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2013-06-19 00:04:09 (2 comments, 2 reshares, 2 +1s)

Today, however, a much darker picture of the effects of technology on labor is emerging. In this picture, highly educated workers are as likely as less educated workers to find themselves displaced and devalued, and pushing for more education may create as many problems as it solves.

Mind that I'm not a fan of Krugman, but I do think that the question he poses is very pertinent:

I can already hear conservatives shouting about the evils of “redistribution.” But what, exactly, would they propose instead?

2013-06-17 13:31:40 (5 comments, 0 reshares, 6 +1s)

So +Patricia Vieira just asked me if I knew what was going on at São Paulo and I replied, "no, I haven't got a clue". I mean I'm keeping tabs on what's going on over in Turkey, and that's that. Apparently people are rioting in São Paulo as well. Good for them, the city is dreadful - inequality reeks from its urbanism and architecture. 
 

2013-06-17 11:32:40 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

The machine does not tire of this repetition, a repetition reinforced by the uniform lines of the mill windows, the identical terraced houses leading down to the factory. Lowry paints his figures as repeats because that is what they are – clones for the industrial machine. Units. The means of production. The machine is the antithesis of the human.

2013-06-16 03:10:26 (4 comments, 1 reshares, 2 +1s)

"Rape porn", and then two clicks of the mouse, and that's what's there. It's not skulking in some dark recess of the internet, it's a dropdown box on one the most popular porn sites in the world, but my experience – of not knowing, and not really wanting to know – is not unusual. There's a collective, willed ignorance of porn.
 

2013-06-15 19:08:28 (0 comments, 3 reshares, 4 +1s)

Yes, a book with instructions on how to mine your cat’s fur for dinky little crafty projects actually exists. 

See good people from Switzerland? No reason to keep on killing them now...

2013-06-15 18:42:14 (2 comments, 1 reshares, 3 +1s)

In Switzerland, cat fur's appeal largely stems from the traditional belief that wearing blankets or other garments made from felines can cure rheumatism. The centuries-old practice was adapted from traditional Chinese medicine, but experts say it has no scientific merit.

Go figure. I mean, they didn't really bother to call an expert, have they?
 

2013-06-12 20:51:39 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

Pure, unadulterated nostalgia. 

2013-06-11 11:09:39 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Sorrow is the girl inside my cake

Forgive me if along the final countdown to become 30 I become somewhat melancholic. 

2013-06-11 10:33:59 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

I was his father. And all that meant, right then, was that I was there. I was there for my son. I would be there until I wasn't. And that was enough.

2013-06-10 16:26:05 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

In an open letter, Banks revealed in April that he had advanced gall bladder cancer, saying he did not expect to live more than a year.

It is still a shock to hear it though. Damn. 

2013-06-08 20:57:05 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Want his shirt so badly...

2013-06-07 17:54:26 (3 comments, 2 reshares, 6 +1s)

The chronicle of an abusive tweet:

Dear obese PhD applicants: if you didn't have the willpower to stop eating carbs, you won't have the willpower to do a dissertation #truth

OK, I have both stopped eating carbs and quit smocking, can I have my PhD and tenure now? 

2013-06-05 18:37:41 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Should anyone by craft or any device whatever abstract this book from this place may his soul suffer, in retribution for what he has done, and may his name be erased from the book of the living and not be recorded among the Blessed.

Unfortunately, in 1212 a council met at Paris to decree that the hexes would no longer have effect...

2013-06-05 18:16:32 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

But what, exactly, does it mean to be a mother? Surely, it can’t be the mere checklist of certain biological givens and processes — for, as Italo Calvino observed nearly forty years ago, “a human being becomes human not through the casual convergence of certain biological conditions, but through an act of will and love on the part of other people.”

That — how much biology defines parenthood (hint: barely), how much that act of will and love does (hint: a great deal), and how much our experience of gender shapes it (hint: depends) — is precisely what Jennifer Finney Boylan, who used to be James Finney Boylan, explores in Stuck in the Middle with You: A Memoir of Parenting in Three Genders

2013-06-04 23:04:16 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

And here I thought this summer's Brood II cicadas were pretty impressive. Leave it to Australia, with its massive Double Drummer cicada, to blow all the others away.

This beast of a buzzer is the largest cicada in Australia, and the call of the male, amplified by a pair of drum-like pockets on its abdomen, is among the loudest of all cicadas worldwide.

More here: http://www.brisbaneinsects.com/brisbane_cicadas/DoubleDrummer.htm

+Queensland Museum & Sciencentre offers a downloadable PDF introduction to some of Australia's many species of cicadas, including the Double Drummer: http://bit.ly/16HeNFW

Photo: BrisbaneInsects.com

2013-06-04 22:49:16 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 2 +1s)

Jon Hopkins previews his new album with stunning microscopic art, a collaboration with biochemist turned artist Linden Gledhill:

Stunning time-lapse photography of crystal growth and chemical reactions soundtracked by music from Jon Hopkins' upcoming album Immunity forms the basis of this new audiovisual experience, produced in collaboration with The Creators Project.

The making of can be found here: 
Creating The Microscopic Art Of Jon Hopkins' Immunity!

#scienceeveryday  

2013-06-04 11:12:24 (6 comments, 5 reshares, 6 +1s)

Math is invisible. Unlike physics, chemistry, and biology we can't see it, smell it, or even directly observe it in the universe. And so that has made a lot of really smart people ask, does it actually even EXIST?

2013-06-03 16:55:51 (2 comments, 1 reshares, 1 +1s)

Is it possible, after all, that through the pharmaceutical industry a fairy-tale ending could come to pass? Perhaps the fantasy that so many of us harbor, consciously or not, in the early days of our relationships, that we have found a soul mate who will offer us both security and passion, till death do us part, will soon be available with the aid of a pill.

Not putting my money on it, though...

2013-06-03 13:15:39 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

So we will drink beer all day
And our guards will give way
And we'll be good

Love this early '90s alterna-chick bands revival. Makes feel a teenager again.

2013-06-03 10:22:31 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Oh, the pynchonesque ring this story has to it:

Crystal meth is notorious for being highly addictive and ravaging countless communities. But few know that the drug can be traced back to Nazi Germany, where it first became popular as a way to keep pilots and soldiers alert in battle during World War II.

via http://technoccult.tumblr.com/

2013-06-02 19:17:50 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Amazing pictures. Made me wonder... Kabourophobia, it turns out, is the name for the fear of crabs.

Red crabs (Gecarcoidea natalis) on Christmas Island swarm a tree on their annual migration to the sea to breed. Once the males arrive at the sea, they dig special burrows, where mating takes place once the females arrive.

Afterwards males begin the arduous journey back inland while the females remain in the burrows for about two weeks, laying eggs and waiting for them to develop. The eggs are held in a brood pouch – located between the female crab's abdomen and thorax – which can hold as many as 100,000 eggs.

via http://curioushistory.com/

2013-05-31 21:00:58 (0 comments, 4 reshares, 11 +1s)

The Lembeh Straits in Indonesia are apparently home to a host of creepy, lovecraftian critters.

via http://www.lostateminor.com/

2013-05-31 19:12:59 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

 Giant, fluorescent pink slugs. Enough said.

2013-05-30 14:15:41 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

I hope this doesn't trigger another "sensible vampire" fad...

2013-05-29 23:59:48 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 4 +1s)

Try to acquire the weird practice of savoring your mistakes, delighting in uncovering the strange quirks that led you astray.

Easier said than done... but surely a good advice. This preview actually got me interested in buying the book. A rare thing.

2013-05-29 23:22:46 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

The machines to which we have become enslaved, all of them quite astonishing, represent the greatest assault on human attention ever devised: they are engines of mental and spiritual dispersal, which make us wider only by making us less deep. There are thinkers, reputable ones if you can believe it, who proclaim that the exponential growth in computational ability will soon take us beyond the finitude of our bodies and our minds so that, as one of them puts it, there will no longer be any difference between human and machine. La Mettrie lives in Silicon Valley. This, of course, is not an apotheosis of the human but an abolition of the human; but Google is very excited by it.

2013-05-29 22:14:42 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Love what Tom Hunter did with John Everett Millais's Ophelia. Currently I'm on a Pre-Raphaelite and Arts & Crafts binge, so I guess this will be my new wallpaper... 

All the images draw upon these influences combining the beauty and the degradation with everyday tales of abandonment and loss to music and hedonism. The reworking of John Millais’s ‘Ophelia’ shows a young girl whose journey home from one such rave was curtailed by falling into the canal and losing herself to the dark slippery, industrial motorway of a bygone era.

By taking on some of the attributes associated with the Pre-Raphaelite artists, such as social engagement, which has been largely erased from the cultural understanding of this group, and the obvious intertwining of beauty and nature Hunter has reinvestigated his much maligned inner city landscape and society to create an unusualchronicl... more »

2013-05-24 18:48:57 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 4 +1s)

In research to be published in Current Biology, Martin and colleagues studied tomatoes enriched in anthocyanin, a natural pigment that confers high antioxidant capacity. The purple GM tomatoes have already been found to prolong the lives of cancer-prone mice and in the latest findings they also more double the normal shelf life of tomatoes from an average of 21 days to 48 days.

But if you love food like me, you'll be wondering, "who cares about antioxidants? What about the flavor?" Well:

One way to improve shelf life is to pick tomatoes early when they are still green and induce them to ripen artificially with ethylene. However, this results in loss of flavor. Another method is to grow varieties that never fully ripen, but these also never develop a full flavor.

In the current study, anthocyanins were found to slow down the over-ripening process that leads to... more »

2013-05-22 10:47:32 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

Despite – or perhaps because of – millions of views in less than a week, The David Foster Wallace Literary Trust has filed a copyright claim against the wildly popular YouTube version of the wonderful short film adaptation of Wallace’s timeless 2005 commencement address, This Is Water. (Luckily, you can still watch the film on Vimeo – but that’s beside the point.)

2013-05-21 11:24:07 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 4 +1s)

These curious rocks are actually concretions having iron (hematite) rinds. Very similar rocks, called blueberries, have been observed repeatedly on Mars by the rovers.

2013-05-20 19:13:12 (0 comments, 3 reshares, 2 +1s)

You are home to many trillions of viruses, most of which infect the bacteria that live inside you. According to a new study, they may actually be your symbiotic partners, creating a defensive wall to keep bacteria from killing you. Think of them as your second immune system. Details at the Loom.

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/05/20/meet-your-new-symbionts-several-trillion-viruses/

2013-05-20 18:44:49 (13 comments, 6 reshares, 22 +1s)

Note this was pointed to me as a fraud, by the gentlemen at the comments that were civil enough not to humiliate me about it...

An interesting model of our solar system’s path as it travels through space in the Milky Way. Certainly a departure from usual models that show the Sun as a static object, which it certainly isn't.

I have to agree, this is an unusual spectacular presentation. 

PS: after knowing that the model is a fraud, the question that needs to be asked is: where can I find an accurate one, that is just as aesthetically pleasant as this one?

via and quoting http://we-are-star-stuff.tumblr.com

#scienceeveryday  

2013-05-20 11:14:33 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 1 +1s)

Finally, an action figure of one of my actual teenage heroes! 

2013-05-18 22:49:08 (1 comments, 1 reshares, 7 +1s)

Watch this, even if you have already heard David Foster Wallace's epic, instant classic speech, because the animation is great, and you deserve it.

There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes "What the hell is water?"

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/david-foster-wallace-graduation-speech-2013-5#ixzz2TgfmRM6j 

via http://www.lostateminor.com/

2013-05-18 22:21:14 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 12 +1s)

This amazing Instructables project by Amanda Ghassaei teaches you how to laser cut a wooden record! I don't really care how it sounds, I want one now! 

http://www.instructables.com/id/Laser-Cut-Record/

via http://prostheticknowledge.tumblr.com/

2013-05-18 22:10:30 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

This has a Catch-22'ish vibe to it, hasn't it? I mean, I would never dream of travelling to Mars surrounded by a bunch of suicidal loonies, but you kinda have to be suicidal to enlist for a on-way trip, don't you? Quoting the masterpiece:

There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he were sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a... more »

2013-05-18 20:53:59 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 3 +1s)

The National's new album, Trouble Will Find Me sounds amazing. These guys never disappoint. 

I'm tired, I'm freezing, I'm dumb
When it gets so late I forget everyone.
I need somewhere to stay.
Don't think anybody I know is awake.

Calm down, it's alright,
Keep my arms the rest of the night.
When they ask what do I see,
I see a bright white beautiful heaven hangin' over me.

2013-05-18 20:43:13 (0 comments, 3 reshares, 7 +1s)

This impressive image is from the book On the Writing of the Insane (1870) by G. Mackenzie Bacon. The Public Domain Review has an article about it here:

http://publicdomainreview.org/2013/03/12/the-diagrammatic-writings-of-an-asylum-patient-1870/

Quoting the article:

The pictures are the product of a “respectable artisan of considerable intelligence [who] was sent to the Cambridgeshire Asylum after being nearly three years in a melancholy mood”. Bacon describes how the unnamed patient, for the two years he was committed, spent “much of his time writing — sometimes verses, at others long letters of the most rambling character, and in drawing extraordinary diagrams.”

One cannot help but feel that the poor fellow was born a century too soon, otherwise he would have been recognized as the artist he was...

2013-05-17 21:05:19 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 13 +1s)

Nano "Flowers" Created in Lab

Getting structures to self-assemble or grow from a solution of chemicals is relatively straightforward: Confectioners have done this for years when growing rock candy. *

Love the way they make it sound all so easy over at National Geographic...

Quoting the author of the nano structures:

To create the flower structures, Noorduin and his colleagues dissolve barium chloride (a salt) and sodium silicate (also known as waterglass) into a beaker of water. Carbon dioxide from air naturally dissolves in the water, setting off a reaction which precipitates barium carbonate crystals. As a byproduct, it also lowers the pH of the solution immediately surrounding the crystals, which then triggers a reaction with the dissolved waterglass. This second reaction adds a layer of silica to the growing structures, uses up the acid from... more »

2013-05-17 20:44:54 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 9 +1s)

Finally same-sex adoption is legal in Portugal (marriage has been since 2010). You know, I'm a right wing catholic, but in this particular matter - love, marriage and families - I always said that the more, the merrier. It has been a long struggle, so I wish to give heartfelt congratulations to all that fought it.

Oh, the song bellow is intended to mock the typical conservative stereotypes, in case the irony is not clear. Quoting wikipedia:

Most of the songs on [this] album deal with stereotypes associated with homosexuality, especially negative ones used by social conservatives. The lyrics are highly satirical and portray stereotypes in an absurdly over-the-top manner.

2013-05-17 15:39:11 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

Who are the lonely? They’re the outsiders: not just the elderly, but also the poor, the bullied, the different.

Interesting article over at the New Republic about the science of loneliness. 

If you are wondering how you can fight it:

Wilco - How To Fight Lonelines (HQ)

2013-05-16 03:18:33 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 7 +1s)

Despite the absence of a direct causal connection between the ritual and the desired outcome, performing rituals with the intention of producing a certain result appears to be sufficient for that result to come true. While some rituals are unlikely to be effective – knocking on wood will not bring rain – many everyday rituals make a lot of sense and are surprisingly effective.

Francesca Gino and Michael I. Norton are behavioral scientists and professors at Harvard Business School. Besides the outlandish claim quoted above, they also state that:

While anthropologists have documented rituals across cultures, this earlier research has been primarily observational. Recently, a series of investigations by psychologists have revealed intriguing new results demonstrating that rituals can have a causal impact on people’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

I have to disclaimthat ... more »

2013-05-15 23:47:27 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 7 +1s)

I'm loving the theme of the last couple of +Brain Scoop episodes: "De-Extinction". Every time someone starts talking about bringing back the woolly mammoths I can't resist but start explaining why such a feat is impossible.

I usually begin by explaining that as most species, the mammoths were entire ecosystems, so bringing them back would imply bringing back their gut bacteria, etc. etc....

Anyway, episode 2 can be found here:

De-Extinction, Part Two: Yes, no, maybe so?

#scienceeveryday  

2013-05-15 19:48:31 (3 comments, 1 reshares, 2 +1s)

Pictured bellow is a sheep heart amulet (Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford), collected by Edward Lovett, the author of Magic in Modern London (1925):

Of course, the concept of attracting good fortune or protection using animal remains seems a bit naive and outdated in the early 20th century, even for Lovett’s contemporaries. But as a matter of fact, this heart was one of many examples of charms and amulets made from carcasses that he found during his metropolitan adventures.

Preserved moles' paws would be carried in tiny bags to calm toothaches or eradicate cramps, while the tips of rabbits' tongues would protect against poverty. Bones and skulls would be often carried as amulets, carved or adorned with sterling and worn as necklaces. These often fragile artifacts were materialized solace, shaped out of humans' hopes and fears. 

And if you think thattod... more »

2013-05-14 22:11:20 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

Steven Poole makes a strong case for public ‘algorithmic auditors’:

What lies behind our current rush to automate everything we can imagine? Perhaps it is an idea that has leaked out into the general culture from cognitive science and psychology over the past half-century — that our brains are imperfect computers. If so, surely replacing them with actual computers can have nothing but benefits. 

Well, I think that Charles Robert Ashbee, the Arts and Crafts movement pioneer, said it all back in 1888:

"We do not reject the machine, we welcome it. But we would desire to see it mastered."

2013-05-13 13:42:38 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Mr. Francis, a group of über-hipsters from Barcelona (in case you were wondering where their accent was from), performs this timeless classic from KC & the Sunshine Band. I'm shocked by the price of fresh produce over there... 

2013-05-10 18:07:22 (1 comments, 1 reshares, 3 +1s)

So yeah, Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore's new band sounds great:

Hey Billy, what’s your cure for pain? [...]
Oh Billy, the sweetest drug is free...
Will you Billy shoot it into me?
Love... Love... Love...

And, yes the subject matter of the song is William Burroughs. 

2013-05-03 17:27:51 (5 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)

I promise I'm not going to turn this profile into a music channel, but since I quit smoking (a week ago today - I used to smoke a pack and an half daily, give or take) I can't do much besides listening to music and reading, as I'm finding it difficult to concentrate enough to write...

2013-05-02 14:00:02 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 3 +1s)

Go figure... I know that obtaining empirical evidence is a scientific must, but whenever scientists finally get to a conclusion that is common sense for decades now, one cannot help but sigh... Anyway:

It’s important to stress the obvious: Not all those who campaign against gay men and lesbians secretly feel same-sex attractions. But at least some who oppose homosexuality are likely to be individuals struggling against parts of themselves, having themselves been victims of oppression and lack of acceptance. The costs are great, not only for the targets of anti-gay efforts but also often for the perpetrators. We would do well to remember that all involved deserve our compassion.

2013-05-02 13:40:30 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)

Here's a bit of anthropological pessimism to suit my current state of mind:

But there's a bad man in everyone
No matter who we are
There's a rapist and a Nazi living in our tiny hearts
Child pornographers and cannibals, and politicians too 
There's someone in your head waiting to f*cking strangle you

Always loved folk-punk...