Even in absurdity, sacrament. Even in hardship, holiness. Even in doubt, faith. Even in chaos, realization. Even in paradox, blessedness
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"Life expands or shrinks in proportion to one's courage." ~Anain Nin
The Race is On: Chimps Are Out-Evolving Humans The results are in: chimps are evolving faster than human beings. This startling discovery was made by a group of biologists and evolutionary scientists at the Biped Research Institute of Portland, Oregon following a three-year study into the genetic and evolutionary patterns of multiple generations of both species. Research was conducted by analysing the genetic patterns in a rare, 22-generation direct line of chimpanzee descendants, then comparing these records with those of a similar multiple-generation selection of humans. According to Biped Research, chimpanzees, or Pan troglodytes, are evolving approximately 30% faster than human beings and will, if the rate continues, eventually outstrip homo sapiens in many of the characteristics that define "humanness". "We're not particularly surprised that there is a disparity in evolutionary efficiency," said Dr. Truman Kettle, President of BRI. "However, that the disparity is so dramatic took us all a bit aback. Should trends continue, we could expect to find talking, reasoning, fully bipedal chimps to begin to appear within 15-20 generations. Quite possibly faster." jaybird found this for you @ 16:56 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
Black holes: The ultimate quantum computers? Nearly all of the information that falls into a black hole escapes back out, a controversial new study argues. The work suggests that black holes could one day be used as incredibly accurate quantum computers – if enormous theoretical and practical hurdles can first be overcome. Black holes are thought to destroy anything that crosses a point of no return around them called an "event horizon". But in the 1970s, Stephen Hawking used quantum mechanics to show black holes do emit radiation, which eventually evaporates them away completely. Originally, he argued that this "Hawking radiation" is so random that it could carry no information out about what had fallen into the black hole. But this conflicted with quantum mechanics, which states that quantum information can never be lost. Eventually, Hawking changed his mind and in 2004 famously conceded a bet, admitting that black holes do not destroy information. But the issue is far from settled, says Daniel Gottesman of the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Canada. "Hawking has changed his mind, but a lot of other people haven't," he told New Scientist. "There are still a lot of questions about what's really going on." jaybird found this for you @ 12:55 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Kosmos: A Brief History of the Word that means “Everything” “The authentic and primal Kosmos . . . contains within itself no spatial distinction, and has none of the feebleness of division, and even its parts bring no incompleteness to it since here the individual is not severed from the entire. . . . [D]o but survey it, and surely this is the pleading you will hear:” “I am made by a God: from that God I came perfect above all forms of life, adequate to my function, self-sufficing, lacking nothing: for I am the container of all, that is, of every plant and every animal, of all the kinds of created things, and many Gods and nations of Spirit-Beings and lofty souls and men happy in their goodness. . . . And all that is within me strives towards the Good; and each, to the measure of its faculty, attains. For from that Good all the heavens depend, [along] with all my own Soul and the Gods that dwell in my every part, and all that lives and grows, and even all in me that you may judge inanimate.” jaybird found this for you @ 08:40 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
Flemming Funch: Key Concept The global brain, well, we seem to really need it. As it is right now, humankind is a schizophrenic moron. Or manic-depressive, maybe. Sometimes brilliant and productive, mostly lethargic, largely criminally destructive. Despite that many members of the human race are well-meaning, knowledgeable and resourceful. We desperately need to be connected in a manner that is constructively complex, so as to awaken our collective intelligence. Maybe that is something we can do on the internet, maybe it is a different way of doing a few key things. It appears that none of us are smart enough to solve the puzzle. But we might be smart enough to discover patterns that allow something bigger to emerge. We might not be clever enough to know exactly how to do it, but we might know how to start something that triggers the emergence of a bigger level of intelligence. Patterns that promote self-organization and collective intelligence, even small scale, are a very likely leverage point. One ingredient is to know when to get out of the way, and let useful things happen. jaybird found this for you @ 20:59 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
SPECULATIONS ON THE FUTURE OF SCIENCE Recursion is the essence of science. For example, science papers cite other science papers, and that process of research pointing at itself invokes a whole higher level, the emergent shape of citation space. Recursion always does that. It is the engine of scientific progress and thus of the progress of society. A particularly fruitful way to look at the history of science is to study how science itself has changed over time, with an eye to what that trajectory might suggest about the future. Kelly chronicled a sequence of new recursive devices in science... 2000 BC — First text indexes Projecting forward, Kelly had five things to say about the next 100 years in science... 1) There will be more change in the next 50 years of science than in the last 400 years. 2) This will be a century of biology. It is the domain with the most scientists, the most new results, the most economic value, the most ethical importance, and the most to learn. 3) Computers will keep leading to new ways of science. Information is growing by 66% per year while physical production grows by only 7% per year. The data volume is growing to such levels of "zillionics" that we can expect science to compile vast combinatorial libraries, to run combinatorial sweeps through possibility space (as Stephen Wolfram has done with cellular automata), and to run multiple competing hypotheses in a matrix. Deep realtime simulations and hypothesis search will drive data collection in the real world. 4) New ways of knowing will emerge. "Wikiscience" is leading to perpetually refined papers with a thousand authors. Distributed instrumentation and experiment, thanks to miniscule transaction cost, will yield smart-mob, hive-mind science operating "fast, cheap, & out of control." Negative results will have positive value (there is already a "Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine"). Triple-blind experiments will emerge through massive non-invasive statistical data collection--- no one, not the subjects or the experimenters, will realize an experiment was going on until later. (In the Q&A, one questioner predicted the coming of the zero-author paper, generated wholly by computers.) 5) Science will create new levels of meaning. The Internet already is made of one quintillion transistors, a trillion links, a million emails per second, 20 exabytes of memory. It is approaching the level of the human brain and is doubling every year, while the brain is not. It is all becoming effectively one machine. And we are the machine. "Science is the way we surprise God," said Kelly. "That's what we're here for." Our moral obligation is to generate possibilities, to discover the infinite ways, however complex and high-dimension, to play the infinite game. It will take all possible species of intelligence in order for the universe to understand itself. Science, in this way, is holy. It is a divine trip. [via reality carnival] jaybird found this for you @ 20:58 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Hormones could treat phobias It could be easier for those with a fear of spiders to have a bath following a study published this week. Researchers suggest arachnophobes, and people with other phobias, could be helped by a dose of the stress hormone cortisol, which impairs memory. The University of Zurich team found giving the hormone before being exposed to the phobia trigger led to less fear... Cortisol impairs the retrieval of memories, so the principle the researchers were looking into was whether giving a dose of the hormone before people were exposed to a spider - or their own personal phobia trigger - would help. The theory was tested on 40 people with social phobia and 20 with spider phobia. Half of those studied were given cortisol and the rest a dummy version. They were then either asked to give a speech in public, or exposed to a spider, depending on their phobia. In both cases, subjects who received the hormone reported less stimulus-induced fear and anxiety. jaybird found this for you @ 16:55 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
Mayan Legend: How The King Of Birds Was Chosen Halach-Uinic, the Great Spirit guarded over all the Maya World. His will was law. One day be grew tired of the constant chatter and fighting among the birds. At a meeting in the center of the forest, he announced that the birds must choose a king to keep peace. Of course, each bird thought it possessed the best qualifications. Col-pol-che, the cardinal sang, "Look at me. No one else is bright red and so beautiful. All the birds admire me. I should he king." And he strutted in front of the impressed bird audience, fluttering his wings and raising his crest. X-col-col-chek, the tropical mockingbird, trilled out, "I'm the only bird with such a lovely voice. Everyone listens to me." Enlarging his throat, X-col gave a short performance of enchanting and complicated melodies. This was a tremendous sensation among the birds and went far in convincing them that the mockingbird should be king. Then the wild turkey, Cutz, strode into the circle and gobbled, "There's no doubt that I should be king because I'm the biggest and strongest bird. With my size and strength, I can stop fights and also defend any bird. You need a powerful king. I'm the one!" And so, throughout the day various birds displayed their qualities. The only one that kept quiet was Kukul, the quetzal. This bird was very ambitious and proud. He had elegant manners and a graceful body, but his plumage was shabby. Kukul thought it would be impossible to be chosen as king while he was dressed so poorly... jaybird found this for you @ 12:51 in Spirituality, Religion & Mythos | | permalink
The Chinese zombie ships of West Africa We're in the big African Queen inflatable, cruising alongside an anchored trawler. It's more rust than metal - the ship is rotting away. The foredeck is covered in broken machinery. The fish deck is littered with frayed cables, and the mast lies horizontally, hanging over the starboard side. A large rusty Chinese character hangs on railings above the bridge, facing forward. It reads 'happiness'. Zizi - our Chinese translator - shouts a greeting. A head pokes out from the accommodation, puzzled at this disturbance. A female voice, out here? He picks his way through the debris to the side of the ship. He's friendly, but a bit perplexed at our presence. Sarah asks questions - Zizi translates. He's the 2nd mate, and says that he's been sitting here on his own for five days, awaiting a new crew, He doesn't know when they'll arrive. The trawler itself has been anchored here, at this spot, for three months. "Is this ship ready for fishing?" we ask. "Yes, of course", he looks around, gestures at the deck. He seems surprised that we would ask. We're amazed it's even floating. Moff turns the boat, taking us to another of the rusting fishing vessels, 70 nautical miles (130km) off the coast of Guinea, West Africa. We had been told this was where old pirate fishing boats were left at anchor, abandoned. We didn't expect to find living people on board the dying ships. Earlier, after leaving the Esperanza, we'd found a big red Russian tanker engaged in the refuelling of Chinese trawlers - with one alongside, the Zhang Yuan Yu 1 was practically falling apart at the seams. The skeleton crew were friendly enough - and told us that they awaiting a new crew, so that they could go fishing again. Except for some brief words with an engineer in overalls on the stern, the Russian crew on the tanker Wkotobo were unfriendly, and didn't even return our waves. We head away, going with the current, which was purple and green with the dregs of spilled fuel. Throughout the afternoon, I keep noticing just how dirty the water is, with oil and fragments of plastic. We arrive at Long way 08, which is in line for refuelling. This trawler is in a poor state, with the hull covered in masses of good-sized shellfish. Four young Chinese crewman meet us with smiles and welcomes. They tell us that some of them have been on board for 2 years, non-stop. The trawler itself has been out here for eight years, and would probably be kept going for another six or so, or as long it lasted. jaybird found this for you @ 08:35 in Environment, Ecology & Nature | | permalink
New brown dwarf star discovered in the galactic neighborhood  A team of astronomers has found a cold object that is neither star nor planet circling a star relatively close to Earth. The object, a cool brown dwarf orbiting its red parent star, sits about 12.7 light-years from the Sun, making it the third closest such object known to date, researchers said. Cold and dim, brown dwarfs are objects that are typically more massive than planets but fall short of igniting into full-fledged stars. Astronomers using the Very Large Telescope at European Southern Observatory in Paranal, Chile found the latest brown dwarf orbiting the red star SCR 1845-6357. “Besides being extremely close to Earth, this object is a T dwarf—a very cool brown dwarf—and the only such object found as a companion to a low-mass star,” said Beth Biller, lead author of the study reporting brown dwarf find and a graduate student at the University of Arizona, in a statement. “It is also likely the brightest known object of its temperature because it is so close.” The newly found brown dwarf carries a temperature of about 1,382 degrees Fahrenheit (750 degrees Centigrade) and a mass between nine and 65 times that of Jupiter, researchers said. It also orbits its red parent at a distance 4.5 times that of the average separation between Earth and the Sun, or about 418 million miles (672 million kilometers), they added. The research will be detailed in an upcoming issue of the Astrophysical Journal. jaybird found this for you @ 21:04 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Two years into the crisis, the western Sudanese region of Darfur is acknowledged to be a humanitarian and human rights tragedy of the first order. According to recent reports by the World Food Program, the United Nations and the Coalition for International Justice, 3.5 million people are now hungry, 2.5 million have been displaced due to violence, and 400,000 people have died in Darfur thus far. The international community is failing to protect civilians itself or to influence the Sudanese government to do so. jaybird found this for you @ 17:01 in News, Opinion & Politique | | permalink
When William Blake died in 1827, his widow Catherine appointed Frederick Tatham his literary and artistic executor. No sooner had Tatham accepted the position than he was, in the words of William Michael Rossetti, brother of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, "beset" by "Swedenborgians, Irvingites, or other extreme sectaries", and compelled to thrust "a gag into the piteous mouth of Blake's corpse". What these timid souls feared was that Blake's remains would disclose his intense, frequently obsessive and occasionally pornographic interest in sex. Tatham's job amounted to a full-scale expurgation of what Blake's less unbuttoned followers considered obscene. Blake had left many drawings and manuscripts containing his most explicit sexual, religious and political expressions - all three were linked for him - and Tatham felt obliged to destroy these. The loss was irreparable, but some of the cover-up - literally - was less extreme. Joined by Blake's friend John Linnell, on some works Tatham only erased the offending words or images. When this proved impracticable they resorted to a fig leaf. Blake's original nude self-portrait for his Milton exhibited an erect and oddly blackened penis. One of Blake's prudish descendants mitigated the shock caused by the poet's proud member by drawing knickers over it. Thankfully, modern technology has restored much of this censored material, and what emerges is a vivid recognition that for Blake, sex was at the centre of his spiritual and domestic life. jaybird found this for you @ 12:59 in Authors, Books & Words | | permalink
Blumenthal: The Apocalyptic president In his latest PR offensive President Bush came to Cleveland, Ohio, on Monday to answer the paramount question on Iraq that he said was on people's minds: "They wonder what I see that they don't." After mentioning "terror" 54 times and "victory" five, dismissing "civil war" twice and asserting that he is "optimistic", he called on a citizen in the audience, who homed in on the invisible meaning of recent events in the light of two books, American Theocracy, by Kevin Phillips, and the book of Revelation. Phillips, the questioner explained, "makes the point that members of your administration have reached out to prophetic Christians who see the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism as signs of the apocalypse. Do you believe this? And if not, why not?" Bush's immediate response, as transcribed by CNN, was: "Hmmm." Then he said: "The answer is I haven't really thought of it that way. Here's how I think of it. First, I've heard of that, by the way." The official White House website transcript drops the strategic comma, and so changes the meaning to: "First I've heard of that, by the way." But it is certainly not the first time Bush has heard of the apocalyptic preoccupation of much of the religious right, having served as evangelical liaison on his father's 1988 presidential campaign. The Rev Jerry Falwell told Newsweek how he brought Tim LaHaye, then an influential rightwing leader, to meet him; LaHaye's Left Behind novels, dramatising the rapture, Armageddon and the second coming, have sold tens of millions. But it is almost certain that Cleveland was the first time Bush had heard of Phillips's book. He was the visionary strategist for Nixon's 1968 presidential campaign; his 1969 book, The Emerging Republican Majority, spelled out the shift of power from the north-east to the south and south-west, which he was early to call "the sunbelt"; he grasped that southern Democrats would react to the civil-rights revolution by becoming southern Republicans; he also understood the resentments of urban ethnic Catholics towards black people on issues such as crime, school integration and jobs. But he never imagined that evangelical religion would transform the coalition he helped to fashion into something that horrifies him. In American Theocracy, Phillips describes Bush as the founder of "the first American religious party"; September 11 gave him the pretext for "seizing the fundamentalist moment"; he has manipulated a "critical religious geography" to hype issues such as gay marriage. "New forces were being interwoven. These included the institutional rise of the religious right, the intensifying biblical focus on the Middle East, and the deepening of insistence on church-government collaboration within the GOP electorate." It portended a potential "American Disenlightenment," apparent in Bush's hostility to science. jaybird found this for you @ 08:57 in News, Opinion & Politique | | permalink
Duh: The Science Of Sexual Orientation The bedrooms of 9-year-old twins Adam and Jared couldn't be more different. Jared's room is decked out with camouflage, airplanes, and military toys, while Adam's room sports a pastel canopy, stuffed animals, and white horses... Jared was eager to show her his G.I. Joe collection. "I have ones that say like Marine and SWAT. And then that's where I keep all the guns for 'em," he explained. Adam was also proud to show off his toys. "This is one of my dolls. Bratz baby," he said. Adam wears pinkish-purple nail polish, adorned with stars and diamonds. Asked if he went to school like that, Adam says, "Uh-huh. I just showed them my nails, and they were like, 'Why did you do that?'" Adam's behavior is called childhood gender nonconformity, meaning a child whose interests and behaviors are more typical of the opposite sex. Research shows that kids with extreme gender nonconformity usually grow up to be gay. Danielle, Adam and Jared's mom, says she began to notice this difference in Adam when he was about 18 months old and began asking for a Barbie doll. Jared, meanwhile, was asking for fire trucks. Not that much has changed. Jared’s favorite game now is Battlefield 2, Special Forces. As for Adam, he says, "It's called Neopets: The Darkest Faerie." Asked how he would describe himself to a stranger, Jared says, "I'm a kid who likes G.I. Joes and games and TV." "I would say like a girl," Adam replied to the same question. When asked why he thinks that is, Adam shrugged. "To me, cases like that really scream out, 'Hey, it's not out there. It's in here.' There's no indication that this mother is prone to raise very feminine boys because his twin is not that way," says Michael Bailey, a psychology professor at Northwestern University and a leading researcher in the field of sexual orientation. Bailey says he doesn't think nurture is a plausible explanation. Psychologists used to believe homosexuality was caused by nurture — namely overbearing mothers and distant fathers — but that theory has been disproved. Today, scientists are looking at genes, environment, brain structure and hormones. There is one area of consensus: that homosexuality involves more than just sexual behavior; it’s physiological. jaybird found this for you @ 20:56 in Gay, Lesbian, Queer & Free | | permalink
In 1972, the physicist Freeman Dyson wrote an article called "Missed Opportunities." In it, he describes how relativity could have been discovered many years before Einstein announced his findings if mathematicians in places like Göttingen had spoken to physicists who were poring over Maxwell's equations describing electromagnetism. The ingredients were there in 1865 to make the breakthrough—only announced by Einstein some 40 years later. It is striking that Dyson should have written about scientific ships passing in the night. Shortly after he published the piece, he was responsible for an abrupt collision between physics and mathematics that produced one of the most remarkable scientific ideas of the last half century: that quantum physics and prime numbers are inextricably linked. This unexpected connection with physics has given us a glimpse of the mathematics that might, ultimately, reveal the secret of these enigmatic numbers. At first the link seemed rather tenuous. But the important role played by the number 42 has recently persuaded even the deepest skeptics that the subatomic world might hold the key to one of the greatest unsolved problems in mathematics. jaybird found this for you @ 16:50 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Researchers get neurons and silicon talking  European researchers have created an interface between mammalian neurons and silicon chips. The development is a crucial first step in the development of advanced technologies that combine silicon circuits with a mammal’s nervous system. The ultimate applications are potentially limitless. In the long term it will possibly enable the creation of very sophisticated neural prostheses to combat neurological disorders. What's more, it could allow the creation of organic computers that use living neurons as their CPU. Those applications are potentially decades away, but in the much nearer term the new technology could enable very advanced and sophisticated drug screening systems for the pharmaceutical industry. "Pharmaceutical companies could use the chip to test the effect of drugs on neurons, to quickly discover promising avenues of research," says Professor Stefano Vassanelli, a molecular biologist with the University of Padua in Italy, and one of the partners in the NACHIP project, funded under the European Commission’s Future and Emerging Technologies initiative of the IST programme. NACHIP's core achievement was to develop a working interface between the living tissue of individual neurons and the inorganic compounds of silicon chips. It was a difficult task. "We had a lot of problems to overcome," says Vassanelli. "And we attacked the problems using two major strategies, through the semiconductor technology and the biology." jaybird found this for you @ 12:48 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Jubilee: Doing what is right and holy in the world My wide-open, big-love multi-faith spiritual community is stepping up to the plate against institutionalized discrimination. I was asked to make a statement on my opinion of Howard's move, and a gave it all the gusto he deserves, for he is just a man who feels deeply and profoundly about being spiritually congruent with your source, whatever that may be. It is a rare and noble virtue, and I applaud him. I'm proud to call Howard a friend, and proud of my community.
In a statement he released Monday morning, Hanger said: jaybird found this for you @ 08:35 in Local- Western North Carolina | | permalink
Hardly Surprising: Bush shuns Patriot Act requirement When President Bush signed the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act this month, he included an addendum saying that he did not feel obliged to obey requirements that he inform Congress about how the FBI was using the act's expanded police powers. Bush signed the bill with fanfare at a White House ceremony March 9, calling it ''a piece of legislation that's vital to win the war on terror and to protect the American people." But after the reporters and guests had left, the White House quietly issued a ''signing statement," an official document in which a president lays out his interpretation of a new law. In the statement, Bush said that he did not consider himself bound to tell Congress how the Patriot Act powers were being used and that, despite the law's requirements, he could withhold the information if he decided that disclosure would ''impair foreign relations, national security, the deliberative process of the executive, or the performance of the executive's constitutional duties." jaybird found this for you @ 20:02 in News, Opinion & Politique | | permalink
Could Ethiopian skull be missing link? Scientists in northeastern Ethiopia said Saturday that they have discovered the skull of a small human ancestor that could be a missing link between the extinct Homo erectus and modern man. The hominid cranium -- found in two pieces and believed to be between 500,000 and 250,000 years old -- "comes from a very significant period and is very close to the appearance of the anatomically modern human," said Sileshi Semaw, director of the Gona Paleoanthropological Research Project in Ethiopia. Archaeologists found the early human cranium five weeks ago at Gawis in Ethiopia's northeastern Afar region, Sileshi said. Several stone tools and fossilized animals including two types of pigs, zebras, elephants, antelopes, cats, and rodents were also found at the site. Sileshi, an Ethiopian paleoanthropologist based at Indiana University, said most fossil hominids are found in pieces but the near-complete skull -- a rare find -- provided a wealth of information. jaybird found this for you @ 16:59 in History, Civilization & Anthropology | | permalink
You thoughts can now be read: The Silent Speaker In space, no one can hear you scream. Use a cell phone on a crowded commuter train and everyone can. Read it- the implications are spooky. jaybird found this for you @ 12:56 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
Brezny: Secrets of Pronoia When an old tree in the rain forest dies and topples over, it At the Beauty and Truth Laboratory, we believe that stories How did it come to be that the news is reported solely by “Ninety-six percent of the cosmos puzzles astronomers,” jaybird found this for you @ 08:30 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
Tonight will be my last night of un-aided sleep Tomorrow night I pick up my CPAP, and I'll post all about it. That said, goodnight, beautiful people. jaybird found this for you @ 23:10 in Journaling the Infinite | | permalink
Wordplay: Perspective, balance, and today Today has been a bit too cold for much gallivanting, and it's been snowing off and on for some time, perhaps for the last time until winter returns. This being fickle Asheville, I somehow don't think this is the end of it... It's funny how we humans always seem to start things off by yakking about the weather. Perhaps that thin skin between us and cold Space is more of a friend than we realize- it's always in conversation. I've been generally happy lately, mixed with the occasional petty derailment. But I've been having fun with it all, and have put myself on the analyst's couch of the mind, to be both the nut and the nutcracker. Mirror mirror. Good times. I've been delighting lately in contrasts- delicious contrasts which force one to laugh through the tears, to kiss the sky through balled-up fists. No details, but it's been a thrilling ride which enlivens and sustains through this gray threshold between winter and the flowery, orgasmic Puck-ish fever of Spring. If anything, what these contrasts have done is to teach (again) that the material side of this crawl through the mire and tang of life on a sphere is a rather silly affair and not worth wasting vital dendritic quivers over. The material failures which caused me a little more ire than necessary are some pretty big metaphors which say, really, don't rely on anything, at all. By being alive I've chosen to gamble, and my happy ramble through Being is rather like the dance of a single die upon a verdant felt runway under a million glittering casino lights. Either way I land, I can't ever really come up empty. So, here's to laughter. Here's to surprise. Here's to the big fat unknown which will one day fold me in its flesh. I can't bet on having this body for an eternity, nor can I not. I can't know, so I'll laugh, as the daffodil laughs at the snow, as the pigeon laughs at the airplane, as the Infinite laughs, lovingly, at our castles and contraptions. What else can be done but to pick up my hat, and sail into the night, to the land of inviting glances and endless second chances? Time for a shower. jaybird found this for you @ 18:27 in Journaling the Infinite | | permalink
Charles Tayfor for Congress: He Sucks! A daring group of local concerned citizens launched a new, imformative and pretty damn funny site aimed at Taylor's highly unethical behavior, sap-lust for deforestation, and rather unfortunate relationships with unsavory characters. All with a delicious satiric bite. Do check it out. jaybird found this for you @ 20:41 in Local- Western North Carolina | | permalink
Bring on the freeze-dried ludefisk: Swedes plan to colonise Moon We always knew the Swedes were a shifty bunch - softening hearts worldwide with a pleasing blend of inoffensive europop, cheap yet effortlessly stylish flat-pack furniture and fun-loving, pnemuatic blonde fillies - but now the horrible truth can now be revealed: they're planning to colonise the Moon thereby ensuring their own survival as the Earth's resources dwindle and lesser nations are returned to a primitive Stone-Age state enslaved to Sweden's galactic ambitions*. The proof comes in the form of the innocent-looking SMART-Centre which, according to various reports, has assembled a consortium of more than 50 partners - including Japan's Shimizu Corporation, US NASA contractor Orbitech and the UK's Cranfield University - to turn the centre's Dr. Niklas Järvstråt's dreams of extraterrestrial conquest into reality. Järvstråt first pitched the idea of colonising the Moon over ten years ago. His plan is to establish a self-sustaining community "where the great circle of life can be sustained in its entirety by lunar raw materials and where all life-sustaining products will be manufactured in situ". jaybird found this for you @ 16:56 in Radical Undertakings | | permalink
100-year-old decides it’s time to retire  Awwww... Winston retired this week after 75 years of cleaning and then supervising the maintenance of first, Los Angeles trolleys, and then buses. He never took one sick day and only missed one day of work — when his wife passed away. jaybird found this for you @ 12:53 in Interesting People | | permalink
"Flow" & Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Csikszentmihalyi opened the lecture with an account of his name which included reference to its Hungarian/Transylvanian roots. Talking of his roots he noted one of his defining moments was at the age of ten, in 1945, when Hungarian society was overturned and most of the adults whom he had respected "disintegrated" with the loss of social status and financial support. Though he acknowledges that he hasn't yet discovered the basis for why a few did not "disintegrate", he set himself a goal of discovering a way to live a better life. [more, via metafilter] jaybird found this for you @ 08:34 in Consciousness, Psychology & Philosophy | | permalink
The Mayas: How The Mockingbird Became The Best Singer When X-chol-col-chek, the mockingbird, was young, her family was very poor, and she could only dress in dingy feathers. Since she was hatched, however, X-col had displayed a magnificent voice. She wanted to take singing lessons but could not afford them. The mockingbird was fortunate to obtain work with a rich and noble family of cardinals. That winter, a famous singing professor, Dr. Xcau, the melodious blackbird, came to Maya Land. The father cardinal immediately imagined that his daughter, Col-pol-che, could become a fine singer. She was lazy vain and hated to study. But by promising her many fine gifts, the father convinced her to try singing lessons. When Col-pol-che went with Dr. Xcau to a quiet part of the woods to begin her music course, X-col followed and hid in the bushes to listen and learn. Then she raced back to finish her chores. For weeks, the professor tried to make the girl cardinal sing sweetly, but without success. He soon realized she had neither the voice nor the ambition. He was afraid to tell her wealthy father after such a long time, having accepted a lot of money. So, he finally flew far away an forgot the whole affair. Meanwhile, X-col had been practicing. One morning, Col-pol-che happened to hear her and was very surprised at her little maid's ability. That same day, the father cardinal decided his daughter should give a concert for their friends. The indolent girl was terrified, yet she dared not tell her parents that she couldn't sing. She thought of the mockingbird's lovely voice and decided to ask her for help. The two birds asked Colote, the woodpecker, to bore a hole into the tree trunk where Col-pol-che would perch. Then the mockingbird would hide inside. While Col-pol-che pretended to be singing, the real voice would come from X-col within... jaybird found this for you @ 20:14 in Spirituality, Religion & Mythos | | permalink
Unprecedented double helix near center of Milky Way  Astronomers report an unprecedented elongated double helix nebula near the center of our Milky Way galaxy, using observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. The part of the nebula the astronomers observed stretches 80 light years in length. The research is published March 16 in the journal Nature. "We see two intertwining strands wrapped around each other as in a DNA molecule," said Mark Morris, a UCLA professor of physics and astronomy, and lead author. "Nobody has ever seen anything like that before in the cosmic realm. Most nebulae are either spiral galaxies full of stars or formless amorphous conglomerations of dust and gas -- space weather. What we see indicates a high degree of order." The double helix nebula is approximately 300 light years from the enormous black hole at the center of the Milky Way. jaybird found this for you @ 16:12 in Science, Quantum & Space | | permalink
The red rain phenomenon of Kerala and its possible extraterrestrial origin A red rain phenomenon occurred in Kerala, India starting from 25th July 2001, in which the rainwater appeared coloured in various localized places that are spread over a few hundred kilometers in Kerala. Maximum cases were reported during the first 10 days and isolated cases were found to occur for about 2 months. The striking red colouration of the rainwater was found to be due to the suspension of microscopic red particles having the appearance of biological cells. These particles have no similarity with usual desert dust. An estimated minimum quantity of 50,000 kg of red particles has fallen from the sky through red rain. An analysis of this strange phenomenon further shows that the conventional atmospheric transport processes like dust storms etc. cannot explain this phenomenon. The electron microscopic study of the red particles shows fine cell structure indicating their biological cell like nature. EDAX analysis shows that the major elements present in these cell like particles are carbon and oxygen. Strangely, a test for DNA using Ethidium Bromide dye fluorescence technique indicates absence of DNA in these cells. In the context of a suspected link between a meteor airburst event and the red rain, the possibility for the extraterrestrial origin of these particles from cometary fragments is discussed. jaybird found this for you @ 12:10 in Forteana, Phenomena & the Bizarre | | permalink
Shari'a Law in the United States First in Europe and now in the United States, Muslim groups have petitioned to establish enclaves in which they can uphold and enforce greater compliance to Islamic law. While the U.S. Constitution enshrines the right to religious freedom and the prohibition against a state religion, when it comes to the rights of religious enclaves to impose communal rules, the dividing line is more nebulous. Can U.S. enclaves, homeowner associations, and other groups enforce Islamic law? jaybird found this for you @ 08:07 in Spirituality, Religion & Mythos | | permalink
JON CARROLL: I believe I lost it. I believe I lost it. I believe I yelled. It was in an empty room, so no animals were harmed in the making of that yell, but still. I felt frustrated. And you know what's really good when you're feeling frustrated? Remembering that you have a newspaper column. Last year the Ford Motor Co. started to buy ads in several publications aimed at gay readers. They did so, one presumes, because they realized that gay people buy automobiles, and Ford has, alas, not been selling many automobiles lately. Then the company got assaulted by the American Family Association, a creation of the Rev. Donald Wildmon, a clever right-wing agitator with a hate-based agenda. So Ford announced that it would stop advertising in gay publications. But then, whoops, Ford reversed its reversal and said, never mind, it was going to advertise in gay publications after all. So then a representative of the AFA announced that it was reinstating its boycott. "We cannot, and will not, sit by as Ford supports a social agenda aimed at the destruction of the family." What a vile sentence. What a vile sentiment. What overbusy, underbrained worms these people must be. I am not yelling. jaybird found this for you @ 20:19 in Gay, Lesbian, Queer & Free | | permalink
Why Oh Why Are We Ruled by These... Whatever They Ares? Interesting that [Bush] cannot remember "Federal Reserve" on the fly. Also interesting that he does not know that the Federal Reserve controls the overnight federal funds rate, but does not control--it influences--long-term rates. Interesting that he thinks his power to veto appropriations bills is the power to "make suggestions" about spending levels. Who is the "they"? And did "they" really tell him to say that? jaybird found this for you @ 16:14 in News, Opinion & Politique | | permalink
Two Years Before 9/11, Candidate Bush was Already Talking Privately About Attacking Iraq, According to His Former Ghost Writer Two years before the September 11 attacks, presidential candidate George W. Bush was already talking privately about the political benefits of attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost writer, who held many conversations with then-Texas Governor Bush in preparation for a planned autobiography. "He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999," said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. "It was on his mind. He said to me: 'One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.' And he said, 'My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.' He said, 'If I have a chance to invade·.if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency." Herskowitz said that Bush expressed frustration at a lifetime as an underachiever in the shadow of an accomplished father. In aggressive military action, he saw the opportunity to emerge from his father's shadow. The moment, Herskowitz said, came in the wake of the September 11 attacks. "Suddenly, he's at 91 percent in the polls, and he'd barely crawled out of the bunker." That President Bush and his advisers had Iraq on their minds long before weapons inspectors had finished their work - and long before alleged Iraqi ties with terrorists became a central rationale for war - has been raised elsewhere, including in a book based on recollections of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill. However, Herskowitz was in a unique position to hear Bush's unguarded and unfiltered views on Iraq, war and other matters - well before he became president. In 1999, Herskowitz struck a deal with the campaign of George W. Bush about a ghost-written autobiography, which was ultimately titled A Charge to Keep : My Journey to the White House, and he and Bush signed a contract in which the two would split the proceeds. The publisher was William Morrow. Herskowitz was given unimpeded access to Bush, and the two met approximately 20 times so Bush could share his thoughts. Herskowitz began working on the book in May, 1999, and says that within two months he had completed and submitted some 10 chapters, with a remaining 4-6 chapters still on his computer. Herskowitz was replaced as Bush's ghostwriter after Bush's handlers concluded that the candidate's views and life experiences were not being cast in a sufficiently positive light. jaybird found this for you @ 12:11 in News, Opinion & Politique | | permalink
President Bush Increasingly Uses Rhetorical Straw-Man Arguments to Combat Unnamed Critics "Some look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that the war is lost and not worth another dime or another day," President Bush said recently. Another time he said, "Some say that if you're Muslim you can't be free." "There are some really decent people," the president said earlier this year, "who believe that the federal government ought to be the decider of health care ... for all people." Of course, hardly anyone in mainstream political debate has made such assertions. When the president starts a sentence with "some say" or offers up what "some in Washington" believe, as he is doing more often these days, a rhetorical retort almost assuredly follows. The device usually is code for Democrats or other White House opponents. In describing what they advocate, Bush often omits an important nuance or substitutes an extreme stance that bears little resemblance to their actual position. He typically then says he "strongly disagrees" - conveniently knocking down a straw man of his own making. jaybird found this for you @ 08:07 in News, Opinion & Politique | | |
