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Courtesy of George Djorgovski
Second Life residents Desdemona Enfield and Curious George work on a virtual-reality visualization that classifies stars, galaxies and quasars according to their colors, brightness, distance and morphology.
Does the virtual-reality world known as Second Life have anything to offer for real-world scientists? Absolutely — and a trailblazing researcher says the payoffs are sure to increase when the Internet goes 3-D.
"We are really meant to interact in 3-D, with other people and with information," Caltech astronomer George Djorgovski, director of the Meta Institute for Computational Astrophysics, told me today during an interview in Second Life. "Because this works so well with the human perception system, as soon as there is an easy and 'good enough' 3-D approach, people will switch en masse."
Djorgovski will talk about the past, present and future of virtual worlds on "Virtually Speaking Science," a talk show that's simulcast in Second Life and on the Web via BlogTalkRadio. I'm one of the co-hosts of the hourlong show, which airs on Sunday at 7 p.m. SLT/PT (10 p.m. ET).
Virtual worlds have been around for decades, if you count immersive gaming environments such as World of Warcraft. But jacking into virtual reality still isn't exactly a mainstream phenomenon. Some might be scared off by the fact that online worlds can offer havens for cyber-sex and other virtual vices. Others might see Second Life as downright clunky, compared with the photorealistic, hyper-responsive graphics of present-day video games or the all-consuming interaction available through Facebook or Twitter.
But when it comes to scientific collaboration and outreach, Djorgovski thinks Second Life is a thick slice of awesome.
"This technology is already basically a killer app," he told me. "Even with its crappy graphics and user interface, it already works astonishingly well. And that's only going to get a lot better."
Djorgovski joined Second Life three years ago, and today his avatar ("Curious George") seems totally comfortable in the world. (I, on the other hand, still walk over chairs, even though I've been an occasional Second Lifer for four years.) The Meta Institute for Computational Astrophysics presents a series of professional seminars, workshops and popular talks in Second Life, including a couple that I've presented. In addition, Djorgovski regularly meets with scientific collaborators in Second Life to work on his real-world research, which focuses on galaxy formation and evolution, quasars, sky surveys and data visualization.
"Even if they're in Pasadena, we meet in Second Life," Djorgovski said of his colleagues. "We prefer doing that over Skype, even if it's just one-on-one. It feels better."
Why is that? Djorgovski points to a couple of analyses suggesting that immersive telepresence is more engaging than phone or video conferencing — partly because multiple senses (hearing, sight, kinesthetics) are in play, and partly because there's more of a sense of inhabiting 3-D space. But those advantages apply to any type of virtual-reality interaction. Djorgovski goes on to say that scientific applications in particular can be more fruitful because you can immerse yourself in your own data.
The road to virtual worlds
That's why he took up residence in Second Life to begin with. Djorgovski has long been interested in finding better ways to work with massive databases, such as the Palomar Digital Sky Survey he worked on back in the 1990s. "With sky surveys, we suddenly had so much informational wealth that it was actually irresponsible not to make the data public," he said.
Djorgovski played a part in articulating the concept of a "Virtual Observatory" that could be used by astronomers as well as the general public — a concept that gave rise to the National Science Foundation's National Virtual Observatory as well as Google Sky and Microsoft Research's WorldWide Telescope. (Microsoft is a partner in the msnbc.com joint venture.)
Djorgovski's not the only one interested in 21st-century tools for handling large data sets. "There is a worldwide community of aficionados of what is variously called e-Science, informational science or cyberinfrastructure," he said. "I would say there are about 1,000 researchers worldwide, and it's very much the start of an S-curve."
He compares the current situation to the situation that faced scientists in the 19th century, when the field of statistics was developed to handle kilobytes' worth of data. Djorgovski believes a new set of tools will be needed to cope with terabytes, petabytes and exabytes. "That's exactly what led me into this virtual-reality business," he said.
In a 2008 posting to the Cosmic Variance blog, Djorgovski describes how a couple of research papers written by Piet Hut, a stellar-dynamics expert at the Institute for Advanced Study, pointed him toward Second Life. "I was very skeptical ... until I tried it," Djorgovski told me. "Then I became a convert."
Today, Djorgovski's little corner of virtual property contains one 3-D simulation that charts categories of stars, galaxies and quasars, and another that lets you fiddle with gravity in triple-star systems.
Djorgovski said virtual worlds can offer opportunities for budding scientists as well as the professionals. "I can totally see that this would be a very powerful way to provide experimental experience to students who don't have access to a real lab," Djorgovski said. "Maybe it's not 100 percent fidelity, but if it's 90 percent, that's still better than zero."
You'll find plenty of virtual experiments in SploLand, the Second Life science center operated by San Francisco's Exploratorium. "We're using it as an extension of our exhibit space, to do things for our online visitors that we can't do in the real world," Rob Rothfarb, the Exploratorium's project director for online engagement, told me today.
For example, Second Life visitors can shoot themselves out of a virtual cannon to learn about Newtonian orbital mechanics, visit the center of the big bang, or sit on top of an atom to feel the jiggles of Brownian motion.
They can also gather together in cyberspace to witness live events such as a total lunar eclipse. "In those cases, we're creating extensions of our public programs," Rothfarb said. "We're able to share exciting images, along with commentary from scientists, and we're creating a context for conversation among people who come there from all over the world."
Just last week, SploLand was the venue for the Exploratorium's Second Life celebration of Pi Day, the science-centered holiday that celebrates 3.14 as well as Albert Einstein's birthday.
Djorgovski said such events show that virtual worlds can make a valulable contribution to science education. "It's actually very impressive what goes on in the education community," he said. "We're thinking, 'OK, obviously what's happening is that people who can't come to Caltech or the Exploratorium can do this here in Second Life.'"
The future of virtual worlds
So what's next? Djorgovski said Second Life is still too limited to handle the kinds of high-data applications that scientists will require in the years ahead. He pointed to his own stellar-classification simulation and said, "If I were to put in another 12,000 data points here, it might crash the server."
The future may well lie in open-source virtual environments, created using tools such as OpenSim. Djorgovski can easily imagine an immersive 3-D version of Facebook, for example, or an interface that displays websites as objects in virtual 3-D space rather than as rectangles on a 2-D screen.
"To my mind, really, it has to be a full immersive 3-D version that draws upon content that's already on the Internet," he said. "Humanity's information content is all on the Internet now. We use it to access all kinds of information, to access each other, to access entertainment. That's not going to change. Whoever builds 3-D, immersive, virtual-reality environments will pretty much have to do it in a way that is entirely compatible with the mainstream cyberspace that we're using. It can be a year. It can be 10 years. But I'm confident that someday it will happen. I wouldn't be surprised if the immersive 3-D Web will be as fundamentally transformative as the Web itself."
What do you think? Weigh in with your comments below, and be sure to tune in to "Virtually Speaking Science" on Sunday. And if you miss the live show for some reason, never fear: It'll be made available as a downloadable podcast next week.
More about virtual reality:
- Second Life Education Wiki
- Virtual haven set up for combat vets
- Game device adapted for robo-touch
- Virtual puppies want to lick your real face
My co-host on "Virtually Speaking Science" is Robin Snelson of the Space Studies Institute. Check out these links for podcasts from previous shows:
- Tim Pickens, team leader of the Rocket City Space Pioneers, talks about commercial spaceflight and his team's bid to launch a lunar rover (Feb. 13).
- Air Force Col. M.V. "Coyote" Smith discusses the future of space solar power and private enterprise on the final frontier (Feb. 27).
- Planetary scientist Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute chats about suborbital space research as well as NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt (March 13).
Join the Cosmic Log community by clicking the "like" button on our Facebook page or by following msnbc.com science editor Alan Boyle as b0yle on Twitter. To learn more about Alan Boyle's book on Pluto and the search for planets, check out the website for "The Case for Pluto."
Leave a Comment:
Did you ever try out AVAYA's web.alive HD 3D Immersive Environments , try the dinosaur museum at
[Lack of] Reason2200 have you ever heard of the fossil record? Its not a matter of imagination its this other strange thing you might not have heard of yet, facts. Go back to your make believe religions invented by humans during a time period that they thought the river flooded because God was mad that they didn't sacrifice a virgin to him, such an enlightened time! All the stuff that Hubble has shown us must be imaginary too, since the Earth is flat and the center of the universe.
Hey Reason, are you currently observing the electron flow in the circuts of your computer? (probably not since that's occuring on an atomic scale ) Put you money where your mouth is and shun these tools that operate by forces you don't believe in. Turn off and step away from your computer.
"But when it comes to their fish to man story of evolution, they suddenly plead complete and utter ignorance of this concept of "observable" or "able to be shown in repeatable test cases."
Are you just making this crap up, seriously?
"Can we observe the fish to man storybook version of evolution? No. Can we observed it doing what they claim it does in repeatable test cases? No. End of story - it's not science."
There is this neat thing called DNA and RNA, which you can follow through the evolutionary tree, you really need to go do some reading beyond the bible. People like you are not open to thinking, stop trying to debate things you won't even bother to read up on because you sound like an idiot, watch the video Bill Hicks supplied the link to:
youtube (dot) com/watch?v=5MXTBGcyNuc
I doubt it will change your lack of understanding, but it can show you the traceable linage of all creatures and it is repeatable with the same results every time. Small minded people like you are why we still have some places trying to teach creationism, which can not be backed up by any science at all, and you can repeat those findings again and again!
Don't bother replying to me, this is my last post against your ignorance.
@ Reason 2200,
Seriously? You can't "observe" mountains rising up from the crash of tectonic plates over hundreds of millions of years, yet you can clearly follow the geologically record of the rock. Ever drive through a cut-out of a hillside or mountain? You can see with your own eyes how the layers of rock from two different sides are level until they meet and then are forced upwards in a new direction. What, those dinosaur bones we find in the ground and dig up are just random bones that people just haphazardly put together to create some hulking skeleton out of nothing? Puh-lease! These earthquakes and volcanoes aren't "god" speaking to us in some kind of geological Morse code, it simply the natural process of the earth doing what gravity and orbital mechanics do. Look at Hawaii. Lava flows out from a volcano, hits the ocean, cools and solidifies, and creates new land. The islands are expanding, sloooowly. It's the evolution of the planet itself at a pace we CAN observe, you just choose to ignore the fact that in a million years Hawaii will become a continent of it's own and eventually crash into another continent and create more mountains.
If god created the world the way he wanted it, then why is it changing all of the time? Or us for that matter? Didn't god create man in him own image? In what way, his spiritual image, physical image, emotional image? If it's his physical image, then why is there such diversity in people all over the world? If it's his emotional image, then why aren't we all fatherly and patient and loving and caring of all things? If it's his spiritual image, then why don't we all believe the same thing with divine reverence? If he was the template for all things and all things are constantly changing or imperfect, then what does that say about god or our perception of him?
In our history, religion has often been the foil of men as the sought advance their own interests at the expense of their fellow man. Religion is the mystical, the etheral, something to be taken on faith with no discernable evidence or way to observe it's mechanics in action. We are each moved by differnt things...different feelings...different ideas, and are affected differently in turn. That's why individual religious belief is personal and not easily defined. It's also why, despite evidence to the contrary, people will still cling to the belief that god is listening to them, because to think otherwise is to acknowledge that we don't have a divine purpose for being here and that our actions are the result of our own short-comings or our own inspiration, not god or the devil's.
Science, however is definable. It's connecting the dots to a "logical" conclusion based on known facts that can be measured, hypothesis, experimentation, studying data, and verification of findings...not connecting the dots to a conclusion that you "want" based on your personal beliefs (religion). You can't pray away facts.
Reason: "Question: why is it you try so hard to excuse the fact that they are passing off as science something that cannot be observed AND ALSO cannot be shown doing what they claim it does in repeatable test cases? Why don't you instead follow common sense to the irrefutable conclusion that the fish to man story of evolution is not science?"
Maybe because relying on the explaination of "God did it" would not have allowed us to progress beyond the Classical era, when it was believed that creatures spontaneously sprang into being.
I can accept that "God did it" but want to know HOW. Science seems to be showing the construction details and methods for all things. 'Fish to man' evolution is too huge a period to directly observe. Have we observed the interior of a black hole? Have we observed dimensions beyond our own space-time? NO, but we can theorize and virtually model them.
from another article:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42307845/ns/technology_and_science-science/
"Researchers led by Sheldon Stone, a physicist at Syracuse University, have now observed a new kind of decay process of the B meson that had been previously theorized but never before seen."
Voila!
Once again science has been hijacked by bronze age mythology. Is it any wonder the rest of the world is passing us by in science and math?
I would strongly suggest in the future that political/religious commentators be ignored so we can get on with the discussion of the topic at hand.
Second Life would be a poor choice for doing any university-based research because of the lack of intellectual property ownership (LL stipulates they can use anything you create, make, code, etc without notice or credit). however, they were the only choice until the last year or two
an alternative that is nearly identical but is 100% yours would be an OpenSim deployment and very good science is being done with it. such as the one million dollar NSF grant funded Fern Seed:
other advantages are that any age can enter to explore; it is not limited to those over 16 and can be fully copied and deployed in areas that do not have internet access
Indeed, the MICA activities are now moving into OpenSim, for these and other reasons. SL was (and in some ways it still is) a useful experimental platform, and it is still the best place for outreach, since that is where the people are. SL is probably going to die before too long (there is an extensive discussion about that in the blogosphere), and there is not obvious successor yet. Something will come along eventually, and in the meantime, OpenSim is probably the best we got at the moment.
Well, a year after that comment, and Second Life is nowhere near "dying out", and Linden Lab not only continues to be a profitable company — a rare example, in this era of fast-venture-capital-burning start-ups which disappear after their investors give it up as yet another bad idea. Instead, LL turns a healthy profit around 70 million US$ every year — not a huge profit, but certainly enough to keep them going for many years and diversify their portfolio of products. And, of course, to continue to improve the technology.
OpenSimulator is most certainly a decent alternative, which is good for standalone projects not requiring an audience.
As for the "limitations" of Second Life for complex simulations requiring a lot of calculations to display data... well, the usual way to go around any limitations is just to do all the heavy work on a remote server, and contact SL (or OpenSim...) via two-way HTTP communication, using a simplistic protocol. This is rather easy to accomplish, and is fast enough for almost-real-time communication (specially if your backend server is "near" to LL's co-location facilities). So you can dump all the tough calculations to the backend server, and just let SL display what you wish; and, in return, allow user interaction to be routed via small HTTP messages to the backend server to do new calculations.
Thank you, Alan.
re: Hax -> Plus with opensims you can alter the simulators physics and couple it directly to a CUDA substem to create really.. umm.. stellar displays (smiles).
If you are concerned about intellectual property theft, then host your opensimulators on your own computer systems, and do not allow people outside your community to visit your regions.
des.de.mona of second life
---------------
CUDA -->
The thought of virutal worlds being used for science and education is great. There are virtual 3d worlds being built for entertainment, like Entropia Universe where you can explore planets and set up businesses there even make real money and transfer it back to use it in real life.
This might also be an idea: virtual universities and colleges, so that anyone anytime can take classes and see the campus that they can never get to. Of course that's just a small idea, but considering there would be no wasted time commuting, or not nearly as expensive as living on or near a university, it could expand teaching to those who can just, barely afford the classes but nothing else, and spread education to many people who need it most.
Make-believe goes digital...
Second Life is the start of the new social network. It's an unreal and limitless world of endless possibility. SL is the future. The next internet billionaire will come from here.
I can't help but feel that presently undetected inadequacies in this program are going to lead to some false conclusions in research.....some that might even have major repercussions......just a gut feeling here...
There's nothing like real world observation.
..it seems to me that virtual science will come to resemble virtual sex...interesting to some in a distant phoney sort of way.......its certainly easier to do astronomy on a big computer than to do it the way Hubble did, toiling in cold dark places where the air is thin, and examining thousands and thousands of photographic plates by hand year after year......
It seems to me we live in a virtual society. Reality is found in our history books and the schools do not teach history anymore. Dreaming doses not get the job done. You still have to dig a little at the end of the rainbow.
Reason- science IS the last best case scenerio predicated on what we can observe thus far and is always open to revision based on new observation. Based on what we KNOW of the fosil record and DNA and wolf to dog- long beaked finch ,short beaked finch among other FACTS, the best observable evidence point to evolution.Did GOD make the world and everything in it to evolve ? that is speculation so we can say we dont know, nothing observable points to that(in my opinion) and NO we have never observed a fish evolve into a primate because the prosess takes billions of years.I can say that if in a few thousand years a finch can evolve to not even resemble another finch than given billions of years it seems plausible it could become a mammal and this IS what science states nothing less nothing more.
Watching the evolution of these virtual world simulations is amazing. Its especially cool when we consider that we are "living" in a simulation. A highly developed simulation run on unimaginably powerful computers. Eventually we will have an infinite series of simulations within a simulation within a simulation .....
Not sure I like where this is going. The PC memory required to maintain and display such a format will surely propose a next generation of computers. The new format will require greater interaction between the PC and the internet interface, opening a whole new window for idiot hackers and cyber terrorists who think it is an awesome idea to bring down computers. Or worse, where thieves go phising for your virtual information in hopes of a real payday. So it takes a good 5 to 7 minutes to boot up to the internet know because of all the virus prevention software protection checks.
Then all this new technology is not used to promote any real science but rather it is used to drive advertisements that slow down the computer's response time, computer games and social network <site>ville simulations to trap people indoors, and random access web searchers that half to filter on all this content. So it's not about creating new ideas or working towards resolutions, it's all about prolonging a false sense of dependence on the internet. Hell, you can't look up anything without being inundated with a plefory of ads that you are forced to navigate just to see your requested information.
But then it is all about promoting a disposable society where buyers just keep buying the next toy or gadget without regard to waste. Oh you can couch it in terms like recycling, but it is still just promoting waste. It's all about the profit of wastefulness.
Wonderful thing being able to access information electronically, but there is no way to filter out the constant influx of garbage that collects with it. So with each new 'App', the line between fact and fiction become blurred in a virtual reality; a reality without any real human interaction or emotional attachment. A reality where it is OK to let you ID run wild without the benefit of a well developed SUPEREGO to control it. The internet is competing with the proper development of the human psyche and is helping to promote rude and selfish behavior. While it is OK to get in touch with one's inner feelings, it is not OK to burden society with a mass exodus from compassion and other positive moral attitudes.
I would juts like to meet Mr or Miss evolution because if " God " is not the True Creator behind all of this ........ you better Hope you are right...
Or what? He's gonna punish me for not being convinced?
Why, because I used the free will that was supposedly bestowed upon mankind in an act of divine benevolence to make a decision that made sense to me and led me to dis-believe the existence of a supreme being that created everything in the universe?
Led me to disbelieve that "god" has always been here and always will be and created everyhting in this massive universe that we'll never, ever be able to explore completely, yet he can't do away with evil, even though he created Lucifer as an angel and now tolerates all of the vile, twisted things that are attributed to his evil machinations?
Isn't god all powerful? All knowing? The True Creator of everything?
If he's sitting in heaven judging us because we used the tools of knowledge and reason to come to a different conclusion than what is being spouted in his name in the Bible, Koran, Torah, etc then there is something fundamentally wrong with the universe.
I don't believe these things because they don't make sense, yet I am still a good person, that does good things and loves and works hard and enjoys life. I'm not evil, heathen, unclean, sinful, or any other derogatory term that has been spat in my face by some self-righteous hypocrites who can't even follow the tenets of their own faith, yet they know the will of "GOD" and "woe be unto you that doesn't follow what I believe". Just ignore the other thousands of interpretations of who/what/how "God" is and follow me or your gonna go to Hell and burn for all eternity.
How's about this....
YOU go to Hell!
I can use my brain to investigate things for myself. I don't need a preacher slamming a bible on the pulpit in my face and scaring me into submission, and oh, by the way, pass the offering plate won't you please?
It makes sense to me that an ape and a human are related because LOOK AT THE PHYSICAL SIMILARITIES! BIPEDAL, TWO ARMS AND LEGS WITH FIVE DIGITS EACH, A FACE WITH TWO EYES, NOSE, MOUTH, TWO EARS, SIMILAR REPRODUCTIVE CYCLE, HEART, KIDNEY, LUNGS, A BRAIN THAT IS CAPABLE OF REASONING AND PROBLEM SOLVING! Our DNA is only a few percent different! Evan among apes, you can clearly see species variations that are due to different evolutionary paths caused by climate and geography, etc.
South America and Africa clearly fit together at some point in the past....millions of years ago!
Look at the fossil record. Duh! Dinosaurs!
The Galapagos Islands, a place unlike any other place on Earth and has animals that are just as different....just as specialized to their environment.
Noah's Ark COULD NOT, in any way have held two of every animal that exists on the surface of the planet, let alone one of them,...even in ancient times (again...DUH! Dinosaurs!).
Adam and Eve? Seriously? Putting aside Adam being molded from clay and just POOF, spontaneous life AND Eve being made from a rib...you're trying to tell me that they alone are responsible for BILLIONS of people on the planet today? That they had sex, bore children, and then they had sex with their own siblings and so forth without any genetic abnormalities due to a shallow gene pool? Did Adam and Eve have sex with their own children? Grandchildren? Great grandchildren?
You Creationists take it on faith that some guy with a bible tells you this and you don't question anything because you either don't want to or are unable to ask questions and arrive a a conclusion yourselves. You don't like to think that your lives could actually not have some divine purpose that makes you special.
Well, you are special. Your whole body is special. Specialized for a purpose...to survive and pass on your genetic material to the next generation. You have a brain with deductive reasoning. You can solve complex problems unlike any other creatures that exist on Earth. You got this way by millions of years of natural selection and refinement of biological processes that worked better than the previous generation. And you are most special because you can think for yourself and make a decision that is right for you. The only catch is, you have to be responsible for those decisions and actions. You can't just say it was God's will. It's time to grow up. It's time to put make believe things away and engage the rest of the world with a brain and consiousness that can lead us into the next chapter of our existence. Technology is just a tool, weilded by hands with a purpose. Use it to advance science and our understanding of ourselves and our universe. Because if you don't, if you continue to let religious bickering, hatred, distrust, fear, righteousness, etc to go the way it is, then you will use it to destroy us all. YOU will be the end of mankind, not technology.
Excellently put.
Bring on the Singularity!
Also check out the AlloSphere:
http://www.allosphere.ucsb.edu/
Wow, you religious whack-jobs really take the cake! Especially the Christian ones.
You actually believe, on faith, a completely ludicrous story like the bible while arguing against mathematically and logically provable facts. Christians utterly ignore the fact that the origin of their own religion is based on the idea that an invisible space-being popped into existence out of nothingness, then created all of everything, then created 'man' in his own image, then repeatedly vacillated over whether or not to destroy humanity, and in some final stroke of genius, decided to child-rape a girl in order to send himself to Earth on a suicide mission to save us from Him. What a crock of baloney!! No self-respecting comic book editor would even consider using such garbage as a plot for a fantasy story because it's so obviously impossible. And yet, you insist on believing this complete nonsense while rejecting provable truths, and ignore the basic tenets of your chosen beliefs by going around the world killing anyone who doesn't agree with you.
Next, you're probably going to pray to your god that Superman or the Easter Bunny will come and kill me for disagreeing with you. Makes me embarrassed to be of the same species, assuming you've evolved that far!
I negate your truth and interject my own!
Well said David!