Does this theme sound familiar? It’s from a 1942 film…
Does this theme sound familiar? It’s from a 1942 film called KING’S ROW.
via Tumblr http://cameronreilly.tumblr.com/post/64069814063
If you like jazz but have never heard this album from Leonard…
If you like jazz but have never heard this album from Leonard Bernstein, where he explains, in his own inimitable style, the history of and concepts behind jazz, then you have missed out. This album was my first introduction to the wonders of Bernstein and massively increased my appreciation of jazz. Bernstein was a brilliant educator – and not only regarding classical music.
via Tumblr http://cameronreilly.tumblr.com/post/63975394932
Rather than savage cuts, Switzerland considers “Star Trek” economics – Salon.com
Rather than savage cuts, Switzerland considers “Star Trek” economics – Salon.com:
What would you do differently if the government regular paid you a basic living wage every month, no strings attached?
via Tumblr http://cameronreilly.tumblr.com/post/63957297527
Really?!
Really?!
via Tumblr http://cameronreilly.tumblr.com/post/63916784959
Nanotube-Coated Spider Silk Might Spawn New Electronics
Spider silk is the toughest known material made by organisms, more than 10 times stronger than Kevlar. Now scientists have enhanced it with carbon nanotubes, making it even tougher than normal spider silk and electrically conductive as well, findings that could lead to novel silk-based electronics.
The natural fiber’s strength makes it potentially valuable in a wide range of commercial applications. Researchers are also investigating its medical potential— for instance, they might find use in artificial skin or synthetic tendons.
It can also contract greatly, suggesting it could serve in artificial muscles for robots or prosthetic limbs. For instance, a spider silk fiber only 1 millimeter thick could lift a 5 kilogram weight, suggesting it can carrying out 50 times more work than a comparable amount of biological muscle.
via Tumblr http://cameronreilly.tumblr.com/post/63916508726
Tim Minchin’s Grad Speech
Brilliant and profound speech by everyone’s favourite comedian-pianist-actor (and the best thing about the woeful most-recent season of Californication), Tim Minchin.
“Searching for meaning is like searching for a rhyme scheme in a cookbook: you won’t find it and you’ll bugger up your soufflé.”
Using Siri, iOS Reminders and Evernote Together
I’ve discovered a better way to create notes for Evernote using iOS. Check it out.
Deer Hunting With Jesus
Joe Bageant wrote “Deer Hunting With Jesus”, the best explanation I’ve yet read for why poor Americans vote against their own best interests. This interview recorded shortly before he died is worth watching.
Introducing The Amplituhedron
This is the most exciting physics article I’ve read all year!
“Physicists have discovered a jewel-like geometric object that dramatically simplifies calculations of particle interactions and challenges the notion that space and time are fundamental components of reality.”
It’s called the amplituhedron.
Why is it so exciting?
“The revelation that particle interactions, the most basic events in nature, may be consequences of geometry significantly advances a decades-long effort to reformulate quantum field theory, the body of laws describing elementary particles and their interactions. Interactions that were previously calculated with mathematical formulas thousands of terms long can now be described by computing the volume of the corresponding jewel-like “amplituhedron,” which yields an equivalent one-term expression.”
The suggestion is that space and time – until now considered the very fundamentals of the universe – may be illusory and, instead, a property of the amplituhedron.
Bucky Fuller and Plato both always thought the universe would one day be explained by the properties of geometry. Looks like they might have been right!
From Peer Gynt to Gershwin to Inspector Gadget
I’m sure I’ve made this connection before, but it just hit me again this morning (the benefit of having no long term memory). I’m not sure who copied from whom, but I was listening to Gershwin this morning and it clicked. Gershwin’s “Sweet And Lowdown” rips off the theme from Grieg’s Peer Gynt “In The Hall Of The Mountain King”.
(kicks in after 51 seconds)
And then Shuki Levy ripped off one or the other of them for the Inspector Gadget theme.
GO, GO GADGET RIP-OFF.