The Fermi Paradox

We're rare, we're first, or we're fucked.

Just read it. It's compelling. And my money is on rare and fucked. Accidents happen, doesn't mean they turn out well.

Kowloon City 20 Years Later

The Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong was once the densest place on earth, a virtually lawless labyrinth of crime, grime, commerce and hope. A Wall Street Journal documentary tracks its colorful legacy 20 years after its demolition.

Really interesting video. I was too young to ever know this place even existed before it was gone, but the stories from the people that lived there are intriguing.

Flu Pandemic of 1918 Explained

“Ever since the great flu pandemic of 1918 it has been a mystery where that virus came from and why it was so severe,” says Professor Michael Worobey of the University of Arizona. Between 50 and 100 million people died from the outbreak dubbed “the Spanish flu”, several times more than World War I, yet history books generally relegate it to a footnote.

While most of those who die from normal flu outbreaks are the very young or the elderly the 1918 outbreak was different – the heaviest death toll was among young adults, including those that had been in good health beforehand...

However, Worobey also turns the idea on its head by proposing exposure to a very different version of the flu virus primed the immune system to misread epidemic version. The finger of suspicion is pointed at an H3N8 virus common between 1889 and 1900. Tens of millions of people would have been exposed to this virus in childhood and recovered, but Worobey said, “A person with an antibody arsenal directed against the H3 protein would not have fared well when faced with flu viruses studded with H1 protein. And we believe that that mismatch may have resulted in the heightened mortality in the age group that happened to be in their late 20s during the 1918 pandemic."

King of Gore!

A newly-discovered dinosaur, which has been christened "King of gore" by the scientists who have studied it, is the oldest known member of the dinosaur group that gave rise to the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex.

The 80m-year-old fossil of Lythronax argestes was found in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in the desert of southern Utah. The two-legged carnivorous beast was eight metres long and weighed around 2.5 tonnes. It had a head full of sharp teeth and lived during the Late Cretaceous period, between 95m and 65m years ago.

Please read the bolded red pint......AND negate my last post

Since January, Republicans on the board have passed more than 100 amendments to the 120-page curriculum standards affecting history, sociology and economics courses from elementary to high school. The standards were proposed by a panel of teachers.

“We are adding balance,” said Dr. Don McLeroy, the leader of the conservative faction on the board, after the vote. “History has already been skewed. Academia is skewed too far to the left.”....

Battles over what to put in science and history books have taken place for years in the 20 states where state boards must adopt textbooks, most notably in California and Texas. But rarely in recent history has a group of conservative board members left such a mark on a social studies curriculum.


“I reject the notion by the left of a constitutional separation of church and state,” said David Bradley, a conservative from Beaumont who works in real estate. “I have $1,000 for the charity of your choice if you can find it in the Constitution.”

I am glad I do not have children, since this is something that will now be in effect for a DECADE. If you have children, please, teach them about the other side that will no longer be taught. This is f**king ridiculous, and I am so very tired of this state. History is written by the winner, and obviously, Texas and the Republicans here have been emigrated from Kansas and their superior educational system.

..via Steve is Bored

The Internet? Bah!

What the Internet hucksters won't tell you is tht the Internet is one big ocean of unedited data, without any pretense of completeness. Lacking editors, reviewers or critics, the Internet has become a wasteland of unfiltered data. You don't know what to ignore and what's worth reading. Logged onto the World Wide Web, I hunt for the date of the Battle of Trafalgar. Hundreds of files show up, and it takes 15 minutes to unravel them--one's a biography written by an eighth grader, the second is a computer game that doesn't work and the third is an image of a London monument. None answers my question, and my search is periodically interrupted by messages like, "Too many connectios, try again later."

You can't blame the writer for his opinions. It was 15 years ago, the internet was still fresh ground for everything. I remember 1995 as AOL being ruler and the internet was a matter of staying in their 'webshell' a term now completely outdated. From the original Geocities accounts, I can see how anyone would be pessimistic about the internet becoming a more comprehensive, usable idea. I am now able to laugh about the idea of the cacophony of the internet, mostly due to growing up half my life with this concept and constantly getting new ways to overcome the problems. "You don't know what to ignore and what's worth reading. Logged onto the World Wide Web, I hunt for the date of the Battle of Trafalgar. Hundreds of files show up, and it takes 15 minutes to unravel them" When you think on it, it really is amazing how these concerns are made so simple thanks to Google and Wikipedia. Poplar blogs, news sites, Digg, Fark, Reddit, etc. All the reasons that were never supposed to happen filled i the void, just as Paypal, Amazon and Facebook have filled in the other concerns laid forth.

If nothing else, as interesting an article as anything from the early 1900's about what we ould be capable of by 2000.

All the Uses

I have always wanted to see this first-hand: The full function and beauty of the Antikythera device remained hidden until recent studies subjected it to more advanced imaging techniques.

via io9

The Tomb of Cao Cao

對酒當歌，人生幾何？
I lift my drink and sing a song,
for who knows if life is short or long?

譬如朝露，去日苦多。
Man’s life is but the morning dew,
past days many, future ones few.

慨當以慷，憂思難忘。
The melancholy my heart begets,
comes from cares I cannot forget.;

何以解憂？唯有杜康。
What can unravel these woes of mine?
I know but one drink – Du Kang Wine.


According to the Zhengzhou Evening News, a newspaper based in Zhengzhou, capital city of Henan Province: in addition to the artifacts recovered from the site, archeologists also discovered human bones which are believed to belong to three persons. Among them, one is believed to be a male who was in his sixties, which is consistent with the historical chronicle of Cao's death at 66. This assumption is also confirmed by multiple inscriptions found in the grave with Cao's temple name The Invincible King of Wei (魏武王).

Wang Liqun, a historian who attended yesterday's media conference held in Beijing about the excavation, said that he was hopeful that by examining the recovered skull, the scientists would pinpoint the cause of Cao's headache which supposedly propelled him to kill his doctors and eventually led to his own death.

Painting by Li Ying-Lai

Happy All Saints Day

Or, Happy Vesuvius Explosion Day!

Or, Happy Sistine Chapel Opens Day!

A Little Late on the Bandwagon....

Ok, so everyone knows I'm a big Mac nerd. I love the software, the hardware, the commercials, the design. So, thanks to Adrian's employement at AT&T changing over our previous employee rate plan from paying only taxes to paying half a normal bill, we decided to upgrade to getting refurbished original iphones. No 3g for us, we're the type to take that phone some shmuck paid $600 for and we bought for $100. Considering I bought my SLVR a few years back off ebay from China for over $100 and had to unlock it to even work on our bands, I got a good deal. Especially since said SLVR could only take/receive calls and text messages and do absolutely nothing else. And in the call department, it liked to drop or not inform there were voicemails for me to ignore.

So we bought the iphones back in October and were not able to use them until a few days ago thanks to AT&T believing their employees are not worthwhile customers.

But damn. I have not added many apps as I like free things. But even the free apps are impressive. I'm loving having all the time instant access to Wikipedia. I love that when in Barnes and Noble a few days ago, I did not have to wait at the busy information desk, I could just log in to the Hotspot since all Starbucks have converted to AT&T from back in my day when they were tMobile.

-

To segway the above conversation, I love history books, especially about technological development or when I have the chance to read something that explains how life/places were in the past from a first-hand experience. Last week, Fark had a link about 2 women who went bicycling from Buffalo, NY to New Orleans, LA and back over the summer of 1944. It is incredibly long, but a wonderful account of their adventures. While reading it, I was constantly looking up information on places mentioned in the story to see if they still exist, especially the section on New Orleans, one of my favorite cities to visit. Having been there so many times, it was nice to see reference to some of the places I have see4n or been to, and to read about how they were over 60 years ago, knowing how they have changed. In the story, the writer speaks of a book about the French Quarter, which I identified as written by Herbert Asbury back in 1936, 8 years prior. I picked this book up in Barnes and Noble (thanks Greg for the gift certificate!), and have been racing through it tonight. Barely into 1800 and already incredibly hooked. Cannot wait until he starts in on times that lead to the modern age.

And to attach section 1 to section 2 here, I have been picking up my new shiny toy every few minutes to look up something different. Because, unsurprisingly, wordage and phrases from 1936 are no longer applicable, and much to my chagrin, not everything has a Wikipedia page.

The Things You Learn...

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall;
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again

The real Humpty Dumpty was not a person but a powerful cannon used by the Royalist forces during the English Civil War of 1642 to 1651.

Sir Charles Lucas and Sir George Lisle led the King's men and overpowered the Parliament stronghold of Colchester early in 1648. They grimly held on while the Parliamentarians, led by Thomas Fairfax, encircled and besieged the town.

The supporters of Charles I almost won the day - all thanks to his doughtiest defender, Humpty Dumpty. In pole position, as it were, on top of the church tower of St Mary-at-the-Walls (Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall) their gunners managed to blast away the attacking Roundhead troops for 11 weeks.

Eventually, though, the top of the church tower was blown away, sending Humpty Dumpty crashing to the ground, where it buried itself in deep marshland (Humpty Dumpty had a great fall).

The king's cavalry (the horses) and the infantry (the men) hurried to retrieve the cannon, but they couldn't put Humpty together again - and without their weapon of mass destruction they were soon overrun by Fairfax and his soldiers.

...From archaic nursery rhymes...viaDaily Mail>

British people are bloody weird.

Photography for the Win!

Parthenon Frieze Live!

..via Eternally Cool

Necropolis

Town of the dead, North Ossetia, somewhere in caucasus mountains. A great plague wandered across area of current Ossetia in 16-18th century AD. Clans built houses for sick family members and kept them away there, while providing with food. People died there in slow, alone agony. Once they died, the made place for others. the "houses for dying" are filled with bones.

Wonderful Flickr stream via Dark Roasted Blend