Travel to the past is possible

                                        

In the documentary "Stephen Hawking's universe", the British physicist categorically denied that man can travel into the past.

But what is feasible physically impossible in a virtual world, thanks to a series of Internet resources that allow us to look at the world that our grandparents lived.

Recently added to the list click Pastmapper, a kind of Google maps through which we can see were the streets of San Francisco, USA, 1853.

Although still in its infancy, as the current page is a trial version, the driver is considered the germ of a global network to reconstruct the past of cities around the world.

Google Campus

"I live in San Francisco and I enjoy telling people that visits the city's history and how it has changed. So I started doing a little research online," said Bradley Thompson, a graphic designer and creator of Pastmapper.

The implementation of this project came during a conference on the humanities in the digital world
hosted by Google Campus in Silicon Valley and aimed at people interested in maps and history.

When Thompson explained his idea for a Google maps of the past, to include details of streets and businesses, it generated much interest. Shortly after he had the help of a Google developer.

For several months, Thompson investigated old maps of the city with the help of volunteer historians, creating the first sketch that aspires to be a kind of Wikipedia of the past.

"A kind of Wikipedia"

The system was developed from the Illustrator program and the technology of Google maps API and the idea is that, like the online encyclopedia, reaches the point where users can add data.

"It has great potential for people who can explain where they lived," he said, "over the maps may be added as data layers.

For now, the map allows us to locate streets of San Francisco that no longer exist, or where lived Miss Bowden, designer dresses, and George Gordon, a local blacksmith and where is the room or where they were the salted or shops selling coal.
But in the future, Thompson expected to include further information service, covering more cities and dates.
Augmented Reality

Pastmapping not the first Internet resource that aims to become a time machine.

In 2010 was launched in the UK click Historypin page, which also works in collaboration with Googlemapsclic, as well as museums and libraries.

The site started with the City of London and has already spread to cities around the world.

The difference with this is that beyond showing streets and businesses, this virtual map includes photographs, video, audio and personal stories hung by users with dates between 1840 and today.

Recently, it launched an application for android and iphone that uses augmented reality technology to allow users to access this information by simply pointing the phone to a particular street.

The place is quite a nostalgic fetish, and includes material posted by users all around Latin America, from suspension bridges in Paraguay in 1926 the state of the streets the Colombian city of Bucaramanga in 1920.

The secret of the Loch Ness Monster

                                        

Scotland recently declassified documents realize how seriously the police took the existence of the Loch Ness monster, after several alleged sightings in the thirties.

The documents, held by National Archives of Scotland, shows that several ministers came to view the capture of the mythical creature, considered real even by the local police chief, said BBC correspondent Colin Blane in Scotland.

1938, the chief of police in Inverness-shire announced its desire to protect Nessie hunters who wanted to get him "dead or alive."

The legend of a Loch Ness monster covers more than 1,400 years, when he says that St. Columba encountered a strange beast ski. However, all picked up in the thirties, with the appearance of blurred photographs of the "monster" in the newspapers.

"To be or not to be"

In 1933, he was asked the Minister of Scotland to confirm the existence of a monster or water snake. The House of Commons whether the approach was in the interest of science, research should be funded.

Much of the press at the time derided the proposal.

Ministers and public employees were skeptical, but declassified documents show that observers are thought to park around the lake to photograph Nessie and shuffled forms of capture without damage.

But the story became world famous after a Scottish newspaper reported that the beast had been seen crossing the street.

In the end, seemed like a good thing not to kill the monster, much less a myth.

Mysteries in the painting of The Mona Lisa

 

Without doubt, or Gioconda, is one of the most famous paintings throughout art history.

This reputation has contributed several factors: the media painting theft suffered one hundred years ago, the fascinating and inspiring figure of its author, no less known Leonardo da Vinci, the enigma surrounding its expression - smiling or not? - and, more recently, the overwhelming success of the bestseller 'The Da Vinci Code'.

For all these reasons it is surprising that a recurring basis, the media will echo new hypotheses about the alleged mysteries surrounding the painting of the Florentine genius.

The latest addition to the already long list is the American graphic artist and designer Ron Piccirillo who recently announced to all and sundry that he had discovered some hidden symbols, animals, specifically surrounding the figure of the Mona Lisa.

To discover the animals hidden at first sight-a lion, a buffalo, a monkey and a snake-painting should be placed horizontally. At least that is what ensures Piccirillo.

According to this New York artist, his discovery was entirely accidental. After those figures appeared before him in the newspapers decided to track manuscripts of Leonardo and fruit of that research, Piccirillo believe they have found several fragments of text that explain the inclusion of animals in the painting.

Specifically, these sentences in which Leonardo mentions the lion and the serpent, and Piccirillo has been interpreted as a reference to the sin of envy. As interpreted by this artist, Leonardo painted the Mona Lisa would not to represent a real person, but to capture iconographically this sin.

The Mona Lisa, oriented horizontally, with arrows pointing to some of the animals "discovered."

At first glance, the hypothesis may be consistent Piccirillo, but what's true in that interpretation? To tell the truth, the truth is that very little. The first of these statements is barely above minimum scrutiny is the existence of animal figures in the painting.

If we take a good quality image of the Mona Lisa-like the one available in the Wikipedia entry, and turn horizontally, we see that the forms Piccirillo identified as animals are in the mountains and forests represented by the protagonist of canvas. Undoubtedly, you have to do a good stretch of the imagination to detect any animal there.


The shapes of the "animals", highlighted

More likely is that the American artist has been the victim of pareidolia, a psychological phenomenon by which our brain plays tricks on us and makes us see recognizable shapes patterns where there are only vague. It's the same phenomenon occurs, for example, when we see figures and faces in the clouds.

Moreover, his interpretation of Leonardo's painting represents envy does not seem very successful, because besides that he had never used this combination of animals to symbolize the sin, the protagonist of the picture is fully identified, contrary to Piccirillo, what he proposes: Gerardini Lisa is the wife of a wealthy merchant named Gioccondo (hence the other title of the work).

Also, if Leonardo had wanted to hide any such symbolic allusion would not have needed to hide it so convoluted. Another of his famous paintings, 'The Lady in Ermine', animal symbolism used a more conventional way. She represented in this painting is Cecilia Gallerani, the beautiful mistress of Ludovico Sforza, who, besides being known as "El Moro", also received the nickname ermellino (ermine, in Italian). That is surely the reason that she portrayed the animal appears.

The mystery of the strange trail

People in Rybnik, Poland, this December 19 observed a strange wake, like a cloud in the local sky.

Sounds like an airplane, but a lot of attention because of its shape, density and color.

The curious trail could be seen clearly, not the device that let her. In a brief moment in the video itself is hard to see a small object brighter.

Some have related to a meteorite, although there is evidence that nothing has fallen into that area. Officials say there was nothing unusual in that part of heaven.

Do you think that aliens are watching us from the Moon?

                                                                       

Scientists look for traces of alien presence on the moon. We are invited to participate in the search and rediscover the cosmos.

Paul Davies and Robert Wagner of the University of Arizona, USA. UU., Argue that it is a good time to reinvestigate our closest neighbor. Both scientists believe the moon's surface may contain traces of extraterrestrial activity.

The research, in this case can be prolific, as the Earth's natural satellite is always "at hand" and because of its geology inactive "can keep long-term evidence."
By this time the researchers have at their disposal tens of thousands of pictures of the lunar surface.

And science seeks collaboration and support from fans or interested in astronomy, to those available to those photos. There you can find, according to scientists, some evidence of stay of visitors from other worlds, such as tools, trash, and traces of various drilling.

The journal Acta Astronautica 'shows that this project will be a good companion to another program, the "SETI" (Search of Extraterrestrial Intelligence) is analyzing possible signals from other planetary space, with the aim of detecting extraterrestrial life.

Apart from a significant number of potential partners, the research project of the Moon, from photos, it's too cheap, it does not require massive funding.
Those wishing to help scientists, and possibly make your own discovery, will have 340,000 pictures available to NASA's Lunar Orbiter.

Ingenuity, since its launch in June 2009, is sending high-quality photos of the superficiel of Earth's natural satellite with a resolution of 50 centimeters per pixel. It is estimated that the number of photos reaching a million at the end of the mission of the station, "which can increase the chances of finding traces of extraterrestrial life."

Scientists find traces of the on Pluto 'cornerstone' of life

                                        

U.S. scientists have found the cornerstone of life on Pluto. The Hubble telescope, NASA revealed the existence of traces of organic molecules on the surface origin of the dwarf planet.

The researchers found that areas highlighted by the high level of absorption of solar ultraviolet radiation

This peculiarity confirms the existence of organic substances. It is assumed that molecules with a complex structure, including hydrocarbons and nitrogen.

"It's an amazing discovery, because exactly the molecules of oil or other substances, which are supposedly responsible for some features of the ultraviolet spectrum, can give Pluto its special color of red and brown," said Alan Stern, director of the research.

U.S. scientists hope to receive more information about the surface of Pluto in July 2015 when the New Horizon spacecraft flies over NASA's Pluto and its moons.

The studies previously conducted by an international group of researchers, composed of specialists from NASA showed that the surface of Pluto, probably larger astronomical object in the Kuiper Belt (formerly considered a planet in the Solar System), consists of a thin ice and nitrogen, under which lies a layer of water ice.

Scientists suspect that under this crust may be an ocean water (liquid water is a major housing conditions pointed to the crawl space) and heat to melt the ice could come from within and proceed radioactive decay of isotopes of potassium in the nucleus of the object.

This assumption requires further investigation. But if the hypothesis is proven and can speak of the existence of an ocean of Pluto, this would mean that even the astronomical objects in the Kuiper belt (located at a distance 20 times greater than the distance between Earth and the Sun) are more suitable for life than previously thought.

The mysterious human spontaneous combustion

                                              

It is called spontaneous human combustion because the victim ends to ashes, without any great damage caused by fire in the vicinity or an obvious source of ignition.



It is very rare and usually the victims are elderly and live alone.

Many assume that only supernatural or alien forces can explain the reason why, for example, is often a leg without burning, while the rest of the body is completely burned.



But more likely it is a more grounded process known as the 'wick effect'.

The first victim dies of a heart attack, stroke or a fall.

A lit cigarette or a spark from a nearby fire burn makes your clothes smoldering.
While the clothing is slowly burning, the heat melts the fat beneath the skin and absorbs charred cloth as a wick and burning.

Experiments carried out with corpses wrapped in blankets pigs have shown that burns with a smooth and steady flame that warms the body at 800 ° C and lasts for seven or more hours.

The body parts that are naked can get without burning but the rest of the body is completely burned.