Blog Lars Jaeger
Will another old promise of science soon become reality? - News from research on nuclear fusion
The “Fridays for Future” demonstrations are reaching new climaxes, the coalition in Germany decides on a multi-billion climate package, and at the global climate summit in New York government representatives and CEOs of multinational corporations and their PR strategists are trying to make a name for themselves as well-meaning climate protectors. It appears that the […]
Google's new quantum computer - Are we experiencing a Sputnik moment in information technology?
The quantum computer – a term that to most people seems to be as weirdly bizarre as excitingly futuristic is pushing its way into the sphere of public attention. It combines the technological omnipotence of digital computing with the awe-inspiring complexity and abstraction of the most important physical theory of the 20th century. It promises […]
Daring more future - How we all benefit from technical progress
An amazing contradiction shapes our time. More and more people live a life with highest comfort, in almost total safety and with an unprecedented level of health into old age. At the same time, most people think that the world is in a bad state and that it is getting worse. One could say: heaven […]
Yet again researchers bump into an ethical borderline: On the breeding a human-animal chimera for the purpose of creating substitute organs
The spectacular accounts from science and research do not break off. From increasingly powerful artificial intelligences, genetically modified CRISPR babies, new quantum technologies, prolonging life by modifying our genes, super-medicines, meat from 3D printers to miraculous nanomaterials – the reports about the rapid technological and scientific progress do not find an end. Philosophers, politicians and […]
The moon landing 50 years ago – The immense possibilities arising upon science and politics having a mutual vision
The landing of the first humans on the moon on 20 July 1969 was one of the most moving moments of the 20th century and the television broadcast of the “Apollo 11” mission its first and largest global media event. Up to 600 million people worldwide watched Neil Armstrong taking his first steps on the […]
After the crash is before the crash - On crypto currencies, blockchain and Facebook’s new currency Libra
There is a ghost going around in the financial world, and this time it is not communism that is frightening the money establishment in Europe. The ghost today is called “crypto currencies”, and it threatens to turn the established power structures in the global financial industry upside down. Similarities with the communist manifesto are limited […]
"Machines Like Me" – On Ian McEwan's new novel
Most readers of novels, and probably also their authors, barely understand the details of technological progress that is developing at breathtaking speed. There is a lot of discussion about new technologies, but few are able imagine how much we will be shaken up by them in the future. In 2006, the American researcher and Stanford […]
Re-Design of the human being - What are we: Molecular genetic machines or autonomous individuals?
Considering the groundbreaking developments in genetic engineering in recent years, it is all too surprising that the new opportunities to bioengineers have not yet provoked a broader public debate. In concrete terms, as humanity we are facing what is probably the most important crossroads of the last 2’000 years: the appropriation of nature by man, […]
A path towards artificially produced life - From designer bacteria to designer humans?
Meanwhile, everyone is talking about the genetic scissors “CRISPR”: The news at the end of November 2018 that the Chinese researcher He Jiankui had genetically modified two embryos to protect them from HIV and then implanted those into a woman’s uterus who subsequently gave birth to genetically modified twins (“CRISPR babies”) shocked the world far […]
Listen to the sound of science - On denials and the lack of intellectual integrity in the climate debate
They take place all over the world, mostly on Fridays, most recently also on the weekend in Switzerland: Climate strikes and climate demonstrations. They have finally brought the debate on how to deal with climate change into the public domain. It says a lot about the state of our society that it took the initiative […]