Eric Paulos is a man riding the experimental edge between humans and machines. His research in this area, both in his graduate studies in computer science and robotics at the University of California at Berkeley, and with renegade robot troops such as Survival Research Laboratories, is far more adventurous than most researchers in similar space dare to be. “Lethal, anonymous tele-obliteration,” the “I-Bomb,” and several types of tele-embodiment are just a few of his past projects. Danger is definitely not outside the scope of his work. Read more

Journalist Malcolm Gladwell has put together what is easily one of the most readable books about social phenomena out right now. Borrowing by analogy from epidemiology, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (Little Brown & Company) is a clear, concise analysis of social epidemics and why they “tip” (”The Tipping Point” is the name given to the moment in an epidemic when a virus reaches critical mass). Gladwell says, “If you talk to the people who study epidemics - epidemiologists - you realize that they have a strikingly different way of looking at the world. They don’t share the assumptions the rest of us have about how and why change happens.” Read more