The Latest Developments

NAVIGATION BY TELEPHONE POLES AND TRAFFIC LIGHTS

We have gotten really dependent on GPS. But remember that it can be vulnerable to something like a solar storm. Satellites can also be shot down.

There is a low-tech potential complement to the GPS system right in front of us.

Wherever people settle there will be telephone poles, spaced roughly evenly. We often express driving directions in terms of traffic lights.

Why not just attach a visible number to every traffic light and telephone pole? Location can then be easily expressed or determined by the nearest number. The information for the entire world could easily be stored on an app or added to Google Maps.

This would be so simple and convenient. There are distance markers on highways, why couldn't we do this?

Remember that one reason for the awkwardness of the GPS system is that we count by tens but the angular measurement is done by a base twelve system. We saw this in "The Queen Of Numbers", on the Progress Blog, www.markmeekprogress.blogspot.com .

SPACE JUNK AND RADIO RECEPTION

One thing that should get more attention is the connection between space junk and radio reception.

Much has been written about "space junk", the mostly metallic debris that is leftover since the beginning of the Space Age. The fragments orbit the earth at high speed and endanger space vehicles and satellites.

Trying to clean up space junk risks making it worse because it would be better to have one large piece, that can be more easily tracked and avoided, than to have it break into smaller pieces.

But there is a plus side to space junk. It should improve radio reception over long distances.

The earth's ionosphere reflects waves of longer wavelength. The longest waves, meaning the lowest frequency, can use the ionosphere as a waveguide. But shorter waves, particularly television and higher-fidelity radio waves, pass right through the ionosphere, which are layers of charged particles in earth's upper atmosphere.

That is where communication and broadcast satellites come in, receiving and retransmitting signals that would otherwise not be received because of the curvature of the earth.

But each bit of space junk is, in effect, a micro-satellite. The average altitude of space junk is about twice as high as the ionosphere. Space junk should shorten the wavelength threshold of the signals that are reflected back to earth and possibly lengthen the surface distance that waves that are not reflected can be received.

In fact, the increase in radio reception can be used as an index of the dangers of space junk, as more smaller pieces, as opposed to fewer larger pieces, will not only improve radio reception at a distance more but will also be more perilous to satellites and spacecraft.

WORD DEVELOPMENT

A quick look at an old book or document shows how words change over time. We can see how modern technology and signage is accelerating the changes in our time.

Aside from abbreviations,

Night is becoming Nite.

Through is becoming Thru.

You is becoming U.

Want To Be is becoming Wannabe.

For is also being expressed as 4.

THE RETURN OF HIEROGLYPHICS

We saw in "The Center Of The World", on the World And Economics Blog, www.markmeekeconomics.blogspot.com how important Egypt has been to human history. The ancient Egyptians used a system of writing based on pictures, known as hieroglyphics.

But the development of alphabets, first by the Phoenicians and then the Greeks, and Oriental writing with characters, hieroglyphics fell out of favor.

But then along came modern technology, and with it global travel and communications, and now hieroglyphics is making a major comeback.

On highway signs across the world, a knife and fork with a plate is the symbol for dining and food. A person sleeping is the symbol for accommodation. A fuel pump is the symbol of a filling station. Male and female figures are the symbols of washrooms.

The use of hieroglyphics will only increase. Other methods of writing have the advantage of being easier when writing is difficult and time-consuming. But that ceases to be the case with modern graphics technology.

The great advantage of hieroglyphics is that it requires little or no translation for people speaking different languages, and in our globalised world that makes all the difference.

Remember that we saw the real meaning of Egypt's pyramids in "The Underground Orion Correlation Theory", March 2016 on this blog.