Lifeboat Foundation

Our trusted and proven sources were correct once again, as just hours after we broke the news that a Gattaca series is in development at Showtime, The Hollywood Reporter confirmed our exclusive. One of our writers here at Giant Freakin Robot wrote just two weeks ago that the 1997 dystopian sci-fi classic would be perfect as a television series, and it’s amazing how quickly we went from hoping it would happen to confirming that it is. The new series will be coming from the creators of Homeland, Howard Gordan and Alex Gansa.

As noted in our initial report, this is not the first time the film, starring Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, and Jude Law, has been optioned as a series. Back in 2009, Sony attempted to turn the movie into a procedural from Gil Grant, a writer on 24 and NCIS. The underrated cult-classic movie is ideal for transforming into a prestige series on a premium network as its themes on transhumanism, genetic manipulation, and a stratified society have become more relevant as technology leaps forwards every year.

In Gattaca, eugenics separates society into “valids” and “in-valids,” even if genetic discrimination is illegal; that hasn’t stopped businesses from profiling, giving the best jobs to the former and only menial labor opportunities to the latter. Ethan Hawke plays Vincent, an in-valid with a heart defect that uses samples from Jude Law’s Jerome Morrow, a paralyzed Olympic champion swimmer that’s also a valid. Using the purloined DNA, Vincent cons his way into a job at Gattaca Aerospace Corporation, eventually being selected as a navigator for a trip to Saturn’s moon, Titan.

Long-term microgravity exposure causes various biological changes, ranging from bone loss to changes in cardiovascular function.

Towards this, SpaceX’s Dragon cargo ship is set to deliver cardiac tissue chips to the International Space Station (ISS). According to NASA, the cargo spacecraft is expected to autonomously dock with the ISS at 7:52 am EDT Thursday, March 16.

One of the most fundamental rules of physics, undisputed since Einstein first laid it out in 1905, is that no information-carrying signal of any type can travel through the Universe faster than the speed of light. Particles, either massive or massless, are required for transmitting information from one location to another, and those particles are mandated to travel either below (for massive) or at (for massless) the speed of light, as governed by the rules of relativity. You might be able to take advantage of curved space to allow those information-carriers to take a short-cut, but they still must travel through space at the speed of light or below.

Since the development of quantum mechanics, however, many have sought to leverage the power of quantum entanglement to subvert this rule. Many clever schemes have been devised in a variety of attempts to transmit information that “cheats” relativity and allows faster-than-light communication after all. Although it’s an admirable attempt to work around the rules of our Universe, every single scheme has not only failed, but it’s been proven that all such schemes are doomed to failure. Even with quantum entanglement, faster-than-light communication is still an impossibility within our Universe. Here’s the science of why.

There’s a new sight to see in the skies over the eastern seaboard of the United States courtesy of Rocket Lab and NASA.

The space startup is beginning to make a habit of launching its Electron rockets from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. Unlike the majority of space launches in the US that blast off from the far southeastern corner of the country in Florida, some of the nation’s largest population centers have a view of launches from Wallops.

The “Stronger Together” mission is the second launch of the space startup’s Electron rocket from Virginia. Before adding a second launch facility, all of the company’s previous launches were conducted from its primary launch pads in New Zealand over the past couple years.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Four space station astronauts returned to Earth late Saturday after a quick SpaceX flight home.

Their capsule splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico just off the Florida coast.

The U.S.-Russian-Japanese crew spent five months at the International Space Station, arriving last October. Besides dodging space junk, the astronauts had to deal with a pair of leaking Russian capsules docked to the orbiting outpost and the urgent delivery of a replacement craft for the station’s other crew members.

European Space Agency’s suggestions were made for implementing time zones on the Moon.

During a meeting at the European Space Agency’s ESTEC technology center, reports Endgadget, in the Netherlands last year, proposals were made to implement a standard time zone for the moon. This is because people are again interested in returning to the nearest celestial body.

At present, public and private bodies are working on returning to the moon in different parts of the world and in different time zones. This can make it harder for people planning their missions to the moon over the next few years to work together.

“NASA and SpaceX continue to evaluate the weather for the return of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission from the International Space Station,” NASA wrote. “Teams conducted a weather briefing overnight and decided to waive off the initial undocking opportunity for early Thursday, March 9, due to high winds at the splashdown sites. Teams are currently targeting undocking for no earlier than Thursday evening, pending weather.”

It’s the latest in a series of interesting events for Crew-5.

“The universe started throwing curveballs our way, and then it got really crazy,” NASA astronaut Josh Cassada said during a livestreamed in-orbit farewell today (March 8) reflecting on Crew-5’s six-month mission. During their time aboard the orbital lab, two spacecraft docked at the ISS experienced coolant leaks (a Soyuz crew capsule and a Progress cargo vessel, both Russian) and the orbiting complex had to dodge space debris a few times. Nevertheless, all has been righted in time for Crew-5’s departure.

The mission to return humans to the Moon is moving on to its next phase, NASA has announced. While reporting the current analysis of the successful uncrewed Artemis I mission, the agency revealed when the first crewed mission will take place.

Artemis I was the first test flight for NASA’s megarocket Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion spacecraft and spent 25.5 days in space. Artemis II will be the first crewed flight to the Moon before Artemis III actually lands on the lunar surface.

Continue reading “Humans Will Fly Around The Moon In 2024, NASA Announces” »

During a conference with Morgan Stanley, Tesla CEO Elon Musk reiterated the promise that the company’s next-generation vehicle will operate mostly in autonomous mode. The event was primarily focused on Twitter, but Musk fielded questions about Tesla and SpaceX during the latter half of the conference. One of the questions was about the potential capabilities of the company’s upcoming vehicle, which was previously discussed at Tesla’s Investor Day event. The promise of a mostly autonomous vehicle is not new for Tesla, but it continues to generate interest and speculation from investors and the public alike.

Tesla’s upcoming vehicle, which will be manufactured at the company’s latest factory in Mexico, is anticipated to function in “almost entirely autonomous mode.” Tesla has been working on developing Full Self-Driving for a few years now, and the company’s CEO, Elon Musk, has consistently stated for at least four years that Teslas will be able to drive themselves. Despite impressive strides made in this area, Tesla’s vehicles are still not completely capable of autonomous driving.

Continue reading “Elon Musk Just Made a Big Announcement About Tesla’s Next-Gen Vehicle” »