It is perhaps inevitable, then, that we rewrite Sri Aurobindo, that we revision and rethink his vision as the background of this passing age of scientific and technological hubris, and that we narrate the necessary emergence of the trans-human. ...   more »

The University of California (UC) at Berkeley has joined other leading universities, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), in offering courses free to the public via the Internet. UCB is now making these course available on Apple's Computer's iTunes Music Store in an easily downloadable format for viewing on Apple's color video iPod.

Think about this. High-level academic materials that have previously been restricted only to wealthy elites are becoming available to everyone. I anticipate that we'll soon be seeing incredible new contributions to human knowledge coming from poor, unknown kids living in small Chinese, African and Indian villages. Imagine what that will do for the world!
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"Podcasts of selected UC Berkeley course lectures are now available through Apple's iTunes Music Store.

"Further extending its curricular reach to the iPod generation, the University of California, Berkeley, today announced "Berkeley on iTunes U," a free service that makes video and audio recordings of a growing number of course lectures available both on and off campus through Apple Computer's iTunes Music Store.

"Berkeley on iTunes U" is now available by visiting itunes.berkeley.edu, and is open to the public as well as to all UC Berkeley students.

"... As a public university, UC Berkeley has a tradition of openness," [a Berkeley spokesperson] said. "It really speaks to our motto - 'Fiat Lux,' Let there be light." ...    more »

Check out this article re the new 3-wheeled ecocar unveiled today in Britain. It's been developed over the past three years by a collaborative team of nine European partners from industry and academia, funded by the European Union.

I think cars like this offer a possible path to a sustainable transportation future, especially in compact urban areas.

I wonder if Auroville could partner with these folks for a real-life test of a few of these cars? Fact that they use compressed natural gas would fit right in with Auroville's current extensive use of CNG. Sounds like their crash protection would help cut down the high injury rate of motorcycles & scooters. - I'll bet they're quieter than our current motorbikes so would cut down on the AV noise pollution problem.

Hmmm, we may have to involve India's government to allow us to drive them on the roads around Auroville, e.g. Pondicherry. Anyone have any ideas re ways to follow-up on these possibilities?   more »

I just watched a fascinating PBS/NOVA program called "Newton's Dark Secrets."

"In 1936, a huge collection of [Sir Isaac Newton's] scientific documents and personal papers was put up for auction at Sotheby's in London. These papers had never been seen by the public, and a large number of them were bought by the famous British economist John Maynard Keynes. Many were written in secret code, and for six years, Keynes struggled to decipher them.

"But what Keynes found shattered his image of Isaac Newton. For, in these manuscripts, Keynes discovered an Isaac Newton unknown to the rest of the world, an Isaac Newton who seemed obsessed with religion and devoted to the occult."

The manuscripts included detailed laboratory notebooks documenting that Newton had been doing secret alchemical research for over 30 years!

Bill Newman, an historian of science from Indiana University, has spent years decyphering Newton's notebooks and replicating his experiments in a modern lab. His results are astounding: He says that certain ancient myths that Newton was studying were actually encoded recipes for alchemical procedures!

"Newton believed that in the distant past, people knew great truths about nature and the universe. This wisdom was lost over time, but Newton thought it was hidden in Greek myths, which he interpreted as encoded alchemical recipes. ..."   more »

This article by Nicholas Kristof, winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize Award for Commentary, was published a few days ago in the Editorial Page of the New York Times.

Read it carefully; as Kristof says, "Since President Bush is complacent about conventional risks from climate change, such as the prospect that those of us in Manhattan will end up knee-deep in the Atlantic, let's try fear-mongering." His major point is the systematic supression by the current US administration of the facts of global warming.

Though his comments on methane hydrates are scientifically sound, large uncertainties remain re the precise conditions that would set off their release. --
Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. And thousands of gigatons of methane, equivalent to the total amount of coal in the world, lie deep within the oceans in the form of ice-like solids called methane hydrates.

The big question is whether global warming temperatures, which have risen about one degree Fahrenheit over the last 30 years, will thaw some of these methane hydrates. If so, the methane might be released as a gargantuan oceanic burp. Once in the atmosphere, that methane would accelerate the greenhouse effect and warm the earth and raise sea levels even more. ...   more »