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Archive for 'Science'

Kurt Vonnegut – “How To Get A Job Like Mine”

August 11, 2010

Do yourself a favour and what all five of these. Kurt Vonnegut is one of my favourite writers and if you haven’t read him then you’re in for a treat. I particularly love the anecdote about his joke at Asimov’s funeral.

“We are here on earth to fart around and don’t let anyone tell you different.”- Kurt Vonnegut

via kottke.

Neil deGrasse Tyson

July 2, 2010

Lawrence Krauss – “A Universe From Nothing”

June 17, 2010

“Hubble, he began life as a lawyer and became an astronomer. So there is hope.”
- Lawrence Krauss

If you’re not interested in watching the full hour, at least check out this segment, where Lawrence relates the most poetic thing he knows about physics.

Eric Fischer – “Locals and Tourists #2 (GTWA #1): New York”

June 9, 2010

Eric Fischer gives the key to this work as:

Blue points on the map are pictures taken by locals (people who have taken pictures in this city dated over a range of a month or more).

Red points are pictures taken by tourists (people who seem to be a local of a different city and who took pictures in this city for less than a month).

Yellow points are pictures where it can’t be determined whether or not the photographer was a tourist (because they haven’t taken pictures anywhere for over a month). They are probably tourists but might just not post many pictures at all.

Locals and Tourists #2 (GTWA #1): New York

Dan Nocera: Personalized Energy

March 8, 2010

Chocky (opening titles)

January 26, 2010

Watching Chocky is one of my earliest memories as a child, which probably explains a lot. While the book is exceptional, the childrens show which grew out of it in the 80s was wondrously dark and foreboding, and featured magnificent effects.

Surfactant – “Twins”

November 28, 2009

Click through to see the video of the X-ray of two 20 week old fetuses in their mother’s womb.
twins

Julia Bruderer – “Lucy”

October 22, 2009

lucy2_web

NASA Hubble Space Telescope – “Carina Nebula”

September 21, 2009

via The Frame
hubble_newold02

Thomas Traxler – “Idea of a Tree”

September 13, 2009

via Every Day I’m Tumblin’

Semiconductor – “Black Rain”

August 1, 2009

Jorge Lopes Dos Santos – “The Foetus Project”

July 27, 2009

the-fetus-project-by-jorge-

Richard Feynman

July 3, 2009

Celeste Nelson – “Baby Squid”

June 3, 2009

“My tissue morphodynamics laboratory studies the dynamic processes that control tissue development. This image of squid (Loligo pealeii) embryos was taken using bright field microscopy.”

via Ectomo
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Mind Reading

January 15, 2009

A while ago I linked to a report about Japanese Scientists who had made a break-through in understanding brain activity to the point where they were able to correctly reconstruct the images inside a persons brain, effectively reading their mind. This is the accompanying video.

Scientists extract images directly from brain

December 12, 2008

This is interesting:

Researchers from Japan’s ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories have developed new brain analysis technology that can reconstruct the images inside a person’s mind and display them on a computer monitor, it was announced on December 11. According to the researchers, further development of the technology may soon make it possible to view other people’s dreams while they sleep.

“These results are a breakthrough in terms of understanding brain activity,” says Dr. Cheng. “In as little as 10 years, advances in this field of research may make it possible to read a person’s thoughts with some degree of accuracy.”

Scientists extract images directly from brain

Pink Tentacle has more, or you can go directly to the results of the experiment published in the December issue of the science journal Neuron. Unfortunately to read the article online costs $35, so maybe try your local University.

McCain – Tough on Zombies.

September 19, 2008

This is a lot of fun. McCain is a lot more enjoyable if you just let yourself imagine him to be some crazed president in a post-apocalyptic Zombie threatened world. And considering his energy policy, that’s only a stone’s throw from the truth. Emphasis is obviously mine.

Science Debate 2008 Obama and McCain answer the top 14 science questions facing the United States

When faced with a global pandemic [zombie threat], the United States must have in place and implement a layered strategy to save lives and protect the continuity of a functioning society. First, we must limit the spread of [the zombie] disease to the United States. Second, we must limit the spread of [the zombie] disease within the United States. This must be accomplished at the community level with strategies that have worked in past pandemics [zombie crisis] and can be adapted to a current crisis [zombie crisis]. Third, we must mitigate symptoms of the [zombie] disease and minimize suffering and death with effective treatments and countermeasures [shovels and spades]. And fourth, we must maintain a functioning economy, public service sector and community [so as to effectively combat the zombie threat].

- John McCain

Rat-Brain Cyborg

The future isn’t always what you wish it would be. Some are dissapointed by the lack of hover-boards and flying cars.

I for one welcome our new rat-brain-cyborg overlords.

More here.

Chemical Party

August 15, 2008

Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight

June 28, 2008

It’s interesting to hear the near death experience of a brain Scientist and the language she uses to describe it. No white light, but a lot of energy and atoms. Via Boing Boing’s Top 10 TED Talks.

“How many brain scientists have been able to study the brain from the inside out? I’ve gotten as much out of this experience of losing my left mind as I have in my entire academic career.”

Jill Bolte Taylor

Map Club

June 4, 2008

A map of relationships among scientific paradigms.

Go here for the explanation or here to buy the print, or just go here to jump straight in (always recommended).

Map Club Strange