Genetically preparing humans for space exploration – Interview with Christopher Mason

Posted on July 12, 2021 by SpaceScholar

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Christopher Mason Engineering Life to Reach New Worlds

Genetically preparing humans for space exploration – Interview with Christopher Mason

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3yQhVhn

Interview Timeline

Dr. Christopher E. Mason is a geneticist and computational biologist who has been a Principal Investigator and Co-investigator for many NASA missions and projects. He is a Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, with affiliate appointments at the Meyer Cancer Center, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, the Information Society Project (ISP) at Yale Law School, and the Consortium for Space Genetics at Harvard Medical School. He recently wrote a book on modifying humans to explore space. We spoke about the subject. The Next 500 Years: Engineering Life to Reach New Worlds (The MIT Press, 2021)

0:36 – Chris talks about how he got into studying space.

1:47 – Chris talks about how astronauts were examined by ten teams.

2:27 – Chris talks about how his genetics studies were done.

3:44 – Chris talks about genetic material in astronauts versus others who haven’t been in space.

4:43 – Chris explains why he wrote the book on space exploration.

7:35 – Chris talks about the danger of creating super humans to explore space.

9:51 – Chris talks about engineering for emotional hazards.

12:08 – Chris talks about historic genetic engineering.

12:40 – Chris talks about how he extrapolated science 500 years into the future.

14:00 – Chris talks about the business side of this work.

15:14 – Chris talks about Earth uses for space technologies being developed.

17:15 – Chris talks about Chinese genetics research.

19:18 – Chris talks about military research.

20:00 – Chris talks about the current state of genetics especially with astronauts.

22:05 – Chris talks about NASA support for astronaut medical monitoring.

23:05 – Chris talks about growing cells or embryos in space to explore distant space.

25:02 – Chris talks about the appearance of future humans.

26:24 – Chris talks about the morality of engineering embryos.

27:54 – Chris talks about mixing human and animal genes.

29:08 – Chris talks about genetics and cybernetics.

30:33 – Chris talks about his research for the book.

31:35 – Chris talks about his surprise at how much less time the Earth has than he thought.

33:09 – Chris talks about working within a 500 year time frame.

35:17 – Chris talks about the chapters of his book.

39:02 – Chris talks about designing humans for different terrains.

40:51 – Chris talks about cellular and genetic liberty.

42:24 – Chris talks about human bodies adapting to space.

43:08 – Chris talks about extreme environments.

43:55 – Chris talks about new expected discoveries he’s excited about.

45:18 – Chris talks about what alien life might be like.

47:32 – Chris talks about genetic engineering of future alien life.

48:47 – Chris talks about gene drives and dangers with them.

51:12 – Chris talks about teaching science ethics.

52:05 – Chris talks about ethics and genetic duty.

53:07 – Chris talks about hibernation and exoplanets.

56:11 – Chris talks about Estonian contributions to genetics.

56:58 – Chris talks about privacy issues.

57:57 – Chris talks about anti-aging research.

59:19 – Chris is on twitter @mason_lab , on instagram @christopher.e.mason and masonlab.net.

59:49 – Chris talks about wanting to go into space.

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/3yQhVhn

https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/next-500-years

https://twitter.com/mason_lab

https://instagram.com/christopher.e.mason

http://masonlab.net/

Contact Information

For more “Technology and Space” please follow me at technologyandspace.com or www.spacewalksmoneytalks.com , on Facebook at Spacewalks Money Talks, on twitter at SpacewalksMT, on youtube at Spacewalks Money Talks , and on Apple Podcasts / Google Podcasts / Stitcher / Spotify Please see historyrabbithole.com for a list of my dozen or so blogs and podcasts. You’re sure to find something you like.

Guests: Christopher Mason

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: Books, science, space technology, manned space missions, space book, Apollo 11, NASA history, podcast, MIT Press,

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3yQhVhn

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Science New and Old, All Space Technology | Tagged Apollo 11, books, manned space missions, MIT Press, NASA history, podcast, science, space book, space technology | Comments Off

Social design for robots and smart machines – Interview with Carla Diana

Posted on July 10, 2021 by SpaceScholar

Carla Diana is a designer, author, and educator who explores the design of future technologies. She serves as Head of Design for Diligent Robotics. She has designed a range of products and she has written a book on smart machine design concepts. We spoke about machine design and her research. My Robot Gets Me: How Social Design Can Make New Products More Human (Harvard Business Review Press, 2021)

Tags: Books, science, robotics, audio interviews, videos, Harvard Business Review Press,

Posted in All Robotics, All Technology Advances | Tagged audio interviews, books, Harvard Business Review Press, robotics, science, videos | Comments Off

Christa McAuliffe and the Challenger Disaster – an Interview with Kevin Cook

Posted on June 24, 2021 by SpaceScholar

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Kevin Cook The Burning Blue Challenger McAuliffe

Christa McAuliffe and the Challenger Disaster – an Interview with Kevin Cook

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3jbGLnf

Interview Timeline

Kevin Cook has written for many publications and has written numerous histories. His latest book is about Christa McAuliffe and the Challenger disaster. We spoke about the disater and the book. The Burning Blue: The Untold Story of Christa McAuliffe and NASA’s Challenger Disaster (Henry Holt, 2021)

0:36 – Kevin Cook talks about why he wrote a book about McAuliffe and the disaster.

1:54 – Kevin talks about how the book is structured.

3:54 – Kevin talks about McAuliffe’s experiences in joining the program.

5:23 – Kevin talks about writing with a general readership in mind.

9:15 – Kevin talks about researching the aftermath of the disaster.

12:15 – Kevin talks about the restrictions on astronauts in speaking their mind.

14:03 – Kevin talks about the payload specialist program.

16:18 – Kevin talks about the celebrity status and choosing of payload specialists.

19:12 – Kevin talks about McAuliffe’s approach to trying to join the program.

20:46 – Kevin talks about people’s audition tapes for the payload specialist program.

22:12 – Kevin talks about the training process to get ready.

24:17 – Kevin talks about current plans to put civilians into space.

25:14 – Kevin talks about the research for the book.

28:35 – Kevin talks about the diversity of the crew.

30:50 – Kevin talks about what happened after the external tank blew up.

33:34 – Kevin talks about the chapter on the explosion.

35:51 – Kevin talks about what NASA did after the disaster.

36:52 – Kevin goes into more detail about the disaster.

40:01 – Kevin talks about pilot training for disasters.

41:38 – Kevin talks about getting to know about the astronauts during his research.

43:40 – Kevin talks about radio transmissions during the disaster.

45:43 – Kevin talks about getting his book published.

47:17 – Kevin talks about working with Henry Holt.

52:32 – Kevin talks about the publicity stunt aspect of the payload specialist program.

53:16 – Kevin can be found at burningbluebook.com

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/3jbGLnf

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250755551

https://www.burningbluebook.com/

Contact Information

Guests: Kevin Cook

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: Books, space history, manned space missions, audio interviews, space book, NASA history, podcast, Henry Holt,

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3jbGLnf

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Space Program History | Tagged audio interviews, books, Henry Holt, manned space missions, NASA history, podcast, space book, space history | Comments Off

How Google, Facebook, and other tech companies developed their AI – Interview with Cade Metz

Posted on May 31, 2021 by SpaceScholar

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Cade Metz Genius Makers

How Google, Facebook, and other tech companies developed their AI – Interview with Cade Metz

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/34x95rF

Interview Timeline

Cade Metz is a technology correspondent with The New York Times, covering artificial intelligence, driverless cars, robotics, virtual reality, and other emerging areas. He was previously a senior staff writer with Wired magazine. He’s recently published a book based on his research into the technology world and we spoke about how artificial intelligence has been developed and used by major tech companies. Genius Makers: The Mavericks Who Brought AI to Google, Facebook, and the World (Dutton, 2021)

0:37 – Cade talks about being a technology journalist.

1:16 – Cade talks about neural networks.

2:50 – Cade talks about Jeff Heaton and speech recognition.

4:49 – Cade talks about the details of a neural network.

6:43 – Cade talks about the computing power and data needed to create neural networks.

7:58 – Cade talks about the use of the data that is processed.

9:36 – Cade talks about how fringe the neural network concept was.

11:51 – Cade talks about the movement from the academic world to the corporate world.

13:38 – Cade talks about innovation and intellectual property.

14:41 – Cade talks about the global companies the book covers.

16:10 – Cade talks about personnel turnover between these companies and the idealism among some of the researchers.

18:31 – Cade talks about the improvements being made in artificial intelligence.

21:54 – Cade talks about how Amazon does its research.

22:40 – Cade talks about neural networks learning from text.

24:31 – Cade talks about the improvement in query services.

26:02 – Cade explains why the term neural is used in this technology.

27:14 – Cade talks about the various academics used to develop this technology.

28:57 – Cade talks about surveillance fears about this technology.

32:20 – Cade talks about imagery data making this technology more powerful.

33:05 – Cade talks about the research he did for the book.

33:32 – Cade talks about dealing with people getting upset with his research.

34:13 – cade explains that most of the researchers in this field were not researching in the US.

35:31 – Cade talks about the impact of immigration policies on this research.

36:40 – Cade talks about using this technology to create new things.

38:22 – Cade talks about the national security issues with artificial intelligence.

40:30 – Cade talks about quantum computing and artificial intelligence.

42:36 – Cade talks about the sale of Heaton’s services.

43:51 – Cade talks about some of the factors in Heaton’s decision.

45:11 – Cade talks about some of the decisions that surprised him.

46:49 – Cade talks about leadership turnover in these tech companies.

48:16 – Cade talks about Elon Musk’s efforts in AI.

50:37 – Cade talks about the emotional aspects of this story.

53:17 – Cade talks about Jeff Heaton’s style of humor.

56:51 – Cade is @cademetz on twitter and has a writer’s page on the NY Times.

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/34x95rF

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/565698/genius-makers-by-cade-metz/

https://twitter.com/CadeMetz

Contact Information

Guests: Cade Metz

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: Books, artificial intelligence, audio interviews, podcast, Dutton,

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/34x95rF

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Artificial Intelligence | Tagged artificial intelligence, audio interviews, books, Dutton, podcast | Comments Off

How Elon Musk and SpaceX overcame early problems to dominate the space industry – Interview with Eric Berger

Posted on May 24, 2021 by SpaceScholar

How Elon Musk and SpaceX overcame early problems to dominate the space industry – Interview with Eric Berger

Eric Berger is a Houston-based reporter and editor. He reported for the Houston Chronicle and is now the senior space editor for Ars Technica. He was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for his coverage of Hurricane Ike and most recently wrote a book on the early days of SpaceX. We spoke about SpaceX, Elon Musk, the space industry, and his work. Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days That Launched SpaceX (William Morrow, 2021)

Tags: Books, space business, space history, space technology, manned space missions, space book, NASA history, videos, William Morrow,

Posted in All Space Business, All Space Program History | Tagged books, manned space missions, NASA history, space book, space business, space history, space technology, videos, William Morrow | Comments Off

How we can become better partners with our robots and smart machines – Interview with Carla Diana

Posted on May 17, 2021 by SpaceScholar

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How we can become better partners with our robots and smart machines – Interview with Carla Diana

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3bAgdHL

Interview Timeline

0:39 – Carla talks about how she got into the study of human-smart machine interaction.

3:46 – Carla talks about mass market machines versus cutting edge technologies.

6:32 – Carla talks about the book and approaches to human-machine interaction.

14:05 – Carla talks how human machines should be. She discusses the Robopsych podcast she’s part of.

19:39 – Carla talks about interactions between children and robotic devices.

22:43 – Carla talks about robots working with people lacking some senses or limbs.

26:10 – Carla talks creating machines that don’t need an instruction manual.

29:34 – Carla compares robot and computer design principles.

31:37 – Carla talks about the framework of the book.

37:09 – Carla talks about machines collecting information they don’t directly need.

39:33 – Carla talks about users competing to use a machine.

41:40 – Carla talks about the terms host and guest.

43:15 – Carla talks about the research she did for the book and the people she interviewed for the book.

46:51 – Carla talks about cultural impacts on design.

50:35 – Carla talks about affective computing.

52:47 – Carla talks about privacy issues with machines.

1:06:25 – Carla can be found on instagram, facebook and twitter @carladiana and at carladiana.com.

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/3bAgdHL

https://store.hbr.org/product/my-robot-gets-me-how-social-design-can-make-new-products-more-human/10192?sku=10192E-KND-ENG

https://instagram.com/carladiana

https://carladiana.squarespace.com/

https://twitter.com/carladiana_

https://www.facebook.com/carla.diana.design

Contact Information

Guests: Carla Diana

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: Books, science, robotics, audio interviews, podcast, Harvard Business Review Press,

Check out the book here https://amzn.to/3bAgdHL

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Robotics | Tagged audio interviews, books, Harvard Business Review Press, podcast, robotics, science | Comments Off

Today in Space and Science History: May 12

Posted on May 12, 2021 by SpaceScholar

Today in Space and Science History: May 12

May 12 1803 – German scientist Justus von Liebig born https://amzn.to/3fc0WOz
May 12 1880 – American explorer Lincoln Ellsworth born https://amzn.to/3bonn1T
May 12 1886 – German Zeppelin captain Ernst A. Lehmann born https://amzn.to/3hq21ov
May 12 1895 – American chemist William Giauque born https://amzn.to/3obA8BX
May 12 1902 – John Bruce Medaris born https://amzn.to/33ArkMw
May 12 1910 – British chemist Dorothy Hodgkin born https://amzn.to/3faIXYJ
May 12 1916 – Bernhard Hohmann born
May 12 1922 – Abram Moiseyevich Genin born
May 12 1924 – Russian mathematician Alexander Esenin-Volpin born
May 12 1950 – Last flight of the XS-1
May 12 1965 – Soviet spacecraft Luna-5 crashes on the moon https://amzn.to/33COmSV
May 12 1967 – French mathematician Mireille Bousquet-Mélou born
May 12 1977 – Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani born https://amzn.to/3vX1zlN
May 12 2000 – Final spacewalk at Mir space station https://amzn.to/3hmeObq

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Today in Space and Science History: May 11

Posted on May 11, 2021 by SpaceScholar

Today in Space and Science History: May 11

May 11 1752 – German scientist Johann Freidrich Blumenbach born https://amzn.to/3y2JwfN
May 11 1781 – The Sombrero Galaxy is discovered https://amzn.to/3bj1jpa
May 11 1871 – American astronomer Frank Schlesinger born https://amzn.to/3bebY4D
May 11 1875 – American aviation pioneer Harriet Quimby born https://amzn.to/3bB8VUr
May 11 1881 – Austro-Hungarian scientist Theodore von Kármán born https://amzn.to/3eENBzf
May 11 1918 – American physicist Richard Feynman born https://amzn.to/3o7XOaq
May 11 1924 – British astronomer Antony Hewish born https://amzn.to/33wAY2G
May 11 1930 – Dutch computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra born https://amzn.to/3tBInID
May 11 1997 – Deep Blue defeats Garry Kasparov in a chess match https://amzn.to/3uzKqya
May 11 2001 – Extraterrestrial bacteria found in a meteorite by University of Naples researchers https://amzn.to/3f9TeEy

More Space and Science trivia collection

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Artificial Intelligence, All Astronomy, All Coding and Computing, All Science New and Old, All Space Program History | Tagged today | Comments Off

Today in Space and Science History: May 10

Posted on May 10, 2021 by SpaceScholar

Today in Space and Science History: May 10

May 10 1930 American physicist and Nobel prize winner George E. Smith born
May 10 1958 American astronaut Ellen Ochoa born https://amzn.to/2Q6c1rV

More Space and Science trivia collection

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Posted in All Science New and Old, All Space Program History | Tagged today | Comments Off

How astronomers can find extra-terrestrial life with Cesare Barbieri

Posted on May 10, 2021 by SpaceScholar

Cesare Barbieri is Emeritus Professor of Astronomy at the University of Padova, Italy. He and his teams have been involved in the construction of various astronomical instruments. He recently wrote a book on the methods to discover extra-terrestrial life. We spoke about the book and his work. A Brief Introduction to the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Life (CRC Press, 2021)

https://youtu.be/gMXA49c86V0

Tags: Books, astronomy, space technology, audio interviews, space book, videos, CRC Press,

Posted in All Astronomy | Tagged astronomy, audio interviews, books, CRC Press, space book, space technology, videos | Comments Off

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