…the catching machine: a robot capable of tracking and grabbing a ball hurtling toward it at 300 kilometres per hour. (It can’t handle real baseballs yet, just soft balls, but it’s only a matter of time…)
Enhanced humans
Here’s an interesting interview with author Joel Garreau about his new book Radical Evolution: The Promise and Peril of Enhancing Our Minds, Our Bodies—And What It Means to Be Human. I have to take issue with one statement: he says he wrote his book to “try to let the ordinary reader in on a conversation …
Ancient cultures, living in harmony with nature…
…wiped out the giant mammals of North America. Hey, nobody’s perfect. Although the IMAX film Sacred Planet (which we just saw over the weekend), which lauds that good old-fashioned lifestyle of living in shacks, spending all of your time trying to scrape together the basics of survival, and being old at 40, would want you …
Another review for Lost in Translation
SF site has posted Georges T. Dodds‘s review of my novel Lost in Translation. He had some problems with it (and his criticisms are fair ones, I think, so my nose isn’t at all out of joint), but even though I’d obviously prefer a rave, as the old saying goes, there ain’t no such thing …
Cat senses
It’s said there are cat people, and there are dog people. Personally, I like both, but if I had to state a preference, I’d probably give the edge to cats. It’s not very often I have an excuse to write about them in this column, but this week I do, because by some coincidence, two …
The quiet bike
A London-based company called Intelligent Energy is bringing to market itsfuel-cell-powered motorbike the ENV (pronounced “envy”). It’s silent, non-polluting, quick and cheap. It’s almost enough to make me by a motorcycle…except I find it almost impossible to buy a helmet to fit my oversized head. (No smart remarks, please.)
Keep your head down…
…and fire this ballistic camera into the air with a grenade launcher to get a bird’s-eye view of the battlefield. A brilliantly simple idea.
The sensory world of cats
It’s said there are cat people, and there are dog people. Personally, I like both, but if I had to state a preference, I’d probably give the edge to cats. It’s not very often I have an excuse to write about them in this column, but this week I do, because by some coincidence, two …
DNA sequencing 100 times faster
Just in time for the release of my book Genetics Demystified comes a new technique for DNA sequencing that is 100 times faster than current methods. Not only does this render a portion of my book slightly obsolete even before it’s published, it could mean big changes in the near future in how we deal …
Surveillance society
Ambivalent about security cameras? How about a world where just about anyone can be tracked at any time, using tools ranging from cameras that can I.D. you by the shape of your ears to scanners that recognize you by your sweat, body odor and skin flakes?
Civil war threatens in Scotland!
Several Scottish cities are arguing over which one is really Montgomery “Scotty” Scott’s home town. I dinna have an opinion, tho’ I have a soft spot in my heart for Edinburgh, having lived there for three weeks one summer.
Bad writing awards are out!
The 2005 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Awards have been presented! Here’s the grand winner: As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire, highly functional yet pleasingly formed, perched prominently on top of the intake manifold, aching for experienced hands, the small knurled caps of the oil …
My latest live walk and vlog
Buy Autographed Books
