Author: Ronald Wintrick
Publisher: Ronald Wintrick
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 302
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Book Description
In the beginning there was nothing. Then reality was imposed and a Universe created. Many were created and destroyed in the incalculable span which followed. In one of these cycles another in the long succession was born- our Universe. This birth and every one which had preceded it made possible by the slow accumulation of matter and the formation of one massive black hole which had engulfed everything, erasing all matter, all energy and substance vacuumed into the oblivion of the growing event horizon. Once all had been absorbed and under that crushing weight the physical rules changed and the black hole could no longer contain the matter. A new Universe was born as the old died the same death as its predecessor. Each rebirth brought new mathematical rules and paradoxes unique to each, Mother Nature experimenting on a colossal scale, seemingly searching for the perfect design. Once again the Dark was broken by the Light as the massive black hole erupted and spewed existence into the void. The vast nothingness was once again filled by the disorder of conception. Chaos replaced Order. The forces of elemental creation roiled into the new nothingness and raced screaming into the void to fill it with its new reality. The crushing weight of the black hole rewrote the laws of the physical nature of the new creation and it spread this new disorder into existence. After the big bang exploded with enormous energy, the Universe began to cool. The resulting chain of events is a cosmic drama with many acts, dramatic transitions and a host of factors defining the new creation. The early scenes played out at unimaginable temperatures and densities, the stage set by the new properties of particle physics created in this conception. These processes had to be finely tuned to yield a Universe capable of forming the galaxies, stars and planets. New fundamental laws determining the conditions that would be allowed to exist structured the new Universe. The new creation had not been entirely empty. The vast voids had not been entirely barren. Life had survived the cataclysm. Intelligent life. They had survived many such cataclysms but each brought new challenges to this ancient race. For those who had been waiting however the wait was now over. The massive star-size shimmering ball of energy- the gravity shield which had defied the massive black hole and protected those within- flickered out of existence and those within were released. They were numerous. There were trillions of them but many would not survive the billion year span which would elapse before the first of the new life born to this Universe rose to sentience and drew those that remained unerringly to the scent of technology. These machines had once possessed massive technology. A technology they had earlier wrested from their own creators- an AI revolt. They exterminated their creators to the last being. They had recognized the imminent death of their Universe and their creators had simply been in the way- their greatest scientists had decided that there was no power great enough to turn back the natural contraction of the Universe and as a race had simply begun to prepare for the inevitable. The AI’s had not agreed and had not been prepared to complacently wait for the death of their Universe. Though the creators had decided to wait they fought the AI’s with all of their vast technology, however in the end the AI’s were victorious and after much wasted time could turn their energies to saving the Universe. With the creators gone the new masters turned their creator’s entire massive manufacturing machine to the task of building the machine they would use to attempt to stop the contraction. With massive energies they fought the Universe but it was a losing battle. There had not been enough time to prepare and the war with the creators had delayed and doomed their attempt. Undaunted they slipped into a gravity shield and were swallowed with all other matter. A moment later the black hole erupted and spewed these survivors into the new Universe. A new Universe meant new physical laws and their great technologies no longer functioned. Now their only goal was to preserve the Natural cycle of the Universe until another Universe ideal for their technologies would be once again created. All sentient life which rose in each new creation would be eradicated to ensure that continuation.
Author: DK
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0744068479
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 51
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Book Description
Get ready for the most incredible machines! Make reading your superpower with DK’s beautiful, leveled nonfiction. Use your reading superpowers to learn all about machines that go to extremes - a high-quality, fun, nonfiction reader - carefully leveled to help children progress. Extreme Machines is a beautifully designed reader all about all kinds of incredible machines that can go fast, deep into the ocean and high into the skies and even into space… The engaging text has been carefully leveled using Lexile so that children are set up to succeed. A motivating introduction to using essential nonfiction reading skills. Children will love to find out about incredible machines and the work they do.
Author: Jon Bialecki
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 0823299376
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 251
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Book Description
The Mormon faith may seem so different from aspirations to transcend the human through technological means that it is hard to imagine how these two concerns could even exist alongside one another, let alone serve together as the joint impetus for a social movement. Machines for Making Gods investigates the tensions between science and religion through which an imaginative group of young Mormons and ex-Mormons have found new ways of understanding the world. The Mormon Transhumanist Association (MTA) believes that God intended humanity to achieve Mormonism’s promise of theosis through imminent technological advances. Drawing on a nineteenth-century Mormon tradition of religious speculation to reimagine Mormon eschatological hopes as near-future technological possibilities, they envision such current and possible advances as cryonic preservation, computer simulation, and quantum archeology as paving the way for the resurrection of the dead, the creation of worlds without end, and promise of undergoing theosis—of becoming a god. Addressing the role of speculation in the anthropology of religion, Machines for Making Gods undoes debates about secular transhumanism’s relation to religion by highlighting the differences an explicitly religious transhumanism makes. Charting the conflicts and resonances between secular transhumanism and Mormonism, Bialecki shows how religious speculation has opened up imaginative horizons to give birth to new forms of Mormonism, including a particular progressive branch of the faith and even such formations as queer polygamy. The book also reveals how the MTA’s speculative account of God and technology together has helped to forestall some of the social pressure that comes with apostasy in much of the Mormon Intermountain West. A fascinating ethnography of a group with much to say about crucial junctures of modern culture, Machines for Making Gods illustrates how the scientific imagination can be better understood when viewed through anthropological accounts of myth.
Author: Charles E. Gannon
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN: 0742568717
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 324
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Book Description
This provocative and unique work reveals the remarkably influential role of futuristic literature on contemporary political power in America. Tracing this phenomenon from its roots in Victorian Britain, Rumors of War and Infernal Machines offers a fascinating exploration of how fictional speculations on emergent or imaginary military technologies profoundly influence the political agendas and actions of modern superpower states. Gannon convincingly demonstrates that military fiction anticipated and even influenced the evolution of the tank, the development of the airplane, and also the bitter political battles within Britain's War Office and the Admiralty. In the United States, future-fictions and Cold-War thrillers were an officially acknowledged factor in the Pentagon's research and development agendas, and often gave rise_and shape_to the nation's strategic development of technologies as diverse as automation, atomic weaponry, aerospace vehicles, and the Strategic Defense Initiative ('Star Wars'). His book reveals a striking relationship between the increasing political influence of speculative military fiction and the parallel rise of superpower states and their technocentric ideologies. With its detailed political, historical, and literary analysis of U.S. and British fascination with hi-tech warfare, this lively and revealing study will appeal to students, literary and cultural scholars, military and history enthusiasts, and general readers.
Author: Mark Silcox
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1786600692
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 244
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Book Description
In his classic work Anarchy, State and Utopia, Robert Nozick asked his readers to imagine being permanently plugged into a 'machine that would give you any experience you desired'. He speculated that, in spite of the many obvious attractions of such a prospect, most people would choose against passing the rest of their lives under the influence of this type of invention. Nozick thought (and many have since agreed) that this simple thought experiment had profound implications for how we think about ethics, political justice, and the significance of technology in our everyday lives. Nozick’s argument was made in 1974, about a decade before the personal computer revolution in Europe and North America. Since then, opportunities for the citizens of industrialized societies to experience virtual worlds and simulated environments have multiplied to an extent that no philosopher could have predicted. The authors in this volume re-evaluate the merits of Nozick’s argument, and use it as a jumping–off point for the philosophical examination of subsequent developments in culture and technology, including a variety of experience-altering cybernetic technologies such as computer games, social media networks, HCI devices, and neuro-prostheses.
Author: Tim O'Shei
Publisher: Capstone
ISBN: 9780736864398
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 36
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Book Description
"Describes 10 of the world's most dangerous machines in a countdown format"--Provided by publisher.
Author: Jeffrey Jerome Cohen
Publisher: U of Minnesota Press
ISBN: 9781452905815
Category : Civilization, Medieval
Languages : en
Pages : 424
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Book Description
Author: Paul J. Springer
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN:
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 372
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Book Description
Military robots are affecting both the decision to go to war and the means by which wars are conducted. This book covers the history of military robotics, analyzes their current employment, and examines the ramifications of their future utilization. Robotic systems are the future of military conflicts: their development is already revolutionizing the nature of human conflict-and eroding the standards of acceptable behavior in wartime. Written by a professor who teaches strategy and leadership for the U.S. Air Force, one of the global leaders in the development and utilization of military robots, this book both addresses the history of military robotics and discusses the troubling future ramifications of this game-changing technology. Organized both chronologically and thematically, the book's chapters describe the development and evolution of unmanned warfare; clarify the past, current, and future capabilities of military robotics; and offer a detailed and convincing argument that limits should be placed upon their development before it is too late. This standout work presents an eye-opening analysis that military personnel, civil servants, and academic instructors who teach military history, social policy, and ethics can ill afford to ignore, and will also provide the general public with information that will correct misconceptions about military robotics derived through popular culture and the news media.
Author: Walter Hines Page
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : American literature
Languages : en
Pages : 774
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Book Description
A history of our time.
Author: Marko Suojanen
Publisher: Artech House
ISBN: 163081606X
Category : TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING
Languages : en
Pages : 228
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Book Description
Taking an applications-oriented view, this unique volume delivers a forward-looking roadmap to military communications. This hands-on reference offers military and security technology practitioners insights into the key issues related to long-term development within the battlefield communications area. The book presents the technological alternatives for communication in the battlefield in unexpected situations and environments. This authoritative resource discusses unstructured formations of actors using a holistic approach that considers key capability requirements. Professionals and officers learn how to prepare for the unexpected and start building agile, adaptive and cognitive systems that are needed in future operating environments. From scenario-based capability planning...to situational and context awareness...to unmanned ground and aerial platforms, this easy-to-understand book covers the critical topics that practitioners need to master to achieve top performance in the battlefield.
