Stephen Hawkings PC
Intels Free Press hat ein Interview mit dem Ingenieur, der Stephen Hawkings Computer baut. Hawking bedient den Rechner übrigens mit Bewegungen seiner Backen über einen Sensor in seiner Brille.
What technology does Stephen use?
The computer is made up of three parts: a Lenovo X220 tablet PC, a custom black box containing various peripherals and the hardware voice itself. The computer features an Intel Core i7 processor along with a forward-facing webcam, which Stephen uses to place phone calls using Skype.
Underneath the wheelchair is the black box, which contains an audio amplifier, voltage regulators and a USB hardware key that receives the input from the IR sensor on Stephen’s eyeglasses. The hardware voice synthesizer sits in another black box on the back of the chair and receives commands from the computer via a USB-based serial port.How does Stephen control what comes out of his voice synthesizer?
When I first met Stephen, he still had some use in his thumbs. In fact, he’d still attempt to drive his own wheelchair. He pinned me against the wall once [laughs]. He had basically a clicker, a binary switch that he held in his hand. He’d press it with his thumb to highlight the words or commands on the computer screen. He was typing at about one word per minute when I first met him. He was actually pretty snappy with it.
Over time the nerve that allowed him to move his thumbs degraded, and he had to find another way to communicate. They originally talked about using one of his pectoral muscles and putting a sensor there. He wasn’t too thrilled with that idea.
What he’s got now is an infrared sensor hanging off of his glasses. It basically detects the changes in light as he twitches his cheek. They call it the “cheek switch.”
Stephen Hawking’s New PC (via /.)
Happy 70th, Stephen Hawking!
Stephen Hawking wird heute 70 Jahre alt. Happy Birthday, alter Big Bang-Ausrechner! Auf Youtube findet man dutzende Dokus mit dem Mann, Wired hat ein paar Zitate als Audiofiles und gestern hatte die BBC einen Artikel mit Hawking-Quotes über die Zukunft der Menschheit. Snip vom Guardian:
The world’s most famous living scientist turns 70 today. Professor Stephen Hawking has defied medical expectations, since being diagnosed with a form of motor neurone disease at the age of 21 and given only a few years to live, to become one of the most accomplished physicists in the fields of black holes and the study of the early universe.
Hawking’s fame has also brought his ideas to a vast audience outside academia. His first book, A Brief History of Time, has reportedly sold more than 10m copies worldwide and the physicist has made guest appearances on The Simpsons and Star Trek.
Later on Sunday, Hawking will deliver a rare public lecture in Cambridge, entitled A Brief History of Mine. He will be joined on stage for an afternoon of celebrations with talks from Lord Rees, the astronomer royal, and Saul Perlmutter, who won the Nobel prize in physics last year for the co-discovery of dark energy, the mysterious substance said to drive the expansion of the universe.
God says that God does not exist
Stephen Hawking schreibt in seinem neuen Buch, das man ein Hirngespinst wie Gott nicht braucht, um ein Universum loszutreten. Sag’ ich doch.
“Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing,” he writes. “Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.
“It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.”
In the forthcoming book, published on 9 September, Hawking says that M-theory, a form of string theory, will achieve this goal: “M-theory is the unified theory Einstein was hoping to find,” he theorises.
Stephen Hawking says universe not created by God (via Rivva)
Stephen Hawking über Religion: Science will win!
Stephen Hawking is my man.
“What could define God [is thinking of God] as the embodiment of the laws of nature. However, this is not what most people would think of that God,” Hawking told Sawyer. “They made a human-like being with whom one can have a personal relationship. When you look at the vast size of the universe and how insignificant an accidental human life is in it, that seems most impossible.”
When Sawyer asked if there was a way to reconcile religion and science, Hawking said, “There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, [and] science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.”
Stephen Hawking on Religion: ‘Science Will Win’ (via Cnet, Reddit)
Kids teaching Stephen Hawkings Time Travel
(Youtube Direkttime, via Boing Boing)
Kids rezitieren Stephen Hawkings „How to build a Time-Machine“-Artikel, den ich neulich verlinkt hatte. Der Clip kommt von Joe Sabia für das Ignition Tutoring Projekt.
CNNs Larry King diskutiert Stephen Hawkings Alien-Theorie
(Youtube Direktking, via MeFi)
Ihr erinnert euch an Stephen Hawkings Warnung vor Aliens neulich? Larry King diskutiert seine Theorie auf CNN mit Michio Kaku, Seth Shostak vom SETI, SciFi-Autor und Astronom David Brin und, natürlich, mit Dan Aykroyd. (Den Ausschnitt mit Dan Akroyd habt ihr vielleicht schon gesehen, das komplette Ding allerdings ist ein echtes Juwel). Die restlichen zwei Teile nach dem Klick.
Doku: Into The Universe with Stephen Hawking – Alien Hunters
Huch, ich wusste gar nicht, dass die Doku-Reihe „Into The Universe with Stephen Hawking“ bereits läuft. Die ersten drei Episoden sind bereits gesendet worden, man findet sie bei den üblichen Verdächtigen und auf Youtube habe ich die erste Folge „Alien Hunters“ gefunden, Snip von der Website zur Serie:
Into The Universe with Stephen Hawking is an epic new kind of cosmology series, a Planet Earth of the heavens. It takes the world’s most famous scientific mind and sets it free, powered by the limitless possibilities of computer animation. Hawking gives us the ultimate guide to the universe, a ripping yarn based on real science, spanning the whole of space and time — from the nature of the universe itself, to the chances of alien life, and the real possibility of time travel.
Die weiteren 4 Videos nach dem Klick.
Stephen Hawking: How to build a Time-Machine
Stephen Hawking hat im Guardian einen sehr schönen, langen und verständlichen Artikel darüber geschrieben, wie wir vielleicht wirklich mal ‘ne Zeitmaschine hinbekommen: „All you need is a wormhole, the Large Hadron Collider or a rocket that goes really, really fast.“
Stephen Hawking über Aliens
Stephen Hawking erzählt – und ich habe körperliche Schmerzen beim Tippen der folgenden Worte – ein bisschen Unsinn über Aliens: „We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.“
Das ganze ist sehr offensichtliche Promo für eine neue Dokumentation über Außerirdische, an der er maßgeblich mitgewirkt hat (weshalb sie ja auch „Stephen Hawking’s Universe“ heisst) und deshalb ist das natürlich extraprovokant formuliert, Promo eben, aber genau deshalb empfehle ich eher die Kommentare auf Reddit, als den Artikel selbst.
Stephen Hawking Photobomb
[update] Hier war mal ein Bild zu sehen, auf dem ein Student in Cambridge zu sehen ist, während Stephen Hawking im Hintergrund vorbeifährt. James (der Mensch auf dem Bild) schreibt mir:
Dear Rene,
I noticed that you posted a photo of me on your site with Stephen Hawking in the background. This is a private photograph which I do not want up on the internet. I am a student at Cambridge University and have been asked to remove this photograph by faculty members, and as I value my degree and would like to stay here to finish it, I would appreciate it if you could kindly take down the photo from the “Nerdcore” page, as the initial sites have.
It was originally posted on a site without my knowledge or consent, where I assume you picked it up from.. please if you see it elsewhere could you ask them to respect me and Professor Hawking and take the photo down too?Thank you very much and sorry for any inconvenience this causes.
Hier das ursprüngliche Posting:
Ich so: Och, heute ist echt ein super Tag, um auf meinem Campus in Cambridge ein tolles Foto zu schießen. Einfach so ein Portrait, nix besonderes. Gesagt, getan, ich schnappe mir meine Freundin und geh raus, positioniere mich vor ein bisschen Grün und ein bisschen Cambridge-Architektur in der Sonne, lächle auf meine Banker-Art in die Kamera und meine Freundin knipst so und dann kommt dieser verfickte theoretische Space-Physiker und Entdecker der schwarzen Löcher, rollt mit seinem Luxus-Vierrad-Segway inklusive Sitzmöglichkeit und sprechender Tastatur ins Motiv und ruiniert mein fucking Foto! Fucking Genius!
(via NCOTB)
Pink Terror Hawking
(Vimeo Direkthawking, via Beautiful Decay)
Destruction, Böller und Feuer in SlowMotion featuring Stephen Hawking? I’m completely sold.
Carl Sagans autotuned Cosmos kommt auf Vinyl auf Jack Whites Label!
Vor ein paar Wochen lud John Boswell seinen Remix von Carl Sagans „Cosmos“ auf Youtube hoch, eine autotuned Version von dessen Astronomie-Show aus den 70ern inklusive ebenfalls autogetunter Zitate von Stephen Hawking. (Das Video und dessen Nachfolger hatte ich hier und hier.)
Jetzt hat Jack Whites Label Third Man Records den ursprünglichen Track gesignt und der kommt auf Vinyl und als superlimitierte 7″, die auf der B-Seite eine Gravur der goldenen Platte, die mit der Voyager Sonde 1977 ins Weltall geschossen wurde. Und das alles zusammen ist absolut Jesus Christ in a chicken basket, I’m standing on the fucking Moon!
The release is timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of Sagan’s birth. Also happening that day is a reception in United States’ Congress with speeches by senators, NASA officials and assorted scientists, all hosted by the Planetary Society, which was co-founded by Sagan.
Third Man Records, in conjunction with United Record Pressing, fabricated a special “Cosmos Colored Vinyl” of which 150 copies will be available…50 randomly inserted into mail orders for “A Glorious Dawn” and the remainder to be made available at the Third Man Records Nashville store front at noon on November 9th.
The one-sided single features a very special etching on the flipside. Reproduced from the original artwork, the etching copies the etching included with the Voyager Golden Record, set off into space in 1977 as the most elaborate message-in-a-bottle idea ever imagined.
Die Platte kostet schlappe €6,92, meine Bestellung ging über den Third Man Store eben grade raus und ich freue mich ja schon auf die Nachricht, dass die Rechteinhaber von Sagans Space-Show die Veröffentlichung verhindern wollen. Hier jedenfalls der Link zu Third Man Records, hier die Meldung auf TwentyFourBits: Jack White´s Third Man Records to Release Carl Sagan Remix “A Glorious Dawn” on Vinyl (via Stereogum) und hier nochmal das Video:
Carl Sagans Cosmos autotuned (feat. Stephen Hawking)
(Youtube Direktcosmos, via Forgetomori)
OMG, wie großartig ist das hier denn bitte? Carl Sagans Cosmos, autotuned und dann auch noch Stephen Hawking, autotuned und beide erzählen/singen über das Universum und Wurmlöcher und Space and Time. Fantastisch! Die Lyrics zu dem Dings nach dem Klick.
Gib mir den Rest, Baby…
Larry Dunstans mutierte Celebrity-Fotografie
Larry Dunstan fotografiert Promis und Behinderte (stellenweise nackt, deshalb ein sanft hingehauchtes NSFW), photoshopt die Ergebnisse dann nochmal ordentlich und heraus kommen zweigesichtige Stephen Hawkings und dreigesichtige Terry Gilliams. I ♥ Mutants.
Larry Dunstan (via Feingut)
Stephen Hawking’s explosive new theory
Prof Stephen Hawking has come up with a new idea to explain why the Big Bang of creation led to the vast cosmos that we can see today.
Astronomers can deduce that the early universe expanded at a mind-boggling rate because regions separated by vast distances have similar background temperatures.
They have proposed a process of rapid expansion of neighbouring regions, with similar cosmic properties, to explain this growth spurt which they call inflation.
But that left a deeper mystery: why did inflation occur in the first place?
Now New Scientist reports that an answer has been proposed by Prof Stephen Hawking of Cambridge University, working with Prof Thomas Hertog of the Astroparticle and Cosmology Laboratory in Paris.
