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This week the Enquiring Hitchhiker has several new interviews. The first of these is with  Dr. Gregory Benford. Dr. Benford is one of the leading authors of hard science fiction working today. His novel In the Ocean of Night was one of my first introductions to the idea of artificial intelligence.

We've written about how college students should major in science, tech, engineering or math (STEM). This conventional wisdom is based on government propaganda (Obama: "This is what will make a difference in this country over the long haul.") and studies showing that science majors from the past forty years have scored better jobs. Unfortunately today's science job market doesn't live up to the hype (via @curriculumveto). Jim Austin of ScienceCareers tells WashPo's Brian Vastag: “There have been many predictions of [science] labor shortages and . . . robust job growth. And yet, it seems awfully hard for people to find a job....

We may not be alone. But our cosmic companions might be moist creatures in watery worlds -- lacking, of course, E.T.'s impulse, or ability, to phone home. The growing evidence of wet planets -- and its implications in our search for extraterrestrial life -- is among the marvels shared this weekend at a Santa Clara gathering of astronomers, astronauts and science fiction fans. The theme of the three-day SETIcon event: the exploration of universe and the quest to find life beyond Earth. Scientists agreed that the neighborhood is looking a lot friendlier. What began as a trickle of new planet...

The Earth is reaching a "tipping point" in climate change that will lead to increasingly rapid and irreversible destruction of the global environment unless its forces are controlled by concerted international action, an international group of scientists warns. Unchecked population growth, the disappearance of critical plant and animal species, the over-exploitation of energy resources, and the rapidly warming climate are all combining to bring mounting pressure on the Earth's environmental health, they say. Scientists from five nations, led by UC Berkeley biologist Anthony Barnosky, report their analysis Thursday in the journal Nature. They likened the potential impact of the forces...

WikiLeaks: The sleazy criminal organization dedicated to publishing U.S. secrets may loudly deny its leaks led to the hanging of a man in Iran Tuesday. But that's irrelevant because WikiLeaks gave Tehran the pretext it sought. A 24-year old Iranian man was the latest victim of the mullahs' monstrous tyranny this week, executed as a spy for Israel, supposedly for killing an Iranian nuclear scientist on behalf of his Zionist masters. That's a whiff of the twisted kangaroo court verdicts typical of Iran. In reality, Majid Jamali Fashi was a young kick-boxing instructor who visited Baku, Azerbaijan, for a tournament...

All fossil fuels must be cut to avoid global warming, scientists sayBy Mike De Souza, Postmedia News February 21, 2012 6:10 PM OTTAWA — Two Canadian climate change scientists from the University of Victoria say the public reaction to their recently published commentary has missed their key message: that all forms of fossil fuels, including the oilsands and coal, must be regulated for the world to avoid dangerous global warming. "Much of the way this has been reported is (through) a type of view that oilsands are good and coal is bad," said climate scientist Neil Swart, who co-authored the...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientists say NASA is about to propose major cuts in its exploration of other planets, especially Mars. And NASA's former science chief is calling it irrational. With limited money for science and an over-budget new space telescope, the space agency essentially had to make a choice in where it wanted to explore: the neighboring planet or the far-off cosmos. Mars lost. Two scientists who were briefed on the 2013 NASA budget that will be released next week said the space agency is eliminating two proposed joint missions with Europeans to explore Mars in 2016 and 2018. NASA...

This is quite something. Sixteen scientists, including such names as Richard Lindzen, William Kininmonth, Wil Happer, and Nir Shaviv, plus engineer Burt Rutan, and Apollo 17 astronaut Dr. Harrison Schmidt, among others, write what amounts to a heretical treatise to the Wall Street Journal, expressing their view that the global warming is oversold, has stalled in the last decade, and that the search for meaningful warming has led to co-opting weather patterns in the blame game. Oh, and a history lesson on Lysenkoism as it relates to today’s warming-science-funding-complex. I can hear Joe Romm’s head exploding all the way out...

After having exhausted the indignant possibilities of protesting the extinction of whales, pelicans and polar bears, the left has found a new endangered species to be outraged about. Iranian nuclear scientists. It's one thing to hug a polar bear or a tree, but it's another to embrace an Iranian nuclear scientist, who may well be a jolly and colorful fellow with a family and a paint by numbers coloring kit of an atom, but also happens to be a participant in a plot to kill millions of people. The left which has all the moral sense of a squashed peanut...

(JPost) — Israel’s Mossad is responsible for training and paying the assassins of a number of Iranian nuclear scientists over the past two years, TIME magazine reported Saturday citing unnamed Western intelligence sources. In addition to the assassinations of the scientists, all of which were carried out using nearly identical magnetic bombs attached to the side of their cars, the intelligence sources claimed Israel was responsible for an explosion at an Iranian missile base outside Tehran late last year. Majid Jamali Fashi, one of several suspects arrested, tried and sentenced to death by the Islamic Republic in the past two...

Harsh Political Reality Slows Climate Studies Despite Extreme YearBy JUSTIN GILLIS Published: December 24, 2011 At the end of one of the most bizarre weather years in American history, climate research stands at a crossroads. Scientists say they could, in theory, do a much better job of answering the question “Did global warming have anything to do with it?” after extreme weather events like the drought in Texas and the floods in New England. But for many reasons, efforts to put out prompt reports on the causes of extreme weather are essentially languishing. Chief among the difficulties that scientists face:...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Scientists have found the biggest black holes known to exist — each one 10 billion times the size of our sun. A team led by an astronomer at the University of California at Berkeley discovered the two gigantic black holes in clusters of galaxies 300 million light years away. That's relatively close on the galactic scale.

An Interior Department official said Thursday the agency will ask independent experts to review allegations by a federal judge that the testimony of two department scientists was so inconsistent and contradictory it amounted to deliberate deception. U.S. District Court Judge Oliver Wanger attacked the credibility of the biologists last month shortly before retiring from the bench. At a hearing on a motion in a court case involving delta smelt protections, Wanger called one of the scientists a "zealot" and accused the agency of engaging in "bad faith."

Scores of scientists work for the Interior Department on issues involving birds and bees, foxes and foxgloves, and all manner of other species and their habitats. But in the eyes of the general public they tend to be virtually anonymous, at best names in italics at the end of a Federal Register notice. Nonetheless, a spotlight has been trained recently on a few department employees: some National Park Service scientists at Point Reyes National Seashore on California’s northern coast, and an Arctic wildlife biologist working for the Anchorage office of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. And this week, two...

BRUSSELS (AP) — Warning: The warming of the world's oceans can cause serious illness and may cost millions of euros (dollars) in health care. That is the alarm sounded in a paper released online Tuesday on the eve of a two-day conference in Brussels. The 200-page paper is a synthesis of the findings of more than 100 projects funded by the European Union since 1998. It was produced by Project CLAMER, a collaboration of 17 European marine institutes. The paper says the rising temperature of ocean water is causing a proliferation of the Vibrio genus of bacteria, which can cause...

Malaria-carrying mosquitoes are disappearing in some parts of Africa, but scientists are unsure as to why. Figures indicate controls such as anti-mosquito bed nets are having a significant impact on the incidence of malaria in some sub-Saharan countries. But in Malaria Journal, researchers say mosquitoes are also disappearing from areas with few controls. They are uncertain if mosquitoes are being eradicated or whether they will return with renewed vigour. Data from countries such as Tanzania, Eritrea, Rwanda, Kenya and Zambia all indicate that the incidence of malaria is dropping fast. Researchers believe this is due to effective implementation of control...

Three years after the release of the remake The Day the Earth Stood Still, a team of American researchers has made the film’s theme a scientific theory: They are suggesting that an alien race might destroy man to stop our release of greenhouse-gas emissions and global warming. Writes Fox News: The thought-provoking scenario is one of many envisaged in a joint study by Penn State and the NASA Planetary Science Division, entitled "Would Contact with Extraterrestrials Benefit or Harm Humanity? A Scenario Analysis." It divides projected close encounters into "neutral," those that cause mankind "unintentional harm" and, more worryingly, those...

Extra, extra read all about it (hat tip Andrew Bolt): Aliens may destroy humanity to protect other civilisations, say scientists Rising greenhouse emissions may tip off aliens that we are a rapidly expanding threat, warns a report for Nasa Is it April Fools’ Day, or is someone playing the alien card? The scare report was brought to us by the Guardian’s science correspondent, Ian Sample. One threat – preemptive strikes: The authors warn that extraterrestrials may be wary of civilisations that expand very rapidly, as these may be prone to destroy other life as they grow, just as humans have...

MINNEAPOLIS – U.S. scientists discovered a naturally-occurring agent that destroys the bacteria that cause meat, fish, eggs and dairy products to rot. Researchers at the University of Minnesota reported the discovery of bisin -- a naturally-occurring compound produced by some types of bacteria. The agent reduces the growth of bacteria including E. coli, salmonella and listeria and could lead to sandwiches that stay fresh for more than a year, The (London) Sunday Times reported

Robots will soon be able to feel heat or gentle touching on their surfaces. Researchers at Technische Universitaet Muenchen are now producing small hexagonal plates which when joined together form a sensitive skin for "machines with brains." This will not only help robots to better navigate in their environments, it will also enable robot self-perception for the first time. A single robotic arm has already been partially equipped with sensors and proves that the concept works.Our skin is a communicative wonder: The nerves convey temperature, pressure, shear forces and vibrations – from the finest breath of air to touch to...