Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by chromas on Wednesday October 17 2018, @01:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the I-call-it-a-Hawking-Chamber dept.

Essays reveal Stephen Hawking predicted race of 'superhumans'

The late physicist and author Prof Stephen Hawking has caused controversy by suggesting a new race of superhumans could develop from wealthy people choosing to edit their and their children's DNA. Hawking, the author of A Brief History of Time, who died in March, made the predictions in a collection of articles and essays.

[...] In Brief Answers to the Big Questions, Hawking's final thoughts on the universe, the physicist suggested wealthy people would soon be able to choose to edit genetic makeup to create superhumans with enhanced memory, disease resistance, intelligence and longevity. Hawking raised the prospect that breakthroughs in genetics will make it attractive for people to try to improve themselves, with implications for "unimproved humans". "Once such superhumans appear, there will be significant political problems with unimproved humans, who won't be able to compete," he wrote. "Presumably, they will die out, or become unimportant. Instead, there will be a race of self-designing beings who are improving at an ever-increasing rate."

Stephen Hawking's last paper on black holes is now online

Stephen Hawking never stopped trying to unravel the mysteries surrounding black holes -- in fact, he was still working to solve one of them shortly before his death. Now, his last research paper on the subject is finally available online through pre-publication website arXiv, thanks to his co-authors from Cambridge and Harvard. It's entitled Black Hole Entropy and Soft Hair, and it tackles the black hole paradox. According to Hawking's co-author Malcolm Perry, the paradox "is perhaps the most puzzling problem in fundamental theoretical physics today" and was the center of the late physicist's life for decades.

Black Holes and Soft Hair: why Stephen Hawking's Final Work is Important:

[Black holes] have a temperature and produce thermal radiation. The formula for this temperature, universally known as the Hawking temperature, is inscribed on the memorial to Stephen's life in Westminster Abbey. Any object that has a temperature also has an entropy. The entropy is a measure of how many different ways an object could be made from its microscopic ingredients and still look the same. So, for a particular piece of red hot metal, it would be the number of ways the atoms that make it up could be arranged so as to look like the lump of metal you were observing. Stephen's formula for the temperature of a black hole allowed him to find the entropy of a black hole.

The problem then was: how did this entropy arise? Since all black holes appear to be the same, the origin of the entropy was at the centre of the information paradox.

What we have done recently is to discover a gap in the mathematics that led to the idea that black holes are totally bald. In 2016, Stephen, Andy and I found that black holes have an infinite collection of what we call "soft hair". This discovery allows us to question the idea that black holes lead to a breakdown in the laws of physics.

Stephen kept working with us up to the end of his life, and we have now published a paper that describes our current thoughts on the matter. In this paper, we describe a way of calculating the entropy of black holes. The entropy is basically a quantitative measure of what one knows about a black hole apart from its mass or spin.

So if black holes have soft hair, is it possible to give them a hair cut?


Original Submission #1Original Submission #2

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @01:33AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @01:33AM (#749756)

    Massively higher IQ Finns are the exact same species as nomadic Africans and aliens visiting the planet would scientifically conclude the same. Galapagos finches have slightly different beaks, though, so they're completely different species. Science deniers like those against climate change are so ignorant!

    Must be great to be an NPC capable of such doublethink. Gene editing itself implies that certain traits, and yes, certain species are BETTER than others (because some go extinct), and what is natural selection but gene editing over time?

    Starting Score:    0  points
    Moderation   +1  
       Troll=1, Interesting=1, Underrated=1, Total=3
    Extra 'Troll' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   1  
  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @04:42AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @04:42AM (#749819)

    "Troll"? Repost!

    ---------

    The true struggle is not between the oppressed and the oppressor; rather it is between these 2 groups:

    • The capitalists, who want to build.
    • The socialists, who want to dissipate.

    Here is the alternative to Hawking's feared self-improvement:

            HARRISON BERGERON by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [tnellen.com]

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 18 2018, @03:07AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 18 2018, @03:07AM (#750287)

      You know what's interesting? There are people out there who have a good career, go to the office a couple of days a week, work out, hang out with other interesting successful people. They all look much more attractive than you, have a calm life they enjoy, travel, just go through a peaceful day. They don't worry about things, they have funny jokes they make - they never worry about something to say so they never say stuff that's weird or retarded. This is most normal people. You have never experienced and never will, the calm pleasure of a regular happy life. Your own brain is your worst enemy, and you will never escape it. It's like being sentenced to a living hell from birth - and you'll never know you're living it.

      enjoy your life chump.

  • (Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @06:11AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @06:11AM (#749841)

    "Troll"? Repost!

    ---------

    The true struggle is not between the oppressed and the oppressor; rather it is between these 2 groups:

    • The capitalists, who want to build.
    • The socialists, who want to dissipate.

    Here is the alternative to Hawking's feared self-improvement:

            HARRISON BERGERON by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [tnellen.com]

  • (Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @07:05AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @07:05AM (#749848)

    Censorship? Repost!

    ---------

    The true struggle is not between the oppressed and the oppressor; rather it is between these 2 groups:

    • The capitalists, who want to build.
    • The socialists, who want to dissipate.

    Here is the alternative to Hawking's feared self-improvement:

            HARRISON BERGERON by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [tnellen.com]