Quotes from Michio Kaku

If a planetary twin of the Earth exists in space, it has eluded us so far. But we have found about fifty super-Earths so far. Kepler-452b, which was discovered by the Kepler spacecraft in 2015 and is about 1,400 light-years from us, is particularly interesting. It is 50 percent bigger than our planet, so you would weigh more than you do on the planet Earth, but otherwise, living there may not be so different from living on Earth.

Nor do we experience the mechanisms that convert our desires into movements. When I wished to begin hiking up the mountain again, I would simply set off, without thinking about the individual muscle contractions that each step required. When a wasp flies, it is probably not aware of its every wing beat. It may simply will itself through space.

If each of them creates another thousand robots, then we have a million. Then a billion. Then a trillion. In just a few generations, we can have an expanding sphere containing quadrillions of these devices, which scientists call von Neumann machines.

Scientists were able to replicate this process—successfully replacing a viral sequence with other types of DNA and inserting that DNA in the target cell—making "genomic surgery" possible. CRISPR rapidly replaced older methods of genetic engineering, making gene editing cleaner, more accurate, and much faster.

These are examples of "transhumanism," which advocates embracing technology to enhance our skills and capabilities. To survive and even flourish on distant worlds, we may have to alter ourselves mechanically and biologically. To transhumanists, it's not a matter of choice but of necessity.

Thee notion that we live in a quiet, ordinary suburb of the galaxy was simple and comforting. But boy, we were wrong.

The first is the Copernican principle, which simply states that there is nothing special about the Earth. So the Earth is just a piece of cosmic dust wandering aimlessly through the cosmos. It is just a coincidence that the forces of nature are "tuned" just right.

I theorize that humans are different from animals because we understand time. We have temporal consciousness in addition to spatial and social consciousness. The latest part of the brain to evolve is the prefrontal cortex, which lies just behind our forehead. It is constantly running simulations of the future.

Musk's proposed rocket system was originally called the Mars Colonial Transporter, but he renamed it the Interplanetary Transport System because, as he said, "This system really gives you freedom to go anywhere you want in the greater solar system." His long-term vision is to build a network that would connect the planets as the railroad connected American cities. Musk

The universe is a symphony of strings. And the Mind of God, which Einstein wrote eloquently about, is cosmic music resonating throughout hyperspace.

Finally, the basic principles of transhumanism, that humanity should not have to endure "nasty, brutish, and short" lives, when science can relieve suffering by enhancing the human race, were first clearly laid out by Julian Huxley in 1957.

A figure skater, for example, can only spin about four times in the air on the Earth. No skater has ever performed a quintuple jump. This is because the height of the jump is determined by the velocity at takeoff and the strength of gravity.

The leading fusion reactor using magnetic confinement at present is called the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), located in southern France.

Global warming is controversial, of course, but the controversy is mainly over whether human activity is driving it.

If the universe is dense enough, then there is enough matter and gravity to attract the distant galaxies and reverse the expansion, so that the Big Crunch becomes a realistic possibility. If the universe lacks sufficient mass, then there is not enough gravity to reverse the expansion and the universe goes into a Big Freeze. The critical density separating these two scenarios is roughly six hydrogen atoms per cubic meter.

The largest Martian canyon, Mariner Valley, which is probably the largest canyon in the solar system, is so vast that, if placed on North America, it would extend from New York City to Los Angeles.

Most of the energy of a chemical rocket goes into lifting its own weight into space, but a nanoship passively receives its energy from external ground-based lasers, so there is no wasted fuel—100 percent of it goes into propelling the ship. And since nanoships do not have to generate their own energy, they have no moving parts. This significantly reduces the chances of mechanical breakdowns. They also have no explosive chemicals and would not blow up on the launchpad or in space.

A headlamp of known brightness is a "standard candle." A Type Ia supernova acts as a standard candle, so it's easy to tell its distance.)

Throughout world history, the greatest killers have not been wars but plagues and epidemics. Unfortunately, it is possible that nations have kept secret stockpiles of deadly diseases, such as smallpox, which could be weaponized using biotechnology to create havoc.

So in addition to the Big Freeze and Big Crunch, a third alternative began to emerge from the data, the Big Rip, which is like the Big Freeze on steroids. It is a vastly accelerated time frame for the life cycle of the universe.

All the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and [the] whole temple of man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins…Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul's habitation henceforth be safely built.

An interesting fact is that astronauts become several inches taller in outer space due to the expansion of their spinal columns. Once back on Earth, their height reverts back to normal. Astronauts may also lose 1 percent of their bone mass per month in space. To slow down this loss, they have to exercise at least two hours a day on a treadmill

It would take them only five seconds to zip to the moon, about an hour and a half to get to Mars, and a few days to reach Pluto. Rather than waiting ten years for a mission to the outer planets, we could receive new information about them from nanoships in a matter of days, and in this way we could observe the developments in the solar system very nearly in real time.

Every few days, Giordano Bruno has his revenge.