MindStretch With Fletch

Sharing info for exploring reality, beliefs, and ideas to stretch your mind.

Flips

Our big cities are vulnerable to ‘inevitable’ pandemic
news.com.au - Nick Whigham
Our cities are facing a growing vulnerability to pandemics, a University of Sydney research team has found. A large jump in arrivals by air and …
Scientists Genetically Engineer Living Cells to Store “Memories” in Their DNA
futurism.com - Cecille De Jesus
A More Complex Memory Capability For the first time ever, biological engineers from MIT have found a way to make cells “remember” past events. Of …
Opening Pandora’s Box: Gene Editing and Its Consequences
theepochtimes.com - John Bergeron
Today, the scientific community is aghast at the prospect of gene editing to create “designer” humans. Gene editing may be of greater consequence …
On the age of computation in the epoch of humankind
nature.com - Christoph Rosol,Benjamin Steininger,Jürgen Renn &Robert Schlögl
We live in a moment of profound transitions caused by the accelerating dynamics of planetary change. The digital transformation is an important …
The End Of The World with Josh Clark
stitcher.com
There’s one last thing. Maybe the reason why we don’t see other intelligent life, maybe the reason we are in the astoundingly unique position of …
Earth Is Totally Unprepared For a Surprise Asteroid Strike, NASA Scientists Warn
ScienceAlert - BEC CREW
NASA is certainly not in the business of spreading panic over asteroid strikes - every time one comes close, we see yet another press release telling …
Coronary Heart Disease
50 Years Ago, Sugar Industry Quietly Paid Scientists To Point Blame At Fat
NPR - Camila Domonoske
In the 1960s, the sugar industry funded research that downplayed the risks of sugar and highlighted the hazards of fat, according to a newly published article in JAMA Internal Medicine. The article draws
In time warping study, people unconsciously controlled blood sugar levels
Ars Technica - Beth Mole
Researchers suggest well-timed placebos may be useful in managing type 2 diabetes. Ideas can be powerful drugs. If a person is simply convinced that a …
Scientists Create Successful Biohybrid for 3-D Printing, Genetic Engineering
Inc Magazine
Solar cell sucks up CO2 and spits burnable fuel out the other side
newatlas.com - Nick Lavars
Recreating a plant's ability to use sunlight to turn carbon dioxide into fuel, something known as artificial photosynthesis, is one of the holy …
IVF
In 20 Years, Couples Won't Have Sex to Reproduce, Says Genetics Expert
bigthink.com
The 1932 dystopian masterpiece Brave New World opens with a tour of the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, where genetically engineered …
Why we feel emotions in our guts, and what microbes have to do with it
Los Angeles Times - By Deborah Netburn
In the dark, oxygen-free zone of our large intestines, a vast community of life is flourishing. Scientists say there are more than 100 trillion microbes living there, and if you gathered them all together,
The Top 10 Emerging Technologies Of 2016 [INFOGRAPHIC]
valuewalk.com
The Top 10 Emerging Technologies Of 2016 by Jeff Desjardins, Visual Capitalist Sometimes the world is not yet ready for a new technology to enter the …
Business Insider
facebook.com
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There's Very Little Evidence That Flossing Actually Works
iflscience.com - By Tom Hale
Don't lie, everybody exaggerates how often they floss when they go to the dentist. However, maybe there’s no need to feel wracked with guilt the next …
Researchers think we may have to protect our brains from hackers in a few years
TNW - Bryan Clark
What if hackers could one day control your mind, or at least take a glimpse inside, through the use of sophisticated malware? It’s a scenario that’s sounds straight out of a science fiction novel, but
Carbon Dioxide
Scientists turn CO2 into fuel with solar power
Engadget - Daniel Cooper
Which could spell the end for traditional gasoline production. Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago believe that they've perfected the art of photosynthetic solar cells. It's a technology
Neuroscientists Still Don’t Know Why Music Sounds Good
WIRED - Chelsea Leu
Your taste in music is weird. Maybe you just can’t stop listening to that power ballad, or you’ve wondered about your bewildering weakness for …
"In the future we will all be homeless" says co-living entrepreneur
dezeen.com - Jessica Mairs
Amazing NASA Time Lapse Shows a Year on Earth From Space
slate.com - Phil Plait
NASA has released a pretty amazing video: It consists of more than 3,000 images of Earth taken by the Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) on …
Geophysicists just debunked a key assumption about how Earth's continents formed
Business Insider - Erin Brodwin
Over tens of millions of years, as the familiar story goes, these giant hunks of rock slowly split apart, breaking up at a rate of just a millimeter — a little more than the thickness of a credit card
5 prescription drugs doctors had no idea could hurt their patients
ted.com - Shirin Samimi-Moore
As a doctor, Ben Goldacre likes to have all the available facts about a prescription drug before he even thinks about prescribing it. However, when it …
Diapers
Why cloth diapers might not be the greener choice, after all
The Washington Post - By Kendyl Salcito
The invaluable yet lowly diaper was first mass-produced in 1887, a rectangle of oft-soiled, washable cotton fabric unimproved for more than 60 years, until a disposable version appeared. Ever since, the
The Chemistry Of Titan Could Pave The Way For Future Life
iflscience.com - By Robin Andrews
The precursors to life may be on Saturn’s smoggy moon Titan, but not in the way you think. Far from there being DNA or RNA drifting around the muddy …
Tesla
The mind behind Tesla, SpaceX, SolarCity ...
ted.com - Elon Musk
Entrepreneur Elon Musk is a man with many plans. The founder of PayPal, Tesla Motors and SpaceX sits down with TED curator Chris Anderson to share …
How to read the genome and build a human being
ted.com - Riccardo Sabatini
Secrets, disease and beauty are all written in the human genome, the complete set of genetic instructions needed to build a human being. Now, as …
This computer will grow your food in the future
ted.com - Caleb Harper
What if we could grow delicious, nutrient-dense food, indoors anywhere in the world? Caleb Harper, director of the Open Agriculture Initiative at the …
Aging
A roadmap to end aging
ted.com - Aubrey de Grey
Cambridge researcher Aubrey de Grey argues that aging is merely a disease -- and a curable one at that. Humans age in seven basic ways, he says, all …
We can reprogram life. How to do it wisely
ted.com - Juan Enriquez
For four billion years, what lived and died on Earth depended on two principles: natural selection and random mutation. Then humans came along and …