Gene Ray and Time Cube Theory

This weeks episode of Righteous Indignation (Ep.70) introduced me to one of my new favorite conspiracies of all time. I'm a little late to the party given that the website around which this particular conspiracy revolves has been up since 97 and has well over a million hits. But I figured since I've never heard of it before then surely some of you haven't either, so why not share.

The Time Cube is self-proclaimed "Dr. of Cubicicsm" and "Wisest man who ever lived" Gene Ray's personal theory of reality and revolves around his assertion that the concept of a linear 24 hour day is an evil lie and that the Earth actually experiences 4 simultaneous days in a single rotation.

See if you can follow this "explanation" of the theory taken from timecube.com:

"When the Sun shines upon Earth, 2 – major Time points are created on opposite sides of Earth – known as Midday and Midnight. Where the 2 major Time forces join, synergy creates 2 new minor Time points we recognize as Sunup and Sundown.

The 4-equidistant Time points can be considered as Time Square imprinted upon the circle of Earth. In a single rotation of the Earth sphere, each Time corner point rotates through the other 3-corner Time points, thus creating 16 corners, 96 hours and4-simultaneous 24 hour Days within a single rotation of Earth – equated to a Higher Order of Life Time Cube."

The website as a whole is a collection of borderline incoherent, and at times racist, antisemitic, homophobic, and violent ramblings about everything from the nature of time itself to religion, mainstream educators, which Ray describes as evil for refusing to teach his theory, and society as a whole, all printed in large, multicolored type set in the center of two pages worth of text which seem to scroll on forever.

As you might expect, Gene is regarded as a nut by most, seen by many as potentially mentally ill, and his theory is not accepted by mainstream science, despite Ray's assertion that his discovery is "the holy grail of physics" and his promise of 10,000 dollars to any scientist or institution that can disprove his theory. And while it's unclear what it was that triggered Ray's seeming break with reality, what ever it was seems to have begun long before he gained infamy as the man who created timecube.com.

In the 1970's Gene Ray was known around St. Petersburg Fl, apparently quite fondly, as Mr. Marbles for his advocacy of the once popular pass time which he authored a book about entitled, "Mr. Marble-Marbles for Everyone", and was even successful in convincing the Mayor of St. Petersburg to devote an entire week to marbles. But then, around 1987, Ray's passion for marbles evolved into a strange metaphor for a new found personal philosophy centering around the concept of the circle and the pyramid.

In Ray's new found "Order of the Sphere" the circle came to represent the "circular cycle", which he described as Natural, mobile, and self-sustaining. While the Pyramid was used to represent what he called the unsustainable increasing growth rate of modern civilization - which he believed had grown to the point of breaking the family circle. Ray's solution to this problem of "pyramiding" progress, was a proposed 1 million dollar marbles tournament. Which he believed would attract people who were concerned with the long-term implications of pyramiding growth, people who could then be convinced of the validity of his philosophy by playing marbles inside a giant sphere. It was shortly after this failed proposal that Ray disappeared from the public eye, until august of 1997 when he introduced the world to "Time Cube Theory".

-CAINE-

Source: Righteous Indignation

Given the sheer volume of material contained on Ray's website I couldn't possibly hope to cover it all in a single reasonably sized entry so for more information on Ray and his theory go to: WordIQ.com

Life-like Japanese Robot Mimics Facial Expressions

In this video the newest version of Japanese roboticist Hiroshi Ishiguro's Geminoid robot, Actoid-F, is set up to observe and mimic human facial expressions. The results are not only astonishing, but also not the least bit creepy.

While there are moments in the video when the robots displays the tell-tale jerky movements we've all come to associate with animatronics, particularly when it nods it's head towards then end. And the intermittent noise of the compressor needed to supply air to power the actuators beneath the android's skin kicking on also detracts rather harshly from the illusion. I was genuinely surprised by the life-like appearance of the robots face and most of all, it's skin.

Like it's predecessors Active-F is a teleoperated android, meaning it is remotely controlled by a human user, and will first be put into public use in Japanese hospitals where the machine will be used to observe patients. What could possibly be creepy about that?


-CAINE-

Source: Gizmodo Also check out the following article on IEEE Spectrum for a more detailed and technical article on Ishiguro's newest creation

Biotech Company Begins First Human Embryonic Stem Cell Trial

Earlier this month the Geron Corporation began the first Human embryonic stem cell trial. This trial, which began October 8th in the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, Georgia, is expected to involve 10 patients, all of whom must have severe spinal cord injuries and begin treatment within 14 days after sustaining their injuries.

Participants in the trial will receive a single injection containing 2 million of Geron's GRNOPC1 cells and will then be monitored for a year to look for any sign of negative side-effects or regained function or sensation in their lower extremities. Assuming this initial group is found to suffer no ill-effect from the treatment, Geron plans to seek FDA approval to extend the study and increase the dose of GRNOPC1 patients receive, as well as including

"as broad a range of severe spinal cord-injured patients as medically appropriate."

Geron ultimately hopes to be able to inject GRNOPC1 directly into the spinal cord lesions of injured patients prompting the regrowth of damaged nerve cells and restoring function and sensation to patients suffering paralysis.

Trials like this one are long overdue and have been unnecessarily delayed due to what I personally view as the largely manufactured controversy surrounding embryonic stem cells. But if treatments like this prove successful, it will no doubt fuel the public's desire to see such treatments made available to patients with debilitating injuries and will help to remove the unfortunate and - in my opinion - completely unjustified bans and restrictions currently placed on embryonic stem cell research here in the US.

-CAINE-

Source:Discovery News

WPB Has a Muck Monster?!

So earlier this week a coworker came to me and asked,

"Did you hear about the Muck Monster?"

I stopped for a moment,

"Muck Monster?" I said inquisitively. I'd never actually heard of this one, "What is this- Muck Monster of which you speak?" I asked.

He continued,

"Ya, in downtown West Palm, The mayor went on TV to talk about it and everything."

I was both intrigued and excited, I'd never heard of this so called Muck monster. But I suppose sometimes refusing to watch the news or read the newspaper can lead to missing out on something important, like the fact that there might be a Muck monster living in the neighboring city!

" I was unaware of any such Muck Monster", I said. " But I WILL be investigating further."

So it turns out, the first- and it seems the only "real" sighting- of the so called Muck Monster, occurred sometime around August of last year and even managed to make Letterman's top ten list. As for the sighting itself, it was described by the Palm Beach Post as, "a strange churning in the Lake Worth lagoon" but in reality, the event captured on the video is more of a mild ripple than a churning or even a disturbance.

As for the Muck Monster's most recent appearance, there wasn't one. It seems instead that the city of palm beach, in conjunction with the nonprofit Lagoon Keepers organization held a Muck Monster themed presentation at the lagoon earlier this month in order to promote the city's new pier. City Commissioner Bill Moss(the Mayor didn't appear to be present for the event either), who has taken the lead on the Muck Monster probe told reporters.

"I've been told it's nothing to be concerned about, but it is mating season, so don't have children lean over the boardwalk or put their hands or feet in the water." And,"The irony is that this is happening around the same time as Halloween and I hope that's not missed on the city,"

But tell me this, If the Muck Monster really is just a manatee as many seem to think, and if any suggestion that it may in fact be some sort of cryptid is really just a ploy to attract more tourists, would the creature have been featured on the History Channel's Monster Quest? On second thought, don't answer that...

-CAINE-

Eye Candy:Spiral Galaxy-NGC 3982

October 19, 2010: This face-on spiral galaxy, called NGC 3982, is striking for its rich tapestry of star birth, along with its winding arms. The arms are lined with pink star-forming regions of glowing hydrogen, newborn blue star clusters, and obscuring dust lanes that provide the raw material for future generations of stars. The bright nucleus is home to an older population of stars, which grow ever more densely packed toward the center.

NGC 3982 is located about 68 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. The galaxy spans about 30,000 light-years, one-third of the size of our Milky Way galaxy. This color image is composed of exposures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), and the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2). The observations were taken between March 2000 and August 2009.

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

NASA and DARPA to Build 100 Year Starship

According to Simon Worden, director of the NASA Ames Research Center, NASA and DARPA have joined forces to create a Hundred-Year Starship, a vessel meant to take explorers on a one way trip to other planets and star systems.

One way settlement missions have long been discussed as a plausible way of sending men to Mars and beyond and I personally believe such missions are not only likely but a necessary step in space exploration. But Worden's belief that "we’ll be on the moons of Mars by 2030 or so", manned mission or otherwise, Seems optimistic at best given NASA's inability to develop a suitable shuttle replacement over ten years and billions of dollars worth of trying. Not to mention the fact that we have yet to make it back to our own moon in nearly 40 years.

But Worden insists that the space program is now "really aimed at settling other worlds" and hopes to persuade billionaires like Google founder Larry page to invest in the project. Which is at least a step in the right direction given that many, myself included, believe the advances in technology needed to advance space exploration will come from the private sector rather than the Government.


-CAINE-

Source:Popsci

Also check out this article from Science News Daily for a more detailed discussion of a one-way mission to Mars.