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BBtv’s Xeni Jardin is joined by astronaut and American hero Buzz Aldrin, Virgin Galactic founder Sir Richard Branson, Scaled Composites founder Burt Rutan, and other space luminaries for an exploration of private space travel — the technology, the science, and the human experience. We fly to the Mojave spaceport to witness the unveiling of WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft that will carry SpaceShipTwo and passengers on Virgin Galactic suborbital space flights. BBtv online: tv.boingboing.net

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An Oklahoman has a revolutionary new plan for an old air base to be transformed into a 21st century space port. Fascinating video from BBC show ‘Space Tourist’.

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Scientists at CERN work with the world’s largest particle accelerator and are asking the question, is time travel not only possible–but inevitable? Naked Science: Time Machine : THURS SEPTEMBER 11 10P et/pt : channel.nationalgeographic.com

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Richard Dawkins: it seems that it would take less than half a million years to evolve a good camera eye … It’s no wonder ‘the’ eye has evolved at least 40 times independently around the animal kingdom … It is a geological blink. This is one of the hardest lessons for humans to learn. We cannot admit that things might be neither good nor evil, neither cruel nor kind, but simply callous – indifferent to all suffering, lacking all purpose. if there is only one Creator who made the tiger and the lamb, the cheetah and the gazelle, what is He playing at? Is he a sadist who enjoys spectator blood sports? … Is he manuvering to maximize David Attenborough’s television ratings? … the true utility function of life, that which is being maximized in the natural world, is DNA survival. But DNA is not floating free; it is locked up in living bodies and it has make the most of the levers of power at its disposal. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference. The universe is a strange and wondrous place. The truth is quite odd enough to need no help from pseudoscientific charlatans. You could give Aristotle a tutorial. And you could thrill him to the core of his being … Such is the privilege of living after Newton, Darwin, Einstein, Planck, Watson, Crick and their colleagues. For the first half of geological time our ancestors were bacteria. Most …

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Time travel theorists ask, what if we could send scientific and medical information through time–perhaps a cure for AIDS? Naked Science: Time Machine : THURS SEPTEMBER 11 10P et/pt : channel.nationalgeographic.com

Science with Dr Michio Kaku: Asteroid detector

Michio Kaku talks to Bill Hemmer about a new Asteroid dectector

Big Spiritual Science

A lot of the language around science seems to want to provoke a feeling in the reader/listener akin to the ‘spiritual’. It is found in mild form in authors such as Dawkins and Hawking, and especially Sagan, who use poetic turns of phrase which seem crafted to infer spiritual sensations such as awe, connection with eternity or the infinite, purposiveness, mindfulness etc. This spiritualisation of science is very present in many Youtube videos, which combine aphorisms and ideas appropriated from the sciences, often accompanied by inspirational images taken by the Hubble space telescope or of the Large Hadron Collider with an appropriately ‘cosmic’ musical soundtrack. In general this is all well and good. Science isn’t made any more or less valid by its spiritualisation so if it helps with understanding or appreciation then that’s fine by me. What does concern me is the type of science that tends to feature in these epiphanies and the version of spirituality which is thereby implied. The most iconic images for spiritual science (apart from QM) tend to come from those scientific endeavours I mention above; the Hubble Space Telescope and the LHC, both examples of ‘Big Science’. The LHC has cost in the region of £5.6 Billion, ($9 Billion), and the Hubble slightly more so far; money which could have been spent elsewhere, possibly to better effect. As a point of contrast, suppose that amount had been invested in human welfare, perhaps the feeding of starving children (£0.82 per …

Symphony of Science – ‘Our Place in the Cosmos’ (ft. Sagan, Dawkins, Kaku, Jastrow)

MP3: symphonyofscience.com “Our Place in the Cosmos”, the third video from the Symphony of Science, was crafted using samples from Carl Sagan’s Cosmos, Richard Dawkins’ Genius of Charles Darwin series, Dawkins’ TED Talk, Stephen Hawking’s Universe series, Michio Kaku’s interview on Physics and aliens, plus added visuals from Baraka, Koyaanisqatsi, History Channel’s Universe series, and IMAX Cosmic Voyage. The themes present in this song are intended to explore our understanding of our origins within the universe, and to challenge the commonplace notion that humans have a superior or privleged position, both on our home planet and in the universe itself. RIP Dr. Sagan and Dr. Jastrow! For more science remixes, check out http As always, view in HQ mode for better sound and visuals. Enjoy! John john@symphonyofscience.com Lyrics: [Narrator] With every century Our eyes on the universe have been opened anew We are witness To the very brink of time and space [Robert Jastrow] We must ask ourselves We who are so proud of our accomplishments What is our place in the cosmic perspective of life? [Carl Sagan] The exploration of the cosmos Is a voyage of self discovery As long as there have been humans We have searched for our place in the cosmos [Richard Dawkins] Are there things about the universe That will be forever beyond our grasp? Are there things about the universe that are Ungraspable? [Sagan] One of the great revelations of space exploration Is the image of the earth, finite …

Symphony of Science – ‘We Are All Connected’ (ft. Sagan, Feynman, deGrasse Tyson & Bill Nye)

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Sunday, November 5th – Neil deGrasse Tyson and VS Ramachandran discuss the scientific findings of prayer studies. www.beyondbelief2006.org therareoften.blogspot.com