November 30, 2005
Bacterial 'film' makes living 'photograph'
In the Nov. 24 issue of Nature is an interesting article about using... well, it's too complicated to describe here, but put simply, researchers were able to make E. coli "see the light" and use the bacteria as a sort of photographic film. There's a good synopsis at Science Blog:
Scientists at UC San Francisco have engineered bacteria to create living photographs that weigh in at 100 megapixels per square inch. The photos were created by projecting light on "biological film" -- billions of genetically engineered E. coli growing in dishes of agar, a standard jello-like growth medium for bacteria.
(Have you been touched by His Noodly Appendage?)
30 Nov 23:10 | Link | Category: Science
November 29, 2005
Windows turns 20
Sorry for posting this rather disturbing image of Bill Gates, but I don't do it without reason. It's sort of a birthday card to remind us how far we've come in two decades. ((Update: I forgot to mention this, but I chose one of the better images from Bill's photo shoot. If you're not too squeamish, check out the second photo on this page. I think we should all be relieved Bill's goal is Microsoft on every desktop, not Bill Gates on every desk.))
Last week, Microsoft Interface Manager Windows officially turned 20 years old. From Download Squad comes 20 things you didn't know about Windows 1.0, including:
- Bill Gates wanted to call Windows 1.0 "Interface Manager." Marketing exec Rowland Hanson persuaded him that Windows was a better name.
- In 1983, Microsoft pitched Windows as a potential GUI for Atari's ST computer. Atari, however, didn't want to wait for the program, and settled on Digital Research's GEM instead.
- An early PR photo for Windows 1.0 shows Bill Gates sprawled on a desk leaning on a computer monitor. Behind him are several other computers, including an IBM PC —and a Mac.
- The system requirements for Windows 1.0 were 256KB of RAM, DOS 2.0 and two floppy drives.
Just to prove how ancient I am, I remember Digital Research's GEM. My family's first PC came with it. (Like most people, we didn't get Windows until v. 3.1.) GEM was actually a pretty functional, decent-looking GUI shell for PCs of the time (though still leaps and bounds behind the Mac). We never really used it, instead using a simple batchfile menu thingy or navigating around in DOS (oh what fun). Our computer also came with great programs like DisplayWrite, Wordstar, GW-BASIC, and Lotus 1-2-3. Ahh, those were the days.
Oh, also... if you haven't seen it, you might enjoy the video of Steve Ballmer pitching Windows 1.0.
29 Nov 16:18 | Link | Category: Technology & Computing
November 27, 2005
Possible hiatus
Things might be really quiet around here for the next few weeks. I have a short writing assignment due in a little over a day (that I haven't started yet), a research paper + presentation due next week, and a group web site project due next week. In two weeks, I have a large writing assignment and four finals. Fun. This semester has been a pain in the ass. And my incredible procrastination hasn't helped for some reason.
I'll try to make a few posts and reply to important e-mails, but if I'm silent you'll know why.
27 Nov 23:24 | Link | Category: Site/Life News
Need a bookshelf?
Below are a few interesting ideas for storing your books.
A coffee table or hanging wire bookshelf (from u:b studio):
Giant lettering with shelves built into the back (from SET):
And if you're poor, like me? Do what I do and use flimsy steel industrial shelving. $15 at your local hardware store:
27 Nov 22:44 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits
Vertical 'Arrange All' for Word X
I've never been much of a fan of Microsoft Word, but like so many people, I find myself stuck with it. I especially miss WordPerfect (Corel hasn't made WP for the Mac for years) because its architecture allows the very useful reveal codes feature.
One annoyance that has been bothering me for a few months now is unique to Word X for Macintosh (not sure about Word 2004 for Mac since I still haven't upgraded). If you have multiple windows open, you only have one choice of how to arrange them, using the menu command Window - Arrange All. It tiles the windows horizontally. And that's your only option. No tiling vertically or cascading or anything else. My screen is wide, so when I want two documents up side-by-side, I prefer that they tile vertically. No luck from Word X. I have to arrange them myself, which annoys me.
Other applications (like Adobe Reader) don't have this problem, allowing automatic horizontal/vertical tile and cascade.
Luckily, I found a bit of a workaround today. Put this macro into your global template and the behavior of Window - Arrange All changes to vertical tiling. Thank you, Mr. McGimpsey!
Update (29.Nov): I just checked Word 2004 for Mac on a computer at school, and it suffers from the same annoyance.
27 Nov 22:11 | Link | Category: Technology & Computing
'Star Wars Auditions' sketch
Kevin Spacey as Christopher Walken as Han Solo in this SNL clip. (Spacey also plays Walter Mathau auditioning for Obi Wan Kenobi, and Darrell Hammond plays Richard Dreyfuss auditioning for C-3PO.)
(via Steel White Table)
27 Nov 11:40 | Link | Category: Art & Entertainment, Humor
November 23, 2005
Current Playlist
Another month, another disjointed hour of listening...
| Spoon - Chicago At Night >> |
| Pixies - Ana >> |
| The Stills - Love And Death >> and i'm just so sick of wasting my time / love and death are always on my mind |
| Hail Social - Get In The Car >> |
| Reigning Sound - Don't Send Me No Flowers, I Ain't Dead Yet >> |
| Secret Machines - Marconi's Radio >> |
| Spoon - All the Pretty Girls Go to the City >> |
| A.C. Newman - Come Crash >> |
| Of Montreal - So Begins Our Alabee >> |
| Luna - Double Feature >> who'm i gonna be / what am i gonna do / i've been foolin' everybody / i've been uptown at the zoo / i have seen the chimpanzees / in the afternoon sun |
| The Jesus & Mary Chain - Just Like Honey >> |
| Dirty on Purpose - Girls & Sunshine >> |
| The Shins - The Past and Pending >> |
| Alabama 3 - Disneyland Is Burning >> |
| Bettye LaVette - Down to Zero >> |
| Bob Dylan - New Pony >> sometimes i wonder what's going on with miss x |
| Bob Dylan - Where Are You Tonight? (Journey Through Dark Heat) >> lyrics |
23 Nov 17:47 | Link | Category: Music
November 20, 2005
Japanese Gallery of Psychiatric Art
The Japanese Gallery of Psychiatric Art is a strange and interesting collection of images from Japanese psychiatric medicine advertisements. (Sadly, the American Gallery of Psychiatric Art is no longer online and the archive doesn't display images.)
20 Nov 14:45 | Link | Category: Art & Entertainment
November 18, 2005
Indie Rock Cribs, part 3
The third clip from Joe Pernice's Indie Rock Cribs is up. Enjoy.
18 Nov 16:10 | Link | Category: Humor, Music
Chronology of Dylan's clothes
Several people have linked to this odd site, so I might as well do the same: Clothesline Saga. It's a "brief chronology of the clothing Dylan has worn on stage." He really seems to love polka dots.
18 Nov 15:51 | Link | Category: Music
November 16, 2005
Photography Links
A few more photography links I should have included last week:
- Arctic Refuge Series - from Subhankar Banerjee's book. Some of his photos were on display at my school last year. Needless to say, they were stunning.
- Photographs of American Indians - I'm not sure what to make of this collection, but it seemed worth sharing for some reason.
- Naoya Hatakeyama - Examples from the Lime Works Series
- Photoflavor - A really nice collection of photos from Zac Doob (and a nicely designed site, I might add)
16 Nov 21:01 | Link | Category: Photography
Audiophile products
If you've ever laughed at ridiculously-priced products marketed to audiophiles, you'll enjoy this list of audiophile products. It includes everything from $30,000 cables to a $485 wooden knob.
16 Nov 19:29 | Link | Category: Humor, Music
November 15, 2005
Lichen survives in space
I never ceased to be amazed by life. 'Extremophiles' are especially interesting. So this story caught my eye: an ESA experiment has shown that "lichens can survive unprotected in the harsh conditions of space." How cool is that? Of course, lichens are cool anyway — they are symbiotic organisms made up of algae (or cyanobacteria) and fungi. (All of which are cool in their own right. If you are interested in the evolution of life - or even if you simply respire oxygen without caring how you ended up that way - you should have a special place in your heart for cyanobacteria.)
I should note that other forms of life (bacteria) have already been shown to survive in space. But lichens are eukaryotic and multicellular, so they're the most complex organisms yet to have proven their hardiness in the cold hot empty ultraviolet hellhole of space. (Once back on Earth, "they returned to their normal activity and their DNA appeared not to have been damaged"!).
Sorry if that bored you. Every once in a while I have to share my sense of wonder of biology.
15 Nov 15:57 | Link | Category: Science
November 14, 2005
Report Card for the USA
A few weeks ago, I caught a segment on CNN called "America By The Numbers". Although I was aware of most of these dismal figures, seeing them collected in a two minute video segment was thoroughly depressing.
Here is a link to a clip of the video. Since I'm not sure how long it will remain active, I'm also cutting & pasting the text of the piece, available from this transcript. (Emphasis is mine.)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, while policy makers wring their hands over this latest Washington scandal, as important as it is, the truth is there are fundamental problems in this country that are eating away the foundations of America and the numbers don't lie.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) ROMANS (voice-over): Policy makers, this is what you've achieved.
37 million people live in poverty. One in five American children is poor. And today the government announced a record 1.5 million babies born to unwed mothers last year.
50 percent of black and Hispanic teenagers will never graduate from high school. Overall, high school graduation rates in this country aren't even in the top 10 of industrialized nations.
Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich calls Washington an arrogant echo chamber. And he says as nation we are blowing it.
ROBERT REICH, FORMER LABOR SECRETARY: Our children are not going to do as well as we are doing. And that's for the first time in many, many years, since the Depression.
And, in fact if you extend backward in American society there's always been an optimism. There's always been a sense of progress. And I'm afraid we're going to lose that because all of the economic indicators, all of the social indicators suggest that we are sliding backward.
ROMANS: American students rank 28th in math preparedness, badly trailing the leaders: China, Finland and Korea. In science, American students are behind 21 other countries. We are no longer the most college educated nation.
ERIC HANUSHEK, HOOVER INSTITUTION, STANFORD: I think it tells us something about the long-run prospects if we don't in fact take a new tact and improve our schools.
Other countries in the world are pushing very, very hard at developing their human resources and the skills of their population.
ROMANS: China graduates eight to 10 times as many engineers each year as the United States.
Eric Klinenberg, a sociologist at New York University, has studied inequality for our elderly.
ERIC KLINENBERG, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY: Today, the United States is the great superpower of the world. But, we haven't found a way to take care of our elderly, our poor, young children and infants. In many respects here we lag behind nations that are far less advanced and powerful.
ROMANS: Life expectancy in the United States lags Japan, Canada, France, the UK, Spain and Singapore.
And here in Washington, D.C. the infant mortality rate is higher than cities in India.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: It is harder and harder to live the American dream in this country. Wages are stagnant, mortgage defaults are rising now, 47 million Americans are without health insurance. This is what America's policy makers have achieved.
14 Nov 18:05 | Link | Category: Current Events
November 11, 2005
Alive Chimpanzee
Weird and creepy. I don't usually get into holiday gift-giving, but I'd like to give this to someone just to freak them out: Alive Chimpanzee, a life-size animatronic chimpanzee bust. Available from The Sharper Image (famous purveyor of useless gadgets), where you can see a video of the product.
11 Nov 18:16 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits
Photography Links
It's been a while since I posted photography links, so here are a few:
- Panoramics from National Parks - for even more, start here or here (QuickTime required)
- Yann Arthus-Bertrand
- Michael Wolf
- Seth Thompson
11 Nov 17:08 | Link | Category: Photography
November 10, 2005
Hey, Pat: Jesus Thinks You're A Jerk
Lately, Pat Robertson seems to have been in the news a lot. This can be fun at first. Pat's always good for a laugh. For example, I was fairly amused when he called for the assassination of Hugo Chavez ("Who Would Jesus Assassinate?"). And earlier today, I had a link in the Quick Links section to an entry at Pharyngula titled Either Pat Robertson is insane, or God is, which linked to a parody about Pat Robertson blaming the tornado in Indiana on Warren Beatty. It was funny because despite the story's absurdity, PZ and most of the commenters missed the fact that it was a parody. (Sadly, it wouldn't surprise anyone if he really did say something like that.)
But as I read about about Robertson warning Dover residents about God's wrath because they didn't support 'intelligent design', I realized I wasn't laughing. I think Pat's prominence in the media lately has pushed me into the dreaded state of Pat Robertson overload in which one recognizes the true power this man wields and the monetary reserves he draws on and the many poor souls who actually take him seriously. Pat Robertson overload is bad because he ceases to be amusing and becomes intensely irritating - even frightening. I don't often enter this state, but when I do, it's not good. I figure writing this post will help me vent so I can quickly get back in the amused-by-Pat mindset.
So here are some fun links for you:
- A collection of Pat Robertson quotes - lots of good ones.
- I Hate Pat Robertson - a fine blog dedicated to Mr. R.
- Pat's Biography from rotten.com
- Perhaps the most entertaining site of them all, the official Pat Robertson site
I find it truly astounding that more people don't see right through Mr. Robertson (not even the Chief of Police). He's a so-called "Christian" with a $200 million - $1 billion net worth who shrilly condemns others, suggests that a nuclear weapon exploding at State Department HQ would be good for the country, tricks the poor, old, and uneducated out of money through television, etc. etc. When I was a kid, my Mormon sunday school teachers warned of 'priestcraft'... I think Pat Robertson would be a shining example of that notion.
Last night, I was watching a TV show about Jesus (one of those silly programs where they interview religion professors, theologists, archaeologists, and the like as they try to determine 'who Jesus really was'). It struck me that Pat Robertson (the "Christian") is the embodiment of nearly everything Jesus so simply and eloquently spoke out against. (I believe this is known as 'irony'.) I really suspect Jesus would be appalled at all the religions that use his name... but particularly appalled at Robertson and his ilk.
(By the way, the title of this post comes from a Frank Zappa song that poses the truly timeless question, "Did he really choose Tammy to do his work?")
10 Nov 22:51 | Link | Category: Current Events, Opinion & Thoughts
Just Shut Up
A couple of weeks ago, I bookmarked an article by Tony Long of Wired News. The title is 'You Know What? Just Shut Up':
How about the ringtone on a cell phone? I never thought I'd see the day when the opening bars of Beethoven's Für Elise would tick me off, but Sprint has managed to do it. Sublime music is not meant to be trivialized through reduction to electronic burps and gurgles.
...
But even butchered Beethoven is better than some of the other sounds these phones make. Dooodle-ooOOO-dooo.... Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle.... They're stupid and intrusive, especially when they go off at a public event (like a Beethoven concert) or in a restaurant or anywhere human beings gather for social intercourse.
Put your phone on vibrate and stick it in your pocket. Don't worry, you'll feel it. Stick it in the right pocket, and it might feel pretty good.
I would like to dedicate this post to the people whose obnoxious ring-tones go off in the middle of a lecture or at the library. (In fact, I'm in the library right now and I would like to further dedicate this post to the asshole 10 feet from me whose obnoxious ringtone signaled the start of an inane conversation he seems to think the entire library is dying to hear.)
Finally, if you're annoyed by people who start up their laptops in the middle of lectures and blast the Windows login sound or the Apple chime at max volume - you should watch this clever movie from Prangstgrüp.
10 Nov 13:01 | Link | Category: Humor, Technology & Computing
November 9, 2005
Solar System To Scale
I'm always fascinated by scale models of the solar system. I remember seeing one that stretched miles and miles across a city. They help put the incredible distances of the solar system in perspective (though they still fail to help our brains grasp the vastness of interstellar and intergalactic space).
Now the web has its own scale model. It doesn't convey the mind-boggling amounts of empty space like real-world models do, but for being confined to a computer screen, it's pretty cool.
(via J-Walk)
09 Nov 18:59 | Link | Category: Cool Links, Science
November 8, 2005
Kansas falls to the ID-iots
I was just greeted with this unbelievable headline: Kansas school board redefines science. The following line floored me:
... the board rewrote the definition of science, so that it is no longer limited to the search for natural explanations of phenomena.
No, this is not a story from The Onion. This really happened.
Since I'm still in a shocked, confounded state, I have nothing to say but "holy shit". I refer you to PZ Myers for more thoughtful words:
It's a sad day for American science. We've lost Kansas... For the next few years, a lot of schoolkids are going to get taught slippery twaddle—instead of learning what scientists actually say about biology, they're going to get the phony pseudoscience of ideologues and dishonest hucksters. And that means the next generation of Kansans are going to be a little less well informed, even more prone to believing the prattlings of liars, and the cycle will keep on going, keep on getting worse.
...
Rewriting the definition of science seems a rather presumptuous thing for a school board to do, I think, especially when their new definition is something contrary to what working scientists and major scientific organizations say is science. As for removing the limitation to natural phenomena, what do they propose to add? Ghosts, intuition, divine revelation, telepathic communications from Venusians? It's simply insane.
08 Nov 21:54 | Link | Category: Current Events, Science
CommonCensus
The CommonCensus Map Project redraws the U.S. map based on boundaries perceived by people. "It shows how the country is divided into 'spheres of influence' between different cities at the national, regional, and local levels." It's pretty interesting for some reason. If you go to the maps page, you can get a local view of the New York City region and Manhattan neighborhoods. You can also see how the national map has evolved as more votes were tallied.
08 Nov 21:28 | Link | Category: Cool Links
Your Band Sucks
Check out the Hall of Douchebags at Rock and Roll Confidential for a glorious collection of band photos. You'll see the pretentious, the ridiculous, and the just plain disturbing - and more brick walls than you can possibly imagine. The photos (and captions) kept me entertained for longer than I care to admit.
08 Nov 21:10 | Link | Category: Humor, Music
November 7, 2005
"We do not torture."
Bush defended U.S. interrogation practices today: "So you bet we will aggressively pursue them but we will do so under the law. We do not torture."
As far as I know, he didn't specify which laws we will adhere to nor did he define "torture." I mention this because a 2002 Justice Department memo cleared by Alberto Gonzalez argued that laws prohibiting torture do "not apply to the president's detention and interrogation of enemy combatants", and that the pain caused by interrogation must be of the intensity of "injury such as death, organ failure, or serious impairment of body functions — in order to constitute torture". That's pretty vile. (John McCain had this to say: "We are Americans, and we hold ourselves to humane standards of treatment of people no matter how evil or terrible they may be. To do otherwise undermines our security, but it also undermines our greatness as a nation." I happened across Jimmy Carter on Larry King's [fluffy] show the other night, and he had some interesting words as well [scroll just past the first commercial break].)
Also... Isn't it disturbing that, as part of the CIA's covert overseas prison system, al Qaeda captives have been hidden and interrogated "at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe." (The EU and human rights groups are now demanding information from the U.S. and our buddies in "the 'new' Europe".)
Yet another item to add to the 'This is America...right?' file.
Also of interest, an item I posted nearly a year ago: You, too, are capable of committing torture.
07 Nov 18:49 | Link | Category: Current Events
November 4, 2005
Procrastination
I have dozens and dozens of items to link to, comment on, or rant about. I planned to start posting some of them tonight and tomorrow, but that plan assumed I would make some headway with schoolwork. (I have dug out a bit, but I still have a tall stack of journal articles to decipher for two anthropology classes, and an even taller stack of books and articles that I need to sort through for a research paper I should have been writing for months but still haven't gotten around to.)
The idea was to spend all day working, then maybe hang out with some friends and pretend to remember what a social life is, and then get around to e-mail and this site. But... I wasted the entire day, so that plan is out. My friends, I'm a procrastinating fool. (I like Bobby Long's definition of procrastination: "To drag one's ass in such a manner as to ensure one's future place in society as a loser.")
04 Nov 18:45 | Link | Category: Site/Life News