May 3, 2008

Why We Sleep 

The Temporal Organization of Recovery — Emmanuel Mignot, Stanford University ('Unsolved Mysteries' discuss a topic of biological importance that is poorly understood and in need of research attention). (PLoS Biology)

8:49 AM   •  

I See Dead People['s Books] 

at LibraryThing: "A group for those interested and involved in entering the library catalogs of famous readers."

8:45 AM   •  

visualcomplexity.com 

A visual exploration on mapping complex networks: "VisualComplexity.com intends to be a unified resource space for anyone interested in the visualization of complex networks. The project's main goal is to leverage a critical understanding of different visualization methods, across a series of disciplines, as diverse as Biology, Social Networks or the World Wide Web. I truly hope this space can inspire, motivate and enlighten any person doing research on this field.

Not all projects shown here are genuine complex networks, in the sense that they aren’t necessarily at the edge of chaos, or show an irregular and systematic degree of connectivity. However, the projects that apparently skip this class were chosen for two important reasons. They either provide advancement in terms of visual depiction techniques/methods or show conceptual uniqueness and originality in the choice of a subject. Nevertheless, all projects have one trait in common: the whole is always more than the sum of its parts." (thanks, abby)

8:43 AM   •  

May 1, 2008

"Your Eternal Webpage" 

Kevin Kelly asks how much data a person generates during their lifetime, and what happens to it after the person dies? (Conceptual Trends and Current Topics)

12:08 AM   •  

Apr 30, 2008

Linking spiral arms... 

"...two large colliding galaxies are featured in this Hubble Space Telescope view, part of a series of cosmic snapshots released to celebrate the Hubble's 18th anniversary. Recorded in astronomer Halton Arp's Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies as Arp 272, the pair is otherwise known as NGC 6050 and IC 1179. They lie some 450 million light-years away in the Hercules Galaxy Cluster. At that estimated distance, the picture spans over 150 thousand light-years. Although this scenario does look peculiar, galaxy collisions and their eventual mergers are now understood to be common, with Arp 272 representing a stage in this inevitable process." (APOD)

11:49 PM   •  

Dumb as We Wanna Be 

Thomas Friedman: "It is great to see that we finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead our nation, it takes your breath away. Hillary Clinton has decided to line up with John McCain in pushing to suspend the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for this summer’s travel season. This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks." (New York Times op-ed)

11:43 PM   •  

One of Denver's 'Most Wanted' 

"Following Rush Limbaugh's broadcast calling for violent riots in Denver, city officials issue a warrant for his arrest. Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper called Limbaugh a 'dangerous domestic terrorist' that should be locked up." (Unconfirmedsources.com)

11:40 PM   •  

Why Things Cost $19.95 

"What are the psychological 'rules' of bartering?" (Scientific American)

11:37 PM   •  

Bush pokes fun at his successors 

"US President George W Bush poked fun at his potential successors during his last White House Correspondents' Association dinner." (BBC) And the petty little man's jibes don't display an ounce of wit.

11:35 PM   •  

Light at the End of the Tunnel? 

Howard Dean: Obama Or Clinton Must Drop Out In June (Huffington Post)
(depictions by Julia Suits)

11:22 PM   •  

Scientists link 17 living people to an aboriginal man found in glacier 

"direct link between the frozen remains of a man found in a glacier in northern B.C. and 17 people living in B.C., Yukon and Alaska..." (Globe and Mail)

11:20 PM   •  

PBS breaks ‘media blackout’ of NYT story on Pentagon propaganda 

"On Sunday, The New York Times published an explosive report exposing the Pentagon’s secret campaign to use analysts in order to “generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance.” Since that time, TV news organizations have largely been silent on their role in the propaganda. Ari Melber notes that last night, PBS’s Newshour finally broke this blackout, but couldn’t convince the other networks to participate." (Think Progress)

11:14 PM   •  

Does the Earth's magnetic field cause suicides? 

Study shows geomagnetic activity correlates with self-destructive behavior in Kirovsk, Russia. Speculation that magnetic flux contributes to depression by desynchronizing human circadian rhythms. (New Scientist)

11:10 PM   •  

R.I.P. Albert Hofmann 

'Father of LSD' Dies at 102: "Dr. Hofmann first synthesized the compound lysergic acid diethylamide in 1938 but did not discover its psychopharmacological effects until five years later, when he accidentally ingested the substance that became known to the 1960s counterculture as acid.

He then took LSD hundreds of times, but regarded it as a powerful and potentially dangerous psychotropic drug that demanded respect. More important to him than the pleasures of the psychedelic experience was the drug’s value as a revelatory aid for contemplating and understanding what he saw as humanity’s oneness with nature. That perception, of union, which came to Dr. Hofmann as almost a religious epiphany while still a child, directed much of his personal and professional life." (New York Times)

10:31 PM   •  

R.I.P. Jimmy Giuffre 

Adventurous clarinetist, composer and arranger dead at 86. His "50-year journey through jazz led him from writing the Woody Herman anthem “Four Brothers” through minimalist, drummerless trios to striking experimental orchestral works...

Among the half-dozen instruments he played, from bass flute to soprano saxophone, it was the clarinet that gave him a signature sound; it was a dark, velvety tone, centering in the lower register, pure but rarely forceful. But among the iconoclastic heroes of the late ’50s in jazz, he was a serene oddity, changing his ideas as fast as he could record them." (New York Times)

10:26 PM   •