Volume 9, Number 9
6/21/2006
Edited by John L. Petersen
johnp@arlingtoninstitute.org

See past issues in the Archives

In This Issue:

Future Facts - from Think Links
Think Links - The Future in the News…Today
A Final Quote

At The Arlington Institute, we believe that to understand the future, you need to have an open mind and cast a very wide net. To that end, FUTUREdition explores a cross-disciplinary palette of issues, from the frontiers of science and technology to major developments in mass media, geopolitics, the environment, and social perspectives.

FUTURE FACTS - FROM THINK LINKS
DID YOU KNOW THAT...

• Nuclear reactors could be built more efficiently using supercomputers to artificially "evolve" designs.
• Satellite images reveal that shrubs and trees grow taller and greener along stripes where a volcano eventually ruptures.
• Researchers have devised a "nanosheet" that can be wrapped around any surface - such as that of a surgical instrument or a robotic hand - to mimic the sensitivity of touch.
• German scientists have shown that ingesting coca solids and dark chocolate can fight skin cancer.

THINK LINKS – THE FUTURE IN THE NEWS...TODAY

INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE

Five Hot Products for the Future
West Virginia Schools Use Dance Video Game in Gym Class

Five Hot Products for the Future -- (CNN -- June 9, 2006)
http://money.cnn.com/2006/06/08/technology/business2_bigsellers/index.htm
Trend spotting is serious business. So much so that the Institute for the Future, a Palo Alto-based think tank, produces an annual 96-page 10-year forecast - an exhaustive compendium of societal and technological trends, widely regarded as the bellwether of long-range planning. But people wanted specifics, so it started giving away prescient product ideas instead.

West Virginia Schools Use Dance Video Game in Gym Class -- (Post-Gazette -- June 4, 2006)
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06155/695356-298.stm
Video games in gym class? After trying a pilot program in 20 schools last year, West Virginia has announced the "Dance Dance Revolution" video game program to all of West Virginia's 753 public schools. They trained teachers, then, this spring, introduced the program in about 150 middle schools, targeting students who are maturing and developing lifestyle habits. Their primary intent is to combat childhood obesity in a state which consistently ranks among the nation's highest in rates of obesity and related ailments.

NEW REALITIES

On Mars, No One Can Hear You Scream
Upper Size Limit for Moons Explained
Study Reveals Who Hears Best
Meteor May Have Caused Extinction
The Dean of Debunking
Plants Predict Where Rumbling Volcanoes Will Blow

On Mars, No One Can Hear You Scream -- (Science Now -- June 12, 2006)
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2006/612/2
Sound dies quickly in the cold, thin air of Mars. Researchers have modeled a sound wave traveling through the Martian atmosphere and report that it doesn't go far-- even a lawn mower's roar dies after a hundred meters or so. The model presents an unusually detailed picture of how sound travels in an alien atmosphere and hints at what it would take to communicate on the Red Planet.

Upper Size Limit for Moons Explained -- (New Scientist -- June 14, 2006)
http://www.newscientistspace.com/article/dn9336-upper-size-limit-for-moons-explained.html
A striking similarity between the moons of Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus could be explained by a new model of how they formed. The model could also explain why some of the moons have ice, something previous models could not do. Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus each have several dozen moons. But while the planets vary in size, each collection of moons contains the equivalent of 0.01% of its host planet's mass.

Study Reveals Who Hears Best -- (Yahoo -- June 13, 2006)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20060613/sc_space/studyrevealswhohearsbest;_ylt=AoGulMtvMn3WrgVbuiX9pBms0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MzV0MTdmBHNlYwM3NTM-
The nation's hearing hasn't changed all that much from 35 years ago, despite significant changes in society and technology. A new study also revealed that non-Hispanic blacks have better hearing on average compared to non-Hispanic whites and Hispanic adults in the United States, and that women tend to have better hearing than men.

Meteor May Have Caused Extinction -- (CBS -- June 8, 2006)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/06/08/ap/tech/mainD8I3MJSO0.shtml
A massive crater in Antarctica may have been caused by a meteor that wiped out more than 90 percent of the species on Earth 250 million years ago. The 300-mile-wide crater lies hidden more than a mile beneath a sheet of ice and was discovered by scientists using satellite data.

The Dean of Debunking -- (Times Online` -- June 11, 2006)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2102-2214707,00.html
Peter Woit, a mathematician at Columbia University, has challenged the entire string-theory discipline by proclaiming that its topic is not a genuine theory at all and that many of its exponents do not understand the complex mathematics it employs.

Plants Predict Where Rumbling Volcanoes Will Blow -- (New Scientist -- June 14, 2006)
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg19025554.900
Want to know where a rumbling volcano is likely to split at the seams? Look for the tallest and greenest plants. Vigorous plant growth on the flanks of a volcano like that at Rabaul, Papua New Guinea (above), can indicate where magma is most likely to spurt out. Satellite images reveal that shrubs and trees grow taller and greener along stripes where the volcano eventually ruptures.

GENTICS/HEALTH TECHNOLOGY

Genes Governing Embryonic Stem Cell "Immortality" Discovered
Two Butterfly Species Evolved into Third
Chocolate as Sunscreen
Tooth Gives Up Oldest Human DNA
Cloned Mules Lose to Naturals in Pro Race
Private Project to Make Human Stem Cells

Genes Governing Embryonic Stem Cell "Immortality" Discovered -- (Scientific American -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=000ABA73-E0A5-1489-A0A583414B7F0000&ref=rss
Embryonic stem cells differ from other cells in the body. They can divide seemingly endlessly; they do not perform a specialized function; and, ultimately, they can become any other type of cell. How they do this remains a mystery, but new research has uncovered some of the genes that allow these cells to renew themselves.

Two Butterfly Species Evolved into Third -- (National Geographic -- June 14, 2006)
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/06/060614-butterfly.html
A butterfly species from South America has been revealed as nature's answer to Frankenstein's monster, scientists say. New research shows the insect was originally created from two different butterflies in an evolutionary process many biologists didn't think possible.

Chocolate as Sunscreen -- (Science News Online -- June 10, 2006)
http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20060610/food.asp
As if you needed another reason to eat chocolate, German researchers have shown that ingesting types rich in cocoa solids and flavonoids - dark chocolate - can fight skin cancer. Their findings are preliminary because they come from a trial of just 24 women who were recruited to add cocoa to their breakfasts every day for about 3 months.

Tooth Gives Up Oldest Human DNA -- (BBC -- June 6, 2006)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5052414.stm
Scientists have recovered DNA from a Neanderthal that lived 100,000 years ago - the oldest human-type DNA so far. It was extracted from the tooth of a Neanderthal child found in the Scladina cave in the Meuse Basin, Belgium. The study suggests our distant cousins were more genetically diverse than once thought.

Cloned Mules Lose to Naturals in Pro Race -- (Washington Post -- June 5, 2006)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/05/AR2006060500152.html
Nature triumphed over nurture as two cloned mule brothers came up short in a professional race against traditionally bred runners. Idaho Gem, the world's first equine clone, finished third while Idaho Star wound up seventh in an eight-way race Sunday at the 20th annual Winnemucca Mule Races, Show & Draft Horse Challenge.

Private Project to Make Human Stem Cells -- (Washington Post -- June 7, 2006)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601290.html?referrer=emailarticle
Harvard University announced yesterday the launch of a privately funded, multimillion-dollar program to create cloned human embryos as sources of medically promising stem cells. The collaborative effort marks a new phase in the long-simmering U.S. culture war over stem cell research, pitting some of the nation's most prestigious institutions against a vocal conservative movement that opposes the work.

NANOTECHNOLOGY

Nano World: Advanced Circuits
Robot Revolution: New Material Sensitive as Human Skin

Nano World: Advanced Circuits -- (Semiconductor International -- June 9, 2006)
http://www.reed-electronics.com/semiconductor/articleXml/LN394699991.html
An international team of university and industry scientists has discovered a way to improve nanoparticles used to make advanced circuits. These findings could help improve the reliable large-scale manufacture of high quality chips.

Robot Revolution: New Material Sensitive as Human Skin -- (National Geographic News -- June 8, 2006)
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/06/060608-robots.html
It's hundreds of times thinner than a human hair but as sensitive as a human finger. Researchers have devised a "nanosheet" that can be wrapped around any surface - such as that of a surgical instrument or a robotic hand - to mimic the sensitivity of touch. The sensitive sheet was produced by encouraging microscopic particles to bond to the sensor surface by dipping the materials in a series of chemical baths.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

Error-Check Breakthrough in Quantum Computing
Researchers Teach Computers To Perceive Three Dimensions in 2-D Images
Translator Lets Computers Understand Experiments
EU Institute Inches Forward

Error-Check Breakthrough in Quantum Computing -- (New Scientist -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/dn9301-errorcheck-breakthrough-in-quantum-computing.html
Physicists have discovered a new way to check the quantum state of information stored inside a qubit. Knowing exactly what's going on inside makes designing error-checking for quantum computers possible. This is necessary because information encoded as a qubit degrades over time.

Researchers Teach Computers To Perceive Three Dimensions in 2-D Images -- (Carnegie Mellon -- June 13, 2006)
http://www.cmu.edu/PR/releases06/060613_3d.html
Researchers in Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science have found a way to help computers understand the geometric context of outdoor scenes and thus better comprehend what they see. The discovery promises to revive an area of computer vision research all but abandoned two decades ago because it seemed insoluble. It may ultimately find application in vision systems used to guide robotic vehicles, monitor security cameras and archive photos.

Translator Lets Computers Understand Experiments -- (New Scientist -- June 7, 2006)
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/dn9288-translator-lets-computers-understand-experiments-.html
A framework for translating the write-ups of experiments into a format that can be processed by computers has been developed by academics. The new tool could revolutionize the way scientific papers are written and help scientists make creative leaps, researchers say.

EU Institute Inches Forward -- (Red Herring -- June 12, 2006)
http://redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=17158&hed=EU+Institute+Inches+Forward
The European Commission has outlined preliminary plans for a European Institute of Technology, but the announcement underscored the many obstacles that remain in the ambitious effort to create a world-class center of innovation in the next three years.The plan called for the formation of a governing board, awarding of degrees, and autonomy from the commission itself. However, many critical details must be resolved before the first bricks can be laid.

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Electronic Smog
Report Warns of Threat to World's Deserts
Global Warming's Potential Effects on Coastal Cities
Weather Changes
The Top 10 Emerging Environmental Technologies
Warming Turns Bears into Cannibals

Electronic Smog -- (Info Wars -- May 7, 2006)
http://www.infowars.com/articles/science/cell_phones_electronic_smog.htm
Invisible "smog", created by the electricity that powers our civilization, is giving children cancer, causing miscarriages and suicides and making some people allergic to modern life, new scientific evidence reveals. The evidence - which is being taken seriously by national and international bodies and authorities - suggests that almost everyone is being exposed to a new form of pollution with countless sources in daily use in every home.

Report Warns of Threat to World's Deserts -- (ABC -- June 5, 2006)
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=2039766&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312
The world's deserts are under threat as never before, with global warming making lack of water an even bigger problem for the parched regions, a U.N. report says. The first comprehensive look at deserts around the world said these areas, their wildlife and, most of all, their scarce water supplies are facing dramatic changes.

Global Warming's Potential Effects on Coastal Cities -- (National Environmental Trust -- June 14, 2006)
http://www.net.org/globalwarming/sea_level/
These animations below show the flooding we can anticipate in major cities as global warming raises sea levels and leads to stronger hurricanes. They show that as sea levels rise, even relatively weak storms will be able to do a great deal of damage.

Weather Changes -- (Unkown Country -- June 14, 2006)
http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5316
Atmospheric sciences researcher John M. Wallace is studying whether the jet streams, that mark the edge of the tropics, are moving towards the poles. He's not sure if this is evidence of global warming or just an anomaly. He says, "If they move another 2 to 3 degrees poleward in this century, very dry areas such as the Sahara Desert could nudge farther toward the pole, perhaps by a few hundred miles."

The Top 10 Emerging Environmental Technologies -- (LiveScience -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.livescience.com/environment/top10_emergingenvironment_technologies.html
By the year 2025, an additional 2.9 billion people will strain tightening water supplies, and the world's energy needs will go up 60 percent by 2030, according to the United Nations. LiveScience looks at 10 technologies - some old, some new, some a bit offbeat - that might help make the future a little brighter.

Warming Turns Bears into Cannibals -- (CNN -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/06/12/polar.bears.ap/index.html
Polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea may be turning to cannibalism because longer seasons without ice keep them from getting to their natural food. A study reviewed three examples of polar bears preying on each other from January to April 2004 north of Alaska and western Canada, including the first-ever reported killing of a female in a den shortly after she gave birth.

TERRORISM AND THE FUTURE OF WARFARE

Pentagon Sets Its Sights on Social Networking Websites
Global Military Spend Hits $1.12 Trillion
Report Details Failure of U.S. Prison System
Reach Out and Tap Someone

Pentagon Sets Its Sights on Social Networking Websites -- (New Scientist -- June 9, 2006)
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/mg19025556.200-pentagon-sets-its-sights-on-social-networking-websites.html
The National Security Agency, which specializes in eavesdropping and code-breaking, is funding research into the mass harvesting of the information that people post about themselves on social networks. And it could harness advances in internet technology - specifically the forthcoming "semantic web" championed by the web standards organization W3C - to combine data from social networking websites with details such as banking, retail and property records, allowing the NSA to build extensive, all-embracing personal profiles of individuals.

Global Military Spend Hits $1.12 Trillion -- (Reuters -- June 12, 2006)
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-06-12T114509Z_01_L12351514_RTRUKOC_0_US-ARMS-SPENDING.xml
U.S. spending in Iraq and Afghanistan helped push up global 2005 military expenditure by 3.5 percent to $1.12 trillion. "The USA is responsible for 48 percent of the world total, distantly followed by the UK, France, Japan and China with 4 to 5 percent each," the Swedish government-funded institute added.

Report Details Failure of U.S. Prison System -- (The Seattle Times -- June 8, 2006)
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003046811_prison08.html
Americans spend $60 billion a year to imprison 2.2 million people - exceeding any other nation - but receive a dismal return on the investment, according to a report to be released today by a commission urging greater public scrutiny of what goes on behind bars. The report says legislators passing get-tough laws have packed the nation's jails and prisons to overflowing with convicts, most poor and uneducated, but have done little to help them emerge as better citizens upon release.

Reach Out and Tap Someone -- (The American Conservative -- June 19, 2006)
http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_06_19/article.html
The National Security Agency has been tracking the calls of millions of Americans and constructing the largest database ever assembled in the world. The nation's biggest telephone companies have apparently turned over masses of personal records to the feds, allowing Uncle Sam to build up a database of the phone numbers of incoming and outgoing calls of Americans. The NSA's surveillance program undermines the rule of law without producing real gains in security.

ENERGY REVOLUTION

Enough Wind Offshore to Electrify America
Chocolate-Munching Bugs Provide Fuel of the Future
Nuclear Reactors Evolve Inside Supercomputers
Gas Station Looks at Gas-Free Future
High Cost of Oil Could Put Many Jobs at Risk

Enough Wind Offshore to Electrify America -- (Cape Cod Today -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.capecodtoday.com/news246.htm
There is as much wind power potential (900,000 megawatts) off our coasts as the current capacity of all power plants in the United States combined, according to a new report sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, and General Electric. And the greatest wind resources are off the Northeast Coasts

Chocolate-Munching Bugs Provide Fuel of the Future -- (PhysOrg -- June 1, 2006)
http://www.physorg.com/news68364644.html
Chocoholic germs can reportedly provide hydrogen, the clean-burning energy of the future. The hydrogen was used to power a fuel cell, generating enough electricity to drive a small fan. The experiment has applications far beyond the lab. Waste chocolate, instead of being thrown away by confectionary companies, could be turned into hydrogen and used to help power their factories or sold to energy companies.

Nuclear Reactors Evolve Inside Supercomputers -- (New Scientist -- June 9, 2006)
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article.ns?id=dn9302&feedId=online-news_rss20
Nuclear reactors could be built more efficiently using supercomputers to artificially "evolve" designs, say engineers. They have found they can speed up the extremely complex process of designing a reactor and generate novel designs from scratch by simulating natural selection.

Gas Station Looks at Gas-Free Future -- (CNN -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/06/12/alternative.fuel.ap/index.html
If the United States is going to end its addiction to oil, the fuel station of the future might look like Pearson Ford Fuel Depot. Along with gasoline and diesel, the one-of-a-kind station -- located in California -- offers a full range of clean-burning alternative fuels from ethanol to propane to BioWillie, a brand of biodiesel made from soybeans and promoted by country music legend Willie Nelson.

High Cost of Oil Could Put Many Jobs at Risk -- (USA Today -- June 8, 2006)
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/employment/2006-06-05-oil-cover-usat_x.htm
The rising cost of oil has put a squeeze on the companies that use oil as an ingredient for their products. Although they are down from the records seen recently, oil prices are up more than 20% from a year ago and are more than 150% higher than they were five years ago. Natural gas prices have also risen. Chemicals made from oil are used by companies to manufacture many products consumers rely on every day, such as plastic bottles, aspirin, lipstick and deodorant.

CONTACT

Is It Raining Aliens?

Is It Raining Aliens? -- (Popular Science -- June 14, 2006)
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/2c21c0f98d07b010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
Nearly 50 tons of mysterious red particles showered India in 2001. Now the race is on to figure out what they were. One Scientist speculates that the particles could be extraterrestrial bacteria adapted to the harsh conditions of space and that the microbes hitched a ride on a comet or meteorite that later broke apart in the upper atmosphere and mixed with rain clouds above India.

DEMOGRAPHICS AND SOCIAL CHANGE

DNA Links Accountant, Legendary Conqueror
Backs to the Future

DNA Links Accountant, Legendary Conqueror -- (The Seattle Times -- June 4, 2006)
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003038379_khan04.html
A British research firm recently combed 25,000 DNA samples searching for a modern descendant of Genghis Khan from outside the Mongolian warlord's ancient empire. They found one: a University of Miami accounting professor with a receding hairline.

Backs to the Future -- (PhysOrg -- June 12, 2006)
http://www.physorg.com/news69338070.html
New analysis of the language and gesture of South America's indigenous Aymara people indicates a reverse concept of time. Contrary to what had been thought a cognitive universal among humans - a spatial metaphor for chronology, based partly on our bodies' orientation and locomotion, that places the future ahead of oneself and the past behind - the Amerindian group locates this imaginary abstraction the other way around: with the past ahead and the future behind.

A FINAL QUOTE...

"I don't want to be left behind. In fact, I want to be here before the action starts." --Kerry Packer

A special thanks to Bernard Calil, Neil Freer, Humera Khan, KurzweilAI, Sher Patterson-Black, Diane Petersen, John C. Petersen, the Schwartzreport, Joel Snell, Ken Dabkowski, Hanna Adeyema, Jin Zhu, and Richard May, our contributors to this issue. If you see something we should know about, do send it along - thanks.
johnp@arlingtoninstitute.org