The Science of STAR WARS….SPOILERS!

By | 2017-12-21T14:41:59-08:00 December 21st, 2017|Astronomy, Featured, Physics, Technology|

There are plenty of concepts in Star Wars that just straight up require a suspension of scientific understanding.  Some of the classic are: no sound in space, explosive fireballs in space, and the basic laws of gravity.  However; all of these blights allow for a more entertaining movie so we allow them without much questioning. Also...why does every spaceship in Star Wars always orientate itself to be right-side up?  There is no right side up in space! The first scene of "The Last Jedi" starts out with an iconic space battle.  Poe Dameron and Leia Skywalker are leading a bombing run on a [...]

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We are the Sims

By | 2016-05-19T10:36:50-07:00 May 2nd, 2016|Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Science|

Think back to the video games of your childhood.  Imagine that one of the characters in your favorite game had such advanced programing that the character itself became "conscious."  What would this character in this video game simulation think?  What would it believe? However strange it may seem, new evidence has the world's leading scientists believing that our universe is simply an incredibly advanced simulation and that we are the sims.     This idea first surfaced in the Greek philosopher Plato's hypothetical scenario: "Plato's Cave."  The story describes 4 prisoners who had been locked up in a cave without ever seeing the [...]

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The Experiment that Changed Everything

By | 2016-03-24T21:01:26-07:00 March 15th, 2016|Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Science|

For 4,000 years we have been fading into the background of existence.  There was a time we thought our local world to be so privileged as we boasted ourselves the center of the universe.  But soon the earth was round, we revolved around the Sun and not the other way around, and the whole planet was just one speck of dust drifting through the cloudy Milky Way.  Our big egos were crushed with every discovery. The final blow came when the Hubble telescope discovered that even our galaxy was not unique; billions more just like it are hiding in every seemingly empty patch [...]

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Let’s Build a Warpdrive

By | 2016-03-27T03:37:35-07:00 February 24th, 2016|Astronomy, Featured, Physics, Science|

If you have read our recent article, or any like it, then you already know about the incredible discovery of Einstein's predicted gravitational waves.  And so, it is time for us to "nerd out" imagining what new technologies could arise from the discovery. It is time for us to build a Warp Drive. Yes, that same legendary Warp Drive you remember from Star Trek is actually based in some concrete scientific fact. How it works: The space in front of the spaceship is condensed while simultaneously the space behind the ship is expanded. This takes an insane amount of energy. A bubble of normal, "flat" [...]

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What are Gravitational Waves and why do I care?

By | 2016-03-02T06:37:34-08:00 February 12th, 2016|Astronomy, Featured, Physics, Science, Technology|

(Image: one of two LIGO research facilities that detected gravitational waves, Washington State)  By now you most likely have heard the news about the discovery of gravitational waves and that it is being lauded as the biggest discovery of the last century. So what is a gravitational wave? Image depicts warping of space around earth. The discovery of a gravitational wave really solidifies a theory that we had a fairly firm understanding of previously.  And that is that that space can be bent and warped in the presence of matter and energy.  This bending is what we call gravity. However; [...]

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My Blind Faith

By | 2016-03-11T04:58:25-08:00 November 10th, 2015|Astronomy, Biology, Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Politics|

"Oh I'm a Christian, so I don't believe in that" is no longer a valid excuse for ignoring concrete scientific facts.  And so it is time for all Christians (including myself) to wake up into the modern scientific age and ask some tough questions about our beliefs or be left at the kids table with the guy who is way too old to still believe in Santa Clause. Christianity needs a scientific revolution. A pursuit as noble as seeking the truth found in Christ has somehow made enemies with a pursuit of the same family; Science, the pursuit of truth found [...]

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Time Traveling Crime Fighters

By | 2016-03-22T04:52:26-07:00 August 17th, 2015|Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Science, Technology|

  "So this is how freedom dies...with thunderous applause." - George Lucas Thousand of miles above crime ridden Mexico City flew the fabled "eye in the sky."  A demo by Persistant Survalence Systems is nothing but a dot in the clouds to those below but up above, an aircraft equipped with high tech cameras is watching every citizen's move. These wide angle cameras can see a huge area of land in high enough definition to track the movement of cars and even people.  All the law enforcement had to do was wait for a crime to be reported. Once a call [...]

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Dark Energy Epicycles

By | 2015-11-11T07:24:39-08:00 July 23rd, 2015|Astronomy, Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Science|

  There is a world hidden from sight.  A world that we cannot touch, see or hear.  It is hidden behind every point of space and every moment of our lives; a dark world that surrounds us.  Or so most scientists believe. Graphic showing how the measured speeds of stars as they get further from the center of their galaxies does not decrease to match calculations. Why do scientists believe in this hidden world?  Because galaxies should simply not exist based on our understanding of gravity and the laws of physics.  These massive collections of stars spin so [...]

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A Something Called Nothing

By | 2016-03-03T06:08:06-08:00 January 27th, 2014|Physics, Science|

  Does "nothing" exist? Here are some DEEPS thoughts about the something we call nothing: 1. The understanding of the zero by ancient cultures such as the Egyptians and Greeks was crucial in the development of trade and economy.  Although, the Greeks still despised the zero integer because of philosophical reasons. 2. Even in an absolute vacuum, theoretical physicists suggest that "virtual particles" are popping in and our of existence and theories argue that there is a positive energy of empty space. 3. Matter in its most simple form, subatomic particles, is best described as only mathematical values in wave [...]

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The Problem of Scale

By | 2016-05-16T22:39:09-07:00 January 16th, 2014|Astronomy, Physics, Science|

  This image is referred to as the "Hubble Deep Field" and it is the single most astonishing picture ever taken.  It is the product of Hubble astronomers' dumb luck as they whimsically aimed the Hubble Telescope at what they thought was an empty space in the sky.  But instead of darkness they found galaxies; billions and billions of hidden galaxies, ghosts caught on film. Patiently, the Hubble Telescope steadily aimed at this dark spot and exposed over 300 images for 10 days.  When the images were merged into one, the black spot was revealed to not be black at [...]

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LFTR’s: Why the future of nuclear energy might never be realized

By | 2016-03-03T06:10:21-08:00 December 5th, 2013|Featured, Physics, Politics, Technology|

Our nation's nuclear reactors are doubling as weapons grade uranium manufacturers. These remnants of the cold war were once designed to not only give our nation energy, but to also produce enough weapons grade uranium to strike fear across the steel curtain. To make things worse, the very common Light Water Reactor (LWR) is inefficient, dangerous, and expensive.

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Elon Musk’s Hyperloop

By | 2016-03-03T06:27:37-08:00 August 17th, 2013|Physics, Politics, Technology|

With the unveiling of his Hyperloop plans, Elon Musk has once again excited tech nerds everywhere with what he proclaims to be the 5th form of transportation joining cars, planes, boats, and trains.  The grandiose design is reminiscent of pneumatic tubes that were once used to send mail (and in one rare case, a cat) across city blocks. The Hyperloop is essentially a large tube connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco with passenger "pods" that would zip around the circular track at record-breaking speeds.  Mr. Musk compares the Hyperloop to an air hockey table, as the passenger pods will be levitated by air currents while they are propelled by [...]

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Citizen Science: Get Involved!

By | 2015-11-11T07:26:44-08:00 August 1st, 2013|Astronomy, Biology, Physics, Politics, Science, Technology|

  Science seeks to harness the brain power of the human population with citizen science projects.  Utilizing the internet, research groups have gamified research for the scientifically curious citizen to help play a role in the advancement of science.  Online programs have been designed to catalog craters on the moon, search for asteroids headed towards earth and identify the creatures of our seas. Clearly, the every day citizen isn't the prefered source for scientific data analysis but there are only so many graduate students to go around.  Because of this, some studies have turned to the average joe to [...]

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The Magic of Science: Is science describing something indescribable?

By | 2015-11-11T07:26:55-08:00 July 16th, 2013|Featured, Physics, Science|

  "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" - Arthur C. Clarke What is the difference between science and magic?  UNDERSTANDING.  A lack of this understanding can wrap us in fear and yet full of wonder.   If science is characterized by an understanding of the laws of nature, then magic must be characterized by a deviation from this natural law. Today's scientific frontier of particle physics sits on this border of science and magic.  As scientists peel away the layers of the atom, they are revealing a very strange reality; a reality more magical than mechanical.  With the emergence of quantum mechanics the [...]

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What are we teaching these kids?!

By | 2015-11-11T07:27:46-08:00 March 18th, 2013|Astronomy, Biology, Featured, Physics, Politics, Science|

  Sadly, the human mind has a limited knowledge capacity.  So why then do our schools continue to waste student's valuable brainpower on outdated paradigms and extinct scientific rationale?  Without even qualifying these dated lessons as science history or as a step in the progress of science, we are building scientific scaffolding in the minds of our young students that leads them to build a incorrect view of our world.  Even more frightening, it could prevent our future generations from being able to progress our scientific understanding. I will consent with Isaac Newton's sentiment that, " we stand on the shoulders of giants," but even Newton [...]

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A Time Traveler’s Quandry

By | 2015-11-11T07:28:11-08:00 January 21st, 2013|Physics, Science, Technology|

  Time is such a familiar mystery.  We boast ourselves intimately acquainted but with one question we are at a loss, straining to describe the face of a stranger. What is time? Einstein describes time as, "the reason things don't happen all at once," even though at times it seems that they do.  However, many people are dissatisfied with such a simplified explanation (and frankly so was Einstein) .  Scientifically, time is most often described as a measure of change.   In a closed system this net change is always from ordered to disordered. For a system to go from configuration A to configuration B, it [...]

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DNA’s Cat in the Bag

By | 2015-11-11T07:30:02-08:00 November 9th, 2012|Biology, Physics, Politics, Technology|

Maurice Wilkins was a chatty Cathy. Steeped in a war of secrecy he handed the opposition his most precious intel and watched them claim victory. Some may think him the fool who let the cat out of the bag, but he just may be the hero science needed. At a time when life was thought to have some immaterial quality, three opposing factions were racing to be the first to give the essence of life a physical explanation. It was a race to see the structure of DNA, the “life molecule”. Maurice Wilkins was working with Roslyn Franklin at Kings [...]

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The Nature of Nature

By | 2015-11-11T07:31:02-08:00 September 27th, 2012|Featured, Physics, Science|

  Science aims to reveal what the world really is.  Not what we think it should be or what we wish it to be but what it truly is.  Science seeks the true nature of nature.  But scientists have become increasingly aware that the world we see is only a shade of reality.  That the true nature of nature is an elusive entity.   An excerpt from my screenplay: "No, the universe doesn't scare me.  In fact, it is the universe’s expanse that entices me.  I find solace in its enormity.  Looking out at the night sky, I see that I am just part of a bigger whole.  And [...]

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Goodbye Blue Sky

By | 2015-11-11T07:31:13-08:00 September 19th, 2012|Astronomy, Physics, Politics, Science, Technology|

  All men have looked up at the sky in wonder, but less have looked down from the sky in awe.  Few have been wrapped in the dark arms of the universe.  And even fewer have seen all of mans existence shrink into a pale blue dot as Carl Sagan so eloquently put it.  These men, through the help of our government were the pioneers of a new frontier.  And their efforts have paved the way for hundreds of new space fearing innovations like satellites, orbiting telescopes, and private space flight.  But even though this innovation has redefined the skyline, it still has found a glass [...]

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What is Real?

By | 2016-04-25T21:47:13-07:00 September 8th, 2012|Featured, Philosophy, Physics, Science|

What can we not doubt? What can we be certain of? It seems all that we can be entirely certain of is that we are in fact experiencing something, even while not knowing quite what it is.  In the words of Decartes, “cogito ergo sum” or  “I think therefore I am,”  our experience is our reality, and our thoughts are our souls.  So how does this consciousness, capable of experiences, stem from matter. “Well whatever matter is made of it clearly isn’t matter” (source unknown).  At least not as defined by common understanding.  We see matter as inanimate, lifeless and [...]

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The Big Freeze

By | 2015-11-11T07:31:58-08:00 September 7th, 2012|Astronomy, Philosophy, Physics, Science, Technology|

Like most landmark discoveries, the history of our universe was stumbled upon by accident.  It seems most game-changing, earth-shattering discoveries are a product of proper planning giving opportunity to dumb luck.  (The discoveries of radiation, the electromagnetic force and penicillin to name a few.) Albert Einstein once said, “Education is what is left after we have forgotten all we have learned in school.” And it seems similarly, scientific break-throughs are what is left after the scientific method breaks down. The discovery that revealed our universe's rich history was the detection of cosmic background radiation, and it was found in a [...]

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