On a platform before a crowd of curious onlookers, the scientists eagerly ripped open a box of CDs containing data from a newly released million-second-long exposure taken by two cameras onboard the Hubble telescope, and struggled to transfer the data to nearby computers as they answered a multitude of questions shouted out by reporters and…
Nobody won. Nobody even came close. But that didn’t stop organizers of the DARPA Grand Challenge from declaring an unusual race across the Mojave Desert a spirited success. —Marsha Walton —Robots fail to complete Grand Challenge (CNN) We’re safe, for a little while longer, from the robot rebellion that will inevitably overwhelm us.
Can you identify the candybar by looking at the cross section? Make a guess and click on the cross section to find the answer. —Name that Candy Bar (Science Museum of Minnesota) I gave up chocolate for Lent, so naturally I’m tormenting myself on this site. Via Page’s Page.
For decades, elementary schoolbooks have maintained that the Great Wall of China could be seen from space – but now the books are being rewritten. —China ends Great Wall space myth (BBC)
Examining the ‘10%’ MemeJerz’s Literacy Weblog) Many of my students are thinking and talking about the gay marriage issue. Johanna Dreyfuss mentioned the “10%” statistic, citing the Kinsey report, via http://www.socal-glide.org/statistics.html. I’ve encountered this statistic in student papers before, so I know that Kinsey didn’t actually claim that 10% of the population was gay. According…
Scientists have cast doubt on the well-established theory that a single, massive asteroid strike killed off the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. New data suggests the Chicxulub crater in Mexico, supposedly created by the collision, predates the extinction of the dinosaurs by about 300,000 years. —Dinosaur impact theory challenged (BBC) Other cosmic news: Mars “soaking wet…
The electric shock hadn’t hurt Jeremy very much, but he had bumped his head on a metal leg of the auditorium seats which he fell into. I had told him to ham it up when I applied the electrode of my violet-ray machine to his outstretched hand, but this was much more than I expected.…
Fantasy worlds created by virtual reality have been shown to provide a novel form of relief to patients suffering from intractable pain…. “My pain when the nurse is changing my bandages is consistently extreme… But during the time I was in VR, I was pretty much unaware that the nurse was even working on my…
[O]bjective achievements in the arts are demonstrable?and if they can be historically established for the arts, then they are even more clearly identifiable for the sciences. These two spheres of human endeavor represent two kinds of potential objectivity: there is as little chance of the human race giving up Homer or the Beethoven symphonies as…
The shooter, officer Richard S. Neri Jr., is white. The victim, Timothy Stansbury Jr., was black. Scientific research has a say here too, probing whether our rawest reflexes can be primed by modern fears based on race. —Erik Baard —Misfire: Why Brain Structure Makes Unintended Shootings Inevitable (The Village Voice)
Planning for the Deep Impact mission began in 1999. It culminates on July 4, 2005, when a “fly-by” spacecraft will release a smaller “impactor” spacecraft, which will smash into comet Tempel 1 at 37,000 kilometers (22,000 miles) per hour…. The impact is expected to create a crater 100 meters in diameter and up to 30…
Mars Express, circling high above the surface, made the discovery on the Red Planet’s south pole, said agency scientist Jean-Pierre Bibring — an indication that Mars may once have sustained life. —Europe probe detects Mars water ice (CNN) Interesting… CNN’s European version of the Mars story says “More than 40 years of Mars exploration have yielded…
Scientists at MIT’s Advanced Machine Cognizance Project announced Tuesday that, after seeing the final installment of the Matrix trilogy, they will cease all further work in the field of artificial intelligence…. “I saw Revolutions with my 12-year-old son Eric,” Markovitch said. “He saw the look of worry on my face and said, ‘Dad, don’t be…
Light playing on water drops, dust or ice crystals in the atmosphere produces a host of visual spectacles – rainbows, halos, glories, coronas and many more. Some can be seen almost every day or so, some are once in a lifetime sights. Find out where to see them and how they form. Then seek and…
Matt Hoy writes: They sell rare earth magnets. Incredibly strong and small. I ordered a bunch of them. These would be useful for creating the “hard drive killer” door frame [Neal] Stephenson mentions in “Cryptonomicon”. They sell one monster with over 350 lbs of force. I’m afraid I had to buy smaller ones, since I…
Huge slabs uncovered in Marion Garry’s garden in Buckhaven, Fife, had experts convinced they had found evidence of an early Viking village….Mr Speirs admitted that his team mistakenly ignored the finds of a World War II child’s gas mask and old television remote in their hunt for Viking evidence. —‘Historic find’ is old garden patio (BBC)
LBV-1806-20 may have formed in what Eikenberry called “violent, triggered star formation.” In the process, a huge, massive star reaches the end of its lifespan and explodes in an intense supernova. The shockwave from that supernova then hits a young star just as its forming, compressing gas around it quickly — over a period of…
At first some girls were intimidated by the power drills, but soon they were vying for access to them…. After building their own siege engine — a medieval invention to catapult objects — they launched the head of a Barbie doll, to mimic the practice of launching diseased corpses over castle walls, to introduce disease…
The Drake equation cannot be tested and therefore SETI is not science. SETI is unquestionably a religion. Faith is defined as the firm belief in something for which there is no proof. The belief that the Koran is the word of God is a matter of faith. The belief that God created the universe in…
Bjorn Lomborg, the author of a controversial book attacking the environment movement, was cleared yesterday of “scientific dishonesty” by the Danish science ministry. The ministry overturned a ruling in January by the Danish committee on scientific dishonesty (DCSD), part of the Danish Research Agency, that Mr Lomborg’s book The Skeptical Environmentalist was “clearly contrary to…