me ... and we are all that as it is us! As much you or me as the hairs on our own heads!

New map of the night sky reveals 4.4 million galaxies and other space objects

Some 4.4 million space objects billions of light-years away have been mapped by astronomers, including 1 million space objects that hadn't been spotted before.

The vast majority of these objects are galaxies that harbor massive black holes or rapidly growing new stars. Other discoveries include colliding groups of distant galaxies and flaring stars, which vary in brightness, within the Milky Way, according to a news statement from Durham University in England.

The observations were made by analyzing a huge amount of data from the sensitive Low Frequency Array telescope, known as LOFAR, which is using low radio frequencies to observe about a quarter of the Northern Hemisphere's sky and catalog it in fine detail. It's operated by ASTRON, the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy.

Each time we create a map our screens are filled with new discoveries and objects that have never before been seen by human eyes. Exploring the unfamiliar phenomena that glow in the energetic radio universe is such an incredible experience and our team is thrilled to be able to release these maps publicly," said astronomer Timothy Shimwell, an associate scientist at ASTRON and Leiden University, in the statement.

This data release was only 27% of the entire survey, Shimwell said.

https://us.cnn.com/2022/02/25/world/galaxy-map-lofar-scn/index.html

Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

Our (Almost) Cognizant Planet Earth

Yesterday, I posted about recent genetic mapping which demonstrates the great human family:

Scientists create biggest-ever human family tree, dating back 100,000 years

https://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?19556-We-are-Each-Other-Scientists-create-biggest-ever-human-family-tree

In another paper published this week ...

... not only are we each other, but (Zen folks would say) we are the earth, which is the stars.

Scientists say planetary intelligence is real, but Earth doesn't qualify yet

There is still one big step Earth must take to be "intelligent."

A group of astrophysicists has proposed that individual planets are capable of developing intelligence — not the kind of smarts like knowing your ABCs, but rather an intelligence associated with the interconnectedness of the life inhabiting them. However, don't assume that our planet is in this intelligent league. Earth is still one major step away from developing true planetary intelligence, a milestone that, if achieved, could help us prevent the impending climate catastrophe, the scientists said.

In the new study, published Feb. 7 in the International Journal of Astrobiology, a group of researchers argues that a planet can be deemed intelligent if it demonstrates cognition — the capacity to know something about what's happening and act on that knowledge. This could happen if nature and technology on planets like Earth can evolve to the point where they are so interconnected that they can recognize potential issues and create feedback loops to counter them.

"To be clear, cognition is not consciousness," the researchers wrote in an article for The Atlantic. "We don't imagine some kind of planetary super-being making self-aware decisions for the world." Instead, the team believes that cognition is a natural product of the relationship between life and the planets on which they develop.

However, Earth hasn't entered this stage, at least not yet. "Even though Earth might be full of intelligent life, at this point in its cosmic history, it certainly doesn't seem very smart," they wrote in The Atlantic. But the new study does outline the remaining final hurdle Earth must overcome to gain true planetary intelligence.

However, as the article then spells out, some other scientists have argued for many years that the earth is already a kind of intelligent system: the so-called GAIA Hypothesis:

The Gaia hypothesis

The new study is built upon a principle known as the Gaia hypothesis, an idea introduced by British scientist James Lovelock and American evolutionary biologist Lynn Margulis in the early 1970s. (Gaia is the personification of Earth from Greek mythology.)

The Gaia hypothesis states that, as life-forms evolve on Earth, they affect the evolution of the planetary system as a whole. The idea is that the biosphere — the global ecological system integrating all living things and their relationships — can physically alter other systems, such as the atmosphere (air), cryosphere (ice), hydrosphere (water) and lithosphere (land). This back-and-forth effect has been happening since life first began on Earth, but it has become more noticeable than ever due to humanity's impacts on the planet, including human-caused climate change, pollution and deforestation.

The researchers wanted to know if this interconnectedness between life and a planet could become so interwoven that the planet could eventually be deemed intelligent. "The biosphere tells us that once life appears in a world, that world can take on a life of its own," the researchers wrote in The Atlantic. "But if a planet with life has a life of its own, can it also have a mind of its own?"

The idea of a collective entity like a planet having some sort of intelligence goes against the notions we have about our own intelligence. "Intelligence tends to be conceived of as something that happens in individual heads, and usually those heads sit on the shoulders of animals like humans," the researchers wrote. However, there are many examples of collective intelligence in the natural world.

For instance, colonies of social insects, like bees, show a collective and often superior intelligence than the individuals that form them. "A single bee holds only a small amount of information about the world, but its colony as a whole knows and responds to the environment," the researchers wrote.

Recent discoveries about fungal networks, known as mycorrhizal networks, that share water and nutrients between individual trees in forests also reveal a form of collective intelligence. "Such fungal networks allow forests stretching hundreds of miles to recognize and respond to changing conditions," the researchers wrote.

Meanwhile, the human brain is made from trillions of connections between different neurons, meaning our own intelligence is more collective than we think.

We humans are not spectators to all this, but part of it ... and any future development ...

Earth is currently stuck at the immature technosphere stage, the researchers said. Our advancements in energy production are allowing us to achieve some remarkable technologies for ourselves, but those actions are significantly altering the planet. "Our technosphere is, in the long run, working against itself. It's formally stupid," the researchers wrote. "It leaves the entire planet unguided, careening into new and uncharted territory."

If Earth ever reaches the mature technosphere stage — a pivotal feat that would signify that Earth is "intelligent" — the technology on our blue dot will advance to a point where it does not require planetary energy and resources and instead can be used to repair and improve the systems it was destroying. This would allow the technosphere to co-evolve with the biosphere in a way that allows both to thrive.

"This would be a technosphere rooted in the biosphere, which itself is rooted in the other planetary systems — a technosphere that self-maintains the entire Earth system," the researchers wrote. ...

Progressing to the final stage of planetary intelligence is more than just a curiosity for the researchers — it is a necessity. They believe that it may be the only way to prevent a climate catastrophe, which is nearing ever closer due to the immaturity of our technosphere.

"Humanity stands at a most precipitous moment in both our and our planet's evolution," the researchers wrote. It is "caught in a climate crisis brought on by our supposed advancement as a civilization."

However, thinking about intelligence on a wider scale could help us solve this problem. "Making sense of how a planet's intelligence might be defined and understood helps shine a little light on humanity's future on this planet — or lack thereof," the researchers wrote.

More here, and it is a fascinating article:

https://www.livescience.com/planetary-intelligence-earth

The full report in the Cambridge International Journal of Astrobiology:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-astrobiology/article/intelligence-as-a-planetary-scale-process/5077C784D7FAC55F96072F7A7772C5E5

In any case, the earth is not something that we are just living on or witnessing, but is us happening too, and we are it happening. We are the earth earthing, and the earth is also us. This is something that Buddhists have long known,

Hmmm. And might there be such "cognition" on a universal scale too? I suppose it depends, to some degree, how one defines these things and where on is looking. Hmmm.

Gassho, J

STLah

Sorry to run long.

[Tomás ESP]

I wouldn’t do that if I was you. Almost all of these companies will happily share your DNA with various security services. Not that you’re probably on any most wanted list, but by adding yourself to these databases you’re also adding everyone you’re related to. I would advise doing some research on how this data will be used.

No one knows what the future holds, but it’s probably not a bad move to avoid being on the various databases before they’re weaponised.

Personally, I wouldn’t go near them. But I work in cybersecurity, don’t use google and refuse to have always on microphones in my house, so maybe I’m weird.




Look after your data! That especially includes your identifying biometrics!

Gassho, sat, neil

Gassho, Tomás
Sat&LaH

[houst0n]

Thought about doing a DNA test to understand my own ancestry better. Maybe there is not that much of a need in the end. I love the idea that we are all one big family, in one way or another. Thank you for sharing Jundo

Gassho, Tomás
Sat

I wouldn’t do that if I was you. Almost all of these companies will happily share your DNA with various security services. Not that you’re probably on any most wanted list, but by adding yourself to these databases you’re also adding everyone you’re related to. I would advise doing some research on how this data will be used.

No one knows what the future holds, but it’s probably not a bad move to avoid being on the various databases before they’re weaponised.

Personally, I wouldn’t go near them. But I work in cybersecurity, don’t use google and refuse to have always on microphones in my house, so maybe I’m weird.




Look after your data! That especially includes your identifying biometrics!

Gassho, sat, neil

[Ryumon]

So you’re related to Charlemagne? You and every other living European…

https://www.theguardian.com/science/commentisfree/2015/may/24/business-genetic-ancestry-charlemagne-adam-rutherford

Gassho,

Ryūmon (Kirk)

sat

[Tomás ESP]

Thought about doing a DNA test to understand my own ancestry better. Maybe there is not that much of a need in the end. I love the idea that we are all one big family, in one way or another. Thank you for sharing Jundo

Gassho, Tomás
Sat

[Tai Shi]

We are Each Other: Scientists create biggest-ever human family tree

Leave it to education from an educator. Be informed and be Treeleaf where we learn from each person, here and we read to think. The Buddha was a man who thought .
Gassho
sat/ lah


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[Jundo]

We are Each Other: Scientists create biggest-ever human family tree

It is true, we are a great family ...

Scientists create biggest-ever human family tree, dating back 100,000 years

Researchers have used genetics to create the largest human family tree ever made, allowing individuals to find out who their distant ancestors were and where they lived, as well as exactly how they are related to everyone alive today.

The research, carried out by scientists from the University of Oxford's Big Data Institute, combines human genomes from a variety of sources -- both ancient and modern DNA -- to better understand human history and evolution.

Just as a family tree shows how an individual is related to their parents or siblings, genetic genealogy reveals which genes are shared between two individuals, lead author Anthony Wilder Wohns, now a postdoctoral researcher at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, told CNN.

"Simply put, what we did was we created the largest human family tree ever," Wohns said. "We have a single genealogy that traces the ancestry of all of humanity, and shows how we're all related to each other today." ...

The resource means anyone who has access to their own genetic information can work out when their ancestors moved to a particular place, and why they have certain genes.

"It's basically understanding the entire story of human history that's written in our genes," Wohns said.
Human genetic research has developed rapidly in recent decades, generating huge amounts of new information. New techniques in ancient DNA analysis have provided tantalizing details about prehistory and in 2010 explosively revealed that humans interbred with Neanderthals.

... As things stand, the genes of 3,609 people from 215 populations have been sequenced, with some dating from more than 100,000 years ago. The method allows for this number to be expanded to potentially millions of genomes in the future.

The paper confirms existing conclusions about human history, including that most human evolution took place in Africa before a large movement out of the continent around 70,000 years ago, Wohns said.
https://us.cnn.com/2022/02/24/world/...gbr/index.html

https://youtu.be/R8G6wSFIeSE

The published paper:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi8264

Gassho, Your Cousin Jundo

STLah

[Nengei]

Gassho,
Nengei
Sat today. LAH.


Sent using Tapatalk.

[Jundo]

Yet all things are temporary. Unfortunately we will not be observing the galactic confluence. At least, not from Earth.

https://theconversation.com/the-sun-wont-die-for-5-billion-years-so-why-do-humans-have-only-1-billion-years-left-on-earth-37379

Gassho,
Nengei
Sat today. LAH.

Yet, we will be it, and it will be you and me ... for we are the confluence, always have been and always will be. Until the end of all, at least.

Gassho, J

STLah