• A Popular Mechanics article on carbon-nanotube-enhanced chloroplasts that triple photosynthetic activity triggered debate over whether the gains come from improved light absorption or a deeper nanotech redesign of plant energy systems.  
• Participants sketched a speculative roadmap for photosynthetic human skin: engineering DNA so skin cells produce their own light-absorbing pigments and generate glucose, weighing R&D costs against large-scale biological manufacturing.  
• Bitcoin 2.0 projects were evaluated: Counterparty deemed usable, Mastercoin criticized as bloated, and Ethereum predicted to face launch turmoil over premine distribution and potential DoS or code-execution vulnerabilities.  
• A new alt-coin concept was floated whose proof-of-work would perform useful scientific computation (e.g., Folding@home), with discussion of how to verify reproducible results while remaining ASIC-resistant.  
• Wei Dai’s 1990s cypherpunk posts on anonymous e-cash and CPU-market pricing were linked as early conceptual roots of Bitcoin, fueling speculation that Dai could be Satoshi Nakamoto.  
• Danko Nikolić’s “practopoiesis” theory of cognition was introduced via his blog, though participants expressed skepticism about its vagueness and its reliance on Searle’s Chinese Room argument.  
• Eric Hunting’s TMP2 (The Millennial Project 2.0) wiki was highlighted as a deep, underutilized resource for hard-sci-fi world-building, alongside Simon Funk’s novella “AfterLife” (http://sifter.org/~simon/AfterLife/).