Sunday, 19 January 2014
Entertainment stuff from the week 13-19/1/14
Hi synthetic-breasted-DNA-shedding-cannibalist-novelists!
I'm running short on inventive intros. Can you tell? :-D
First up - please sign this - the more signatures there are, in petitions like this one, the more it'll show the Russian government that homophobic hysteria is not OK, and that there are plenty of people around the world who agree on that point. All people and nations can influence each other, so any changed mind is an achievement.
'To: Winter Olympians'
https://www.allout.org/en/actions/p6-gb?
That sexy top's being modelled by Belle Brockhoff, btw, whom, amongst other athletes, fears the way they might be treated, at the Games. Their fears are not unfounded - non-athlete residents have been subject to brutal homophobic violence, in recent years, with victims unable to name their perpetrators' crime, because it's unlawful to even acknowledge homosexuality, in Russia atm!
Please sign.
And, on with the show. You might have seen the last episode of the Sherlock mini-series. In it, they reference 23 and 24 Leinster Gardens - houses that are mere facades. Are they real?
'The 'houses' in Leinster Gardens'
http://150greatthingsabouttheunderground.com/2012/09/08/48-the-houses-in-leinster-gardens/
They're absolutely real - the facades are in Leinster Gardens, built to preserve the image of the street, from the road, but to leave room behind, for smoke from the London Underground trains to escape through!
As the article says of numbers 23 and 24:
"Like Dolly Parton, Blackpool and extreme political organisations of both left and right, it is all front."
Incidentally, i happen to know that 'Dolly the Sheep' was called Dolly, because she was cloned from a cell from another sheep's mammary gland.
"Who's famous for mammaries?", thought the scientists, "Why, Dolly Parton is", they giggled, "Then we shall call her 'Dolly'." And so it was.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is why scientists never present comedy shows... apart from Brian Cox, Dara O'Briain, Harry Hill, and, um... more.
Some scientists do have a strong sense of humour :-P
Exciting news from the world of synthetic biology:
'First Plastic Cell With Working Organelle'
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140114091707.htm
"Jan van Hest and his PhD candidate Ruud Peters created their organelles by filling tiny spheres with chemicals and placing these inside a water droplet. They then cleverly covered the water droplet with a polymer layer -- the cell wall. Using fluorescence, they were able to show that the planned cascade of reactions did in fact take place. This means that they are the first chemists to create a polymer cell with working organelles. Just like in the cells in our bodies, the chemicals are able to enter the cell plasma following the reaction in the organelles, to be processed elsewhere in the cell."
Other researchers have been working on replicating the equivalent mechanisms, with the specific materials that are used within real cells - fatty acids, for example - but i think the mechanisms are of highest interest. It doesn't really matter whether the specific components are the same, as long as the processes they go through mimic real cells.
In future, these simplified versions of real cells, made to order, will be incredibly useful in exploring the myriad of chemical reactions that go in inside the cells of every living organism on Earth - a world that is, as yet, very murky to us!
'DNA detectives able to 'count' thousands of fish using as little as a glass of water'
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-dna-thousands-fish-glass.html
"It might be unpleasant to think about when going for a swim in the ocean, but the water is a soup of cells shed by what lives there," [Ryan Kelly, University of Washington assistant professor of marine and environmental affairs, and lead author] said. Fish shed cells from their skin, damaged tissues and as body wastes. "Every one of those cells has DNA and if you have the right tools you can tell what species the cell came from. Now we're working to find the relative abundance of each species present," he said.
Wow! What the scientists did, was to identify different species by the genetic samples they left in the water. By collecting a glass of it, they could recognise those traces, and match them to the species they already knew.
This technique could be used to track the presence and abundance of known species, in the wild, without catching them.
The limitations are, of course, that it can't be used to identify unknown species, because their genetic 'fingerprint' would be unknown. Also, the technique didn't work for cartilaginous 'bony' fishes - rays and sharks - or the reptiles in the tank - turtles.
Potentially, this means that ocean and waterway surveys can be conducted without costing the lives of the species they're looking for... and no excuse for Japanese whalers who slaughter them 'for research'.
And here i go, bringing the mood down again --- sickening religious behaviour by a Christian man who blamed a Muslim for his wife's death -- he proceeded to find the next entirely-different Muslim man, and to eat him, in public, while passing strangers vomited in disgust!
'Cannibal Eating Muslim Man That Killed His Wife–CAUGHT ON TAPE'
http://informoverload.com/cannibal-eating-muslim-man-that-killed-his-wife-caught-on-tape/
Imagine if he'd arbitrarily picked somebody who instead happened to be White, or had epicanthal folds, or was short, or fat, or had collected sticks on an arbitrary day of the week.
What kind of a sick, corrupted mind could think such a thing morally viable? Well, actually, this other Christian dude thinks it:
'How Religion can make you happy to kill!'
http://youtu.be/K2Rx4cW6E6Y
Except he's a pale and pastey White man, boasting armchair bigotry. Either way - religion, yuck. :-(
There will never be peace in the world while do-gooders don't know what 'good' is!
A first for RC Christianity: this week, the Holy See (the Roman Catholic Church when it's speaking through its 'country' hat) reported to the UN, for the first time ever. And guess what about -- their systematised abuse and rape of children, around the world.
'Crime But No Punishment'
http://youtu.be/AcKn46n79jM
Did they show an intent to stop being such perverted anti-sexual deviants, however? No - they offered only empty promises - as usual - to prevent their faction's 'image' from slipping! It's possibly a sign of progress that they're apologising to the UN, though, or maybe they're just trying to make more use of their guise as a nation?!
As if to pile in on the coincidence, Roy Zimmerman has presciently recorded and uploaded a good 'ol song, to cheer us up, in deriding the factionalism that keeps people apart:
'"Norwedish Hate Anthem" by Roy Zimmerman with Joe Zimmerman'
http://youtu.be/4gWAUxP6RmM
They're both wrong, however. The English, the English, the English are best! I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest :-D
'Flanders & Swann - A Song Of Patriotic Prejudice (VIDEO)'
http://youtu.be/1vh-wEXvdW8
"This is a song calculated to offend practically everybody" :-D
In case you're wondering:
- Michael Flanders had polio, which left him paralysed from the chest down, meaning he had to breath from the shoulder.
- This performance is from the '60s - not the Teenies of Lloyd-George's Prime Ministership.
- And no, Donald Swann was always like that :-D
Away from Superstition, and back to Science, for some pleasant News...
'ScienceCasts: Countdown to Pluto'
http://youtu.be/eMaPAM3vfv0
NASA has officially started plugging New Horizons' arrival at Pluto. Unfortunately, that countdown's going to be quite long - it won't start sending back pictures until July of 2015!
There's more from NASA in 'contemporary stuff', btw...
'The Secret to Writing a Bestselling Novel'
http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/the-secret-to-writing-a-bestselling-novel
If you have any awareness of anything, you'll probably be aware that there are all kinds of people willing to offer fatuous advice about how to do things. Writing novels is just one example.
Don't worry - Mignon is not trying to sell you anything - her podcast's free!
But the 'rules' she describes... not very useful, but certainly curious ;-)
Other things that happened this week:
MI5 and MI6 officers have been granted permission to break the national speed limits on the UK's roads. They have to abide by the rules of the road even if national security is threatened, but they will be given the same exemptions as police vehicles, ambulances and fire engines, Transport Minister Robert Goodwill has announced. Basically, that means they can treat red lights as 'give way' signs, and break speed limits on open roads, where it's safe to do so.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-25703725
Guenter Zettl was awarded a copy of 'Painter Man' by 'The Creation', for correctly identifying it in a radio competition, 45 years before, when he was 18. The Stasi intercepted his postcard response, and censored it due to the illegality of listening to 'Western' stations. This week, the radio station Europawelle Saar awarded him a copy of the single. How cute.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25742917
Female capuchin monkeys were captured by film-makers for the BBC/Discovery Channel co-production series Wild Brazil throwing stones at potential mates as a form of flirtation. In-so-doing, their use of tools displays greater skill than the humans who behave with similar antipathy to lovers - they usually resort to punching, shoving and verbal abuse. Does this mean capuchins are more mature than humans? Discuss.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/25667268
A nun who had sex, got pregnant, and then birthed the baby somewhere in the central Italian city of Rieti, claimed she had no idea she was pregnant. She thought she merely had stomach ache. I have no idea whether she's also claiming pathenogenesis! Do i have to remind everyone that Jesus was a girl? It's impossible to produce an XY individual, when all of the genome comes from an XX mother. Either 'the big JC' was a lady, or Mary was a bloke in drag... or lying. Nah - people don't ever lie to save face, do they :-P
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25787757
I've held a ball lightning story over 'til next week.... just so you know :-P
I reckoned there was disproportionately much wordiness, for one week, in this issue.
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
To start - two awesome astronomy videos, from AMNH - the American Museum of Natural History:
'Science Bulletins: Signs of Water Detected on Distant Worlds'
http://youtu.be/gZTimovGIM4
{There's no narration in this one, so keep you peepers on the text!}
'Seeing Planets Like Never Before'
A demonstration of the incredible science that's done to peruse the exoplanets of our galaxy.
http://youtu.be/urQeIjx7Ibo
{When the James Webb Space Telescope comes online, in 2018, it'll give us masses more data to search for signs of life in}
And from Science@NASA - how to recover meteorites:
'ScienceCasts: New Year's Asteroid Strike'
http://youtu.be/uQ5DI97K_S8
'See Liquid Carbon Dioxide'
http://youtu.be/N_cHcOLcAvE
'Pouring Mercury into Liquid Nitrogen (slow motion)'
http://youtu.be/5I4rxfnCtxY
'How the Rosetta spacecraft will orbit a comet'
Funky-sounding music, for a funky-looking journey :D
http://youtu.be/GRjdqUDU3yI
'Hunting falcons rely on sailor's trick'
http://youtu.be/er3AASCnpRg
'Knight's Tour - Numberphile'
http://youtu.be/ab_dY3dZFHM
'Cassetteboy vs David Attenborough'
http://youtu.be/m108JMxpWb0
{Deleted on the grounds of nudity? Pathetic! Hopefully, the video will be returned. Update: Link to silly version with pixellated bits so we don't know what they could possibly have 'down there'. Gah! http://youtu.be/dXZ-ijNAFVM }
'Eating Grass For Jesus!'
http://youtu.be/Q2hf4GLAMzg
'SURICATE - Faites-Le Rire / Make Him Laugh'
http://youtu.be/R2xNMB3JIv8
'Top Wesh (Lucien Maine)'
The gangsta version of Masterchef! This week, on Top Gangsta, the candidates vie to impress the judges on Gangsta Stars.
http://youtu.be/ECGEoifu0as
Interesting goings-on at the Australian Open, this week:
'Ball kid classic catch (2014 edition) - 2014 Australian Open'
http://youtu.be/UDSQ9ivWJLY
And proof that even the best can completely shash up a serve!
'Wozniacki serve fail - 2014 Australian Open'
http://youtu.be/Y9dT8az6wCk
'Andy Murray's super shank serve - 2014 Australian Open'
http://youtu.be/PM2noQkZMPo
I feel so much better about myself :-D
'Sherlock Falling'
This was bound to happen. Internet memes, eh :D
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/73660673869
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: opprobrium -- harsh criticism or censure; often following someone's shameful conduct
Etymology Of The Week: Spain -- possibly via 'I-spania', from Punic for 'land of rabbits'
Gene Of The Week: Headbobber - Headbobber mice have characteristic ear problems including bobbing their heads (obviously), going round in circles, balance problems and deafness.
Quote Of The Week: "A stitch in Time makes it difficult to turn the pages" - Anon; very possibly me
Fact Of The Week: The first spherical magnets were made in the 16th century (or earlier), by grinding mined magnets, called lodestones, into spheres. These were called "terrellas" (little Earths) by William Gilbert, the physician to Queen Elizabeth I of England. He presciently believed the Earth itself to be a giant lodestone with a weathered surface.
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Is Katy Perry's Album a Biohazard?'
http://www.livescience.com/41006-katy-perry-prism-album-biohazard.html
'I'm A Climate Scientist - Extended Version - (CLEAN)'
http://youtu.be/H7wdKg8rYL0
'Wonders of the Stoner System'
What Brian Cox really did with licence-fee-payers' money :-P
http://youtu.be/30ruBtLIvJM
'Incredible Painted Dolls'
The best thing about this article, is that they censored the boobs on the Angelina Jolie doll! LMAO. That puts porn filters in perspective :-D
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unusual-art-and-fashion/incredible-painted-dolls/
'Knife Throwing Mama'
Oh, the horrendous things people do for a giggle >:-(
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/uncategorized/knife-throwing-mama/
Some of cheekychickenhead's videos, that i've added to my YT playlist 'comedy 4' - casual, aussie humour, newly-discovered by me. I like :o) Starting with the oldest... and most psychotic, haha :-D
'Survivor Parody'
http://youtu.be/BuNWALRR9r4
{This is what Survivor is, btw, if you don't know it}
'TaDa Look at Me | Olympic Events'
http://youtu.be/EV8ZShRbIe4
'ROFLMAO'
"I've got to get on the floor!"
http://youtu.be/OaRgC4vweqY
'Flagged | I've made it big time!'
http://youtu.be/83oHNnRTngQ
'Keep Your Day Job'
http://youtu.be/IADGIzmwtn0
'Yentl Bra'
Are four boobs better than two? Answers on a postcard... :-P
http://youtu.be/-2QTlD7WFj8
'Gift wrapped'
Best. Freudian Slip. Everrrr. :-D
http://youtu.be/DF2DoyL_98g
Pokemon tribute to Miley Cyrus:
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/73663991978
Are those dogs mocking that baby? Bitches!
http://niebosaur.tumblr.com/post/63653429701/dogs-imitate-crawling-baby
<<<Tapejara receives 3 points on its blogging licence for using such a trite joke>>>
'futurama songs'
Songs from Futurama. Self-explanatory, really :-P
http://youtu.be/aaawT2ylOmc
And this DIY 'cheap and cheerful' not-really-a-valid-medical-test says you are... oh :-/
"u have a demon"
http://islivalive.tumblr.com/post/73475135127
'Unlikely things for Andy Murray to think - Mock the Week - Series 12 Episode 9 - BBC Two'
http://youtu.be/ZQOyjfkhxPA
'Chris Packham's The Smiths references - Springwatch 2009'
Chris Packham is a Leg End. There is nothing more to say :-D
http://youtu.be/FT9hGAlt89o
'Clever Old Dog'
Featuring the dog that plays fetch with himself.
http://llewblog.squarespace.com/journal/2014/1/12/clever-old-dog.html
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Sunday, 12 January 2014
Entertainment stuff from the week 6-12/1/14
Hi stargazers,
It's been Stargazing week, on the Beeb, this week:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b019h4g8
In it, Dara O'Briain got put in NASA's G-machine. If it's any suggestion of what people will look like, in decades to come, then it's good signs for Dara.
Not such good signs for the great Professor Brian Cox, however, who experienced it for his series 'Wonders Of The Universe'.
'Brain Cox endures extreme G's'
http://youtu.be/mOyfrwbOFJ8
It looks like he's been in the Rolling Stones! D:Ream must have got up to a lot more than we thought :-D
'Radar reveals extraordinary ladybird flight paths'
http://planetearth.nerc.ac.uk/news/story.aspx?id=1587
What extraordinary flight patterns would they be? Well...
"Scientists examining radar data have spotted the tiny creatures travelling at heights of up to 1100 metres, and at speeds of up to 60 kilometres per hour."
Wow! Presuming the data is accurate, of course.
They might just be anomalous data points. But that performance would explain, as the article says, how the Harlequin Ladybird has managed to migrate so far, so quickly.
'The combover: A hairstyle that refuses to lie down'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-25622093
Personally, i think the mohican's a pretty good hairstyle...
A big... orange... mohican. That looks good ;-)
Asinine bullshit propaganda from international terrorist organisation PETA:
'Another Cuban Missile Crisis'
http://www.illegaladvertising.com/post/72441097098/cuban-missile-crisis
Are they seriously claiming that going vegan will make men last longer, in the sack?
Maybe it should be pointed out to those nutbags that the only way diet could do that, is by quelling excitation - so lasting longer means taking longer to get it up, and having more difficulty in keeping it there.
So yeah - go vegan; gain erectile dysfunction - let's buy into that bullshit! <s>
No more hard-ons, no more wide-ons, if you only eat greens. That's if you reach adolescence at all.
Grumble grumble grumble... lovely weather we're having... etc.
Good news, everyone! This...
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
'SURICATE - Saison 2'
Finally - a trailer that makes sense - how can they show us anything, if it hasn't happened yet? Duh :D
http://youtu.be/UtXj4PqRrDw
World-leading psychologist Richard Wiseman has a new channel :o)
'In59seconds - Think a little. Change a lot'
http://www.youtube.com/user/In59seconds/about
'10 Amazing Ways To Stop Overeating'
http://youtu.be/2IQiK2pYNWQ
'Never lose your wallet or purse again'
http://youtu.be/33SwGGm9eQc
He has, quite deservedly, made his way into a tumblr GIF:
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/73082859746/goldspandexleggings-jonathaniusarsenius
'Reconstruction gives Stonehenge man a face'
And... he looks like a regular bloke... who's confused to have a face, again :D
http://youtu.be/0s0LPxBvP7g
'Researchers use sound waves to levitate objects in three dimensions'
I posted a video of this, last week. Here's the wordy version. 3D acoustic tweezers. Oh yeah :D
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-levitate-dimensions.html
The video:
'Levitación de objetos mediante intersección de ondas sonoras'
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72263428747/levitacion-acustica
'The Covert World of Fish Biofluorescence'
http://youtu.be/aZ3EaLXh3O4
These next two videos are not the same!
'National Gallery Faces of Chemistry 11-14 Microscopy'
http://youtu.be/FpXHSu7ql6s
'National Gallery Faces of Chemistry 16-18 Chromatography'
http://youtu.be/zoCHJ6eqQ4U
'Charlie's Zombie Noises'
Charlie's zombie needs some opal fruits :-D
http://youtu.be/PUpU9bRYLy8
'ASTOUNDING: 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + ... = -1/12'
This is like a joke, played on mortals by the gods... "Haha - they'll never get their puny heads around this [rumble rumble]"
The joke is in the premise - in the first equation, the answer is not 1/2 - it's undefined. That makes the rest of the equating facetious :-D
http://youtu.be/w-I6XTVZXww
BTW, the Physics it's involved in is String Theory which is, as yet, an obsolete hypothesis. I hope that, someday, all those brilliant minds' works don't prove to be wasted, however.
In Professor Ed's video, you can see him use other mathematical shortcuts that don't necessarily hold all the time but that give the same result. It's wonderfully preposterous maths :-D
'Carl Sagan's Cosmic Calendar'
Made with updated footage. We now know more details of this cosmic calendar - flowers appeared much earlier than thought, for example - but Carl Sagan does this so wonderfully.
http://youtu.be/6soIwzwth6k
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: brachiation -- diverging into branches / swinging from branch to branch, as a form of locomotion
Etymology Of The Week: bourse -- Stock Market; through the meaning of 'meeting place', from latin 'bursa' meaning 'hide'; in modern french, 'bourse' means 'pocket'/'purse'
Fact Of The Week: In 1965, George and Charlotte Blonsky invented a centrifugal birthing machine (to help extract babies from women, by swinging them around in a circle). In 1999, they received a posthumous Ig Nobel Prize for their efforts
Quote Of The Week: "If you gave [Jerry] Falwell an enema, he could be buried in a matchbox." - Christopher 'Hitch' Hitchens
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Sneezes of the world'
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72569842840/la-forma-que-la-gente-estornuda-alrededor-del
'Hey, mother foca'
Foca: the earless seal
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/73083127186/hey-mother-foca
'Who Were the Amazing Ross Sisters?'
Ripley's' lowdown on the amazing Ross Sisters, as well as other extraordinary contortionists.
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/incredible-feats/who-were-the-amazing-ross-sisters/
'Truck Made From 11,000 Pounds of Ice'
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/amazing-science/truck-made-from-11000-pounds-of-ice/
Conservative hysteria, LOL
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72777697768
John Cage's 4'33" has been silenced due to third-party content :-D
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72562913555
"Son, if you can't say something nice, say something clever but devastating"
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/73083167137/chequeralley-new-yorker-14-jan-2013-image
'Amazon Kleenex Review'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/73083208201/amazon-kleenex-review
'The after-effects of a flood near Bishop’s University in Lennoxville, Sherbrooke, Quebec'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/73083263232/chequeralley-redditor-willyyz-the
P.S. If you're living in the Far Northisphere, and feeling the effects of the cold, wintry winds, take a peek at my tumblr for December, where there are lots of pictures of the Sun to make you feel warmer :o)
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/archive/2013/12
.
Monday, 6 January 2014
Entertainment stuff from the week 30/12/13 - 5/1/14
Hi new-year alcoholics,
Tesco supermarket seems committed to encourage healthy behaviours, by selling...
'Everyday Value Vodka 70Cl'
http://www.tesco.com/groceries/Product/Details/?id=260987390
That's right. Just shove some in your spag bol, pour it over your cornflakes, and spice up your cup 'o tea. Squirt some "everyday" vodka in it!
Tesco, in line with other supermarkets, thereby demonstrates that there is zero necessity to be better at regulating the food and drink industry, and certainly zero cause to be better at regulating supermarkets.
After all, like your friendly GP says:
"A pint of vodka a day keeps the doctor away... if you throw it at them"
...or maybe Tesco's just shit at marketing, and this is an honest mistake?
Nah - only joking - with the amount of money they pour into marketing, this is highly unlikely to be an accident.
But let's go back to that expression:
"An apple a day keeps the doctor away"
Dr Steven Novella has written an article refuting quacks who condemn Skeptical Rationalists, such as himself, as Big Pharma shills, despite the obvious (except to themselves) irony - the Quackery industry is massively profitable, and Rationalists rarely profit by their adherence to evidence!
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/an-apple-a-day/
As an example, he compared statins to, quite literally, the practice of eating an apple a day. What would happen if everyone over 50 were offered a statin / ate an apple every day, for vascular ill-health, and 70% actually took it?
The evidence showed that taking a statin would save ~9400 (7000 to 12500) lives per year from vascular illness, and eating an apple would save ~8500 (6200 to 10800) lives per year from vascular illness.
That means eating an apple a day saves an equivalent number of lives from vascular illness, compared to taking a statin... but with much less serious side-effects.
In fact, the only noteable side-effects of eating an apple are tooth decay (from the acidic juices; solved by being assertive with tooth brushing, with toothpaste) and weight-gain through the high-calorie content of the sugars that are in fruit (go for another walk).
Yet again, the general advice for healthy living is this:
- Eat a well-rounded healthy diet
- Exercise regularly
- Get enough sleep
- Don’t smoke
- Use alcohol in moderation
And that advice hasn't changed for decades.
BTW, a vodka every day is not "moderation", Tesco PLC!
A spoiler alert now!
In the new Sherlock series - Sherlock undies :-P
So now you know...
Due to the plot of that episode, the BBC's Magazine Monitor has done an article about abandoned London Underground stations:
'The allure of abandoned Tube stations'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316040659/ghost-stations-of-the-london-underground-due-to
At least half a million people don't know how he didn't not die, however:
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72136118113
You gotta watch it to the end, guys :-D
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
'ADAM BUXTON - YOUTUBE 2013 SONG (DIRECTOR'S CUT)'
Forget the YouTube Rewind video - this is the one you ought to watch :-D
http://youtu.be/6KUNFGF7mfM
Verification of the Benedict Cumberbatch neutron story. LOL
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72265188914
Simon Pegg talked about this on Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre podcast. That's where i first heard it:
https://soundcloud.com/britishcomedyguide/richard-herring-lst-podcast-32-simon-pegg
'Levitación de objetos mediante intersección de ondas sonoras'
Want to see what acoustic tweezers can do? Yeah - pretty impressive stuff :)
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72263428747/levitacion-acustica
Only three items? Yeah - it's January - everyone in the Far Northisphere's hibernating :-D
Have some rhymes, instead:
While wanderin' through Sherwood Forest,
i bumped into one Friar Tuck;
said "i heard your name's a spoonerism".
that he used to be called Triar F... actually, let's try another one.
There once was a man dressed in orange,
Who went by the name of Stan Collins;
He was unfortunately built,
I mean, under his kilt;
His member was shaped like a syringe.
Simple Simon wore an iPod,
going to the fair;
said simple Simon to the pieman:
"what?"
In a house, on a hill, lives a hobbit,
least i think that's what he said he was to me;
he had spent all his time on a rocket,
and left me to work out the trajectory!
While pondering my favourite Science,
i thought "well, it's got to be Physics";
with Newton, and Einstein, and Krauss,
and the latter's penchant for Politics;
but i've got to consider Biology,
and the squidgy bits in all those animals;
and then there's my interest in Chemistry,
which comes between each in the annals...
of Science's great records of wonder and might,
of evidence and empiricism;
'scientility''s the name for truth-born delight,
and like Science, this poem'll take criticism...
i expect.
Well, you make a poem with the word 'empiricism' in it! :-P
While writing some of these, i got writer's block, and couldn't think of the right word for two weeks. Then i remembered it - 'fortnight'.
They might not be up to the standards of William Topaz McGonagall, but i hope they make someone smile :-)
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: dioecious - describing species that have distinct male and female sexes
Expression Of The Week: 'court of piepowders' -- 'piepowder' comes from french - 'pied poudreux', meaning 'dusty footed' - it referred to itinerant tradesmen, who bought and sold their wares at borough fares. the 'court of piepowders' was a borough organisation that existed to organise these fairs, settle disputes, and punish theft and violence. They had died out in the UK, by the end of the 19th century.
Etymology Of The Week: St Kilda -- an island of the Outer Hebrides, Scotland. The name does not come from that of a saint - there is no saint called Kilda, male or female. Leading hypotheses are that it was originally sunt kelda (sweet wellwater) or skildir (shields)
Fact Of The Week: The elements lutetium, hafnium, and holmium are named after Paris, Copenhagen, and Stockholm, respectively; the elements copper, ruthenium, thulium, and magnesium, are named after Cyprus, Russia, Norway, and the region Magnesia, in Greece, respectively.
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Roger Federer - Top 10 All-Time Tweeners (HD)'
I'm too short to play this shot. 65cm isn't enough :-(
http://youtu.be/9Le6vlSLuaM
'Andy Murray vs Roger Federer Australian Open 2013 Semi Final'
http://youtu.be/cynrv0ZgvNc
'The Fastest Tennis Shots (HD)'
http://youtu.be/F0ffr8HmkPk
'The Fastest Tennis Shots - 2nd Part (HQ)'
http://youtu.be/yk1SzTqRh7s
'The Fastest Tennis Shots in 2013 [HD]'
http://youtu.be/FLaqJdj5L4Y
'The Greatest ATP Points in Tennis [HD1080p]'
http://youtu.be/vZMl30LKFHc
'British Whale - This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us'
Here's an old favourite - and yes, that is Phil 'the power' Taylor - and yes, those two are Ron and Russell Mael, who did the original of this song :-D
http://youtu.be/Vs1nK6aiHW8
'British Whale - This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us (Making Of)'
http://youtu.be/s26EiFvColU
'Best Snookers in Snooker (Reedited)'
http://youtu.be/cZ81x-ytT3U
'Exhibition Shots'
http://youtu.be/IXZMJ4uSBu4
'Exhibition Shots 2'
http://youtu.be/U1O1TJWL-rU
'Perfect Swerve Technique'
http://youtu.be/Yuv6ne-vLuM
'Snooker Bloopers'
http://youtu.be/rO85r7nLQ9o
'Snooker Chuckles!'
http://youtu.be/ENeAVX6jvBM
'Rammstein - 03 - Rammlied (Rammin The Steins Remix by Devin Townsend)'
Loving this remix. So comic :D
http://youtu.be/x7fRsbbD6T8
'Reflections on Planet Earth'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72216306469/reflections-on-planet-earth-image-credit
'The boy with the giant head'
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2014/01/02/the-boy-with-the-giant-head/
'Giant Snow ‘Crop Circles’'
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unusual-art-and-fashion/giant-snow-crop-circles/
A beautiful map of Earth's circulating weather systems; apparently updated every 3 hours. I'm not sure how accurate, nor useful it is, but it certainly looks nice :-)
http://earth.nullschool.net/
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/71696563371/mapa-de-los-vientos-en-tiempo-real
'Estructura de un hormiguero revelada por aluminio lÃquido'
The structure of an anthill, cast in aluminium
http://youtu.be/JRBuiXfv3N4
'Giphoscope, reproductor de GIF animados analógicos'
Giphoscope - a reproduction of GIF images, in analogue form. The last one's a bit quirky :D
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72137729439/giphoscope
[smirks] :o)
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/69483956798
'Awkward moments of 2013'
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/70435675597
'How Canadians are hatched'
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/71451510062
"There's a pudding hidden in the money"
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316467576/privateeyenews-from-eye-1355
"I'd like to be able to move out of my parents' place"
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316471756/privateeyenews-from-eye-1355
'A Still From A Workplace Etiquette Video For Deer'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316496750/jeffjohnsonart-another-fortune-cookie-500
'Death's Psychiatrist'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316551592/jeffjohnsonart-i-admit-this-is-a-bit-dark-mom
'Après-ing Mantes'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316555607/jeffjohnsonart-another-fortune-cookie-500
'Carbon Hard Under Pressure'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316559487
.
Tesco supermarket seems committed to encourage healthy behaviours, by selling...
'Everyday Value Vodka 70Cl'
http://www.tesco.com/groceries/Product/Details/?id=260987390
That's right. Just shove some in your spag bol, pour it over your cornflakes, and spice up your cup 'o tea. Squirt some "everyday" vodka in it!
Tesco, in line with other supermarkets, thereby demonstrates that there is zero necessity to be better at regulating the food and drink industry, and certainly zero cause to be better at regulating supermarkets.
After all, like your friendly GP says:
"A pint of vodka a day keeps the doctor away... if you throw it at them"
...or maybe Tesco's just shit at marketing, and this is an honest mistake?
Nah - only joking - with the amount of money they pour into marketing, this is highly unlikely to be an accident.
But let's go back to that expression:
"An apple a day keeps the doctor away"
Dr Steven Novella has written an article refuting quacks who condemn Skeptical Rationalists, such as himself, as Big Pharma shills, despite the obvious (except to themselves) irony - the Quackery industry is massively profitable, and Rationalists rarely profit by their adherence to evidence!
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/an-apple-a-day/
As an example, he compared statins to, quite literally, the practice of eating an apple a day. What would happen if everyone over 50 were offered a statin / ate an apple every day, for vascular ill-health, and 70% actually took it?
The evidence showed that taking a statin would save ~9400 (7000 to 12500) lives per year from vascular illness, and eating an apple would save ~8500 (6200 to 10800) lives per year from vascular illness.
That means eating an apple a day saves an equivalent number of lives from vascular illness, compared to taking a statin... but with much less serious side-effects.
In fact, the only noteable side-effects of eating an apple are tooth decay (from the acidic juices; solved by being assertive with tooth brushing, with toothpaste) and weight-gain through the high-calorie content of the sugars that are in fruit (go for another walk).
Yet again, the general advice for healthy living is this:
- Eat a well-rounded healthy diet
- Exercise regularly
- Get enough sleep
- Don’t smoke
- Use alcohol in moderation
And that advice hasn't changed for decades.
BTW, a vodka every day is not "moderation", Tesco PLC!
A spoiler alert now!
In the new Sherlock series - Sherlock undies :-P
So now you know...
Due to the plot of that episode, the BBC's Magazine Monitor has done an article about abandoned London Underground stations:
'The allure of abandoned Tube stations'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316040659/ghost-stations-of-the-london-underground-due-to
At least half a million people don't know how he didn't not die, however:
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72136118113
You gotta watch it to the end, guys :-D
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
'ADAM BUXTON - YOUTUBE 2013 SONG (DIRECTOR'S CUT)'
Forget the YouTube Rewind video - this is the one you ought to watch :-D
http://youtu.be/6KUNFGF7mfM
Verification of the Benedict Cumberbatch neutron story. LOL
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/72265188914
Simon Pegg talked about this on Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre podcast. That's where i first heard it:
https://soundcloud.com/britishcomedyguide/richard-herring-lst-podcast-32-simon-pegg
'Levitación de objetos mediante intersección de ondas sonoras'
Want to see what acoustic tweezers can do? Yeah - pretty impressive stuff :)
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72263428747/levitacion-acustica
Only three items? Yeah - it's January - everyone in the Far Northisphere's hibernating :-D
Have some rhymes, instead:
While wanderin' through Sherwood Forest,
i bumped into one Friar Tuck;
said "i heard your name's a spoonerism".
that he used to be called Triar F... actually, let's try another one.
There once was a man dressed in orange,
Who went by the name of Stan Collins;
He was unfortunately built,
I mean, under his kilt;
His member was shaped like a syringe.
Simple Simon wore an iPod,
going to the fair;
said simple Simon to the pieman:
"what?"
In a house, on a hill, lives a hobbit,
least i think that's what he said he was to me;
he had spent all his time on a rocket,
and left me to work out the trajectory!
While pondering my favourite Science,
i thought "well, it's got to be Physics";
with Newton, and Einstein, and Krauss,
and the latter's penchant for Politics;
but i've got to consider Biology,
and the squidgy bits in all those animals;
and then there's my interest in Chemistry,
which comes between each in the annals...
of Science's great records of wonder and might,
of evidence and empiricism;
'scientility''s the name for truth-born delight,
and like Science, this poem'll take criticism...
i expect.
Well, you make a poem with the word 'empiricism' in it! :-P
While writing some of these, i got writer's block, and couldn't think of the right word for two weeks. Then i remembered it - 'fortnight'.
They might not be up to the standards of William Topaz McGonagall, but i hope they make someone smile :-)
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: dioecious - describing species that have distinct male and female sexes
Expression Of The Week: 'court of piepowders' -- 'piepowder' comes from french - 'pied poudreux', meaning 'dusty footed' - it referred to itinerant tradesmen, who bought and sold their wares at borough fares. the 'court of piepowders' was a borough organisation that existed to organise these fairs, settle disputes, and punish theft and violence. They had died out in the UK, by the end of the 19th century.
Etymology Of The Week: St Kilda -- an island of the Outer Hebrides, Scotland. The name does not come from that of a saint - there is no saint called Kilda, male or female. Leading hypotheses are that it was originally sunt kelda (sweet wellwater) or skildir (shields)
Fact Of The Week: The elements lutetium, hafnium, and holmium are named after Paris, Copenhagen, and Stockholm, respectively; the elements copper, ruthenium, thulium, and magnesium, are named after Cyprus, Russia, Norway, and the region Magnesia, in Greece, respectively.
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Roger Federer - Top 10 All-Time Tweeners (HD)'
I'm too short to play this shot. 65cm isn't enough :-(
http://youtu.be/9Le6vlSLuaM
'Andy Murray vs Roger Federer Australian Open 2013 Semi Final'
http://youtu.be/cynrv0ZgvNc
'The Fastest Tennis Shots (HD)'
http://youtu.be/F0ffr8HmkPk
'The Fastest Tennis Shots - 2nd Part (HQ)'
http://youtu.be/yk1SzTqRh7s
'The Fastest Tennis Shots in 2013 [HD]'
http://youtu.be/FLaqJdj5L4Y
'The Greatest ATP Points in Tennis [HD1080p]'
http://youtu.be/vZMl30LKFHc
'British Whale - This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us'
Here's an old favourite - and yes, that is Phil 'the power' Taylor - and yes, those two are Ron and Russell Mael, who did the original of this song :-D
http://youtu.be/Vs1nK6aiHW8
'British Whale - This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us (Making Of)'
http://youtu.be/s26EiFvColU
'Best Snookers in Snooker (Reedited)'
http://youtu.be/cZ81x-ytT3U
'Exhibition Shots'
http://youtu.be/IXZMJ4uSBu4
'Exhibition Shots 2'
http://youtu.be/U1O1TJWL-rU
'Perfect Swerve Technique'
http://youtu.be/Yuv6ne-vLuM
'Snooker Bloopers'
http://youtu.be/rO85r7nLQ9o
'Snooker Chuckles!'
http://youtu.be/ENeAVX6jvBM
'Rammstein - 03 - Rammlied (Rammin The Steins Remix by Devin Townsend)'
Loving this remix. So comic :D
http://youtu.be/x7fRsbbD6T8
'Reflections on Planet Earth'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72216306469/reflections-on-planet-earth-image-credit
'The boy with the giant head'
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2014/01/02/the-boy-with-the-giant-head/
'Giant Snow ‘Crop Circles’'
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unusual-art-and-fashion/giant-snow-crop-circles/
A beautiful map of Earth's circulating weather systems; apparently updated every 3 hours. I'm not sure how accurate, nor useful it is, but it certainly looks nice :-)
http://earth.nullschool.net/
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/71696563371/mapa-de-los-vientos-en-tiempo-real
'Estructura de un hormiguero revelada por aluminio lÃquido'
The structure of an anthill, cast in aluminium
http://youtu.be/JRBuiXfv3N4
'Giphoscope, reproductor de GIF animados analógicos'
Giphoscope - a reproduction of GIF images, in analogue form. The last one's a bit quirky :D
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/72137729439/giphoscope
[smirks] :o)
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/69483956798
'Awkward moments of 2013'
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/70435675597
'How Canadians are hatched'
http://goldspandexleggings.tumblr.com/post/71451510062
"There's a pudding hidden in the money"
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316467576/privateeyenews-from-eye-1355
"I'd like to be able to move out of my parents' place"
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316471756/privateeyenews-from-eye-1355
'A Still From A Workplace Etiquette Video For Deer'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316496750/jeffjohnsonart-another-fortune-cookie-500
'Death's Psychiatrist'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316551592/jeffjohnsonart-i-admit-this-is-a-bit-dark-mom
'Après-ing Mantes'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316555607/jeffjohnsonart-another-fortune-cookie-500
'Carbon Hard Under Pressure'
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/72316559487
.
Wednesday, 1 January 2014
What Happened In 2013? An Uncomprehensive Guide
In case you've forgotten what happened during 2013, or just forgot how long ago each event was, here's a rundown of some of the major events that occurred, in chronological order, during the totally-arbitrary solar sojourn that was the year 2013 CE.
It's not comprehensive - it'd be too long to read, if it were - and it might be a tad anglo-centric, but i've tried my best. Enjoy...
January
Malala Yousafzai - the the Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot by Religion, in October 2012, for wanting to go to school but being a girl - is discharged from hospital, in Birmingham, the UK.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
Researchers successfully restore sight in mice, by injecting photosensitive cells into their retinas. This promises a future cure for retinitis pigmentosa.
http://www.pnas.org/content/110/3/1101
The AllTrials campaign is launched, pioneered by Ben Goldacre, to gain access to vital pharmaceutical research data. Medical organisations from around the world sign up almost immediately, with many pharmaceutical companies refraining, for obviously capitalistic reasons.
http://www.alltrials.net/news/
A cloud of atoms is made that appears to 'break temperature' by going below absolute zero. What it really does is to expose the insufficiency of Classical Physics, in describing very low-energy ensembles.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21728995.600-cloud-of-atoms-goes-beyond-absolute-zero.html
http://youtu.be/yTeBUpR17Rw
Researchers create a super-omniphobic material. Everyone gasps at how clean it is.
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-super-repellant-surface-material-video.html
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-01/video-liquid-bounces-new-superomniphobic-material
Quadruple helix DNA is discovered in human cells. "Wow, that's amazing" Unfortunately, it's associated with cancer. "Boo, hiss"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130120150033.htm
A sucrose-based skin patch is developed, to deliver vaccines without the need for a scary-looking needle. It means the potential for self-administered vaccination, as there is less risk of misuse or accident, and the patch can't be reused, which also means protecting more people from horrible diseases.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/44806307871/injection-free-vaccination-injectionless
February
Glory-hunters claim to have found the remains of King Richard III of England, under a Leicester car park. In actual fact, the genetic tests they used are insufficient to determine such a conclusion - they could be one of many thousands of ancestors - but who cares when it gets publicity!
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2013/02/leicester-body-richard-iii.html
Antarctic researchers discover bacteria, living under sub-glacial ice, in Lake Whillans. This means they can survive without light, in persistently low temperatures.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/07/science/living-bacteria-found-deep-under-antarctic-ice-scientists-say.html?_r=0
A meteor splinters and crashes into the frozen ground near Chelyabinsk, in Russia. At almost the same time, another meteorite passes Earth, from the opposite direction, too small to be detected. Conspiracy theorists go crazy, ignoring the fact that neither the USA nor Russia have a meteorite cannon in outer space.
http://phys.org/news/2013-05-russian-meteor-america-hours.html
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/amazing-science/spectacular-cosmic-coincidence/
Fox News mistakenly uses a picture of a lesbian couple to cover an article promoting 'traditional marriage'. Butch lesbians, eh - FSM bless 'em all!
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/42998263613/hehe-those-morons-at-fux-news-accidentally-used
Pope Benedict 'Rattie' XVI resigns his infallibility to become Pope Emeritus. The Vatican is struck by lightning on the same day, and superstitionists conclude it's a message from Yahweh. Presumably, a very poorly worded one.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21630874
A researcher of the ideation of conspiracy theories publishes a paper about it, and is subsequently subject to conspiracy theories about his study of conspiracy theories. Or is this story a conspiracy to make us think it was?
http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2013/02/26/what-happens-when-you-study-conspiracy-theories-the-conspiracy-theorists-make-up-conspiracy-theories-about-you/
Australian-based comedy group 'The Sunny Coast Skate' shoots a dance video to Baauer's 'Harlem Shake' song, starting a meme that will last half the year.
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/harlem-shake
March
The UN imposes stricter sanctions on North Korea, for conducting nuclear weapons tests, detected by seismology. Three days later, North Korea withdraws from its armistice with South Korea.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
The Curiosity Lander makes its first major discovery, examining the rocks in Gale Crater, and sends back extraordinary images of the Martian surface.
http://youtu.be/fpyRQ46fUEM
MIT reveals their running cheetah robot. Surprisingly, it doesn't fall over.
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/mit-cheetah-robot-0308.html
The Planck telescope reveals an almost perfectly smooth universe, with a mysterious but incredibly subtle pattern hinting at mysterious early-universal physics. Theoretical Physicists order new crates of chalk.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/46597807725/planck-reveals-an-almost-perfect-universe
An Italian man who worked in the UK for 10 years, pretending to be a lawyer, was convicted on 25 charges of deception, fraud and money laundering. He claimed to have worked with train robber Ronnie Biggs, Saddam Hussein, Harold Shipman, and Slobodan Milosevic.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21969624
Maurice Goeller - a Swiss quackupuncturist - is sentenced to 13 years in prison, for giving 16 people HIV via standard acupuncture practice. The I-SCAM industry does not commit to any kind of reform, and no official investigation of the fraudulent industry ensues.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/03/swiss-healer-accused-of-infecting-clients-hiv-via-acupuncture/
Companies that bank with Cyprus - a tax-haven - are given a $13 billion bailout, by the EU. And who is made to pay for this? The people who actually live in Cyprus, via a tax on their savings accounts! Protests are met with disdain.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
April
A species of fly is discovered that is only 0.13 millimetres long. Unsurprisingly, they found it while hunting for fly eggs, not trying to spot it in flight.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/49080719601/new-fairy-insect-is-mind-blowingly-small
Chinese scientists further develop aerogel to produce the least-dense material ever created by mankind. It's carbon-based, and only slightly more dense than air.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22079592
Jon Millward reveals what a real porn star looks like, and how they live their lives, through statistics. They turn out to be very 'average' - men are 5'10", women 5'5", but weighing a couple of stone less than the USA's population. That's not hard! The average female's measurements are 34B-24-34, and her hair colour is 'brunette'.
She is proportionally representative of all ancestral backgrounds, and gets into the industry at the same age as her predecessors 40 years ago - at 22. Men, however, are starting younger - 25, down from 29. They're not noteably kinky, but they are more open to new ideas, and experience higher-than-average self-esteem, social support, and sexual satisfaction. Also, the majority do more than three shoots before deciding to quit.
The research jars horrendously with what common prejudice says about pornographers and the porn industry. But that's exactly what you'd expect of people who are ignorant of it!
http://jonmillward.com/blog/studies/deep-inside-a-study-of-10000-porn-stars/
The world's first entirely-algae-powered building is constructed in Hamburg, Germany. It is, quite literally, a green building.
http://www.euronews.com/2013/10/03/algae-powered-building/
http://phys.org/news/2013-04-algae-powered-hamburg.html
In Bangladesh, an 8-storey manufacturing building collapses, claiming the lives of 1,129 people, and injuring 2,515. The profit margins of companies that used the employees' labour - like Benetton, Bonmarché, Matalan, Primark, and Walmart - were barely affected, although some did make a meagre effort to pay reparation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Savar_building_collapse
Lady Thatcher - the only woman to ever be Prime Minister of the UK, past or future, unless the Tories let people forget her - receives a funeral, partly funded by British Labour Party-voting taxpayers. They do not receive shares in her cemetery plot. Atos later declares her fit for work.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
May
IBM produces the world's smallest movie: 'A Boy And His Atom'. It was shot through a Scanning Electron Microscope, and made with carbon monoxide molecules.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/50255863508/a-boy-and-his-atom-the-worlds-smallest-movie
James McCormick is arrested for selling dowsing rods to the UN, USA, UK, and Iraqi security services, as well as others, calling them 'bomb detectors'. His crimes are recognised by the courts, but they, governments, and the Media, continue to pretend that the root problem is not that dowsing is nonsense, and that he is as much a charlatan as a friendly homeopath!
http://youtu.be/i163sq2SIHw
The first gun to be manufactured by a 3D-printer is fired. It breaks. Some others don't fire, at all. But the question still remains: is it a good idea to empower any chump/sociopath with a gun obsession, and enough money to buy a printer, with the ability to manufacture such an item?
www.newscientist.com/article/dn23493-3dprinted-guns-first-shots-spark-calls-for-ban.html
The second of twins was born, 87 days after their sister! Some commenters make it clear that they need reminding what 'twins' really means.
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/twins-born-87-days-apart/
Angelina Jolie receives a double mastectomy, due to medical advice. Epidemiologists go to town, futilely attempting to explain to the scientifically-illiterate Media what her risks really were, and why genetic screening - especially that offered by 23andMe - is not advised, in attempts to be safe.
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/angelina-jolie-radical-strategies-for-cancer-prevention-and-genetics-denialism/
Lego produces a full-scale model of a Star Wars X-Wing fighter - the largest in history - using 5,335,200 bricks.
http://aboutus.lego.com/en-gb/news-room/2013/may/the-lego-group-unveils-worlds-largest-lego-model
June
The New York Times reports that the USA spends the most on healthcare, of any country in the world, yet has the worst healthcare of any developed country. The reason: lack of universal healthcare. They leave medicine in the hands of the private sector, which forces up costs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/health/colonoscopies-explain-why-us-leads-the-world-in-health-expenditures.html?
Andy Murray becomes the first British winner of the Men's Singles competition at Wimbledon, for 77 years. It had been 36 years since a woman won the Women's Singles, 6 years since Andy's brother - Jamie - won the Mixed Doubles, and only 1 year since a Brit won the Men's Doubles.
Many newspapers failed to report this correctly, when they truncated their headlines to paraphrases of "First Brit to win Wimbledon in 77 years". Wrong!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wimbledon_doubles_champions
Edward Snowden reveals himself to be the man who released top-secret documents regarding the activities of the USA's NSA - they had been undergoing covert surveillance, spying on individuals, organisations and governments alike. All, quasi-legally. He is prosecuted under the guise of 'national security'. The spying continues, while the world waits for another hero. Bradley Manning - another whistleblower - announces his body dysmorphia, and that he wishes to be known as Chelsea Manning. A transsexual hero!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden
The US Supreme Court rules that non-synthetic genes may not be patented, with significant implications for future medical research. Permitting Intellectual Property legislation to encroach on science in this way could easily hold humanity back - practically, enforcing a form of blasphemy law, where people are prohibited from freedom of information, at another's selfish whim.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/14/us/supreme-court-rules-human-genes-may-not-be-patented.html
Bizarre stories of goblins running amok continue to come from Zimbabwe, where goblins are believed to be real. The serious moral of these stories is yet another one warning against superstition. Lives will continue to be lost, if they don't discover the true causes of the events.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2012/06/goblins-continue-to-run-amok-in-zimbabwe/
China's Shenzhou 10 manned spacecraft returns safely to Earth, having conducted China's longest manned space mission to date. But this is not their biggest achievement to come, in 2013.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/sci/2013-06/26/c_132488807.htm
July
The President of Egypt - Islamist, Mohammed Morsi - is deposed, and onlookers wait to see whether there will be any genuine changes made, as failed to happen with their last revolution.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
The male guppy is found to grow claws on its genitals, in order to improve its chances of successful reproduction! Penisia dentata? Be afraid!
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130724103225.htm
The London Array - the world's largest offshore wind farm - opens in the UK, in the London Estuary. Thousands of hysterical Londoners instantly get psychogenic migraines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_offshore_wind_farms
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21628850.200-the-sickening-truth-about-wind-farm-syndrome.html
Solar Impulse completes the second leg of its global flight, powered only by the light of the Sun. Last summer, it flew from Madrid to Rabat, in Morocco. This leg crossed the USA - from San Francisco to New York.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23195087
Two new, massive types of virus are found, that are larger than some bacterial cells, and hence visible to the naked eye - Pandoravirus dulcis and Pandoravirus salinus. Virologists' minds swim with the prospect that they've been overlooking species because they were too big.
http://io9.com/newly-discovered-pandoravirus-could-redefine-life-as-827838228
Studies of bottlenose dolphins off the Florida coast, reveal that they use names to identify each other, in just the same way humans do. They don't say whether dolphin mothers use the wrong names for their children, in just the same way human mothers do, however.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20874-dolphins-call-each-other-by-name.html
August
Climatologists report that the trend of increasingly large and dangerous wildfires in the USA is set to continue, as the climate changes. You can guess what the deniers did...
http://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2013/future-extreme-wildfires-may-be-fueled-by-climate-change/
The world's first lab-grown burger is cooked and eaten at a conference, in London, UK. 20,000 slivers of beef muscle were grown over three months, each 1 millimetre thick and 2.5 centimetres long, in order to make the burger. It's pricetag was put at $370,000, but was described as lacking flavour, because it was all muscle, and so contained very little fat. Scaling the process up could lead to a more-efficient way to satiate people's meaty desires, without having to grow and slaughter animals.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23576143
http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/archive/2769/27691206.jpg
Leading Indian Rationalist Narendra Dabholkar is assassinated. Charlatans across India breath an inappropriate sigh of relief. Sanal Edamaruku has already left India, fearing prosecution under the power of the bullying Christian Church.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/08/rationalist-anti-superstition-leader-narendra-dabholkar-assassinated-in-india/
http://youtu.be/Cu4MZlnNCa8
Biologists release the first study of homosexual behaviour in insects. Homosexual behaviour has been seen in ~150 vertebrate species, and in them, it is usually caused by their complex sexualities, often evolved to enhance social bonds. In insects, however, the researchers found that homosexual encounters are accidental - with pheromones circling in the air, they blindly stumble into the wrong sex. The FSM must have a sense of humour!
http://www.livescience.com/38931-insect-gay-sex.html
Other biologists produced the first synthetic brains from human stem cells. The pea-sized bundles of neurons were unable to 'think' the way we do, but this advance suggests what might be possible for medical training, research, or CNS transplantation.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/518716/researchers-grow-3-d-human-brain-tissues/
NASA reveals a newly-discovered canyon hidden under Greenland's ice-sheet. It's 800 m deep in some places, and 700 km long - longer than the Grand Canyon. Christian Creationists have yet to explain how the Great Flood carved it, when it's underneath all that ice.
http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/nasa-data-reveals-mega-canyon-under-greenland-ice/
http://youtu.be/6Wa_ey3jGPs
http://youtu.be/kR4YTY8HQPs
September
Voyager 1 officially leaves the solar system, becoming the first human product ever to be placed outside it. So far, it has completely missed all those aliens that pass it to draw pictures in our wheat.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/voyager/voyager20130912.html
A UK gardening firm starts selling Tomtato plants: tomato and potato plants, cleaved together. Scientifically illiterate journalists incorrectly call it a hybrid.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/meet-the-tomtato-tomatoes-and-potatoes-grown-as-one/
Palaeontologists discover the oldest known fossil of a jawed fish, dating back to 419 million years ago. Creationists pretend not to be surprised.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-26/fossil-discovery-links-gap-in-evolutionary-knowledge-of-fish/4981652
The Mars Curiosity Lander discovers "abundant, easily accessible" water in soil samples in Gale Crater. Meanwhile, droughts are becoming increasingly common and severe, on Earth.
http://www.isciencetimes.com/articles/6131/20130926/mars-water-soil-nasa-curiosity-rover-martian.htm
The Conservative Party of the UK clamours for bloodshed in Syria, but fails to win a vote for it, in the House of Commons. The pro-Warists lost by two votes, because two of its members were in the next room along, at the time! David Cameron's shiny face grows redder.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23892783
The IPCC releases its updated report on Climate Change, showing new, less-pleasant 95% confidence-interval figures. It directly contradicts the obstructionist Media's claims that global warming has stopped.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23014-what-leaked-ipcc-report-really-says-on-climate-change.html
http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1/#.UsNSw7SuJcM
October
Newly-discovered fossils of pollen grains show that flowering plants evolved 100 million years earlier than previously thought, in the Early Triassic (252 to 247 million years ago) or even earlier. The hunt commences, for dinosaur florists.
http://www.mediadesk.uzh.ch/articles/2013/bluetenpflanzen-sind-100-millionen-jahre-aelter-als-bisher-angenommen_en.html
Republicans in the US government force the furloughing of public sector employees, for half a month, over budget disagreements. NASA was worst affected, with more than 17,000 people (of 18,000) told to not go to work.
http://www.space.com/23242-government-shutdown-nasa-back-online.html
Peter Higgs and François Englert win the Physics Nobel Prize for theorizing the now-discovered Higgs Boson. The Media still insists on calling it 'the God particle', despite it actually being nicknamed 'the goddamn particle' after its difficulty to find. Some theists get confused, and start thinking God lives in Geneva.
http://tapejarascience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/higgs-boson-special.html
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2013/
Investment bank JP Morgan reports a $9 billion quarterly loss, having had to set aside $23 billion to pay off fines for investment misconduct. The fines are record sums, but adequate changes to banking regulations have still not transpired.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24494888
Hamza Kashgari is released after 2 years of imprisonment, for 3 vanilla statements on Twitter. He was prosecuted under Blasphemy Laws, and was fortunate not to be executed, like many atheists have been, in countries where Religion has the power and freedom to do so.
http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/saudi-blasphemy-prisoner-hamza-kashgari-tweets-for-first-time-after-release-1.1248548
Australia experiences its earliest bushfire on record, claiming 2 lives and destroying 200 homes - its newly-elected Climate Change and Evolution denying Prime Minister ignores this fact, and sees fit to continue his administration without a Climate Council, or even a Minister for Science!
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24212-australias-new-government-dumps-science-minister-post.html
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/67354776366/england-v-australia-its-the-ashes-of
November
Astronomers extrapolate, based on Kepler space mission data, that there could be as many as 40 billion Earth-sized planets orbiting in the habitable zones of sun-like stars and Red Dwarf stars within the Milky Way galaxy. 11 billion of these estimated planets might be orbiting sun-like stars.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/05/science/cosmic-census-finds-billions-of-planets-that-could-be-like-earth.html
Satellite data reveales a net loss of 1.5 million square feet of forest between 2000 and 2012, based on 650,000 high-resolution images. Having not heard any of them fall, philosophers take to their quills.
http://qz.com/147589/the-world-has-lost-almost-six-californias-worth-of-forest-since-2000/
Hurricane Haiyan claims more than 6000 lives, in the Philippines alone. Climate Change action obstructivists immediately jump to arms, to undermine people's autonomy - to prevent anyone from thinking they could do anything about it. Evidence shows warming will not make such storms more frequent, but will make them stronger, and hence more deadly. The destruction of neighbouring Malaysia's rainforests, to be replaced with Palm Oil plantations for overweight Westerners to eat, is a major cause of carbon emissions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Haiyan
Complimenting the pea-sized brains made from stem cells, earlier in the year, researchers grow miniature kidneys from human stem cells. Again, one day, this technology could be used to develop personally-honed transplant organs. Or it might be used to mass-produce meals of liver and bacon. Yum yum.
http://www.salk.edu/news/pressrelease_details.php?press_id=648
Antarctic researchers discover neutrinos that likely travelled to here from another galaxy. They did not break the speed of light.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6161/1242856
Paleontologists reveal a newly-discovered dinosaur, second only in size to T-Rex - Siats Meekerorum - which was the largest known predator for 30 million years. It could not fly, and it does not have a blog.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/67763970610/colossal-new-predatory-dino-terrorized-early
December
Nelson Mandela - former President of South Africa, who presided over efforts to end racist segregation, and to fight HIV, as well as many other causes - dies, at the age of 95 years, with great successes seen, during his lifetime.
http://youtu.be/UxHrSU1-zJo
Monty Python get back together for a series of stage shows, in order to pay off Terry Jones' mortgage.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/comedy/features/terry-jones-still-silly-after-all-these-years-8975105.html
China's Jade Rabbit - Change'e-3 lands on the moon - the first human product to do so for forty years! It does not vibrate, nor is it a luminous colour - it is not a dildo! Jade Rabbit is the character that the Chinese pareidoically perceive in the Moon, much like Europeans' 'man in the moon'. Personally, i just see a poorly-arranged nest site. You mammals are weird!
http://www.universetoday.com/107369/stunning-change-3-lunar-landing-video-gives-astronauts-eye-view-of-descent-touchdown/
The European Space Agency's Gaia space telescope is launched. It will be used to compile a 3D space catalogue of approximately a billion astronomical objects! Sorry, ESA - that's impressive - but i think the CNSA wins the spacerace for 2013. Oh, btw, it is true - some conspiracy theorists have already decided they didn't really go. Haha!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_%28spacecraft%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Space_Administration
So, that's 2013 summed up. Like i said at the top - there is a lot i've left out - and i know it.
I wonder what will happen, in 2014. Don't just wait for it, though - make it happen - and make the most of this recurring solar sojourn.
On with 2014....
It's not comprehensive - it'd be too long to read, if it were - and it might be a tad anglo-centric, but i've tried my best. Enjoy...
January
Malala Yousafzai - the the Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot by Religion, in October 2012, for wanting to go to school but being a girl - is discharged from hospital, in Birmingham, the UK.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
Researchers successfully restore sight in mice, by injecting photosensitive cells into their retinas. This promises a future cure for retinitis pigmentosa.
http://www.pnas.org/content/110/3/1101
The AllTrials campaign is launched, pioneered by Ben Goldacre, to gain access to vital pharmaceutical research data. Medical organisations from around the world sign up almost immediately, with many pharmaceutical companies refraining, for obviously capitalistic reasons.
http://www.alltrials.net/news/
A cloud of atoms is made that appears to 'break temperature' by going below absolute zero. What it really does is to expose the insufficiency of Classical Physics, in describing very low-energy ensembles.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21728995.600-cloud-of-atoms-goes-beyond-absolute-zero.html
http://youtu.be/yTeBUpR17Rw
Researchers create a super-omniphobic material. Everyone gasps at how clean it is.
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-super-repellant-surface-material-video.html
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-01/video-liquid-bounces-new-superomniphobic-material
Quadruple helix DNA is discovered in human cells. "Wow, that's amazing" Unfortunately, it's associated with cancer. "Boo, hiss"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130120150033.htm
A sucrose-based skin patch is developed, to deliver vaccines without the need for a scary-looking needle. It means the potential for self-administered vaccination, as there is less risk of misuse or accident, and the patch can't be reused, which also means protecting more people from horrible diseases.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/44806307871/injection-free-vaccination-injectionless
February
Glory-hunters claim to have found the remains of King Richard III of England, under a Leicester car park. In actual fact, the genetic tests they used are insufficient to determine such a conclusion - they could be one of many thousands of ancestors - but who cares when it gets publicity!
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2013/02/leicester-body-richard-iii.html
Antarctic researchers discover bacteria, living under sub-glacial ice, in Lake Whillans. This means they can survive without light, in persistently low temperatures.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/07/science/living-bacteria-found-deep-under-antarctic-ice-scientists-say.html?_r=0
A meteor splinters and crashes into the frozen ground near Chelyabinsk, in Russia. At almost the same time, another meteorite passes Earth, from the opposite direction, too small to be detected. Conspiracy theorists go crazy, ignoring the fact that neither the USA nor Russia have a meteorite cannon in outer space.
http://phys.org/news/2013-05-russian-meteor-america-hours.html
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/amazing-science/spectacular-cosmic-coincidence/
Fox News mistakenly uses a picture of a lesbian couple to cover an article promoting 'traditional marriage'. Butch lesbians, eh - FSM bless 'em all!
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/42998263613/hehe-those-morons-at-fux-news-accidentally-used
Pope Benedict 'Rattie' XVI resigns his infallibility to become Pope Emeritus. The Vatican is struck by lightning on the same day, and superstitionists conclude it's a message from Yahweh. Presumably, a very poorly worded one.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21630874
A researcher of the ideation of conspiracy theories publishes a paper about it, and is subsequently subject to conspiracy theories about his study of conspiracy theories. Or is this story a conspiracy to make us think it was?
http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2013/02/26/what-happens-when-you-study-conspiracy-theories-the-conspiracy-theorists-make-up-conspiracy-theories-about-you/
Australian-based comedy group 'The Sunny Coast Skate' shoots a dance video to Baauer's 'Harlem Shake' song, starting a meme that will last half the year.
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/harlem-shake
March
The UN imposes stricter sanctions on North Korea, for conducting nuclear weapons tests, detected by seismology. Three days later, North Korea withdraws from its armistice with South Korea.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
The Curiosity Lander makes its first major discovery, examining the rocks in Gale Crater, and sends back extraordinary images of the Martian surface.
http://youtu.be/fpyRQ46fUEM
MIT reveals their running cheetah robot. Surprisingly, it doesn't fall over.
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/mit-cheetah-robot-0308.html
The Planck telescope reveals an almost perfectly smooth universe, with a mysterious but incredibly subtle pattern hinting at mysterious early-universal physics. Theoretical Physicists order new crates of chalk.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/46597807725/planck-reveals-an-almost-perfect-universe
An Italian man who worked in the UK for 10 years, pretending to be a lawyer, was convicted on 25 charges of deception, fraud and money laundering. He claimed to have worked with train robber Ronnie Biggs, Saddam Hussein, Harold Shipman, and Slobodan Milosevic.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21969624
Maurice Goeller - a Swiss quackupuncturist - is sentenced to 13 years in prison, for giving 16 people HIV via standard acupuncture practice. The I-SCAM industry does not commit to any kind of reform, and no official investigation of the fraudulent industry ensues.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/03/swiss-healer-accused-of-infecting-clients-hiv-via-acupuncture/
Companies that bank with Cyprus - a tax-haven - are given a $13 billion bailout, by the EU. And who is made to pay for this? The people who actually live in Cyprus, via a tax on their savings accounts! Protests are met with disdain.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
April
A species of fly is discovered that is only 0.13 millimetres long. Unsurprisingly, they found it while hunting for fly eggs, not trying to spot it in flight.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/49080719601/new-fairy-insect-is-mind-blowingly-small
Chinese scientists further develop aerogel to produce the least-dense material ever created by mankind. It's carbon-based, and only slightly more dense than air.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22079592
Jon Millward reveals what a real porn star looks like, and how they live their lives, through statistics. They turn out to be very 'average' - men are 5'10", women 5'5", but weighing a couple of stone less than the USA's population. That's not hard! The average female's measurements are 34B-24-34, and her hair colour is 'brunette'.
She is proportionally representative of all ancestral backgrounds, and gets into the industry at the same age as her predecessors 40 years ago - at 22. Men, however, are starting younger - 25, down from 29. They're not noteably kinky, but they are more open to new ideas, and experience higher-than-average self-esteem, social support, and sexual satisfaction. Also, the majority do more than three shoots before deciding to quit.
The research jars horrendously with what common prejudice says about pornographers and the porn industry. But that's exactly what you'd expect of people who are ignorant of it!
http://jonmillward.com/blog/studies/deep-inside-a-study-of-10000-porn-stars/
The world's first entirely-algae-powered building is constructed in Hamburg, Germany. It is, quite literally, a green building.
http://www.euronews.com/2013/10/03/algae-powered-building/
http://phys.org/news/2013-04-algae-powered-hamburg.html
In Bangladesh, an 8-storey manufacturing building collapses, claiming the lives of 1,129 people, and injuring 2,515. The profit margins of companies that used the employees' labour - like Benetton, Bonmarché, Matalan, Primark, and Walmart - were barely affected, although some did make a meagre effort to pay reparation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Savar_building_collapse
Lady Thatcher - the only woman to ever be Prime Minister of the UK, past or future, unless the Tories let people forget her - receives a funeral, partly funded by British Labour Party-voting taxpayers. They do not receive shares in her cemetery plot. Atos later declares her fit for work.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
May
IBM produces the world's smallest movie: 'A Boy And His Atom'. It was shot through a Scanning Electron Microscope, and made with carbon monoxide molecules.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/50255863508/a-boy-and-his-atom-the-worlds-smallest-movie
James McCormick is arrested for selling dowsing rods to the UN, USA, UK, and Iraqi security services, as well as others, calling them 'bomb detectors'. His crimes are recognised by the courts, but they, governments, and the Media, continue to pretend that the root problem is not that dowsing is nonsense, and that he is as much a charlatan as a friendly homeopath!
http://youtu.be/i163sq2SIHw
The first gun to be manufactured by a 3D-printer is fired. It breaks. Some others don't fire, at all. But the question still remains: is it a good idea to empower any chump/sociopath with a gun obsession, and enough money to buy a printer, with the ability to manufacture such an item?
www.newscientist.com/article/dn23493-3dprinted-guns-first-shots-spark-calls-for-ban.html
The second of twins was born, 87 days after their sister! Some commenters make it clear that they need reminding what 'twins' really means.
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/twins-born-87-days-apart/
Angelina Jolie receives a double mastectomy, due to medical advice. Epidemiologists go to town, futilely attempting to explain to the scientifically-illiterate Media what her risks really were, and why genetic screening - especially that offered by 23andMe - is not advised, in attempts to be safe.
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/angelina-jolie-radical-strategies-for-cancer-prevention-and-genetics-denialism/
Lego produces a full-scale model of a Star Wars X-Wing fighter - the largest in history - using 5,335,200 bricks.
http://aboutus.lego.com/en-gb/news-room/2013/may/the-lego-group-unveils-worlds-largest-lego-model
June
The New York Times reports that the USA spends the most on healthcare, of any country in the world, yet has the worst healthcare of any developed country. The reason: lack of universal healthcare. They leave medicine in the hands of the private sector, which forces up costs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/health/colonoscopies-explain-why-us-leads-the-world-in-health-expenditures.html?
Andy Murray becomes the first British winner of the Men's Singles competition at Wimbledon, for 77 years. It had been 36 years since a woman won the Women's Singles, 6 years since Andy's brother - Jamie - won the Mixed Doubles, and only 1 year since a Brit won the Men's Doubles.
Many newspapers failed to report this correctly, when they truncated their headlines to paraphrases of "First Brit to win Wimbledon in 77 years". Wrong!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wimbledon_doubles_champions
Edward Snowden reveals himself to be the man who released top-secret documents regarding the activities of the USA's NSA - they had been undergoing covert surveillance, spying on individuals, organisations and governments alike. All, quasi-legally. He is prosecuted under the guise of 'national security'. The spying continues, while the world waits for another hero. Bradley Manning - another whistleblower - announces his body dysmorphia, and that he wishes to be known as Chelsea Manning. A transsexual hero!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden
The US Supreme Court rules that non-synthetic genes may not be patented, with significant implications for future medical research. Permitting Intellectual Property legislation to encroach on science in this way could easily hold humanity back - practically, enforcing a form of blasphemy law, where people are prohibited from freedom of information, at another's selfish whim.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/14/us/supreme-court-rules-human-genes-may-not-be-patented.html
Bizarre stories of goblins running amok continue to come from Zimbabwe, where goblins are believed to be real. The serious moral of these stories is yet another one warning against superstition. Lives will continue to be lost, if they don't discover the true causes of the events.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2012/06/goblins-continue-to-run-amok-in-zimbabwe/
China's Shenzhou 10 manned spacecraft returns safely to Earth, having conducted China's longest manned space mission to date. But this is not their biggest achievement to come, in 2013.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/sci/2013-06/26/c_132488807.htm
July
The President of Egypt - Islamist, Mohammed Morsi - is deposed, and onlookers wait to see whether there will be any genuine changes made, as failed to happen with their last revolution.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/2013--the-year-in-review-timeline-of-major-news-stories-9027081.html
The male guppy is found to grow claws on its genitals, in order to improve its chances of successful reproduction! Penisia dentata? Be afraid!
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130724103225.htm
The London Array - the world's largest offshore wind farm - opens in the UK, in the London Estuary. Thousands of hysterical Londoners instantly get psychogenic migraines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_offshore_wind_farms
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21628850.200-the-sickening-truth-about-wind-farm-syndrome.html
Solar Impulse completes the second leg of its global flight, powered only by the light of the Sun. Last summer, it flew from Madrid to Rabat, in Morocco. This leg crossed the USA - from San Francisco to New York.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23195087
Two new, massive types of virus are found, that are larger than some bacterial cells, and hence visible to the naked eye - Pandoravirus dulcis and Pandoravirus salinus. Virologists' minds swim with the prospect that they've been overlooking species because they were too big.
http://io9.com/newly-discovered-pandoravirus-could-redefine-life-as-827838228
Studies of bottlenose dolphins off the Florida coast, reveal that they use names to identify each other, in just the same way humans do. They don't say whether dolphin mothers use the wrong names for their children, in just the same way human mothers do, however.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20874-dolphins-call-each-other-by-name.html
August
Climatologists report that the trend of increasingly large and dangerous wildfires in the USA is set to continue, as the climate changes. You can guess what the deniers did...
http://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2013/future-extreme-wildfires-may-be-fueled-by-climate-change/
The world's first lab-grown burger is cooked and eaten at a conference, in London, UK. 20,000 slivers of beef muscle were grown over three months, each 1 millimetre thick and 2.5 centimetres long, in order to make the burger. It's pricetag was put at $370,000, but was described as lacking flavour, because it was all muscle, and so contained very little fat. Scaling the process up could lead to a more-efficient way to satiate people's meaty desires, without having to grow and slaughter animals.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23576143
http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/archive/2769/27691206.jpg
Leading Indian Rationalist Narendra Dabholkar is assassinated. Charlatans across India breath an inappropriate sigh of relief. Sanal Edamaruku has already left India, fearing prosecution under the power of the bullying Christian Church.
http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/08/rationalist-anti-superstition-leader-narendra-dabholkar-assassinated-in-india/
http://youtu.be/Cu4MZlnNCa8
Biologists release the first study of homosexual behaviour in insects. Homosexual behaviour has been seen in ~150 vertebrate species, and in them, it is usually caused by their complex sexualities, often evolved to enhance social bonds. In insects, however, the researchers found that homosexual encounters are accidental - with pheromones circling in the air, they blindly stumble into the wrong sex. The FSM must have a sense of humour!
http://www.livescience.com/38931-insect-gay-sex.html
Other biologists produced the first synthetic brains from human stem cells. The pea-sized bundles of neurons were unable to 'think' the way we do, but this advance suggests what might be possible for medical training, research, or CNS transplantation.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/518716/researchers-grow-3-d-human-brain-tissues/
NASA reveals a newly-discovered canyon hidden under Greenland's ice-sheet. It's 800 m deep in some places, and 700 km long - longer than the Grand Canyon. Christian Creationists have yet to explain how the Great Flood carved it, when it's underneath all that ice.
http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/nasa-data-reveals-mega-canyon-under-greenland-ice/
http://youtu.be/6Wa_ey3jGPs
http://youtu.be/kR4YTY8HQPs
September
Voyager 1 officially leaves the solar system, becoming the first human product ever to be placed outside it. So far, it has completely missed all those aliens that pass it to draw pictures in our wheat.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/voyager/voyager20130912.html
A UK gardening firm starts selling Tomtato plants: tomato and potato plants, cleaved together. Scientifically illiterate journalists incorrectly call it a hybrid.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/meet-the-tomtato-tomatoes-and-potatoes-grown-as-one/
Palaeontologists discover the oldest known fossil of a jawed fish, dating back to 419 million years ago. Creationists pretend not to be surprised.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-26/fossil-discovery-links-gap-in-evolutionary-knowledge-of-fish/4981652
The Mars Curiosity Lander discovers "abundant, easily accessible" water in soil samples in Gale Crater. Meanwhile, droughts are becoming increasingly common and severe, on Earth.
http://www.isciencetimes.com/articles/6131/20130926/mars-water-soil-nasa-curiosity-rover-martian.htm
The Conservative Party of the UK clamours for bloodshed in Syria, but fails to win a vote for it, in the House of Commons. The pro-Warists lost by two votes, because two of its members were in the next room along, at the time! David Cameron's shiny face grows redder.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23892783
The IPCC releases its updated report on Climate Change, showing new, less-pleasant 95% confidence-interval figures. It directly contradicts the obstructionist Media's claims that global warming has stopped.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23014-what-leaked-ipcc-report-really-says-on-climate-change.html
http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1/#.UsNSw7SuJcM
October
Newly-discovered fossils of pollen grains show that flowering plants evolved 100 million years earlier than previously thought, in the Early Triassic (252 to 247 million years ago) or even earlier. The hunt commences, for dinosaur florists.
http://www.mediadesk.uzh.ch/articles/2013/bluetenpflanzen-sind-100-millionen-jahre-aelter-als-bisher-angenommen_en.html
Republicans in the US government force the furloughing of public sector employees, for half a month, over budget disagreements. NASA was worst affected, with more than 17,000 people (of 18,000) told to not go to work.
http://www.space.com/23242-government-shutdown-nasa-back-online.html
Peter Higgs and François Englert win the Physics Nobel Prize for theorizing the now-discovered Higgs Boson. The Media still insists on calling it 'the God particle', despite it actually being nicknamed 'the goddamn particle' after its difficulty to find. Some theists get confused, and start thinking God lives in Geneva.
http://tapejarascience.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/higgs-boson-special.html
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2013/
Investment bank JP Morgan reports a $9 billion quarterly loss, having had to set aside $23 billion to pay off fines for investment misconduct. The fines are record sums, but adequate changes to banking regulations have still not transpired.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24494888
Hamza Kashgari is released after 2 years of imprisonment, for 3 vanilla statements on Twitter. He was prosecuted under Blasphemy Laws, and was fortunate not to be executed, like many atheists have been, in countries where Religion has the power and freedom to do so.
http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/saudi-blasphemy-prisoner-hamza-kashgari-tweets-for-first-time-after-release-1.1248548
Australia experiences its earliest bushfire on record, claiming 2 lives and destroying 200 homes - its newly-elected Climate Change and Evolution denying Prime Minister ignores this fact, and sees fit to continue his administration without a Climate Council, or even a Minister for Science!
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24212-australias-new-government-dumps-science-minister-post.html
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/67354776366/england-v-australia-its-the-ashes-of
November
Astronomers extrapolate, based on Kepler space mission data, that there could be as many as 40 billion Earth-sized planets orbiting in the habitable zones of sun-like stars and Red Dwarf stars within the Milky Way galaxy. 11 billion of these estimated planets might be orbiting sun-like stars.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/05/science/cosmic-census-finds-billions-of-planets-that-could-be-like-earth.html
Satellite data reveales a net loss of 1.5 million square feet of forest between 2000 and 2012, based on 650,000 high-resolution images. Having not heard any of them fall, philosophers take to their quills.
http://qz.com/147589/the-world-has-lost-almost-six-californias-worth-of-forest-since-2000/
Hurricane Haiyan claims more than 6000 lives, in the Philippines alone. Climate Change action obstructivists immediately jump to arms, to undermine people's autonomy - to prevent anyone from thinking they could do anything about it. Evidence shows warming will not make such storms more frequent, but will make them stronger, and hence more deadly. The destruction of neighbouring Malaysia's rainforests, to be replaced with Palm Oil plantations for overweight Westerners to eat, is a major cause of carbon emissions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Haiyan
Complimenting the pea-sized brains made from stem cells, earlier in the year, researchers grow miniature kidneys from human stem cells. Again, one day, this technology could be used to develop personally-honed transplant organs. Or it might be used to mass-produce meals of liver and bacon. Yum yum.
http://www.salk.edu/news/pressrelease_details.php?press_id=648
Antarctic researchers discover neutrinos that likely travelled to here from another galaxy. They did not break the speed of light.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6161/1242856
Paleontologists reveal a newly-discovered dinosaur, second only in size to T-Rex - Siats Meekerorum - which was the largest known predator for 30 million years. It could not fly, and it does not have a blog.
http://tapejarascience.tumblr.com/post/67763970610/colossal-new-predatory-dino-terrorized-early
December
Nelson Mandela - former President of South Africa, who presided over efforts to end racist segregation, and to fight HIV, as well as many other causes - dies, at the age of 95 years, with great successes seen, during his lifetime.
http://youtu.be/UxHrSU1-zJo
Monty Python get back together for a series of stage shows, in order to pay off Terry Jones' mortgage.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/comedy/features/terry-jones-still-silly-after-all-these-years-8975105.html
China's Jade Rabbit - Change'e-3 lands on the moon - the first human product to do so for forty years! It does not vibrate, nor is it a luminous colour - it is not a dildo! Jade Rabbit is the character that the Chinese pareidoically perceive in the Moon, much like Europeans' 'man in the moon'. Personally, i just see a poorly-arranged nest site. You mammals are weird!
http://www.universetoday.com/107369/stunning-change-3-lunar-landing-video-gives-astronauts-eye-view-of-descent-touchdown/
The European Space Agency's Gaia space telescope is launched. It will be used to compile a 3D space catalogue of approximately a billion astronomical objects! Sorry, ESA - that's impressive - but i think the CNSA wins the spacerace for 2013. Oh, btw, it is true - some conspiracy theorists have already decided they didn't really go. Haha!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_%28spacecraft%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Space_Administration
So, that's 2013 summed up. Like i said at the top - there is a lot i've left out - and i know it.
I wonder what will happen, in 2014. Don't just wait for it, though - make it happen - and make the most of this recurring solar sojourn.
On with 2014....
Sunday, 29 December 2013
Entertainment stuff from the week 23-29/12/13
A creepy hello to my sinister and nasty readers!
The Torygraph has reported that the Cuntryside Alliance has declared the RSPCA to be "sinister and nasty". LMAO
https://www.facebook.com/SaveMe2010/posts/725625824123204
That's the same Cuntryside Alliance that represents regionalist xenophobia, technophobia, capitalist farmers' selfishness, animal-blood sports, and inter-species genocide; calling the same RSPCA that puts great efforts into actually improving the lives of animals without the terrorising behaviour of organisations like PETA and Hunt supporters, "sinister and nasty"!
Pot, kettle; kettle, pot... except this kettle's chrome. You have to laugh, don't you :-D
Here's a pretty good quiz from Richard Wiseman's blog. Have a go:
Can you cross out five letters in the sequence below and still be left with two English words?
F F I R V I E L D E T A Y P T U Z E Z R S L E
Answer at the bottom...
'Snow Falls In Cairo For The First Time In More Than 100 Years: Report'
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/13/cairo-snow_n_4441049.html?utm_hp_ref=green&ir=Green
It's the first time in 100 years, that snow has fallen in Cairo, according to the Los Angeles Times. Is there any verification for that?
I didn't find any. But it did sleet a bit, in Alexandria, in early 2013. This year!
'It Snows in Alexandria'
http://egyptianchronicles.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/it-snows-in-alexandria.html
Plus, it regularly snows, up in the mountains, so funnily enough, Egypt is not unfamiliar with snow. And because both Alexandria and Cairo are on the Nile Delta, it seems unlikely that one would get sleet, and the other not, for as much as a century!
But if there's one thing we can take from this news, it's most definitely that winter disproves global warming!
Freak occurrences are certainly better indicators of long-term trends than the long-term trends themselves, haha ;-)
No, but seriously - the IPCC's report on Climate Change has been chosen by RiAus as one of their top-5 news stories for 2013:
'A Week in Science Top 5 science stories of 2013'
http://youtu.be/07-g9HgWHxA
Every year that goes by, more pollutant pours into the atmosphere, through human activities, making the increasingly-precise predictions also increasingly bleak.
But the Climatic Change obstructionists march on, unaffected...
Vladimir Putin - Russia's President - has pledged to release from prison the two remaining members of feminist punk band Pussy Riot, the members of Greenpeace who illegally boarded a Russian oil rig in the Arctic, and "former oil tycoon" Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Pussy Riot release: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25490067
Greenpeace release: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-25524589
Khodorkovsky release: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25483856
Khodorkovsky was imprisoned on the grounds of fraud, theft and money laundering, but is considered by some to have been imprisoned for campaigning against Putin's government, and thereby being a political prisoner.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25450785
It's thought that these releases are happening now, in a bid to ease the pressure on the Russian State, for its Human Rights abuses, ahead of the Sochi Winter Olympics of Homophobia, which is planned for February. The official line is that they're being peculiarly compassionate because it's the 20th anniversary of their constitution. I'm not sure i believe that.
But don't be distracted! These are only a few people - their releases are not as valuable as a change in Russian Law; specifically, the repeal of the recently-enacted homophobic ones.
'Walking with Dinosaurs (film)'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_with_Dinosaurs_%28film%29
New Scientist has made me aware of a film, produced using the same startlingly-realistic production values of the BBC's 1999 series 'Walking with Dinosaurs'
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL50KW6aT4Ugx6C3hr36Onjvwv6NO723gI
It's not actually a documentary - it's got characters, voiced by actors, and all that rubbish - but it seems they have gone to efforts to make it realistic.
There are no Tapejaras in it, though (wrong time period) but there is a Quetzalcoatlus, whose human name derives from the Nuhuatl language for 'tail-feather' (quetzal) and 'serpent' (coatlus) via the Aztec god Quetzalcoatlus.
'The science behind Walking with Dinosaurs'
http://youtu.be/oYU_JOPzJYY
The 2011 series 'Planet Dinosaur' was also pretty awesome :-)
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL50KW6aT4UgwyxBDgijhjvZxsIxRM71d5
Here's something else that there's evidence about:
'Celebrities and health: The good, the bad, and the ugly'
http://youtu.be/8SkXqXjwwNo
I'm so proud of the British Medical Journal. Usually, presenting the truth about quack claims is left to Skeptic/Rationalists.
"Best of British", as the xenophobic bigots say, hehe :-D
Speaking of bigots...
'UK set for first Scientology Church wedding after Supreme Court rules it a ‘place of worship’'
http://wwrn.org/articles/41315/
Christian cultists opposed the inclusion of Scientological superstition as "a Religion" because everyone knows it's batshit crazy... apart from Scientologists, of course.
I think this ruling might help secure advances for humanity, overall, however, as Courts and Politicians will be forced to accept that either they treat all batshit Religion with the same contempt, or be outright glaring hypocrites.
...Politicians, of course, are fine with hypocrisy, as long as it's mealy-mouthed, two-faced hypocrisy that doesn't draw too much attention. They won't like this!
BTW, the French made the wrong decision, when they classified Scientology as "a cult" and somehow not a religion!?
The only difference between a cult and a religion is connotation - a superstitious, authoritarian, factionalistic movement is called a cult when there's a cult leader who has ultimate say about what goes on.
A superstitious, authoritarian, factionalistic movement is called a religion, when that person's dead... or never existed in the first place!
If you find yourself wondering "what the hell is this Scientology thing, anyway?" then here are some resources:
'Scientology - Circus of the Stars'
http://youtu.be/DwiYjQyu0Tw
'Stupid Things Scientologists Say - Longer, more Gay version' (And the whole of the rest of this channel has good stuff on Scientology, too)
http://youtu.be/iUSKjy3BgrI
'Anonymous vs Scientology'
http://youtu.be/cuHF_br-DBs
'Scientology- Because it matters'
http://youtu.be/550sVAr_qPQ
'Scientology vs Godwins Law'
http://youtu.be/MYG5ayrd040
'Scientology: James Randi on L. Ron Hubbard' (Randi's so old, he can talk personally about the founding fathers of Scientology. The rest of this channel is about Scientology, too)
http://youtu.be/Oj-w09kpQcY
'Gruen Planet - The Master, Scientology, and Tom Cruise'
IMO, superstitions are the best examples of marketing that there have ever been. Think about it: there's the lights, the red carpet, the velvet curtain, the celebrity endorsement, but the display case... it's empty. There's no product. From religion to quackery and back again, it's pure marketing. If superstitionists are creditable for anything, it's that. Maximally manipulative marketing.
http://youtu.be/mToinfjfZyo
...and an outright silly one. FSM bless The Chaser :-D
'Chasers War on Scientology'
http://youtu.be/_rn7NVRpQSo
And here's a story that combines quackery and Scientology:
'Miami chiropractic office must quit making its staff practice Scientology following complaint'
http://wwrn.org/articles/41373/
Well, superstitions do tend to clump together :-D
...oh, and David Cameron stole this comedian's joke:
'David Cameron Stole My Joke'
http://youtu.be/AMCQ--KMFU0
Or, more likely, one of his aids spotted it, thought "that'll go down well at PMQs" and wrote it in.
They don't write their own speeches, you know.
http://www.wisegeek.com/do-politicians-ever-write-their-own-speeches.htm
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/why_dont_politicians_write_their_own_speeches/
...saving the most grim and hard-to-read stuff 'til last, as usual...
Probably one of the most important awards to win, Brighton & Hove City Council has won the 'Overall UK Loo Of The Year Award'. Yay for them :D
http://www.loo.co.uk/news/index.php
I suppose we shouldn't underestimate the value of sanitation, however. Thorough handwashing practices in UK hospitals has demonstrated an 80% reduction in contractions of MRSA. Simple as that!
Undoubtedly, however, this is an advert for the toilet industry. And no, when it comes to my contribution to advertising them... i wash my hands of all responsibility... with soap :-D
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: mondegreen -- a mis-hearing of a word or phrase, resulting in a new meaning. Mondegreen itself is derived from a mis-hearing of "I'm on the green"
Etymology Of The Week: tipple -- meaning drinking a little alcoholic beverage; probably from Norwegian 'tipla' meaning 'to drink slowly or in small quantities'
Perversely Popular Industry Of The Week: The Artificial Skin Cancer (Tanning) Industry
Joke Of The Week: How many atheists does it take to change a lightbulb? Two: one to actually do the job; and a second to film it so that religionists don't claim a god did it!
Cocktail Of The Week: Screaming Orgasm (Orgasm + Vodka)
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
Lots of stuff, all jumbled up. Enjoy.... :-P
'YouTube Rewind: What Does 2013 Say?'
I recognised more than i did last year... is that a good thing? I'm not so sure :-D
http://youtu.be/H7jtC8vjXw8
'Why The Germans Can't Get Enough Of English Markets'
"And then we went and bought plugs" :-D
http://youtu.be/f6m9tvs3PhU
'How to train a deadly komodo dragon'
http://youtu.be/QLgs1xwlc6I
'Great animated illusions' via Richard Wiseman
https://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2013/12/18/great-animated-illusions/
'Funny bodies move like laughing people'
http://youtu.be/9MZwQdxIo1s
'Jack Dee - Unwanted Christmas Presents'
http://youtu.be/U0-bXtakp3k
'Simon Cowell: I DID start the fire (song) starring Jon Culshaw'
Jon Culshaw! He's best known for Dead Ringers's TV and Radio series, but his skills are best demonstrated in this video: http://youtu.be/zMLjQjtcjkk
http://youtu.be/9iqXbAApIVQ
'Birding at the Museum: A Tour with Stephen C. Quinn'
A tour of the dioramas, at The American Museum of Natural History
http://youtu.be/AhrniwfiYkQ
'Tabletop volcano crackles with lightning'
http://youtu.be/PaLNrA9vYgc
'How to make cheese using armpit bacteria'
Delightfully disgusting :-D
http://youtu.be/NFPYy0m-GJ8
'Bouncing Liquid'
Probabilty says this has been fapped to. Very pretty, though :O)
http://youtu.be/SstY_Usuwxs
'This Video Will Hurt'
Brilliant, and absolutely true. Although they did miss a trick: they could have explicitly stated the fact that the placebo/nocebo effect should be considered a property of the subject - not the thing that's being done/given to them.
That means it's fraudulent to claim that a 'medicine' "works by the placebo effect", for example.
http://youtu.be/O2hO4_UEe-4
'Security pants'
NOT a banned commercial. HeadmunsTV appears to be a Thai comedy channel :D
http://www.illegaladvertising.com/post/70579576802/security-pants
For people who hate staring at silly pixellage:
http://youtu.be/TyNVpvZRwIY
{Gasp! She's not even naked :D }
'Amazing T-Rex Illusion!'
I'd worked out which trick this employed by the time i saw the 8 T-Rexes. Will you work it out?
http://youtu.be/A4QcyW-qTUg
'Oil of Wintergreen'
How to make a seasonal scent, for a wintry time of year. Sorry for the guys in the Southisphere, but i suppose you could have a go, anyway :-)
http://youtu.be/VTLnNWQhSMI
'Cassetteboy V Pewdiepie'
I don't even know who that guy is, and it's still funny :D
http://youtu.be/PCLxsKpxnsE
'The Mystery of the Red Cards' - Richard Wiseman
http://youtu.be/QpvEmNKyg9A
'Gingerbread Optimus Prime'
http://twicr.tumblr.com/post/70797653430/gingerbread-optimus-prime-selected-as-a-finalist
'A Working LEGO Hot Rod'
What do you get if you put 300,000 lego pieces together in just the right order, and then whack tyres on it? A working lego hot-rod!
And look at that baby go - air-powered 0-Max in less than a second, and a top speed of almost 5 mph :-D As usual, with lego, most of the fun must lie in the construction :-D
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/amazing-science/a-working-lego-hot-rod/
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Get Naked'
A funny advert for Four Seasons Condoms. "Cum again!" :o)
http://www.illegaladvertising.com/post/69573843787/get-naked
Appropriately followed by...
'Vatican misspells Jesus on Pope Francis commemorative coins'
Yahweh's guiding hand, eh... Lesus Christ :-D
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/vatican-misspells-jesus-on-pope-francis-commemorative-coins-8873629.html
'Saturday Night Fry - Floric 19'
http://youtu.be/pgN9WIoFZPE
'Saturday Night Fry - A Lady of Consequence'
http://youtu.be/JBwpW21sfNk
'Saturday Night Fry - Into the Underworld'
http://youtu.be/YhnoYins_kI
'Saturday Night Fry - Don't Be Dirty'
http://youtu.be/T0TVOpChUnQ
''Prove It!' The National Revue company sing "When I'm 64" - forwards and backwards'
http://youtu.be/rwUUOSWThrc
'Arthur Smith singing Jingle Bells... backwards!' (my upload)
http://youtu.be/iMiNWET8nmM
'Time-Lapse Auroras Over Norway'
Beautiful stuff
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap131229.html
'Appearing camel!'
I bet you didn't know camels breed this way! Once every 6 minutes, the world camel population doubles - that's why everywhere they live is desert - they're the mammalian equivalent of locusts :-P
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2013/12/25/appearing-camel/
'Best magic video ever?'
I sense irony in the title, but contend that it might well be true - after all, Debbie McGee never gave us sideboob like that :-D
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2013/12/24/best-magic-video-ever/
'50 wonderful photos'
Yes - i like that one, too - but i also like the porpoise murmuration, and the lightning. Good pics :-)
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/2013/12/26/50-wonderful-photos/
'TOP 20 of 2013 : Part Two' - Ripley's
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/top-20-of-2013-part-two/
'Not The Nine O'Clock News - I Like Trucking'
http://youtu.be/w9lmCpIzhFo
'Mr Bean - Blind Date'
No - that's not Debby Mcgee - it's Rowan Atkinson. But they do look similar, don't they :-P
http://youtu.be/VPkh8lxnxmQ
The answer to this week's quiz:
Remove the letters in "five letters" from the sequence, and you get:
F F I R V I E L D E T A Y P T U Z E Z R S L E
F R I D A Y P U Z Z L E
"Friday puzzle"
Did you get it?
.
Monday, 23 December 2013
Entertainment stuff from the week 16-22/12/13
Hi Winterians,
So... another (arbitrary) year came, another year's swiftly going to leave, and we're all another year older, and another year closer to death.
Happy times :D
Christmas is here. Winterval's here. Ain't it Capitalised. And ain't it commercialised. Ain't it COMMERCIALISED. It's not what it used to be! Yadda yadda yadda...
Happy times :D
I can't bring myself to find more to moan about, comically or otherwise, this year. I did that a whole year ago, and this one seems to have sneaked up on me while i was doing other things!
It is tiring, for signed-up Xmas-aholics and free minds alike, to go through all these weird rituals. But for the latter, it's also despiriting - why should we have to get you cards and drag a big prickly fungus indoors to decorate, etc, etc, etc, when we see no reason to do it??
...what's that? You use a plant, not a fungus? Shit... this is going back to the store!
For us, 'tis the season to be moody. And like Levni says, it's easiest to survive if you stop caring, go with the flow, and instead see how much you can make everyone else pay for their own pleasure :-P
'"Tis The Season To Be Moody" Tales Of Mere Existence'
http://youtu.be/lBRe0xknVWo
...also, it probably helps to lace everything with alcohol. Even though, medically, that's quite bad advice!
Sarah I-know-foreign-policy-because-i-can-see-russia-from-my-house Palin is back, to enhance our festive cheer!
'Sarah Palin: Angry Atheists Want to ‘Abort Christ from Christmas’'
http://www.forwardprogressives.com/sarah-palin-angry-atheists-want-to-abort-christ-from-christmas/
LOL
Aborting Christ is wrong - but eating his flesh and drinking his blood, weekly, for eternity, and celebrating his gory method of death as a 'symbol of love' is a great idea! <s>
While everyone else tries to knuckle down to making the most of the festivities, certain Cross-tians are knucling down to their war on fun, with a supposed counter-war on Christmas.
Um, yeah - btw, that's a fairy on your tree, not an angel. You pagan heathens! :-P
'Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men and Women'
http://www.atheistcartoons.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/tistheseason.jpg
'To XMAS And Beyond'
http://youtu.be/rLjHAzqqOm0
'Merry Giftmas - A Holiday Poem'
http://youtu.be/vmH9WMnHOfw
'Top 10 Christian Fails Of 2013'
http://youtu.be/7Nx1y6ACscM
"Merry Mythmas, and a logical new year" Hehe :o)
Oh, and don't forget the Chinese landed on the moon, recently:
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/70180688705/chang-e-3-y-yutu-en-la-luna
'Stunning Chang’e-3 Lunar Landing Video gives Astronauts Eye View of Descent & Touchdown'
http://www.universetoday.com/107369/stunning-change-3-lunar-landing-video-gives-astronauts-eye-view-of-descent-touchdown/
This is the first time humans have put something on the moon for 37 years, don't forget!
A triumph of Science and Rationality, over moronic reproduction of culturally habitual ritual.
...oops, did i wander from the seasonal, Xmassy subject?
Um... no :-P
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
'Father Christmas: Draw my Life!'
http://youtu.be/wmtBom4C7TU
'Rollin Christmas'
http://youtu.be/Qota928VTXw
'Captain Picard sings "Let it Snow!"' (via Richard Wiseman)
http://youtu.be/oiSn2JuDQSc
'The perfect something for the person who has everything'
Ripley's presents some of its favourite weird presents, available to give to... whomever you wish to unnerve ;-)
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/shrunken-heads-for-sale/
'Reindeer Eyes - Bite Sci-zed'
http://youtu.be/qGJ1N-FCNwk
'Lovely, clever, Christmas video'/'Seasons Greetings' via Richard Wiseman
http://youtu.be/dzWYcnE-S7w
'Best Christmas tree ever? Exfoliate Exfoliate'
Not if you hate Doctor Who, it's not :-D
https://twitter.com/RichardWiseman/status/412146104390914048
'Marcus Brigstocke's New Year resolutions'
A lovely poem :-)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-25323278
'IGUDESMAN & JOO: Feliz Navidad!'
Feliz Navidad to you all :-D
http://youtu.be/gmWiDK7VFhE
'Holiday Emergency (Christmas Vacation Remix)'
http://youtu.be/bvWud0HaC3M
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: emacity -- desire or fondness for buying
Expression Of The Week: 'moon on a stick' -- term used to imply a will to have everything, especially that which you can not have. "you want the moon on a stick!" coined by Richard Herring in the programme 'Fist Of Fun'
Etymology Of The Week: prandial -- meaning 'relating to dinner/lunch', from the latin 'prandium' - the noun for luncheon/late breakfast
Quote Of The Week: "If it weren't for electricity, we'd all be watching television by candlelight" - George Gobel
Trivium Of The Week: Scooby-Doo's real name is Scoobert, as revealed in the prequel series 'A Pup Named Scooby-Doo'. Only his mother calls him Scoobert
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Graeme Garden's 'Red' Lecture'
The book's out now, in all good bookshops ;-)
http://www.comedy.co.uk/guide/radio/the_unbelievable_truth/special/graeme_garden_red_lecture/
'An apple a day and five more fact-checked proverbs'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-25428090
'TOP 20 of 2013 : Part One'
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/top-20-of-2013-part-one/
We can't finish this article without some oldies. After all, what else are they going to do, at this time of year :o)
'Festive greetings from Cyriak'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4ep3OIIKcM
'David Mitchell on Michael McIntyre's Christmas Comedy Roadshow'
http://youtu.be/uwpbpyYxIDA
The best Christmas Tree you're ever going to see (excluding the dalek, of course!):
http://biocas.tumblr.com/post/14504491964/madsciencechicago-the-most-creative-christmas
'A Christmas of Chemistry'
http://youtu.be/YV-8-heRM1I
And of course, The Darkness:
'THE DARKNESS - Christmas Time (Don't Let The Bells End)'
http://youtu.be/XJNWM9Qkj7s
I hope you have a Wondrous Winterval, everyone; and a Joyous New Year.
And for all of you who will be braving the tedious Xmas movies that clog up the TV programming... good luck!
;-)
.
So... another (arbitrary) year came, another year's swiftly going to leave, and we're all another year older, and another year closer to death.
Happy times :D
Christmas is here. Winterval's here. Ain't it Capitalised. And ain't it commercialised. Ain't it COMMERCIALISED. It's not what it used to be! Yadda yadda yadda...
Happy times :D
I can't bring myself to find more to moan about, comically or otherwise, this year. I did that a whole year ago, and this one seems to have sneaked up on me while i was doing other things!
It is tiring, for signed-up Xmas-aholics and free minds alike, to go through all these weird rituals. But for the latter, it's also despiriting - why should we have to get you cards and drag a big prickly fungus indoors to decorate, etc, etc, etc, when we see no reason to do it??
...what's that? You use a plant, not a fungus? Shit... this is going back to the store!
For us, 'tis the season to be moody. And like Levni says, it's easiest to survive if you stop caring, go with the flow, and instead see how much you can make everyone else pay for their own pleasure :-P
'"Tis The Season To Be Moody" Tales Of Mere Existence'
http://youtu.be/lBRe0xknVWo
...also, it probably helps to lace everything with alcohol. Even though, medically, that's quite bad advice!
Sarah I-know-foreign-policy-because-i-can-see-russia-from-my-house Palin is back, to enhance our festive cheer!
'Sarah Palin: Angry Atheists Want to ‘Abort Christ from Christmas’'
http://www.forwardprogressives.com/sarah-palin-angry-atheists-want-to-abort-christ-from-christmas/
LOL
Aborting Christ is wrong - but eating his flesh and drinking his blood, weekly, for eternity, and celebrating his gory method of death as a 'symbol of love' is a great idea! <s>
While everyone else tries to knuckle down to making the most of the festivities, certain Cross-tians are knucling down to their war on fun, with a supposed counter-war on Christmas.
Um, yeah - btw, that's a fairy on your tree, not an angel. You pagan heathens! :-P
'Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men and Women'
http://www.atheistcartoons.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/tistheseason.jpg
'To XMAS And Beyond'
http://youtu.be/rLjHAzqqOm0
'Merry Giftmas - A Holiday Poem'
http://youtu.be/vmH9WMnHOfw
'Top 10 Christian Fails Of 2013'
http://youtu.be/7Nx1y6ACscM
"Merry Mythmas, and a logical new year" Hehe :o)
Oh, and don't forget the Chinese landed on the moon, recently:
http://micro.cibermitanios.com.ar/post/70180688705/chang-e-3-y-yutu-en-la-luna
'Stunning Chang’e-3 Lunar Landing Video gives Astronauts Eye View of Descent & Touchdown'
http://www.universetoday.com/107369/stunning-change-3-lunar-landing-video-gives-astronauts-eye-view-of-descent-touchdown/
This is the first time humans have put something on the moon for 37 years, don't forget!
A triumph of Science and Rationality, over moronic reproduction of culturally habitual ritual.
...oops, did i wander from the seasonal, Xmassy subject?
Um... no :-P
------------------------------------------------------ contemporary stuff
'Father Christmas: Draw my Life!'
http://youtu.be/wmtBom4C7TU
'Rollin Christmas'
http://youtu.be/Qota928VTXw
'Captain Picard sings "Let it Snow!"' (via Richard Wiseman)
http://youtu.be/oiSn2JuDQSc
'The perfect something for the person who has everything'
Ripley's presents some of its favourite weird presents, available to give to... whomever you wish to unnerve ;-)
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/shrunken-heads-for-sale/
'Reindeer Eyes - Bite Sci-zed'
http://youtu.be/qGJ1N-FCNwk
'Lovely, clever, Christmas video'/'Seasons Greetings' via Richard Wiseman
http://youtu.be/dzWYcnE-S7w
'Best Christmas tree ever? Exfoliate Exfoliate'
Not if you hate Doctor Who, it's not :-D
https://twitter.com/RichardWiseman/status/412146104390914048
'Marcus Brigstocke's New Year resolutions'
A lovely poem :-)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-25323278
'IGUDESMAN & JOO: Feliz Navidad!'
Feliz Navidad to you all :-D
http://youtu.be/gmWiDK7VFhE
'Holiday Emergency (Christmas Vacation Remix)'
http://youtu.be/bvWud0HaC3M
------------------------------------------------------ of the weeks
Word Of The Week: emacity -- desire or fondness for buying
Expression Of The Week: 'moon on a stick' -- term used to imply a will to have everything, especially that which you can not have. "you want the moon on a stick!" coined by Richard Herring in the programme 'Fist Of Fun'
Etymology Of The Week: prandial -- meaning 'relating to dinner/lunch', from the latin 'prandium' - the noun for luncheon/late breakfast
Quote Of The Week: "If it weren't for electricity, we'd all be watching television by candlelight" - George Gobel
Trivium Of The Week: Scooby-Doo's real name is Scoobert, as revealed in the prequel series 'A Pup Named Scooby-Doo'. Only his mother calls him Scoobert
------------------------------------------------------ non-contemporary stuff
'Graeme Garden's 'Red' Lecture'
The book's out now, in all good bookshops ;-)
http://www.comedy.co.uk/guide/radio/the_unbelievable_truth/special/graeme_garden_red_lecture/
'An apple a day and five more fact-checked proverbs'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-25428090
'TOP 20 of 2013 : Part One'
http://www.ripleys.com/weird/daily-dose-of-weird-wtf-blog/unbelievable-but-true/top-20-of-2013-part-one/
We can't finish this article without some oldies. After all, what else are they going to do, at this time of year :o)
'Festive greetings from Cyriak'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4ep3OIIKcM
'David Mitchell on Michael McIntyre's Christmas Comedy Roadshow'
http://youtu.be/uwpbpyYxIDA
The best Christmas Tree you're ever going to see (excluding the dalek, of course!):
http://biocas.tumblr.com/post/14504491964/madsciencechicago-the-most-creative-christmas
'A Christmas of Chemistry'
http://youtu.be/YV-8-heRM1I
And of course, The Darkness:
'THE DARKNESS - Christmas Time (Don't Let The Bells End)'
http://youtu.be/XJNWM9Qkj7s
I hope you have a Wondrous Winterval, everyone; and a Joyous New Year.
And for all of you who will be braving the tedious Xmas movies that clog up the TV programming... good luck!
;-)
.
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