Burroughs and Acker

William S. Burroughs discusses art, writing and consciousness with Kathy Acker in this insightful interview, posted in its YouTubed entirety by Renegade Futurist.



I had the good fortune to see Burroughs and Acker onstage together in the mid-90s, the former in his customary suit and Acker decked out in intimidating leather and sporting dark hair. Although I hadn't yet seen it, both had appeared in a Nike commercial (which, miraculously, seems to be absent from YouTube).

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Some tinfoil might be required.

ViRob, a Cavities Crawler

At the upcoming ILSI-Biomed Israel 2009 conference (June 15-17 in Tel Aviv), researchers from the Medical Robotics Laboratory at the Israel Institute of Technology (Technion) will be showing off a microrobot called ViRob, that has only a 1millimeter diameter and can crawl through vessels and cavities, when controlled by an external magnetic field.

"Cavities." Uh-huh. We know what they're talking about.

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Organic quantum computation

First Evidence of Entanglement in Photosynthesis

Physicists are fascinated with entanglement, the strange quantum phenomenon in which distinct objects share the same existence, regardless of the distance between them. But in their quest to study and exploit entanglement for information processing, physicists have found it fragile and easily destroyed. This fragility seems to severely limits how entanglement might ever be used.

But a new, more robust face of entanglement is beginning to emerge from other types of experiment. For example, physicists have recently found the signature of entanglement in the thermal states of bulk materials at low temperatures. This has huge implications for biological systems: if entanglement is more robust than we thought, what role might it play in living things?

Now we're beginning to find out.

KurzweilAI.net poses a fascinating question:

Does this support the Hameroff/Penrose idea of quantum computation in brain microtubules as a model of consciousness?

In short, do our brains utilize Einstein's "spooky action at a distance"? If so, what might this mean for contemporary definitions of consciousness?

Author/mathematician Rudy Rucker addresses some of the implications here.

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Sometimes "alien looking" is good enough.

15 Most Alien Looking Caterpillars on Earth

(Thanks to @josholalia.)

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Coincidence?

Maybe it's just me, but the fantastical concept car pictured above appears to have more than a little in common with the purported alien-derived "drone" pictured below.





Both vehicles sport distinctive eggbeater-like protrusions and both make use of some form of unknown physics. In the case of the "drones," photos featured in cleverly crafted documents depict portions of the craft locked in position without making physical contact with the main body (see image below). The concept car's disembodied rear wheels would seem to make use of a similar concept.





So, is there a causal link? Your guess is as good as mine.

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Photomania

I recently acquired a battery recharger, which makes snapping photos all the more irresistible. I like taking shots of statuary; fortunately (and to the surprise of many) there's no shortage in Kansas City.







Click here to view my Flickr stream.

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"Dreamers of a Better Future, Unite!"

Athena Andreadis has posted an excellent piece on Sentient Developments, lucidly arguing that space exploration and human augmentation are mutually advantageous endeavors.

A brief excerpt:

Yet no matter how palatable the methods and outcomes are, it seems to me that changes to humans will be inevitable if we ever want to go beyond the orbit of Pluto within one lifetime. Successful implementation of transhumanist techniques will help overcome the immense distances and inhospitable conditions of the journey. The undertaking will also bring about something that naysayers tend to dread as a danger: speciation. Any significant changes to human physiology (whether genetic or epigenetic) will change the thought/emotion processes of those altered, which will in turn modify their cultural responses, including mating preferences and kinship patterns.

Andreadis' proposal reminds me of speculation that the so-called "Grays" that play such a pivotal role in the modern UFO mythos are in fact genetically engineered for space travel. With its small, streamlined frame, the anatomy of a prototypical Gray might be ideal for long space voyages; if we chose to send a "generation ark" to a nearby star, we might very well design our astronauts along similar lines.

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Nick Redfern and the Nitinol controversy

Nick Redfern has written a cogent and thought-provoking essay addressing the controversial origin of Nitinol, a "memory metal" not unlike the material described by Roswell eyewitnesses. Must-reading for anyone intrigued by the eponymous UFO crash.

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Spectacularly lifelike giant marionette

(Thanks to @TheDarkEngine.)

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Mars animation

Here's a vision of the future of Mars exploration I can live with. Note the alien ruins (?) near the end.



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If walls could talk

Trigger Point Mouldings by Touchy-Feely (Dezeen)

Architects Stephanie Davidson and Georg Rafailidis of Berlin practice Touchy-Feely have designed heated protrusions from a wall to assist in muscle-tension relief.

"Muscle-tension relief." Yeah, sure.

"The mouldings encourage heightened, physical interactions between bodies and architectural surfaces," say the designers.

Enough said.

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I want to be a cowboy.

I'd like to ride this thing to work. Sure, it wouldn't be the fastest mode of transportation, but I'm certain the looks of passersby would make it thoroughly worthwhile.

For more bizarre creations, click here.

(Thanks to Boing Boing.)

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A mecca for paranoids?

Build it and they will come.

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What will you be driving after the Singularity?

Ultra-futuristic concept vehicles (Pink Tentacle)

What will automobiles look like 50 years down the road? If they turn out to be anything like these concepts from the design studios of four major automakers, we are in for quite a ride.

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Of perchlorates and Martians

More Researchers Say Liquid Water Present on Mars Now

Some salts, like perchlorates, lower the freezing point substantially. It turns out that the temperature for the liquid phase of magnesium perchlorate -- 206 degrees Kelvin -- is a temperature found on Mars at the Phoenix landing site. Based on temperature findings from the Phoenix lander, conditions would allow this perchlorate solution to be present in liquid form for a few hours each day during the summer.

"The window for liquid is very small," Hanley said. Nevertheless, this finding further supports the possibility of finding life on Mars.

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Pole-dancing 2.0

Here's what you get when you let a limber, scantily clad woman loose inside a glass box with a bucket of conductive body-paint.



(Tip of the hat to Fashioning Technology.)

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Extraterrestrials vs. fairies

The ETH and the science of fairies

The ETH has been under pressure for a long-time. The biggest problem is that the more data we have (especially when we can see the geographical and temporal variations) the less easy it is to fit to the idea that space travellers are dropping by in their fancy flying saucers (how we look back to the simplicity of the early, Contactee era with a misty eye). We also have reports of contacts with "aliens" going back centuries (along with other "ascended" masters) and beyond that a range of other entities, suggesting the real possibility that these aliens are just new masks worn by an age-old phenomena.

Readers who've followed this blog since '06 might recall my own disillusionment with the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis.

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The conspiracy lives.

There's a new bot in town and it calls itself "Majestic-12." Where's Greg Bishop when you need him?

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Today's word is "von Neumann."

Two fascinating perspectives:

Growing the Interstellar Probe (Centauri Dreams)

Freitas later turned to nanotech ideas in advocating a probe more or less the size of a sewing needle, with a millimeter-wide body and enough nanotechnology onboard to activate assemblers on the surface of whatever object it happened to find in the destination system.

Now we're looking at a biological variant of this concept that could, if extended, be turned to self-replication. Rothemund says that he wants to write molecular programs that can build technology. A probe built along these lines could use local materials to create the kind of macro-scale objects needed to form a research station around another star, the kind of equipment we once envisioned boosting all the light years to our target. How much simpler if we can build the needed tools when we arrive?

Are Von Neumann Probes Ethical? (Chris Wren)

Von Neumann probes would be small, self-replicating robots. Small, easy to manufacture in large numbers and because of their low mass, easy to accelerate t

We're still grappling with the ethics - and unforeseen consequences - involved with releasing genetically modified strains of crops into the environment. There are always unforeseen consequences with any technology. The more sophisticated the technology, the more extensive and impossible to foresee those consequences are certain to be.

Would a more advanced civilization, if they were also more ethically developed than we are (not hard to imagine) consider von Neumann probes a form of cancer and take steps to eradicate them? Worse, would they take punitive measures against any civilization irresponsible enough to set them loose?"

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The chair that lives your life for you

Autonomous Living Unit by Eduardo McIntosh

Called Autonomous Living Unit, the project envisages furniture that could be installed in derelict buildings and deserted housing projects to "provide for the basic needs of the 21st century human being."

I don't see an espresso machine anywhere.

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It has landed.

lights on from thesystemis on Vimeo.

The designers of this whimsical facade simply had to have had the climax from "Close Encounters" in mind when they coded the sequences of multicolored lights . . . or am I doomed find UFO pop culture references where none actually exist?

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"Crawling horror . . ."

Back in high-school I actually owned a poster commemorating "The Giant Leeches," a film I still haven't actually seen.

Dark Roasted Blend has more here.

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The motherlode?

Not quite -- but not too shabby, either. (Click here to go straight to the vintage science fiction gallery.)

(Tip of the hat to Michael Garrett.)

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Happy birthday, Morrissey!

Morrissey, one of my favorite singers, recently turned 50.

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Winning big

I've been winning free stuff online lately -- and not just the usual Nigerian inheritances and Microsoft giveaways.

Don't believe me? Click here and here.

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A matter of perspective

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo.

(Hat tip: The Teleomorph.)

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You haven't seen pollution . . .

. . . until you've gawked at these photos. People literally swimming in detritus. Stirring and genuinely terrifying.

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Hey, isn't this the set-up for "I Am Legend"?

'Tamed' virus wipes out cancer cells safely

The research team modified a common virus - called an adenovirus - so that it could deliver genetic therapy to destroy tumours without poisoning the liver. The changes enabled the virus to keeps its natural 'infectious' characteristics to replicate in, and kill, cancer cells in mice. But for the first time the virus is also recognised and destroyed by healthy mouse liver cells, so it is no longer toxic.

(Via Futurismic.)

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Concept bots

Top Ten Robots That You Never Knew You Wanted

(Thanks to @bruces.)

The art of IsoBan

I've been digging the science fiction/fantasy art of IsoBan (Chris Butler). Here's a preview to whet your appetite:



A couple favorites from IsoBan's Flickr stream:









Check out IsoBan's blog here.

Humans can get used to anything.

Plausible (and refreshingly pacifist) robots live alongside humans in this sharp, provocative clip by 1stAveMachine, creator of one of the coolest CGI fembots of all time.



For a showcase of additional work, click here.

(Thanks yet again to Grinding.)

Is Rudy Rucker looking for a fight?

No, actually. In fact, I found this observation quite funny:

What's up with so many young people shaving their heads bald? The thing is, if you're at all overweight, you're going to have a lipless slit-mouth wrinkle on your nape. So your back is like an eyeless alien face.

"Supernatural Investigator" stills (part two)

Dramatic headshots. For good or ill, my episode of "Supernatural Investigator" is packed with 'em.









Because it's only fitting that a show about life on other planets should feature a host who looks like living proof.

(Images courtesy of Vision TV.)

"Supernatural Investigator" stills (part one)

I finally received a DVD of my February appearance in the titular role of Vision TV's "Supernatural Investigator." As I'm allowed to post a couple minutes of footage for promotional purposes, I figured I might as well share a few stills instead.

First up is an unflattering shot of me "grilling" the University of Wyoming's Jeffrey Lockwood, an entomologist who taught a NASA-funded course devoted to communicating with ETs (via written English).





And here I am entering a recording studio with the SETI Institute's Seth Shostak. (I disagree with many of the Institute's guiding tenets -- most notably its irrationally harsh, largely uninformed dismissal of UFO evidence. That said, Shostak was a charming and cordial host and I enjoyed strolling the SETI Institute's museum-like central corridor. And where else can you find a paperweight emblazoned with the Drake Equation?)





I had the chance to answer a question for the SETI Institute's radio show. The theme was technology. As I was in the habit of chronicling my travels via Twitter, I related my own somewhat schizophrenic relationship with gadgets.





On a tangential note, I've grown to dislike the gray shirt I'm wearing in the bottom two photos. It makes me look vaguely like Dr. Evil.

(All images courtesy of Vision TV.)

Rise of the tumblebots

Imagine hundreds of these things coming at you in a tide of clicking, whirring, undulating black plastic . . .

(Thanks, Grinding!)

Fernando Vicente -- again

Fernando Vicente's strange visions have cropped up on my radar once again, this time via the excellent Sex in Art.

Click here for Vicente's blog.

Neanderthal sandwiches

How Neanderthals met a grisly fate: devoured by humans

The controversial suggestion follows publication of a study in the Journal of Anthropological Sciences about a Neanderthal jawbone apparently butchered by modern humans. Now the leader of the research team says he believes the flesh had been eaten by humans, while its teeth may have been used to make a necklace.

Fernando Rozzi, of Paris's Centre National de la Récherche Scientifique, said the jawbone had probably been cut into to remove flesh, including the tongue. Crucially, the butchery was similar to that used by humans to cut up deer carcass in the early Stone Age. "Neanderthals met a violent end at our hands and in some cases we ate them," Rozzi said.

Man's salvation

(Image found at Chris Wren's new blog.)

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Today I learned from a friend that one of my neighbors has an unhealthy preoccupation with ordering this stuff off eBay.

Have we detected an extraterrestrial signal?

SETI Picks Up Regular Laser Pulse Emanating From Space

Several years ago Bhathal, a researcher at the University of Western Sydney, suggested that a likely form of extraterrestrial communication would be laser bursts. He set up a facility at his lab which sweeps a nearby volume of space, within about 100 light years, for laser bursts that come in a regular pattern. Any kind of communication would likely be distinguished from background noise by coming in repeated or non-random patterns.

And a few months ago, Bhathal found the kind of regular pattern he's been looking for. He's been analyzing it and seeking a repeat pattern in the same area of space ever since. Though he's cautious about claiming it as a genuine extraterrestrial signal, his discovery has been making local news.

The future of foam-based automobiles is now!

The really cool thing about the Spira? It doubles as a coffin after you get run down by a Dodge Ram.

Fashion tip

Yeah? Well, I think it's sexy.

What's in store?

Kepler Observations Begin (Centauri Dreams)

Expect the first discoveries to be gas giants close to their stars, easiest to spot and confirm using Kepler's transit methods. Then things get even more interesting. This is a mission that should be able to find terrestrial worlds in the ultimate sense; i.e., planets that not only approximate ours in size but are also roughly at the distance required for liquid water to exist at the surface. We still call that distance the 'habitable zone' even though it's becoming clear, as witness the case around Jupiter, that tidal forces can provide immense energies that could extend a different kind of habitable zone much farther from its star.

Fetus frenzy

No, this is not a prop from David Cronenberg's "Dead Ringers."

A very cool idea

Kinetic Prayer Wheels Transform Prayers Into Energy

Every year millions of tourists and locals descend upon Tibet's temples and spin the prayer wheels contained inside. If the mechanical energy generated by the movement of these spinning wheels could be harnessed, we could potentially reduce the size of our current carbon footprint and supplement an inadequate and unreliable electrical grid for numerous individuals. The Prayer Wheel Energy Generator, designed by Taikkun Yang Li does just this by transforming all of those good vibes into electricity that could be used to provide reliable energy for daily needs such as evening lighting.

This chick's got the Posthuman Blues *bad*.

Empty swimming pools

No diving, please.

More . . .

Lunar swarmbots

Italy Aims to Send Spider-Bot Swarm to Moon

The idea to compete for the Google Lunar X Prize crystallized around the vision of Alberto Rovetta, a professor of robot mechanics at Politecnico di Milano. Rovetta's designs for lunar robots resemble skittering spiders or crabs that could deploy as a swarm of mobile cameras and sensors on both legs and wheels.

Such unorthodox designs may help the team seize the Google Lunar X Prize, which requires teams to land a robot on the moon, move at least 1,640 feet (500 meters) and beam high definition views back to Earth.

(Via The Keyhoe Report.)

The unchecked rise of DIY ribofunk

In Attics and Closets, 'Biohackers' Discover Their Inner Frankenstein

The easy availability of synthetic DNA is at the heart of some scientists' concerns. The National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, a government body, has recommended that companies selling DNA be required to screen all orders for signs that the buyers might have nefarious intent. Some biologists argue that anyone wishing to custom-make new organisms, even if it's just glow-in-the-dark bacteria (a popular trick among biohackers), should have to get a license first.

Currently, regulation of labs like these is murky. It's unclear what agency, if any, is responsible.

He's back!

Well, almost . . .

Zombification

Parasitic flies turn fire ants into zombies

It sounds like something out of science fiction: zombie fire ants. But it's all too real.

Fire ants wander aimlessly away from the mound.

Eventually their heads fall off, and they die.

The strange part is that researchers at the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M's AgriLife Extension Service say making "zombies" out of fire ants is a good thing.

"It's a tool -- they're not going to completely wipe out the fire ant, but it's a way to control their population," said Scott Ludwig, an integrated pest management specialist with the AgriLife Extension Service in Overton, in East Texas.

(Thanks to zombie specialist Nick Redfern.)

"Oxygen"

Oxygen from Christopher Hendryx on Vimeo.

(Found at Neural Dump.)

The art of Worm Intruder

More . . .

"Breakfast has been taken over by the machines."

"There's a meat substitute and there's a cheese substitute. Ever think there one day might be a human substitute?"



(Hat tip: @georgedvorsky.)

"A series of tubes"

Because nothing says "future" like gorgeous women encapsulated in giant glass tubes.

(Hat tip: @TheDarkEngine.)

Laughter

(Thanks: Jesus Olmo.)

A belated farewell

Fortean writer John Michell died last month; I just found out today.

Air raid!

Seed Bombs: First stirrings of the Genesis Device?

Each self-contained capsule is made of biodegradable plastic, and it melts away when wet, allowing the seedling within to flourish. Although it's not creating a heaven on earth at a subatomic level, it's a great start. Drop a few dozen planeloads of these babies, and it's goodbye desertification!

Although intended to enliven our own planet, this strikes me as a technology that might be rather easily modified to help terraform Mars.

Who Killed Bambi?

So many images, so little time . . .

(Thanks to @georgedvorsky for the tip.)

Under the knife

From: Next Nature:

Designer Laura Boffi envisions a future in which human instincts will leap behind on technological progress. For example, once the 'disease called mortality' is cured with regenerative medicine, man may start to see death not as a biological event in his life, but as something that may occur to the 'unlucky on call'. What would be the implications for our instincts for death?

Return of the "hobbits"

Hobbits 'are a separate species'

The team, which discovered the tiny remains in Liang Bua cave on Flores, contends that the population belongs to the species Homo floresiensis - separate from our own grouping Homo sapiens.

They argue that the "Hobbits" are descended from a prehistoric species of human - perhaps Homo erectus - which reached island South-East Asia more than a million years ago.

Over many years, their bodies most likely evolved to be smaller in size, through a natural selection process called island dwarfing, claim the discoverers, and many other scientists.

(Via The Keyhoe Report.)

Fab!

3D printing buildings: interview with Enrico Dini of D_Shape

Traditional building methods tend to reel in dreamers outlandish dreams though. Building with concrete and brick require scaffolding and a lot of manpower. This creates constraints. These constraints limit the way in which buildings can be constructed and limit the shapes and forms that architects can use. Rather than accept these constraints as a given Enrico set out to completely remove them. In 2004 he invented and patented a full scale 3D printing method that used epoxy to bind sand. Enrico could now 3D print buildings.

(Via Beyond the Beyond.)

The Geller controversy

Suspension of PSI Belief (Greg Bishop)

I am not aware of any controlled study which examines reported instances of metal continuing to bend after Geller has finished touching it, or indeed after he has left the premises. In any case, I prefer to leave the Geller question open.

Adding to the strange soup is the fact that Geller said he had been contacted in the early 1970s by an alien entity called SPECTRA which relayed messages to him through a supercomputer that was orbiting the Earth -- shades of the contactees and of course Philip K. Dick's VALIS experience. He also claimed UFO sightings from a very young age.

Alleged Russian UFO

Part of me loathes posting anonymous clips of alleged UFO footage; another part, every bit as strong as the other, enjoys the ensuing comments.

Thoughts on this one?

The art of Thomas Allen

Many more here!

(Hat tip: Boing Boing.)

"The Humans Are Dead"

Dawn of the chembots

Chemical 'caterpillar' points to electronics-free robots (with video)

Shingo Maeda and colleagues made the colour-changing, motile gel by combining polymers that change in size depending on their chemical environment. This is based on an oscillating chemical reaction called the Belousov–Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction. The result is an autonomous material that moves without electronic stimulation.

I'm pretty sure Rudy Rucker anticipated something like this in his "Ware" novels.

Support non-human rights!

I'm more than happy to help out with viral marketing, provided it's good viral marketing.

Are cities alive?

The city considered as a very large organism (Paul Raven)

There's a certain innate logic to the analogy that I feel anyone who's lived a long time in one city - or maybe many - would instantly glom onto. Of course the city is alive, of course it is a system, an organism - how could it be anything else?

Once that assumption is agreed, though, the challenge is to work out what that actually means in human terms - which is more of a book-sized challenge than one suitable for a blog post, I suspect. But I'm leaping ahead here, assuming that everyone feels the same way; maybe it sounds daft to you.

I'm drawn to the idea that we're effectively blind to many of the living processes at work in the world. As biological creatures, we expect life to conform to the laws of carbon-based chemistry; consequently, the vast undulations of cities go unnoticed (or at least unremarked).

Given that cities can be viewed as organisms, is it conceivable that some might qualify as intelligent organisms?

"Schlitzie"

Let artist Drew Friedman introduce you:

This is a just completed privately commissioned portrait of "Schlitzie, the Pin Head", AKA Schlitzie Surtees, and born (possibly) Simon Metz, in the Bronx in 1901. Schlitzie had microlephaly, a disorder that gave him a small brain and skull, and the cognizance of a three year old. he stood about four feet and wore dresses (due to his incontinence), leading many people to speculate he was a woman.

Comics connoisseurs likely recognize "Schlitzie" as the real-life inspiration for Bill Griffith's legendary "Zippy the Pinhead."

Don't wear your jewelry. Be your jewelry!

Marta Lwin explains:

epiSkin jewelry extends biological identity by combining technology and design into a new decorative body surface. This project is an exploration into the decorative technological control over biology to create an artifact which is a hybrid of both. Cultured in a lab, this biological jewelry is made of epithelia cells which grow to create an artificial skin. The cells are grown into custom designed forms, controlled by the artist. The cells are incubated for a period of time, following which they are stained with a custom dye. The skin is then visibly sealed into a wearable object.

(Via Grinding.)

No words necessary

Image by Mondolithic Studios.

A science fiction movie worth seeing?

Although I've become almost hopelessly pessimistic about Hollywood's ability to entertain me, I'm virtually certain I'll be buying a ticket to "District 9," apparently an expansion of "Alive in Joburg."

Generative landscapes

Larry Sheradon creates hallucinatory generative landscapes governed by the "physics" imposed by algorithms. Looking at them is strangely like peering into one's own mind in the process of dreaming.

Conifer from larry sheradon on Vimeo.

I bet you didn't know there was such a thing as a paranormal "Rat Pack."

Well, there is.

The abolition of suffering

A World Without Suffering? (David Pearce)

Smart neurostimulation, long-acting mood-enhancers, genetically re-engineering our hedonic "set-point" (etc) aren't therapeutic strategies associated with Buddhist tradition. Yet if we are morally serious about securing the well-being of all sentient life, then we have to exploit advanced technology to the fullest possible extent. Nothing else will work (short of some exotic metaphysics that is hard to reconcile with the scientific world-picture). Non-biological strategies to enrich psychological well-being have been tried on a personal level over thousands of years - and proved inadequate at best.

The future of the Net

From a provocative piece at New Scientist:

Heylighen speculates that it might turn the internet into a self-aware network that constantly strives to become better at what it does, reorganising itself and filling gaps in its own knowledge and abilities.

If it is not already semiconscious, we could do various things to help wake it up, such as requiring the net to monitor its own knowledge gaps and do something about them. It shouldn't be something to fear, says Goertzel: "The outlook for humanity is probably better in the case that an emergent, coherent and purposeful internet mind develops."

On a darker note:

Beware surfers: cyberspace is filling up

Experts predict that consumer demand, already growing at 60 per cent a year, will start to exceed supply from as early as next year because of more people working online and the soaring popularity of bandwidth-hungry websites such as YouTube and services such as the BBC's iPlayer.

It will initially lead to computers being disrupted and going offline for several minutes at a time. From 2012, however, PCs and laptops are likely to operate at a much reduced speed, rendering the internet an "unreliable toy".

DIY AR

Me too (doing some AR stuff)! from Anatoly Zenkov on Vimeo.

I'll admit it: At first, I thought this was an actual demo.

(Thanks: Beyond the Beyond.)

"Mr. Ando of the Woods"

The color of consciousness

I never thought parapsychological research would lend itself to interior design, but it appears I was wrong.

A lamp that reads your mind . . . maybe

The researchers claim -- and at this point the science sounds a bit fuzzy to the lay observer -- that the internal REG can be influenced by the human mind whether by intention, emotion, thought or subconscious processes. Apparently years of research have shown that REGs can be influenced by human consciousness. Even if the research sounds mind-boggling, the lamp is visually striking and most likely a source of light entertainment for family and friends.