Inside the Matrix by Pamela L Gay

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We are pleased Dr. Gay consented to speculate in this article about the science behind creating a permanent singularity like the possible future presented in “For the Children” by Jamie Wahls. Well, science and space pirates.

 

Inside the Matrix

by Dr. Pamela L. Gay

 

Since the beginning of the computer era, people have been speculating that our reality might exist within a computer simulation. This idea was first popularized in 1956, by Isaac Asimov in The Last Question, and famously re-articulated in 1999’s Oscar-winning The Matrix.  Today, prominent thinkers, ranging from Neil Tyson to Elon Musk, are publicly stating that there are good odds that what we call reality is just a simulation. If you are like me, the idea that we are simulated souls living our lives according to complex software is not entirely comforting. Making things even more confusing is the idea that we have the potential to someday download ourselves into future computers. This seems to imply that we could become simulated people simulated in a simulated universe, which I think makes it simulations all the way down. Continue reading…

Astronauts Prepping to be The Martian: They build things and grow things…in space by Dr. Pamela L. Gay

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Astronomer Dr. Pamela L. Gay returns what it really takes to be an astronaut—an inside look at required skills and the long timeline involved.

Astronauts Prepping to be The Martian:
They build things and grow things…in space

by Dr. Pamela L. Gay

“Kid, by the time you’re grown up NASA will have built all the cool stuff.”  I heard those words in 1988. That dude was wrong—today is a great time (for somebody else) to be an astronaut.

At the time, eighth-grade me was standing in front of a diagram of the planned Space Station Freedom at the Huntsville Space and Rocket Center. I was there to pretend to be an astronaut as I attended Space Camp. At that adolescent moment, all I wanted to do was fly among the stars, help build space stations, conduct research, be a science communicator, and build international peace one rocket launch at a time. I was a kid; I wanted to do everything, and I wanted to do it in space. Continue reading…