So let me post (now and then) some GOOD news. Links and other items suggesting that a brash and bold modernist agenda is still underway, based upon science, engineering and goal-oriented futurism, applied to improve both human society and human life.
No, I will NOT be gushing with optimism. For that, turn to Ray Kurzweil's Singularity is Near! materials, promising immortality and omniscience for everybody within a few short years. Actually, I believe talk like this may be helping to drive the anti-modernist movement into its recent frantic fury and rejection of the future. I doubt that it helps very much to tell average folk "we're a-gonna make gods of ya, whether you like it or don't!"
Such talk is guaranteed to provoke a backlash, and not only among middle americans. It underlies the passionate nostalgia and dread of change that we see expressed cogently by Bill Joy, perniciously by Francis Fukayama, and lividly in the purple novels of Michael Crichton and Margaret Atwood. The politically-correct Left and the apocalypt-klepto Right are fast becoming as fixated against tomorrow as any Islamist sheik.
1. Meeting global energy needs with clean solutions
Headline: Smog fight aided by self-cleaning materials News source: The Washington Post by Karl Ritter, UPI . In a test in 2003, the company coated 75,000 square feet of road surface on the outskirts of Milan with photocatalytic cement. It found nitrogen oxide levels were reduced by up to 60 percent, depending on weather conditions.
A similar experiment in France found nitrogen oxide levels were 20 percent to 80 percent lower in a wall plastered with photocatalytic cement than one with regular cement. Encouraged by such results, the European Union last year earmarked $2.27 billion for a project to develop "smart" construction materials that would break down nitrogen oxides and other toxic substances, such as benzene.
-----------------------
2. Providing abundant clean water globally
Headline: Bacteria drive biochip sensor News source: Technology Research News
Researchers are working to connect living cells to computer chips to gain the best of both worlds. Living cells are terrific sensors, and can also be used to evaluate and emulate biological behavior, while electronics are exemplary at serving up data.
Researchers from Tel Aviv University in Israel have built an electrochemical nano-biochip that detects toxic water.
-----------------------
3. Increasing the health and longevity of human life
Headline: Nanotech used to target, kill cancer cells News source: San Jose Mercury News by Lisa M. Krieger
-----------------------
4. Maximizing the productivity of agriculture
-----------------------
5. Making powerful information technology available everywhere
-----------------------
6. Enabling the development of space
Headline: The Next Giant Leap in Space Exploration The science of nanotechnology could lead to radical improvements for space exploration.
==> more soon...
