From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
Water is the essence of life. On Earth it's used to grow plants and within industrial processes but in space it takes on a whole new form. We can use water as a radiation shield. One cubic metre of water gives the same protection as Earth's atmosphere and magnetosphere. Water is a molecule made of hydrogen and oxygen- and that happens to be rocket fuel.
I learned to problem-solve and be self-sufficient at an early age, and that has influenced how I operate my lab. I try to make sure we generate as much of our research, data and activity in house as possible, so that we own what we produce.
The brain is definitely not doing computation in the purest sense. We are not crunching numbers in binary ones and zeros in our heads. A more important question is: what are your inputs, what output do you want, and how intelligently can the system get from one to the other?
We could partly predict where people will come from for future events.
I don't see the concept of offsetting as a valid or beneficial solution in the long run. We need to drastically reduce our carbon emissions. If you genuinely delve into the scientific data, it's clear that we are in a significantly dire situation, far more serious than the conventional media discourse would have you believe.
Hot and humid climates tend to promote a kind of right-wing, slightly authoritarian politics — because hot and humid environments are also pathogen-rich, and over thousands of years, societies in those climates have developed what scientists call behavioural immunity.
Indeed, these concepts transcend our natural intuition, but I firmly believe they aren't beyond our grasp. As Einstein marveled, the universe seems to be comprehensible.
It's quite remarkable that we, creatures who evolved dodging predators on the African savannah, have been able to develop quantum mechanics. I find this to be a splendid evolutionary offshoot.
Despite our huge scientific advances, we're still very-much at the early stages of discovery. Many of our great questions are also stepping into the realms of philosophy. Do we all see the same way? Do we all perceive the same way? It's a hidden frontier.
It's multi-fold. Firstly resources that are useful on Earth that we may get from outer space and secondly- which is perhaps a newer idea- is resources that will be useful in space itself. Water is the essence of life. In space it takes on a whole new form. We can use water as a radiation shield. Water is a molecule made of hydrogen and oxygen- and that happens to be rocket fuel.
A model that's really strong at mathematical reasoning is likely to be strong at coding. And a model that's excellent at both math and code is often very good at analysing the nuts and bolts of legal reasoning as well.
We all share the same 'planet in space'. When you take the time to think about it, that 'we're all in space' part is pretty compelling. I would argue though that small does not mean insignificant. It is a bit of a contradiction – seeing the beauty of Earth from space and the reality of how small our planet is in the grand scheme of the universe, but at the same time recognizing the significance in how perfectly placed in the universe our planet is to take care of us.