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I kinda mentioned in the first post that it CAN'T do that. Concept might be usable to protect against radiation, but the power required to have it constantly "on" would probably be insane. They're using a similar concept to project 'Star Wars' holograms. Vastly improved now too. The initial prototype for this made more noise than a Jacob's Ladder. http://www.bitrebels.com/technology/real-hologram-mid-air-projection/

I think technically they do. The point is though, just as in the IRL counterpart here, the shields only 'react' when they need to. So when a shot is blocked, you lose visibility, but only for that finite moment in time.

For me the answer is out on whether or not "ghosts" exist. And by that, ghosts don't even need to be what we think of them as. Could be deceased people, could be creatures using some insane stealth system, could be inter-dimensional beings that just scarcely touch our plane of existence. Whatever. But if you want to play ghost hunter, I suggest you just go find a real group and ask if they will take you on a 'mission' or two. I will NOT trust reality shows for ANYTHING. The amount of sensationalism that gets artificially stuffed into these shows is beyond ridiculous. Directors have actually been reported to ask real couples to break up because extra drama is needed.

No, they won't shield anyone from bullets, but this is still really cool. Aircraft and military manufacturer Boeing has been granted a patent on a system that is designed to prevent explosion shock-waves from harming a target. http://www.cnet.com/news/boeing-patents-star-wars-style-force-fields/

Kind of surprised this one wasn't even on the list. In addition to the other things that have been posted here: For me, Science is a discipline. While I suppose that can be classified as a philosophy, philosophy usually comes with some form of social moral code. Also, fascinating poll results so far. The votes for each item closely match the average.

Magnets was just a guess, because I only have a vague memory of the article now. Suffice is to say that the satellite was meant to work by 'passively' attracting the debris.

Found this, though it wasn't what I was looking for. http://www.spacesafetymagazine.com/space-debris/debris-removal/electrodynamic-debris-eliminator-receives-funding/ I remember something once about using an space tether that would attract debris to it with either static electricity or electro magnets. That's what I was searching for, but it didn't turn up.

The trouble with rail systems is they're so ridiculously easy to muck up. If the world had less sickos, it might be viable, but this is definitely not that world. Pretty sure over-dependency on rail systems even had a lot to do with the outcome of WWII. Supply lines were a lot easier to sabotage when everything was done by rail. That's the sad thing about trains. Personally, I love them, and I wish we could make optimal use of them.

We're already going to be facing a serious water shortage within a decade or two.

Electric 100%. This has been a pet peeve of mine for a while, the idea that everyone complains about them. "Doesn't matter if your car is electric, when you plug it in, its getting its power from a dirty energy source anyway." Well yeah, that's a valid argument, but only in the short-term. I think we can all agree that a "Mr. Fusion" car engine is a bad idea. Even if we technically could do it, vehicles generating power with volatile energy sources is quite obviously a bad idea. However, what happens when/if fusion power becomes a practical reality? Electric cars will still be able to harness that power. Except for some really extreme discovery, ANY future energy source, no matter how powerful, will probably simply be converted to electricity. Electric cars can tap into that. This is good for the advancement of civilization because electric cars will be able to access the power source no matter what, without any need to make changes to our current infrastructure. No worrying about if the gas station is selling hydrogen, ethanol, gasoline, matter-antimatter particles, etc. Just plug the car into an outlet, and go!

I don't think the general public will accept it until they see a microscopic image of an organism. Either intact or fossilized.

This sounds like a job for a "Genesis Torpedo," or the more practical equivalent. As RainDreamer said, you're better off just going out to find a 'dead' body that fits your specifications, and then "terraform" it. You'll save a lot of time and effort, and won't need 10,000,000,000 dV to get the iron into orbit. What if it was heavily-compated iron? Bit of a tangent, but I've always wondered if compressing matter into a small enough space (without ending up with a singularity) could create a planetary core with a gravity well strong enough to have an asteroid-sized rock with a stable atmosphere comparable to 1atm. Also curious if this could occur naturally, if the solar system contained enough heavy elements while it was forming. For instance, if Earth had a core made of uranium instead of nickel-iron. Granted, that would probably be a very radioactive place, but I'm just thinking in terms of an atmosphere at all, not a habitable world by human standards.

http://www.engadget.com/2015/03/17/nasa-testing-leaptech-wing/ What I find most interesting about this, is the location of so many props on the wing. Apparently, the props will provide the lift by blowing air into the wings, enabling the craft to fly at unusually low speeds. Is my logic failing me? Doesn't this sound strikingly similar to moving a sailboat by pointing a fan at the sail?

Deep down, I'm hoping that NASA is playing with this because they want to see if HD cameras are viable for a future lunar trip. Other planets? Ehh, "live" video would be much more difficult. But I have to assume we could at least manage a stable streaming digital HD transmission from the moon.

Impossible in America. If Martians invaded tomorrow - even if the technology was eons beyond anything humans could develop, here's what the opinions would be. Red: It's the end of the world. We must fight, Fight, FIGHT!!! Blue: The Martian invasion is clearly government propaganda, surgically-planned to rally us behind a meaningless war against a technologically inferior race, to acquire Martian (insert valuable resource here) reserves. And those two opinions, if surveyed, would end up being somewhere around 51-49% of the population. It never fails.

What is China's investment in developing a manned moon program? As far as the U.S. is concerned, if you're looking for a "common cause," you can't even get half of the country to agree on whether or not being nuked by Iran is bad or good (judging by how the representatives have been behaving lately). NASA might as well just go for Mars if they can afford it. The sun will burn out before America unanimously agrees on anything.

The political motivation is making the world realize that humanity can still, in fact, move forward. The feeling of stagnation that civilization is currently in is almost claustrophobic, and it can't be having a good impact on the mental state of our "collective unconscious."

The last aurora I saw was in Buffalo (which is only about a half hour from Canada), and that came from the flare that crippled Africa's power supply.

Naa, it's fine, though, if you plan on doing this regularly whenever there's a good spike, you could just edit the original post to include the latest update and then add a new post at the end to bump it. Something like this should actually be stickied though.

Unless I've been misreading these things all my life, the red line that curves around the oval is the the LOWEST point you need to be in order to have a chance at seeing anything. So, even in that first picture, only the U.S. states touching the Canadian border will be able to see it?

Precisely.

So many times over the years, I've wanted to grab that Total Recall clip, make 50 or so VHS tapes that just play it over and over again for 8 hours, and send the tapes to the NASA offices.

The design is based on things NASA was developing on, with habitat modules being the ultimate goal. And... it's considerably larger than a cupboard.

I guess we'll see what the folks up there do with it after its been attached. I assume it will actually get some use.

It's designed to deflect debris hitting it at 30000kph and you're worried about someone kicking a hole in it? I think we're building things a bit differently these days, regardless.