Book Review of THE WICK

“The Wick” by Julianna Baggott is a look into the future of AI (Artificial Intelligence) and Genetic Engineering that is both engrossing and disturbing. The narrative structure itself tells the reader right away that something unusual is going on here. The story is told from the first person point of view of a being we …

Volcanic Precognition

An article in Science relates a study of earthquake activity near volcanoes being used to warn of impending eruptions. The study was based on the Cumbre Vieja volcano on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands chain that erupted last September. Data from the article is shown to the left. This isn’t the …

Midnight at the Well of Souls

Midnight at the Well of Souls by Jack Chalker has been re-released as a CAEZIK Notable book. From the publisher: “CAEZIK Notables is a series of speculative-fiction books marking important milestones in science fiction or fantasy. Each book published in the series has a new introduction highlighting the book’s significance within the genre.” This gives …

Where’s my robot?

As a kid who grew up obsessed with robots, I have to wonder why I’m still mowing my lawn or grocery shopping. Where’s my personal robot? Perhaps the same place my flying car got lost. Oh well. More seriously, we are on the verge of some very cool robotic things. I had the opportunity to …

Alien Radio

No, I’m not talking about Orson Welles invading homes with his War of the Worlds radio broadcast (something I imagine would spread on social media today). I’m talking about radio signals from space finally resolving the Fermi Paradox: Where are all the aliens? Radio signals abound in space from natural phenomena, so an alien signal …

1st Known Alien Comet Visits Solar System

We are currently experiencing the first know visit by an alien comet to our solar system. Last Saturday, 7 December, marked its closest approach to the sun. The only other object ever detect coming in from deep space was a rock. This doesn’t mean this never happened before, only that we’ve recently gotten good at …

Ad Astra’s Inspirational Message

I was stunned to discover an inspirational message within the movie Ad Astra. I’d read about the dramatic cinematography and went into the theatre expecting an entertaining but essentially “light” experience. In all honesty, I’d avoided reading much about it, because I didn’t want to read any spoilers. The only thing that might have given …

Image of a Black Hole Event Horizon

First image from the Event Horizon Telescope, a global collaboration of radio telescopes from around the world, all synthesized into one big virtual telescope. The whole point was to find out what a black hole looks like, and now we have it. This is a bit blurry and low-resolution, but still amazing when you realize …