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Univac - Early Computer
Photo Source - Library Of Congress

When we hear of super computers being built, they are usually used for scientific purposes. Weather prediction is one function that you just can't seem to get enough computing power for. Another one relates to nuclear weapons and still another astronomy, just to mention a few. There is going to be a change in this philosophy soon however. AMD, Advanced Mirco Devices and the main competitor to Intel, has announced that it is going to build a super computer. Not your run of the mill supercomputer, but one that will be dedicated to games. No you will not be able to afford one for your home, that is not its purpose. It will be used as a sort of game server. The idea is for it to use its over 1,000 graphic processors to render all the effects in a game right on the computer and then you will be able to play the game with the advanced effects on a simple computer, because the rendering will already be done for you. Presently the two fastest computers in the world run on AMD chips.

If you thought that the only way to make a pair of eyeglasses was to grind lenses and put them into a frame, you would have been right a couple of years ago, but a British inventor has changed all that. He has figured out how to use water that is trapped inside a membrane. He used the principle that the thicker a lens is, the more powerful it becomes. The owner just takes a syringe and adds or reduces the amount of liquid in the membrane, until he finds the right prescription for his particular eye problem. While this probably won't catch on in the western world, it is just the ticket for those in the third world that can not afford glasses. This should be a very valuable asset to them.

Earthquake Damage
Photo Source: NASA

Where in the U.S. would you least expect earthquakes to appear? Sure we know that they have hit California quite a few times causing tremendous damage, but there are other areas of this country that could also have a major quake at any time. The Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant, in New York is built on a fault, but luckily there is no real seismic activity there. This is not the case for Arkansas. Recently a series of small quakes rattled central Arkansas and scientists are warning that these could be the precursor of the big one. The quakes were very tiny and at the bottom end of the scale that people could feel, so some people may not have even noticed them, but they were relevant. What really has scientists worried is the fact that central Arkansas has no seismic history. One scientist stated, "It is abnormal. It is significant. We need to carefully watch this activity."

NASA Balloon Probe
Photo Source: NASA

What is that sound that was picked up from a distant area of space? It sounded like a roar. Scientists are puzzled by it? You are not going to find too many sound waves traveling in space. Even if you did, sound moves very slowly compared to light. Sound, depending on what it is moving through travels about 700 miles per hour, give or take about 50 miles per hour for temperature, while the accepted speed of radio waves and light is 186,000 miles per second. That is quite a difference. We know that heavenly bodies emit radio waves that contain strange sounds and the sound the scientists are hearing is probably from a star or planet. In 2006 NASA launched an atmospheric probe that went to an altitude of 120,000 feet. Its mission was to search for heat from first generation stars. Instead it picked up this booming noise from space. A scientist stated, “The universe really threw us a curve. Instead of the faint signal we hoped to find, here was this booming noise six times louder than anyone had predicted."

Some scientists are pushing for the sharing of nuclear secrets. No they don't want to give them to other countries. What they want us to do is share some of the information with different law enforcement agencies, so that they will be better qualified to detect people trying to sneak nuclear components into the country. It is felt that if those in law enforcement knew the basic principles involved in building a nuclear device, they would be better prepared to stop this from happening. Others worry that this might cause nuclear secrets to fall into the hands of people that are a threat to us. It seems that the ones that are already a threat know what they need to construct a nuclear weapon, so this doesn't seem like a valid argument to me.

Scientists have been examining bodies from the deadly 1918 flu pandemic and now they think that they have found out why it was so deadly. They are saying that there are three genes in the human body that allowed the flu to get into the lungs and cause pneumonia. This discovery has led scientists to the assumption that a mutation might turn the ordinary flu that we experience, into another deadly pandemic. Pneumonia is not always caused by flu however, sometimes it is caused by bacteria. I don't know how happy I am knowing that scientists are experimenting with deadly flu germs. There are cases on record where germs have gotten out of labs.

Speaking of germs, it is being said that Al-Qaeda, in their rush to develop biological weapons, had one of their cells wiped out by the Black Plague. Supposedly there were 40 Al-Qaeda members working on trying to weaponize this stuff and it got away from them and killed them all. It is being said that their lab was in an Al-Qaeda training camp, so you have to wonder how many others will die from their mistake? It is being said that Al-Qaeda is planning to send people with infectious diseases walking through our cities.