This is why I want to sell everything, buy kruggerrands and flee north.

It now costs two cents to make a penny, and nine cents to make a nickel. The administration suggested making the coins out of cheaper metals but was blocked buy the coin operated vending machine lobby who did not want to update their machines.

understated genius

The beautiful rubber band-powered artificial butterfly is helping researchers understand the flight of swallowtails. Hiroto Tanaka of Harvard University and Isao Shimoyama of the University of Tokyo built the balsa-wood machine, which boasts thin polymer film wings with "veins" made with a silicon-etching technique. The artificial butterfly enables them to control the flight mechanisms in ways they couldn't do with live butterflies. From Science News:

“We can't ask insects, like ‘Hey, please just flap your wings at 10 hertz,’” Tanaka says... To mimic the way the butterflies might use their front and rear wings together, the researchers created one big wing for each side of the body...

With high-speed cameras, the researchers got enough images of the model’s few seconds of flight for motion analysis. They conclude that by simply flapping its wings straight up and down, the machine recreated the bobbing flight of real butterflies. And by comparing fully veined with veinless wings, the researchers found that veins stiffened the wings and helped them achieve greater lift. The bobbing motion of the body also increased lift to help keep the flier aloft

Evil...

Below is video of Ardi Rizal, 2, who smokes two packs of cigarettes a day.

The Sumatran toddler was first given a cigarette when he was just 18 months old.

I'm not worried about his health, he looks healthy,' shrugged the boy's father Mohammad Rizal.
'He cries and throws tantrums when we don't let him smoke. He's addicted

Amazing

The Curta was conceived of by Curt Herzstark (1902-1988) in the 1930s in Vienna. By 1938, he had filed a key patent, covering his complemented stepped drum, Deutsches Reichspatent (German Empire Patent) No. 747073. This single drum replaced the multiple drums, typically around 10 or so, of contemporary calculators, and it enabled not only addition, but subtraction through nines' complement math, essentially subtracting by adding. The nines' complement math breakthrough eliminated the significant mechanical complexity created when "borrowing" during subtraction. This drum would prove to be the key to the small, hand-held mechanical calculator the Curta would become.


His work on the pocket calculator stopped in 1938 when the Nazis forced him and his company to concentrate on manufacturing measuring instruments and distance gauges for the German army.

Herzstark, the son of a Catholic mother but Jewish father, was taken into custody in 1943, eventually finding himself at the Buchenwald concentration camp. Ironically, it was in the concentration camp that he was encouraged to continue his earlier research: "While I was imprisoned inside [Buchenwald] I had, after a few days, told the [people] in the work production scheduling department of my ideas. The head of the department, Mr. Munich said, 'See, Herzstark, I understand you've been working on a new thing, a small calculating machine. Do you know, I can give you a tip. We will allow you to make and draw everything. If it is really worth something, then we will give it to the Führer as a present after we win the war. Then, surely, you will be made an Aryan.' For me, that was the first time I thought to myself, my God, if you do this, you can extend your life. And then and there I started to draw the CURTA, the way I had imagined it

A is for Away Team, where you should never wear red (mild mannered photographer)


B is for Binary, 1s and 0s in your head (jpstanley)

C is for Cosplay, making cons an awesome place

D is for Doctor, who keeps changing face (great beyond)

E is for Emoticons, that tell you what we’re feeling (neal gillis)

F is for Flickr, whose photos we are “stealing” (tricky)

G is for Gadgets, the way to our heart (slipstreamjc)

H is for Hardware, I took it apart! (jurvetson)

I is for iEverything, love it or hate it (dan dickinson)

J is for Japan, we’re glad Nintendo invaded (oscar mota)

K is for Keyboard, we love every letter (andrew*)

L is for Leias, the more the better! (koadmunkee)

M is for MMORPGs, it’s a magical place (i eated a cookie)

N is for NASA, and the beauty of space (nasa1fan)

O is for Occipital Lobe, we love using our brains (illuminaut)

P is for Programming, ((though lisp is a pain)) (phil_jackson)

Q is for Quilting, and other geeky crafts (athenamat)

R is for Reading, no matter what the path (timonoko)

S is for Science, though the cake is a lie (don solo)

T is for Tabletop, and a 20-sided die (nengard)

U is for Uncertainty, you just never know (neil crosby)

V is for Voltage, oh the places we’ll go! (oskay)

W is for the World Wide Web, it’s more than just porn (shimown)

X is for Xerox, where so much geekiness was born (marc smith)

Y is for Youth, since kids are geeks too (benmcleod)

Z is for Zork, watch out for the grue! (the_tml)

From Chop Shop comes this fantastic "Gundam Calling" t-shirt playing on the Clash's London Calling album cover which itself was a tribute to the design of Elvis's self-titled first album. Available in men's and women's sizes from the Boing Boing Bazaar! "robotRock (or Gundam Calling) Tshirt"

After nearly a month of failed efforts to stop the oil gushing into the Gulf, BP needs to get serious about destroying its well. Nuclear policy scholar Christopher Brownfield on the benefits of a nuclear explosion.

On Day 1 of the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico, my gut instinct was to nuke the well shut. This was not simply an aggressive urge to brandish the most beastly of weapons in our mighty American arsenal, but a serious way to snuff out an enormous problem that grows worse by the day.
For more than 100 years, explosives have been used to break the necks of runaway oil wells, snapping the long, narrow columns and sealing them shut with tons and tons of rock. Over the last several days, our 24-hour news cycle has pumped us full of excruciating details about the failed efforts to siphon, cap off, and ultimately recover the oil that is gushing into the Gulf. The latest nonsense and false hope, a mile-long pipe designed to divert some of the oil flow, is like putting a 4-inch straw into a 22-inch-diameter fire hose. It's a sordid attempt by BP at drinking its own milkshake. But the problem with this disaster response is that the ideas BP has brought to the table all seem to ignore the simplest solution: permanently destroying the well.

Ahh...yeah

Last week, Noah's Ark Ministries, including evangelical explorers and filmmakers, announced that they had found the remnants of Noah's Ark on Mount Ararat in Turkey. (Read all about the claim in National Geographic.) Of course, this isn't the first group that's "found" Noah's Ark. No, it's at least the sixth in the last 50 years. Over at Discovery News, the Skeptical Inquirer's Benjamin Radford provides "A Short History of Noah's Ark Discoveries." From Discovery:

Interest in the Ark spiked in the 1970s after a man named Georgie Hagopian said he located and climbed on the remains of the Ark at least twice--though he claimed it occurred some 60 years earlier (in the early 1900s) and could offer no evidence to back it up. One of the first people to claim to have found the Ark on Mt. Ararat was a woman named Violet Cummings, who in the early 1970s wrote a book titled Noah's Ark: Fable or Fact? Despite its intriguing title, the claim turned out to be fable, not fact. A few years later, in 1976, yet another man claimed to have discovered the Ark on Ararat, and offered ambiguous photos as proof but nothing more came of it.
Interest waned until the 1990s, when CBS television aired a primetime special titled The Incredible Discovery of Noah's Ark, which finally offered seemingly definitive proof in the form of an eyewitness who owned a piece of wood he claimed was from the ark. The whole thing turned out to be a huge hoax; CBS and its viewers had been duped

Natali explains how he'll adapt NEUROMANCER and HIGH RISE
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Posted on Monday, May 10th, 2010 20:35:28 GMT by: io9

Posted under: movie news cyberpunk interview scifi horror
Splice director Natali has two huge movie adaptations in the pipeline: William Gibson's Neuromancer, and J.G. Ballard's High Rise. In an exclusive interview, Natali explains to us how he updated and changed High Rise, and his hopes for Neuromancer.
While explaining to us the ideas behind Splice's graphic horror, Natali took some time to update us on how he's transforming High Rise, Ballard's story of class warfare in an isolated building the size of a city, into a movie. And he explained what he hopes audience will experience in his recently announced adaptation of Neuromancer

In 1901, Massachusetts surgeon Dr. Duncan MacDougall attempted to prove the existence of the soul by weighing a person before, and right after, death. He hacked an industrial beam scale so that it could be attached to a hospital bed. Then, he began to seek out a subject in the terminally ill patients at the hospital. First up was a man dying of tuberculosis. According to MacDougall, “The instant life ceased, the opposite scale pan fell with a suddenness that was astonishing – as if something had been lifted from the body.” Apparently, 21 grams was missing from his body. MacDougall reproduced the experiment several more times. The physician's work has become a classic tale that, of course, is still widely cited by philosophers, skeptics, and "believers." And yes, it's MacDougall's experiments that inspired the film 21 Grams too. Fortean Times weighs the truths, half-truths, and unknowns of "the strange deathbed experiment of Dr. MacDougall." From FT:




Deducing exactly what went on in MacDougall’s laboratory after more than a century has passed is no easy task, but a possible insight comes from some written correspondence between MacDougall and Richard Hodgson. These letters (which were later published by the American Society of Psychical Research) start in November 1901, after MacDougall’s first experiment, and continue until May 1902, when the entire project was halted. They contain a full description of MacDougall’s methods, results and the circumstances of all six patients which, when compared with his American Medicine paper, offer some clues to the solution of this mystery.

MacDougall’s letters make it plain that, with the exception of the first patient, all the experiments were beset with problems that may be broadly divided into one of two categories. The first problem was in ascert­aining the exact time of death, an issue that appears to affect patients two, three and six. MacDougall acknowledged this with the second patient, where the period of uncertainty lasted for 15 minutes, but with patient three it is only in his letters that we learn of “a jarring of the scales” made while trying to determine “whether or not the heart had ceased to beat”. Patient six was excluded for other reasons (see below), but in his letters MacDougall remarks that “I am inclined to believe that he passed away while I was adjusting the beam”, which again suggests uncertainty as to the exact moment of death.



The second issue was a problem relating to the measuring equipment itself, which MacDougall himself cited as a reason for voiding the results of patients four and six. However, with the fifth patient the measured drop in weight at death was later followed by an evident malfunction, as the scales could not afterwards be made to re-balance themselves correctly. In any object­ive experiment this uncertainty would have voided the result, but at no point does MacDougall question the reliability of his set-up. Thus, of the six patients, just one (the first) appears to have been measured without mishap, but repeated troubles with the equipment and with determining the moment of death perhaps casts doubt on even these results. Thus, rather than trying to find a physical cause for the loss of weight at death, it is conceivable that there was no loss of weight at all, or that it might not have coincided with the moment of death. Only a complete retrial with human patients will answer these questions, and that has so far not been forthcoming

Space cowboy

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal independently confirmed that they heard Reagan  tell a moving story about having filmed the death camps. Even though he never left the United States during wartime. According to Reagan aide Michael Deaver, just because Reagan may have viewed "footage shipped home by the Signal Corps" and "saw the nightmare on film not in person," that "did not mean he saw it less." Yikes

Have you ever noticed how incompetent people are often incredibly confident? Meanwhile, highly-skilled folks underestimate their ability to perform. That's called the Dunning-Kruger Effect named for Justin Kruger and David Dunning of Cornell University who published their study of the cognitive bias in a 1999 scientific paper. ABC Radio National's The Science Show recently explored the Dunning-Kruger Effect. According to the scientists, "Overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it." ABC Radio National's The Science Show recently explored the Dunning-Kruger Effect:



Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1995. A local man, McArthur Wheeler, walks into two banks in the middle of the day and robs them both at gunpoint. Making away with the cash, he is arrested later that evening. Back at the station police sit him down and show him footage from the banks' security cameras. Wheeler can't believe it, the cameras had somehow seen through his disguise. He was seen mumbling to himself, 'But I wore the juice.' His was no ordinary disguise; no balaclava, mask or elaborate makeup, just lemon juice, liberally applied to the face. He was certain that the squirt of citrus would render him invisible to security cameras.

Charles Darwin once said, 'Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than knowledge,' and Dunning and Kruger seem to have proven this point. In light of this, it suddenly becomes clear why public debate can be so excruciating. Debates on climate change, the age of the Earth or intelligent design are perfect real-life examples of the Dunning-Kruger effect. It beautifully explains the utter confidence of those who, with no expertise, remain stubborn in their views regardless of overwhelming evidence. It makes you want to shake them by the collar and scream about how stupid they are. But evidence shows that's not the best strategy.

got to have one

The Deliverator belongs to an elite order..."


Here at ThinkGeek World Domination Headquarters, there is only one pizza delivery place we ever call. CosaNostra Pizza. The order always shows up in less than 30 minutes. The pie's still warm, in pristine condition, protected by its corrugated-plastic carapace. Best of all, our local deliverator shows up in his massive car wearing a ninja-black activated charcoal uniform. None of those crappy polo shirts and baseball caps with the corporate logo or the VW Rabbit with the neon sign perched precariously on the roof.



If you don't know what we're talking about by now, this shirt is probably not for you. But if you're curious, read on. The first chapter of one of second generation cyberpunk's seminal works, Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, follows Hiro Protagonist on a run as a pizza delivery guy for the mafia. The chapter is visceral, gritty, and perfectly paints the picture of the novel's future world which feels simultaneously absurd and feasible. We thought it only fitting to make a t-shirt in honor of the CosaNostra Pizza chain, Stephenson's fictional creation which served as the baptism into cyberpunk for so many of us.



Zoom to be sure not to miss the shirt's details. The basics? Black, 100% cotton t-shirt. Text reads, "CosaNostra Pizza" with "#3569, proudly serving the Valley burbclaves" printed underneath

about time

Fan updating David Lynch's "Dune" with modern FX

Craig Engler at 2:15 PM Saturday

Craig Engler is general manager and senior vice president of Syfy digital. He twitters from @Syfy.

Sasha Burrow is working on a "fan-edit" of David Lynch's Dune to recreate some of the film's more outdated special effects. The picture above is what his version of a 2nd Stage Guild Navigator could look like.
The project started out simply but has steadily grown in scope, and now Sasha is looking for help from other contributors:
The project initially began as an endeavor to build a "proper" ornithopter - one with flapping wings, that neither the movie or the mini-series managed to achieve. However, with the advent of the "fan-edit" the scope of the project has expanded with the goal of updating the effects in all those places in the movie where I feel things could be significantly "improved."
Although I am currently working on this by Myself, it's a large undertaking and if there is anyone interested in helping this project along, feel free to contact

surprise

Hearing prayer shuts off believers' brain activity


David Pescovitz at 9:22 AM Monday

When some religiously devout people hear a charismatic healer speak the word of god , the regions of their brains involved in skeptical thinking and vigilance appear to shut down. Uffe Schjødt of Aarhus University in Denmark and his colleagues scanned the brains of Pentecostalists while they listened to recorded prayers from non-Christians, "ordinary" Christians, and a healer. The brain activity changed only in response to prayers they were told came from the healer. According to Schjødt, the same deactivation may occur in response to the words of physicians, parents, politicians, and other charismatic leaders. The researchers published their results in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. From New Scientist:
Parts of the prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortices, which play key roles in vigilance and scepticism when judging the truth and importance of what people say, were deactivated when the subjects listened to a supposed healer. Activity diminished to a lesser extent when the speaker was supposedly a normal Christian.
Schjødt says that this explains why certain individuals can gain influence over others, and concludes that their ability to do so depends heavily on preconceived notions of their authority and trustworthiness.

Pee Wee's Playhouse meets the apocalypse, complete with zombies in ROSE 3-D

Posted on Monday, May 3rd, 2010 21:30:59 GMT by: quietearth
Posted under: zombie movie apocalyptic news horror comedy
I think I just had a wet dream. John Skipp is planning a 3d horror comedy which is described as "Pee Wee's Playhouse meets Night of the Living Dead". Do I really need to say more? Wait, read the synopsis:
48 hours into the undead apocalypse, one woman has managed to stay on the air. She's a hot ex-mental patient with a message of hope, a baseball bat, and her puppet friends.
Welcome to "Rose's Place": where the songs, skits, and rescue stations run all night long or at least until the zombies get in.
F*** YES! They've raised about a third of the money they need, so go to their homepage and help out!
Someone take money from all those bull**** Hollywood remakes and get this one done, NOW!

Horrifying

The Deepwater Horizon disaster Maggie Koerth-Baker at 6:55 PM Monday Americablog has a breathtaking series of photos, taken by a DOE contractor, that show the final hours of the Deepwater Horizon.
Also worth taking a look at: The Times-Picayune's animation of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, which shows the blob growing and shifting on the waves.

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Tribeca: 'Freakonomics' Dream Team Talks About the State of Documentary

by Christopher Campbell May 2nd 2010 // 3:03PM



Filed under: Documentary, Independent, Tribeca, Magnolia, Festival Reports, Politics, Cinematical Indie







The all-star directorial team behind Freakonomics stopped by the SoHo Apple Store in NYC Friday to talk with indieWIRE's Eugene Hernandez about the making of this new anthology documentary, which had it's world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival this weekend. Joined by author Stephen Dubner, whose same-named best-seller is the basis of the film, the six acclaimed documentarians and three producers also got into a discussion of the general state of non-fiction filmmaking in the first decade of the 21st century. This non-promotional part of the discussion caught my interest most, primarily because there could be no documentary "dream team" without the rise in popularity and esteem for documentary cinema that's occurred over the past ten years.

Without this surge, how else would Alex Gibney, Morgan Spurlock, Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady, Eugene Jarecki and Seth Gordon all be renowned enough to be specifically sought after by producer Chad Troutwine for a non-fiction compilation akin to his successful fiction anthology, Paris, Je T'Aime? And how is it that such a film becomes one of the hottest tickets of the fest, as the prestigious event's closing night film? The full reason may not be easily determined, but with so many brilliant representatives of non-fiction cinema together in one place, it couldn't hurt to start a conversation bent on unraveling this

Free market mayhem

While it was thought that the shut off devices that BP did have were more than adequate obviously they were not. Several different back up devices make sense for such an important function. Both Brazil and Norway think it is important enough to mandate their use.

There will be a huge price to pay for the spill now threating the gulf. It is much cheaper to purchace congressmen then to curtail production with safeguards or forethought. BP will not be barred from drilling for oil in the gulf. If previous behavior is to be a guide they will porably be granted more profitable leases.

Just Wrong

My friend Jonathan Koshi, who is Hawaiian, posted his recipe for Spam Musubi. Koshi says, "Over the last 30 years the Spam Musubi has indelibly stamped itself on the local Hawaii menu. They are great snacks, highly mobile, and filling." Here are the ingredients and equipment list, from Notes From The Zeitgeist