There are alien minds among us. Not the little green men of science fiction, but the alien minds that power the facial recognition in your smartphone, determine your creditworthiness[1] and write poetry[2] and computer code[3]. These alien minds are artificial intelligence systems, the ghost in the machine that you encounter daily.
The default psychological setting for human beings is an unavoidable self-centeredness. We each stand at the center of our own thoughts[1], feelings and needs, and thus experience them in a way that we cannot the thoughts, feelings and needs of others.
When you’re sick with a fever[1], your doctor will likely tell you it’s a sign that your immune system is defending you against an infection. Fever typically results from immune cells at infected sites sending chemical signals to the brain to raise the set point of your body’s thermostat. So, you feel chills[2] when the fever starts and feel hot when the fever breaks.
As people, we are all shaped by the neighborhoods we grew up in, whether it was a bustling urban center or the quiet countryside. Objects in distant outer space are no different.
Separating molecules is critical to producing many essential products. For example, in petroleum refining[1], the hydrocarbons – chemical compounds composed of hydrogens and carbons – in crude oil are separated into gasoline, diesel and lubricants by sorting them based on their molecular size, shape and weight. In the pharmaceutical industry[2], the active ingredients in medications are purified by separating drug molecules from the enzymes, solutions and other components used to make them.
Technologies based on nanoscale materials – for example, particles that are more than 10,000 times smaller than the period at the end of this sentence – play a growing role in our world.