Updated to reflect correct Julian Date.
I had this really great post planned for Talk Like a Pirate Day, but I ended up working really late and then passed out while blogging. Oh well. Pirates are just flamboyant drama queens anyways. Ninjas are much cooler.
Lego Menger Sponge |
Lego goes fractal. Check out the Lego Menger Sponge.
The Alameda County Computer Resource Center, which refurbishes old computers (and everything else electronic) and gives them away to schools, non-profits, and disadvantaged people, is being harassed by local government bureaucracy. The ACCRC’s slogan is “Obsolescence is Just a Lack of Imagination.” Way past cool.
Second Kurt Vonnegut reference in two days, check out Popular Science’s how to Transform Hand Warmers to Liquid Ice Sculptures, where the author refers to sodium acetate as the closest thing to ice-nine.
An Italian Labor Union will Protest IBM on their campus in Second Life September 25th. Go Web 2.0!!!
After being driven to a near-extinction low of three percent of the population, Left-Handed People are Making a Comeback, and are now at 11 percent. This gives me hope for the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker. ; )
Nebraska Senator Ernie Chambers is Suing God to Stop Terror Threats. The suit names god and followers of all persuasions, lists terrorism and natural disasters among the grievances, and cites a long history of cruelty documented by the defendant’s “handpicked, trusted chroniclers of yore.” Check out the PDF.
Discover Magazine has a great display online of Children’s Cover Art Entries for the “State of Science in America.” Maya Gouw’s and Kathleen Kao’s were vastly superior to Christina Nicholas’ entry. Obviously someone was paid off (Hat tip to TGAW for the link). Also check out Childrens’ Drawings of Scientists Before and After a Visit to Fermilab.
So Jurassic Park is even more outdated, scientists now know the Velociraptor had feathers. Maybe Michael Crichton and Steven Spielberg can go back and redo the movie like Lucas did with the Star Wars trilogy.
I’m planning a trip to the Library of Congress soon to track down the copyright holder for Singing Science Records so I can get permission to burn the songs to CDs and give them to the kids at the Children’s Science Center. I have to physically visit the Library because it would cost me $150 minimum to get the information through the mail. So, of course, I’m outraged to learn that online access to the Library’s copyright database costs $86,625, which contradicts the Library of Congress’ whole purpose for existing. Free the Library of Congress!!!
When Whoopie Goldberg put her on the spot, “The View” Co-Host, Sherri Shepard, said she didn’t Know if the World was Round or Flat. She explained the next day that she was having a “Senior Poopie Moment,” and her conservative co-host, Elizabeth Hasselbeck, defended her as too busy with being a good housewife to bother with knowing such things.
In a Chemistry-style X-Prize, a company is offering $10 Million to the scientist who can extract silver from ore more efficiently.
Homo floresiensis |
So the Indonesia “Hobbit” was a Distinct Species. This was exactly the sort of thing Professor Teuku Jacob was trying to prevent scientists learning, when he confiscated the fossils in December 2004. As Carl Zimmer observed at the time, the discovery threatened the Professor’s own hypotheses concerning human evolution.
Count me in the world of lefties. I joined the world of the gifted when I lost my right arm in an accident back in ‘95. My left-handed friends whom I had given grief for several years welcomed me with open arms to the fold. What nice guys us lefties, eh?
Who knew being a lefty could be so great. I hereby call upon righties everywhere to convert to leftyism!
Did you haer that God responded to the lawsuit against him?
Talk like a Pirate day ROCKS!!