Back in our elementary-school days, our science textbooks and teachers told us that our planet is part of the Solar System, which in turn is part of the Milky Way — just one of the billions of billions of galaxies that make up the Universe. Compared with the astronomy beliefs of the previous millennium, our ideas and concepts about planets, galaxies, and the whole outer space seemed logical and reality-based. For most cases, anyway.

Recently, however, astronomers and other scientists are hypothesizing that the Universe is merely a part of a bigger universe. For example, Indiana University theoretical physicist Nikodem Poplawski suggests, in a paper published in the "Physics Letters B" journal, that our universe is located inside a wormhole that is a part of a black hole inside a bigger universe.

As if the concept of a universe by itself was not beyond the human ability to grasp and fully comprehend, along comes this hypothesis.

Calling this hypothesis paradigm shifting would be a biggest understatement in the whole "universe."

Seen in this light, some people's obsession with getting elected as leaders of this puny country made up of puny islands seems cosmically inconsequential and comic.

Another Japanese Robot

Scientists in Japan said they have developed a robot that can mimic a human's facial expressions. The Geminoid TMF robot can laugh and smile, even furrow its brows. The robot receives electric signals from the person it is modeled on.

During a demonstration, the robot was shown mimicking the facial expressions of a woman. By the way, I wonder why Japanese engineers are mostly making "female" humanoid robots?

New iPhone OS

After launching the iPad tablet PC, Apple is now set to unveil a new operating system for the bestselling iPhone smart phone. Steve Jobs and company offer journalists a "sneak peek" at the new mobile OS during an invitation-only event at Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, California.

Version 3.0 of the iPhone OS was released in March last year.

Android on Windows Phones

What do you do when you find your Windows mobile phones too slow and sluggish for your taste? Make it run Android, of course. This is what some DIY mobile hackers are doing on their Windows smart phones.

In a way, this reminds me of how "accommodating" the Windows PC is as far as installing an operating system is concerned. Windows Mobile-based smart phones may not be as flashy as their iPhone and Android counterparts, but they have proved to be flexible and enduring, in an open source sort of way.

That's all for the meantime, folks. Join me again next time as we keep on watching IT.