Dark5 – Page 20

Jack-O-Lantern Sun Appears Before Halloween

This past week, the sun briefly gave NASA observers a timely and spooky show.

This past week, the sun briefly gave NASA observers a timely and spooky show:

Active regions on the sun combined to look something like a jack-o-lantern’s face on Oct. 8, 2014. The active regions appear brighter because those are areas that emit more light and energy — markers of an intense and complex set of magnetic fields hovering in the sun’s atmosphere, the corona. This image blends together two sets of wavelengths at 171 and 193 Angstroms, typically colorized in gold and yellow, to create a particularly Halloween-like appearance.

According to NASA, the regions forming the jack-o-lantern features are “markers of an intense and complex set of magnetic fields hovering in the sun’s atmosphere, the corona.” The intense solar activity associated with the photos is not expected to threaten Earth.

See more of the pumpkin sun at NASA’s Goddard Media Studio.

Top Inventor Worries Robots Will “Delete” Humanity

SpaceX and Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, has voiced his concern that self-improving artificial intelligence could lead to killer robots.

SpaceX and Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, has voiced his concern that self-improving artificial intelligence could lead to killer robots. Speaking at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit in San Francisco, Musk explains:

“I don’t think anyone realizes how quickly artificial intelligence is advancing. Particularly if [the machine is] involved in recursive self-improvement … and its utility function is something that’s detrimental to humanity, then it will have a very bad effect.”

Musk humorously (or perhaps frighteningly?) lays out a simple path to humanity’s extinction:

“If its [function] is just something like getting rid of e-mail spam and it determines the best way of getting rid of spam is getting rid of humans . . . “

The comment was surely made with some element of jest, but it is interesting to consider Musk’s take on the pace of advancement in artificial intelligence. Musk’s companies are at the forefront of technological innovation, so one must wonder just how close to his dystopian future we may be…

See the full video at Vanity Fair.

Alien Life Discovered in Earth’s Stratosphere?

Researchers in the UK believe they found proof of extraterrestrial life in the upper reaches of Earth’s atmosphere.

Researchers in the UK believe they found proof of extraterrestrial life in the upper reaches of Earth’s atmosphere. The alien discovery was made when a team from the University of Sheffield and the University of Buckingham Centre for Astrobiology launched a balloon high into the stratosphere during the 2013 Perseid meteor shower.

The balloon was equipped with sterile collection plates designed to capture living particulate matter:

During the trip one of the slides caught an organism, around 10microns in size, which Professor Milton Wainwright says is a structure ‘colloquially called ‘the dragon particle’ which scientific analysis shows is made of carbon and oxygen and is therefore not a piece of cosmic or volcanic dust.’

In an interview with the Daily Express, Wainwight explained that it was unclear whether the organism was a single life-form or was made up of a number of smaller microbes.

He was also unequivocal that the biological entity was “like nothing found on earth”.

Additional organisms captured were covered with cosmic dust and seem to corroborate an earlier discovery of organic particles on the exterior of the the International Space Station (ISS).

As evidence of the mystery alien particles mounts, some scientists are now considering the possibility that the origins of life on Earth may have rained down from space and continues to do so.

[via The Independent]

New Study Reveals “Life After Death” May Be Real

There is new scientific evidence suggesting that life may in fact continue after death.

There is new scientific evidence suggesting that life may in fact continue after death. The prevailing theory of consciousness has long been that the brain shuts down 20-30 seconds after the heart stops beating. Now a large scale study by doctors in the UK has revealed that in nearly 40% of cases where a patient was resuscitated after “clinical death” the patient can accurately recall details from their experience up to three minutes after death.

“The evidence thus far suggests that in the first few minutes after death, consciousness is not annihilated,” said Dr. Sam Parnia, the director of resuscitation research at SUNY-Stony Brook, who spearheaded the life after death study. “Whether it fades away afterwards, we do not know, but right after death, consciousness is not lost.”

Only 9% of those reporting after-death memories likened their experience to the traditional and comforting embrace from light or heaven, and only 20% reported feelings of peacefulness. Other revived patients described feeling a great anxiety and fear… almost like they were drowning in the darkness of deep water.

[h/t] The Inquisitr

Watch: Thieves Hurl Chainsaws at Police in Chase

Police in pursuit of two hardware store thieves in Duluth, GA found themselves evading chainsaws thrown from the back of the getaway vehicle.

Vocativ reports:

After the men had robbed $19,000 in Weedwackers and chainsaws from two other stores, the policeman spied the thieves leaving a Howard Brothers hardware at 1:30 a.m. Seeing as it wasn’t exactly the right hour for a gardening goods run, the officer turned on his lights and followed in hot pursuit.

That’s when they threw chainsaws at him.

At least one of the flying death machines found its mark, doing at least $3,000 in damage to the officer’s cruiser and ending the chase three minutes after it started. The two bandits ran from their car and into the woods, where those chainsaws would have also come in handy. They have yet to be found.

Local news would later clarify that the weapons used to evade pursuing officers included “three chainsaws AND a weed-eater.”

5 Terrifying Facts About Ebola

Ebola outbreak 2014: 5 terrifying facts you should know about the virus.

Ebola outbreak 2014: 5 terrifying facts you should know about the virus.

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Presenting 5 horrifying facts about Ebola, including its origin in Africa, Ebola symptoms, the Reston incident and the first case of Ebola in America, a possible outbreak in ancient Greece and a strange patent on Ebola held by the U.S. government.

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Dig Deeper:
Ebola River virus: http://abcn.ws/1vJ2cfl
Ebola symptoms: http://1.usa.gov/10EUFTt
Ebola Reston: http://usat.ly/1oJIVo8
Ebola in ancient Greece? http://nyti.ms/1vH6guM
Ebola Patent CA2741523A1 – Human ebola virus species and compositions and methods thereof: http://bit.ly/1tryp6q

Music: “Midnight” by Relplus

Intro: “The Machine Thinks”
by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Mystery Virus Causing Paralysis in Children

Nine children in a single Colorado hospital are suffering from a mystery virus that is causing spinal tissue scarring and leading to paralysis of limbs. Doctors believe the damage may be linked to the recent outbreak of Enterovirus D68 that is sweeping the country. Enterovirus D68 typically only causes respiratory illness with symptoms similar to the flu, although esvere cases can result in difficulty breathing and sometimes death. Children have proven easily susceptible to the virus, making the latest developments especially frightening.

Scientists investigating the outbreak are in the process of sequencing the D68 genome to see if it has mutated from its earlier form to cause the paralysis. Dr. Mark Pallansch, director of the CDC’s viral diseases division, says the Denver outbreak is unprecedented and that the CDC’s investigation will take some time:

“There is not a lot of definitive information, but all together, it makes for a very unusual situation,” Pallansch said. “I’ve never seen it before.”

No vaccine or treatment options are currently available.

[h/t] NPR

New Flying Lotus Album & Video Streaming Free

Flying Lotus – You’re Dead!

Video by Xavier Magot

Streaming free for 24 hours only (starting on Oct 3rd at 23:00 EU / 22:00 UK / 17:00 EST / 14:00 PST / 06:00 (4th) JP)

Flying Lotus‘ new album, You’re Dead!, is out October 7 in the U.S. and October 6 in the UK via Warp. After sharing a handful of tracks from the album – including “Moment of Hesitation”, “Coronus, the Terminator”, and “Never Catch Me”, which features Kendrick Lamar – the producer is partnering up with the Boiler Room to stream the LP before its release next week.

As of this afternoon, Boiler Room is offering a free invitation to that world via a 24-hour loop of the new album, which comes accompanied by a trippy, animated short film by Xavier Magot. Watch above while you can.

Real Dracula’s Secret Dungeon Prison is Found

Archaeologists restoring Tokat Castle in Turkey have uncovered a labyrinth of secret tunnels and dungeons where the real-life Dracula was believed to be imprisoned.

Archaeologists restoring Tokat Castle in Northern Turkey have uncovered a long lost labyrinth of secret tunnels and dungeons where the real-life Dracula, Vlad III (better known as Vlad the Impaler), was believed to be held hostage.

In 1442, the ruler of the kingdom of Wallachia, Vlad II, embarked on a diplomatic mission to secure an alliance with the Ottoman Empire to defend Wallachia against an enemy army in Transylvania. Vlad II’s alliance was successful, but in order to guarantee his loyalty the Ottoman’s demanded that he leave his sons Vlad III and Radu under their control.

Both sons were imprisoned in the Tokat Castle where they built an extreme hatred for the Ottomans. Vlad III was regularly subjected to punishments such as flogging and likely developed his later sadistic taste for brutal executions after witnessing the impalement of other prisoners.

Years later, after he gained the throne, Vlad III is said to have retreated from a battle against the Ottomans, impaling and displaying 20,000 bodies outside the city of Targoviste, in Romania. Upon seeing the horrific display, the Ottoman forces retreated to Constantinople.

Read more about the real inspiration for Dracula here.

See 5 Real Signs That Vampires Actually Exist at Dark5.

Mystery Island Floating on Titan’s Alien Sea

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has been monitoring the evolution of a mysterious island that appears to be floating on the alien sea of Saturn’s moon Titan.

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has been monitoring the evolution of a mysterious island that appears to be floating in the alien sea of Saturn’s moon Titan. The unidentified feature covers an area as large as Washington D.C. and has risen and sunk into the hydrocarbon sea at least twice since it was first spotted in July 2013.

Scientists believe the “magic island” could most likely be caused by massive gas bubbles, giant surface waves, or the formation of solid “land” that is dependent on Titan’s seasons, but they have not ruled out that “perhaps something more exotic” could be at work.

Titan is considered one of the most “earth-like” worlds discovered, and some scientists believe that the sea comprised of methane and ethane could sustain early forms of life.However, “There’s no reason to suspect this is a signal for biology,” Jason Hofgartner, a planetary scientist at Cornell University and one of the researchers involved in the mission, told NBC News. “But in general, more energetic processes may enhance the suitability for life on Titan.”