Day's Headlines: Ancient Sky Map; Shield Busting ICBM; US Sailin' for Chinese; S-300s Deployed; Satellite Fortification; Judge Suspended; Transgender Elected; Changing Memories; Accurate to Only 270 Quintillionths of a Second; The Infinity Machine; and Watson Learns Security

Tuesday, May 10, 2016

Ancient Sky Map; Shield Busting ICBM; US Sailin' for Chinese; S-300s Deployed; Satellite Fortification; Judge Suspended; Transgender Elected; Changing Memories; Accurate to Only 270 Quintillionths of a Second; The Infinity Machine; and Watson Learns Security

Russia and China, Russia and China, every day it's Russia and China. We're either being targeted by Russia or making China angry, and today is no different. There's also a story today about finding a lost Mayan city that might not be true (ha!), and a guy who calls himself a girl who is on track to be elected to office in the Philippines.


Archaeology

Star pupil finds lost Mayan city by studying ancient charts of the night sky from his bedroom telegraph.co.uk

William Gadoury, 15, was fascinated by the ancient Central American civilization and spent hours poring over diagrams of constellations and maps of known Mayan cities.

And then he made a startling realisation: the two appeared to be linked.

Well it's all fun and games until the anthropologists weigh in :) Check out the second half of this later article in Gizmodo where it seems like this might not be so true, after all.

Military Activities

Russia developing new ICBMs capable of overcoming US missile shield tass.ru

Capabilities of Russian ballistic missiles increase "by reducing ICBM’s acceleration section, introducing new types of warheads with the flight path that is difficult to predict and new means of overcoming the missile defense system," Karakayev went on. Russian missiles are also capable of delivering warheads via energy optimal trajectory and of striking from multiple directions, "which forces the opposing side to ensure perimeter missile defense," he concluded.

South China Sea: US warship sails near disputed reef bbc

The ship neared the disputed Fiery Cross Reef, which China controls, on Tuesday, US officials said. China said the move was illegal and "damaged regional peace".

Russian S-300 anti-missiles finally deployed in Iran rt

The long-range S-300 system was placed at Iran’s Khatam al-Anbia Air Defense Base, Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan said as cited by the Tasnim news agency.

Also see Iran’s Air Defense Forces Equipped with S-300 System

Fearing Hostilities In Space, Pentagon Fortifies Satellites ndtv

They are making satellites more resilient, enabling them to withstand jamming efforts. And instead of relying only on large and expensive systems, defense officials plan to send swarms of small satellites into orbit that are much more difficult to target.

At the same time, the Pentagon has designated the Air Force secretary a "principal space adviser," with authority to coordinate actions in space across the Defense Department. Agencies have begun participating in war-game scenarios involving space combat at the recently activated Joint Interagency Combined Space Operations Center.

Society

Roy Moore, Alabama Judge, Suspended Over Gay Marriage Stance nytimes

An Alabama judicial oversight body on Friday filed a formal complaint against Roy S. Moore, the chief justice of the state’s Supreme Court, charging that he had “flagrantly disregarded and abused his authority” in ordering the state’s probate judges to refuse applications for marriage licenses by same-sex couples.

Geraldine Roman: First transgender politician elected in the Philippines bbc

The Liberal Party's Geraldine Roman is set to be the predominantly Catholic nation's first public transgender politician. Polls indicate [he] will win the lower house seat for Bataan province, north of the capital Manila.

[He] said: "If Jesus Christ was alive today, he would not approve of discrimination. I firmly believe that."

That may be so, because the Jesus he's speaking about isn't the Jesus of the Bible. The Jesus of the Bible, who is God incarnate (Phil 2:6-7), is alive today (Acts 3:15) and is returning as Judge (Rev 19:11-16) against all unrighteousness (Rom 1:18). Though it is is true that He does not descriminate - all who are found not clothed in His righteousnes (Rom 13:13-14) will be condemed (Rev 22:14-15) without exception and without regard to race, background, or self-identification!

Scary Medical

Researchers discover method to change emotionally charged memory patterns medicalxpress

Two of the team's findings stand out. First, when they increased acetylcholine release in the amygdala during the formation of a traumatic memory, it greatly strengthened memory making the memory last more than twice as long as normal. Then, when they decreased acetylcholine signaling in the amygdala during a traumatic experience, one that normally produces a fear response, they could actually wipe out memory.

Precision Tech

This Small Black Strip Is a Clock Accurate to 270 Quintillionths of a Second gizmodo

Optical clocks work by measuring the frequency changes in light that result from shifting energy states of electrons in molecules. Usually, they’re rather big clunky devices, about the size of a desktop computer, because they make use of large, reliable lasers. But a team from UCLA has been able to shrink down the hardware using silicon chip technology to create solid-state microresonators that perform a similar job. That’s allowed them to create a device that measures just 0.06 cubic inches.

TAKE A LOOK AT THE INFINITY MACHINE popsci

CERN's Infinity machine was actually completed and installed in its Metrology lab several years ago, and has been doing its job ever since. It's basically an extremely precise measuring tool, designed to check the sensitivity of the components CERN uses in its high-energy particle experiments. It's so precise it can measure with a "precision of 0.3 micrometres (μm), around 300 times smaller than the width of a human hair," according to CERN.

AI

IBM Watson Brings AI Wonders to Cybersecurity fortune

IBM researchers have already begun feeding Watson with all sorts of computer security data sourced from its open access threat intelligence platform, called X-Force Exchange. The hope is that the trove of information on security vulnerabilities, spam messages, malware, and more will help the system become an expert assistant and advisor to security analysts.

Watson is also designed to ingest research papers, blog posts, news stories, media reports, alerts, textbooks, social media posts, and more to build up knowledge about all the latest cyber threats. Students at the partnering schools will help input and annotate this so-called unstructured data (meaning data that’s not easily machine readable) to train the system.

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