Exploring how computers, AI, and other technologies are impacting our lives.
Plastic is firmly established in our daily lives, but it’s only existed for about a century or so. As we consider the long-term harms of rapidly accruing pollution, it begs the question…would it be so bad to finally break up with plastics? And is it even possible at
Let’s Stop Pretending AI Is New I’ve been thinking a lot about generative AI lately. It’s kind of hard not to with the latest ChatGPT announcement. The technologies we’re witnessing are powerful, impressive, and developing fast. Everything you’re been seeing on screen, for example, is
Where I live in New England in the winter it can get as low as -13 F (-25 C). During summer heatwaves, it can reach over 100 F (40 C). Many of our houses and homes weren’t built for that, and in the United States, we aren’t exactly
If your taste in TV is anything like mine, then most of your familiarity with what analog computing looks like probably comes from the backdrops of Columbo. Since digital took over the world, analog has been sidelined into what seems like a niche interest at best. But this retro approach
Airships: the number one sign that you’re in an alternate universe, or a Miyazaki movie. While they may seem like a bad idea, because they’re not as fast as planes or as powerful as freighters, airships actually sit in a goldilocks zone in between them. There are some
3D printing rocket engines? It seems like these days you can 3D print just about anything. Just on this channel, we’ve talked about 3D printed next-gen perovskite solar panels, houses, and the development of advanced toroidal propellers for boats and drones. So you probably shouldn’t be surprised to
How can CO2 actually help us keep the planet cooler? When it's the refrigerant in a heat pump! And these heat pumps can warm your house while they heat your water. All while being more than twice as energy efficient as their competitors, at least according to some
The saying goes that “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” and as we speak, researchers around the globe are experimenting with taking this phrase literally. Right now, it’s possible to turn leftovers from brewing beer into batteries and to generate electricity from wastewater. There’s a
Hey, want to hear the most annoying sound in the world? Okay, “most annoying” may be subjective, but according to a 2017 study from NASA’s Langley branch, humans find the buzz of a drone’s propellers to be more annoying than any other machine-based sound on earth, which really
The vast majority of the world’s plastic isn’t recycled … and when it is, we spend more money to achieve less quality. It’s currently cheaper to keep producing newer plastics — at the much higher cost of human and environmental health. But nature has evolved in response. Several species
As our needs for energy and food continue to rise, we’re revisiting the sunny topic of Agrivoltaics - or using land to grow food and host solar panels at the same time. Experiments in this hot space have had some really promising results over the last year, like using
To live, people need food to eat and water to drink. That’s a simple fact. But with growing water scarcity around the world and an ever increasing population, we have to find better ways to produce the food we all need to survive. The solution could lie in one