JaBbA's Hut

The Shuttle is back in business. Sounded like everyone was holding their breath while it came down. Happened to be able to listen to the whole thing on NPR while driving to work.

Now if we could just get NASA back in the business of pure science, rather than this silly Mars expedition. But it needs to keep flying.

Oh, and I'm back from vacation.

I got to spend a little time delving into the intricacies of game theory via Evan's blog entry pointing to an article about a team's attempt to beat the Tit-for-Tat strategy in a iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game.

JaBbA says give yourself a few minutes and learn something!

Stephen Hawking has argued for years that once the event horizon of a block hole is formed, nothing..not even information..can ever escape.

This has caused a lot of problems for quantum physics, since a basic tenet is that information cannot be destroyed.

But now, Hawking is reversing himself, and scientists that have long disputed Hawking's earlier theories may be vindicated, like MIT Engineer Seth Lloyd, who says "black holes allow so much information to escape that they might make viable quantum computers.".

JaBbA says check it out - if you can get your head around it, that is.

I'm very confused.

The Cassini spacecraft successfully entered Saturn's orbit today. The early pictures are black-and-white, but are simply amazing - perfectly defined rings with "density waves" caused by gravitational pulls.

This is why Nasa needs to be funded - not so we can put military bases on the moons. What we will learn from this expedition promises to be fundamental and ground-breaking.