Nailed it. My understanding is that he wanted to activate the magnetosphere, as you stated. Whether or not this would work is questionable -- you would need a lot of resources and an altruistic spirit, extracting wealth from free energy wouldn't be easy. It would also face a powerful opposition of entrenched interests.

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not âoeEureka!â (I found it!) but âoeThatâ(TM)s funny â¦â
â" Isaac Asimov

Surprise is a way to express the discovery of something unexpected-- the premise, all scientists by virtue of understanding a constantly changing world should, "expect the unexpected," is silly. Scientists are people and have emotional responses to unexpected events.

Most science is methodical and incremental, but it is also often surprising and monumental. Most nobel prize winners were just following their passion. It was a surprise for many, to discover how important their work was to the rest of the world.

In no particular order (other than memory):

Fooled by Randomness - Nassim Nicholas Taleb (he's kind of a jerk, but gifted)

Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari (beautiful, at the end I felt like i stared into the abyss of man)

The Idea Factory - Jon Gertner (great history of Bell Labs)

A Mind at Play - Jimmy Soni and Rob Goodman (interesting biography of Claude Shannon)

The Jungle - Upton Sinclair (first time, great book)

Dune - Frank Herbert (second time, great book)

Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein (first time, great book)

Tribe of Mentors - Tim Ferriss (where I found out about lots of good books)

Einstein's Dreams - Alan Lightman (beautiful, poetic)

The Nature of Time - Carlo Rovelli (same as above, but a little less imaginative; i.e. fact based)

The Daily Stoic - Ryan Holiday (almost done, again)

American Gods - Neil Gaiman (first time, great book)

Ready Player One - Ernest Cline (read before the movie, really enjoyed it -- but i'm an 80's kid)

            Not all the books I read this year, but those that stood out as good.

“Those who don't read good books have no advantage over those who can't.”
  Mark Twain

How about teaching children grades don't matter as much as they are meant to believe. Science undergrad with sub-par (2.7) GPA, still made it into graduate school and currently make six figures (with my degree's). Clearly remember, straight A students crying over B's and other straight A students switching to easier majors to maintain unrealistic GPAs. No one gives a shit about your 4.0 five years after the fact. Actually, no one gives a shit now. Too many believe they're learning the material in the book, they're actually learning *how to learn*

Again. You are clearly ignorant of the silk road and other such marketplaces that actually use bitcoins as currency.

I'm pretty shocked by the generally disparaging remarks regarding bitcoin. Nearly *all* currencies are speculative to some degee, just think of the exchange market. Investing in euro's doesn't seem like such a great idea at the moment but that certainly wasn't the case before the credit crunch. As long as the supply is limited (which it is) and there's a demand, bitcoins will have value. Many of you are assuming there is no demand, clearly you haven't visited the silk road. Bitcoin serves a purpose, it's digital cash, pure and simple. As long as people value *relative* anonimity in digital transactions (and there will always be a section of the population that does), there will be a demand.