Windows add/remove programs substitutes
I don't know how complicated it could get, but there are more than a couple.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Excellent documentaries at Google
Conspiracy of Silence -- Pedophile Ring in Washington DC (religious and political leaders; unaired), Big Sugar and Zeitgeist can be found on this list.
Pedophiles have less brain white matter
On average, they're also shorter with lower IQ, and have increased frequency of lefthandedness.
Fatdoor -- social network for neighbors
I thought of this too far back, when social network platform didn't exist yet. I'm just too busy now.
Brilliant social psychology studies
Mostly conformity studies, but also a study about threats reducing favorable outcomes.
Genes are necessary but not sufficient for heritability
Yeah, you can carry, but a trait doesn't have to manifest.
Guide to freezing food
Really now?
Many vegetables contain a number of enzymes which cause them to lose their colour and flavour when frozen. Blanching (putting the vegetables briefly in boiling water) stops these enzymes from acting.Blanching guide list with times for each vegetable.
Funny medical moments
I was caring for a woman and asked, "So how's your breakfast this morning?" "It's very good, except for the Kentucky Jelly. I can't seem to get used to the taste," the patient replied. I then asked to see the jelly and the woman produced a foil packet labeled "KY Jelly."
Anger myths
The one that bothers me most is how venting is supposed to be good for you. The evidence says that one just gets angrier.
Scientists create fearless mouse
No toxoplasma infection here. Just good ole fashioned genetic engineering of olfactory capacity.
Bad day at the office (compilation)
Haven't seen a couple of these. Song is Bad Day by Daniel Powter.
British nukes were protected by bicycle locks
To arm the weapons you just open a panel held by two captive screws - like a battery cover on a radio - using a thumbnail or a coin.
Inside are the arming switch and a series of dials which you can turn with an Allen key to select high yield or low yield, air burst or groundburst and other parameters.
The Bomb is actually armed by inserting a bicycle lock key into the arming switch and turning it through 90 degrees. There is no code which needs to be entered or dual key system to prevent a rogue individual from arming the Bomb.
What makes us moral?
A consideration from Time. Their quiz here (the types of dilemmas presented in studies).
Western Union still relevant as migration continues
Long synonymous with Morse code, the company now advertises in Tagalog and Twi and runs promotions for holidays as obscure as Phagwa and Fiji Day. Its executives hail migrants as “heroes” and once tried to oust a congressman because of his push for tougher immigration laws.
Everyone's Guide to By-Passing Internet Censorship for Citizens Worldwide
Yeah, that's the title and it's a pdf.
Cancer studies wasted millions
Study in the U.K.It found some scientists have failed to carry out simple and inexpensive checks to ensure they are working with the right forms of human tumour cells.
Rust and scratch decals for your vehicle to deter theft
Just stick 'em on and communicate lower value.
Oprah helps hoarding woman remove 75 tons of garbage from her 3000 sq. ft. home
Well, that much stuff and a home that big... My guess is that she could have afforded some maid service earlier.
Browsershots -- test your web design in different browsers
I certainly know a prop shop that could use this.
23AndMe: for $1000, screen your DNA for conditions
Not your full genome, as far as I know (there is service that charges $350k for that). Still useful, but consider legal and economic consequences for merely knowing.
Want democracy? Abolish corporate peronhood
In 1886:
The Supreme Court ruled on an obscure taxation issue in the Santa Clara County vs. The Union Pacific Railroad case, but the Recorder of the court - a man named J. C. Bancroft Davis, himself formerly the president of a small railroad - wrote into his personal commentary of the case (known as a headnote) that the Chief Justice had said that all the Justices agreed that corporations are persons.And in so doing, he - not the Supreme Court, but its clerical recorder - inserted a statement that would change history and give corporations enormous powers that were not granted by Congress, not granted by the voters, and not even granted by the Supreme Court. Davis’s headnote, which had no legal standing, was taken as precedent by generations of jurists (including the Supreme Court) who followed and apparently read the headnote but not the decision.
The Boy with the Incredible Brain
Documentary on a math savant. How he comes to an answer is neurologically distinct from the rest of us.
Pedophiles' secret code on the Web
FBI intelligence bulletin on symbols and logos to indicate sexual preference.
Keeping arguments under control
Don't use absolutes, and maybe actually try to feel the other side's position.
Ideas that will change the world
Like self-modeling robots.
Here's an earth hack about controlling the cow methane problem, thrown in for good measure.
Rules of genetics keep changing
For example, it used to be believed that a single gene had a very specific, single purpose. Not so true anymore.
Health vs. Pork: Congress debates the Farm Bill
"Fruit and vegetable farmers, on the other hand, receive less than 1 percent of government subsidies."
Breaking down the mechanism of amyloid-beta clumping in Alzheimer's
The researchers thus discovered that gene mutations in A-beta increase the flexibility of the protein's loop, enabling it to join easily with loops of other A-beta proteins to form clumps. The loop is also located in the region of the protein that regulates the formation of A-beta and its amount.
Understanding how the toxic A-beta clumps form in the brain could aid the design of new drugs that both block the production of A-beta and prevent it from clumping.
Buying a residence not always the right move
Weigh everything out, crunch the numbers.
Myths about renting or buying here.
Affordable hydrogenases on carbon nanotubes to catalyze hydrogen fuel cell function
The researchers combined hydrogenase enzymes with carbon nanotubes, submicroscopic strands of pure carbon that are excellent electrical conductors. In laboratory studies, the researchers demonstrated that a good electrical connection was established using photoluminescence spectroscopy measurements.
These new “biohybrid” conjugates could reduce the cost of fuel cells by reducing or eliminating the need for platinum and other costly metal components, they say.
True Knowledge -- another natural language search engine
Right now, all of these seem to be in private beta. Lexxe is available right now.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Why self-governance works better than you think
Worried about pure anarchy? There's a lot of self-regulation in nature:
Many mechanisms of self-governance rely on reputation to secure good conduct. It’s not difficult to see how reputation can in many cases prevent cheating even where government enforcement is not an option.
HiveLive social networking platform
Some customizability:
Network users can choose to add their own hives to an existing social network, configure the type of hive (blog, forum, wiki, etc.), and then determine who within the network gets to use them (everyone or just a subset of friends and colleagues). This allows users to stake off their own areas of interaction and undergo activities from there.
Surfer dude with theory of everything
Even better, it does not require more than one dimension of time and three of space, when some rival theories need ten or even more spatial dimensions and other bizarre concepts... Lisi's inspiration lies in the most elegant and intricate shape known to mathematics, called E8 - a complex, eight-dimensional mathematical pattern with 248 points first found in 1887.
90 suicides a day spur Japan into action
Ninth-highest rate in the world, but well ahead for developed nations. Here's one measure:
In 2001 railway stations in Japan introduced mirrors to deter suicide attempts by showing victims their own face before they jump.
The Century of the Self -- the science of crowd control
The first part of a BBC doc on how consumer culture was engineered into existence and associated with democracy by a movement founded by Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, using applied psychology.
Awareness is not Mind
Consciousness, the fifth aggregate/heap (skandha), is still within the phenomenal realm.
25% of U.S. homeless are war vets
They only make up 11% of the adult population, but a quarter of the homeless.
Zilok -- rent anything
Some of techcrunch's reservations:
What is missing for me is a wizard to assist an owner in evaluating the rental price of his goods. If i know how to find a second hand price benchmark on the web (checking eBay for example) i would not know how to find the rental price of a piece of furniture (specially if it is unique). Zilok will not be appropriate for many categories of objects (cloths for example) and in many cases the rental price (even if rented several times) will not be a better bargain than just buying or selling the same product second hand or third hand. But i can see how this could catch with some product categories (some equipments and accessories, or utilities).
Over-the-counter painkillers can cut risk of Parkinson's by 60%?
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, more specifically.
The study volunteers were considered regular users of painkillers if they took two or more pills a week for at least one month.
The link was still in evidence up to two years after the person stopped regularly taking the drugs. The effect did not increase if the person took more than two doses a week and the drugs had no effect if the disease was already well developed.
I Hate Drake -- some fine, funny cut/paste animation
From MORTIFIED, a comedy show that allows everyday adults to read their most embarrassing and real childhood writings. This concert recording was later animated by Bill Barminski.
Random access warehouses
Fascinating packaging system. Not like Charlie Chaplin/Lucille Ball conforming to the machine at all; the machine conforms to human speed.
Zappos.com orders one.
Christian soldiers in the New Rome
A concern that there's a bit of institutional culture shift occurring in the U.S. military because of some more zealous higher-ups:
I also learned that the same Monday night Bible studies discussed at orientation were taught by bused-in members of these evangelical mega-churches and that some spouses of senior academy staff members were employed by these same religious institutions. It seemed that my beloved United States Air Force Academy had morphed into the Rocky Mountain Bible College.
How to classify supraplanetary civilizations
By energy consumption:
In a seminal paper published in 1964 in the Journal of Soviet Astronomy, Russian astrophysicist Nicolai Kardashev theorised that advanced civilisations must thus be grouped according to three Types: I, II and III, signifying mastery of, respectively, planetary, stellar and galactic forms of energy usage. He calculated that the energy consumption of these three types of civilisations would be separated by a factor of about 10 billion.
Causes of death are linked to a person’s weight
Lower weight people still get hit, of course, but their conditions come later.
Bluetooth-enabled DVR in a pen
Capturing real-time capturing video at 30 fps (320x240), the device can be set to activate based on motion detection. Recording is to flash memory or Micro SD and Bluetooth wireless transfer back to PDAs or PCs is included.Looks like any pen. Makes it sound like there's camera functionality, but where's the lens?
Bystander stem cells keep original neurons humming, restore memory
But in this case, the undifferentiated stem cells, harvested from 14-day-old mouse brains, did not simply replace neurons that had died off. Rather, the group speculates that the transplanted cells secreted protective neurotrophins, proteins that promote cell survival by keeping neurons from inducing apoptosis (programmed cell death). Instead, the once ill-fated neurons strengthened their interconnections and kept functioning.
How It All Ends -- cornered by reason into action on global warming
The rational breakdown of why we should take global warming seriously right now. Thanks to Brian.
Doubting the bilingual cognitive advantage: just an effect of socioeconomic status?
So, being multilingual confers no advantage to a poor kid (for this task anyways)?
Sirtris tests their fountain of youth pill
Damned if I had thought that this research was disregarded because the positive results were more a lab artefact or something.
SRT501 impacts a family of genes in humans and other organisms called "sirtuins," which seem to control a cornucopia of desirable functions in cells that lead to improvements in diseases ranging from obesity and diabetes to Alzheimer's and cancer.
Science of flavor
Sweetness signals the presence of calories, vitamins and minerals. Saltiness indicates the presence of sodium (important to keep your heart and neurons going). Bitterness screams "this could be poison!" at your brain.
Violence: A Micro-sociological Theory
New book:
Violence is not primordial, and civilization does not tame it; the opposite is much nearer the truth.From Marginal:
This book has soo many interesting parts, including the micro-dynamics of the Rape of Nanjing, how British soccer stadium designs were (but now less) conducive to violence, how demonstrations can turn into violent confrontations with the police (lines break down and micro-situations of overwhelming power arise), which children and schools are most conducive to bullying, why basketball has fewer fights than football or hockey (no padding), the dynamics of a mosh pit, and how hired assassins motivate themselves, among many other topics.
Neurologist Vilayanur Ramachandran on Capgras syndrome, phantom limbs, synesthesia
Quite intriguing was the assertion that metaphorical thought is a type of synesthesia.
What is life?
i.e. Once you start getting down to really fine levels, what exactly constitutes life?
Robert Reich's Supercapitalism
New book, excerpt:
Finally, I will come to some conclusions you may find surprising -- among them, why the move toward improved corporate governance makes companies less likely to be socially responsible. Why the promise of corporate democracy is illusory. Why the corporate income tax should be abolished. Why companies should not be held criminally liable. And why shareholders should be protected from having their money used by corporations for political purposes without their consent.
Subjectivity of wine
The wines were actually the same white wine, one of which had been tinted red with food coloring. But that didn't stop the experts from describing the "red" wine in language typically used to describe red wines. One expert praised its "jamminess," while another enjoyed its "crushed red fruit." Not a single one noticed it was actually a white wine.The second test Brochet conducted was even more damning. He took a middling Bordeaux and served it in two different bottles. One bottle was a fancy grand-cru. The other bottle was an ordinary vin du table. Despite the fact that they were actually being served the exact same wine, the experts gave the differently labeled bottles nearly opposite ratings. The grand cru was "agreeable, woody, complex, balanced and rounded," while the vin du table was "weak, short, light, flat and faulty". Forty experts said the wine with the fancy label was worth drinking, while only 12 said the cheap wine was.
But just how is consciousness quantum?
I sure don't get this stuff, but it seems to be a trashing of simplistic associating of a couple of unknowns.
Vitamin D affects how you age?
... those with the highest vitamin D levels had longer leukocyte telomere length ... Previous research has found that shortened LTL is linked to risk for heart disease and could be an indication of chronic inflammation – a key determinant in the biology of aging.
Marshall McLuhan's hot and cool categories
The electric media of television and computers, argued McLuhan, would liberate us from our dependence on the printed word. Print was what he called a “hot” medium, one that absorbed all of our attention and left little room for participation. The medium it had supplanted, the spoken word, was by contrast a “cool” medium that left plenty of space for participation.
Reading, to put it simply, is a lonely pursuit, while speech is a social one. So when we became readers, rather than listeners, we sacrificed our shared, tribal consciousness and became locked into private consciousness. Printed text, in McLuhan’s view, led to everything from the rise of individualism to the specialization of jobs in factories.
Wall St. alpha male checking himself
About Todd Thomson, ex-CEO of Citigroup's Global Wealth Mgmt and his splashing of company money around Maria Bartiromo. Summary paragraph of the Street's culture now:
There is a new deal for the alpha male on Wall Street. He can make his millions, and he can still strut and preen and feel important. What he can't do is sexualize his financial clout. In the late 1980s it was fairly routine for men on Wall Street trading floors to order up strippers; when a prominent bond salesman was fellated in a conference room just off the trading floor his colleagues were more amused than shocked. Not long ago a pair of Morgan Stanley employees was fired for merely attending a strip club in their off hours. As one of my former classmates put it, "the decorum in the marketplace has changed.''
Encrypted Hushmail not so hush
... court document from a federal prosecution of alleged steroid dealers reveals the Canadian company turned over 12 CDs worth of e-mails from three Hushmail accounts, following a court order obtained through a mutual assistance treaty between the U.S. and Canada. The charging document alleges that many Chinese wholesale steroid chemical providers, underground laboratories and steroid retailers do business over Hushmail.
Rosemary protects your brain from free radical damage, perhaps for Alzheimer's and strokes
In animal models, the scientific group, led by Drs. Takumi Satoh (Iwate University, Japan) and Stuart Lipton (Burnham Institute), found that CA becomes activated by the free radical damage itself, remaining innocuous unless needed, exactly what is wanted in a drug.
Confessions of an economic hitman: interview with John Perkins
About engineered crippling of poor nations with American-contracted, megaproject debt to make natural resources available for firesale prices.
He has a book and all, but I had to take pause when he referred to the NSA as being something more than a cryptology agency. There are things I just don't know about, I guess. Only caught the first twenty minutes or so.
Part 1
Part 2
Over 90 per cent of the subjects in the phase 1 trials developed an immune response to HIV
The vaccine is what is known as a genetic vaccine, which uses parts of the virus DNA to stimulate the rapid endogenous production of the proteins for which the injected DNA codes.
The trial subjects were vaccinated on three occasions with this vaccine using a needle-free method of injection. In order to enhance the effect, the researchers also gave the subjects a fourth dose of a vaccine in which parts of the HIV virus DNA had been integrated into another virus (vaccinia = the cowpox virus).
Sound training rewires dyslexic children
Infants must correctly process fast-changing sounds, like those within the syllable "ba," in order to learn language and, later, to know what printed letters sound like. Infants use sound processing to grab from speech all the sounds of their native language, then stamp them into their brains, creating a sound map. If they can't analyze fast-changing sounds, their sound map may become confused.
"Children with developmental dyslexia may be living in a world with in-between sounds," says Gaab. "It could be that whenever I tell a dyslexic child 'ga,' they hear a mix of 'ga,' 'ka,' 'ba,' and 'wa'."
Fake excuses for sale
That's right. Just buy one (it does backfire).
For about $25, students and employees can buy excuse notes that appear to come from doctors or hospitals. Other options include a fake jury summons or an authentic-looking funeral service program complete with comforting poems and a list of pallbearers.
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