Great write-up, David. Andrew Cote on XBird calls it a diamagnetic semiconductor. Alex Kaplan tweets like crazy about it, too. Mostly, that it doesn't work. Thing is, one day it will. From a pragmatic POV, LK-99 can't be it because it is too big of a discovery to be shared freely with the world.
One day we'll have Qlev vehicles along with everything that comes with room temp SCs. It is going to change the world as we know it.
Thank you for the kind words and for sharing your perspective. Andrew Cote's insights during the LK-99 news cycle were indeed enlightening, and I'm glad you found them as valuable as I did. I've yet to delve into Alex Kaplan's thoughts, but given your recommendation, he's now on my radar. It's fascinating how the world of scientific discovery oscillates between skepticism and optimism, and I'm with you in hoping that the true potential of materials like LK-99 will eventually emerge.
I briefly scanned through your work on Qlev pods for "Spherean", and the designs of S-zer0 and JCAB are incredible. What a great collaboration! I'm looking forward to delving deeper into it and understanding the nuances behind your concepts and the novel.
On my Substack, my explorations often revolve around the pressing need to enhance human intelligence (1) and the unpredictable emergent behaviors we might witness as AI systems evolve (2). I expect these technological advancements to continue at what feels like 'neck breaking' speed, not just in AI, but in biotechnology and materials.
Given our overlapping interests, I'd love to engage in a deeper discussion. Perhaps we could brainstorm, collaborate, or simply share insights. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.
Yes, indeed, room temp SCs are only a matter of time. Fascinating what the future holds.
Much fun to speculate and spin yarns about it. Spherean is a mix of hard and soft SF, extrapolating what life on earth 500+ years from now could look like, after a cataclysmic event.
I'll have to check those links out, esp. since Augmentation (BMI and Neurobionics) are an integral part of Spherean. Thanks for those! I am sure we could fill a few podcasts on these topics and how this will change and shape civilisation and the evolutionary process. Homo Sapiens 2.0?
That sounds like a fun series of conversations. I look forward to hearing (and reading) more - on that note, do you have a link you can drop for Spherean, or is it still in the works?
I've spent my academic and startup career in interesting biotech research labs and companies. The current company I am with is working on deextinction with the flagship being the Woolley Mammoth. Lot's of fun and interesting discussion to be had.
I am 35k words into the first draft. I only posted world-building and lore articles thus far, S-Zer0 and JCAB and the podcast with the car designer "Creation and Meaning". In essence, the "On Writing" section has all of it, if you want to check that out.
Crichton's Jurassic Park springs to mind as soon as you mention deextinction! Not a topic I am pursuing in Spherean, there it is more about "amortality" thanks to technical advances in BMI, cloning and cellular rejuvenation, yet we'll still face extinction. Happy to have a chat to see what topics would be most interesting to cover that intersect with Spherean.
I think this was a very fun and refreshing article to read. I'm taking credit for the Korean discoveries because I am half Korean and that's how our achievement in society works 😏. Just kidding, but, seeing more articles like this would be awesome. Nothing too serious, just fun and up to date articles that show a clear view of how something in the scientific community works. Like reading about what evidence is promising vs what isn't and conclusions that can be drawn from it. Just scientific perspectives on topics in general.
It is certainly easy to become a victim of the moment. However, this seemed a bit too good to be true. It's almost like it breaks some fundamental law of nature.
I hadn't read Stuart Ritchie previously, but I think I would enjoy this, thanks!
Great write-up, David. Andrew Cote on XBird calls it a diamagnetic semiconductor. Alex Kaplan tweets like crazy about it, too. Mostly, that it doesn't work. Thing is, one day it will. From a pragmatic POV, LK-99 can't be it because it is too big of a discovery to be shared freely with the world.
One day we'll have Qlev vehicles along with everything that comes with room temp SCs. It is going to change the world as we know it.
I teamed up with a professional car designer to create Qlev pods (S-zer0, JCAB) for my speculative fiction novel Spherean, e.g. https://alexanderipfelkofer.substack.com/p/gain-labs-presents-the-s-zer0 maybe you find it interesting.
Hi Alex,
Thank you for the kind words and for sharing your perspective. Andrew Cote's insights during the LK-99 news cycle were indeed enlightening, and I'm glad you found them as valuable as I did. I've yet to delve into Alex Kaplan's thoughts, but given your recommendation, he's now on my radar. It's fascinating how the world of scientific discovery oscillates between skepticism and optimism, and I'm with you in hoping that the true potential of materials like LK-99 will eventually emerge.
I briefly scanned through your work on Qlev pods for "Spherean", and the designs of S-zer0 and JCAB are incredible. What a great collaboration! I'm looking forward to delving deeper into it and understanding the nuances behind your concepts and the novel.
On my Substack, my explorations often revolve around the pressing need to enhance human intelligence (1) and the unpredictable emergent behaviors we might witness as AI systems evolve (2). I expect these technological advancements to continue at what feels like 'neck breaking' speed, not just in AI, but in biotechnology and materials.
Given our overlapping interests, I'd love to engage in a deeper discussion. Perhaps we could brainstorm, collaborate, or simply share insights. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.
1 - https://davidkingsley.substack.com/p/mitigating-the-existential-risk-of
2- https://davidkingsley.substack.com/p/vii-from-neurons-to-ai-the-surprising
Yes, indeed, room temp SCs are only a matter of time. Fascinating what the future holds.
Much fun to speculate and spin yarns about it. Spherean is a mix of hard and soft SF, extrapolating what life on earth 500+ years from now could look like, after a cataclysmic event.
I'll have to check those links out, esp. since Augmentation (BMI and Neurobionics) are an integral part of Spherean. Thanks for those! I am sure we could fill a few podcasts on these topics and how this will change and shape civilisation and the evolutionary process. Homo Sapiens 2.0?
That sounds like a fun series of conversations. I look forward to hearing (and reading) more - on that note, do you have a link you can drop for Spherean, or is it still in the works?
I've spent my academic and startup career in interesting biotech research labs and companies. The current company I am with is working on deextinction with the flagship being the Woolley Mammoth. Lot's of fun and interesting discussion to be had.
I am 35k words into the first draft. I only posted world-building and lore articles thus far, S-Zer0 and JCAB and the podcast with the car designer "Creation and Meaning". In essence, the "On Writing" section has all of it, if you want to check that out.
Crichton's Jurassic Park springs to mind as soon as you mention deextinction! Not a topic I am pursuing in Spherean, there it is more about "amortality" thanks to technical advances in BMI, cloning and cellular rejuvenation, yet we'll still face extinction. Happy to have a chat to see what topics would be most interesting to cover that intersect with Spherean.
I think this was a very fun and refreshing article to read. I'm taking credit for the Korean discoveries because I am half Korean and that's how our achievement in society works 😏. Just kidding, but, seeing more articles like this would be awesome. Nothing too serious, just fun and up to date articles that show a clear view of how something in the scientific community works. Like reading about what evidence is promising vs what isn't and conclusions that can be drawn from it. Just scientific perspectives on topics in general.
Well done. Stuart Ritchie also wrote about the need for caution, you may enjoy reading his thoughts.
https://open.substack.com/pub/stuartritchie/p/science-writing-update-august-2023
It is certainly easy to become a victim of the moment. However, this seemed a bit too good to be true. It's almost like it breaks some fundamental law of nature.
I hadn't read Stuart Ritchie previously, but I think I would enjoy this, thanks!
Fantastic summary of information, even more so when coming at this from the future when some of the later facts are now known.