Off Topic

Filed Under #3

Filed under Math = Awesome + Stupid: The awesome part of the term “yotta,” is that it allows one to introduce terms like “yottasecond” into the vocabulary, which is 32 septillion years. So you get to say pretentious sentences like “It only took a yottasecond for my husband to take out the trash.” The stupid part is—and probably I should have learned this in college at some point—is that my understanding of a number like 32 septillion (32, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000) can not only be computed as zero, but that in French, that number is 32 quadrillion, because the French think in terms of million millions, not thousand millions. In other words, 10⁹ (English billion, French milliard) is 10¹² in French, but only if using a base 10, and if using a different (Logic) system, the number is rendered 1000²⁺¹ unless in French, where a billion is 1000³⁺¹ because I’m guessing the French won’t allow being one-upped by the British, who gave us yards instead of meters, which is why Asian countries are killing the US in math. Well that only took a yottasecond to explain, didn’t it?

 Filed under Stuff That Makes You Want to Holler: Congress first passed the Civil Rights Act in 1875, which was subsequently overturned by the US Supreme Court in 1883. That’s four-score and twenty-odd years of devistating lost progress. The ultimate irony: That law was passed by Lincolnesque Republicans, back when Republican meant Democrat.

 Filed under Awesomest Bet Ever: Dr. Suess’s editor bet him he couldn’t write a book using only 50 words. The result: Green Eggs and Ham.

Filed under What Engineers Do on Friday Nights When the Rest of the World Is Distracted by Romance: Build ridiculous working Lego factories. This video goes on for eight minutes. Don’t knock it. While still in grad school, the Google guys built Lego printers.

 

Filed under Somebody Has Missed the Point Entirely: All Free Speech area postings must be approved by the Office of Student Retention and College Life.

Filed under Skills One Can Master When the Cable Is Cut Off: Olympic Bread Tossing.

Filed under Positive Fashion Contributions from Iran: In 2010, Iran barred men from wearing mullets. In related news, the Hijab and Chastity Festival might sound like a hoot, but with no Kentucky Waterfalls allowed, it’s like a party with no Natty Light.

Filed under Stupidest Thing I Ever Heard: Back in 1999, a federal judge dismissed a discrimination lawsuit filed by a man whose employment application to the local police was rejected on the grounds he was too smart. According the judge, it wasn’t discrimination because everybody with a too-high IQ test score was rejected. Well, duh, stupid genius! The article doesn’t mention why such a hiring stipulation exists to begin with.

Filed under Is America That Racist?: Black dogs get adopted the least.

Filed under A Long, Long Way from Misunderestimated: President Garfield could write with both hands at the same time in two different dead languages.

Filed under Beginning of the End Again: eBooks now outselling paperbacks.

Filed under I Want to Say About a Million Things But I Can’t Express Myself Monosyllabically Enough for You to Understand Them All, and Besides Nobody Will Know How Pithily I Just Insulted You Anyway: Two old men in Mexico are the last two people on Earth who speak the language Ayapaneco. Naturally, they’re not speaking to each other. 

 

Filed Under #2

Filed under Claws or Affect?: Liberal brains are good for thinking about a problem; conservative brains are good for acting on a problem. A larger anterior cingulate cortex, found in people who identify themselves as liberals, understands complexity and is tolerant of conflict. A larger amygdala, found in people who identify themselves as conservatives, is a reptilian area good for seeking and destroying threats. Key point buried in the article: It’s unclear if these differences are the cause of political viewpoints or are the result of them. My hunch is it is the result of environmental factors: Growing up isolated (rural), poorish (survival-minded), and under consistent threat of eternal damnation (religious) creates a highly developed threat center; education (and if done right, religion) can help develop less of a sense of other-as-enemy, but threat assessment andunderstanding how to handle it is weakened. Thus we have our current Congressional situation: sissy weakling Democrats paralyzed by wanting to understand and compromise with a freshman class of GOP who’d rather just kill them and move on with other misdirected assinations, i.e., NPR instead of Defense, which of course the amygdala thinks needs $800 billion annually in case aliens or demons attack. If there’s anything the philosophical left brain can learn from the heat-seeking right brain, it’s how to visualize and attack rather than visualize and wonder how.

Filed under Lazy Ways to Create Energy: Sit in a rocking chair, take a shower, go to bed. 

Filed under Creepy Art: Banana sculptures hold no appeal for me, but are cool in a looks-like-its-face-is-melting kind of way. 

Filed under Maybe There’s Hope After All: By Vadim Lavrusik’s estimation, social media can help save quality journalism. His reason: even though people secretly search out the smut (celebrity gossip, political polemics) for themselves, they’re too embarrassed or polite to share the smut with others. Instead, they tend to share the good stuff, the informative investigative, hard news stuff.  David Wheeler points out that CBS News has the youngest network evening news audience, with an average age of 60, which means younger generations are going elsewhere, most likely the Internet, most likely to social networks.  The fear has been, as 20^th century journalism and media complete the last items on their bucket lists, that media would devolve into fragmented, underfunded, poorly researched, and low quality wars of ideology and culture. But maybe—oh, just maybe—always-on social networks will bring out the best in audiences and news sources. Get thee behind me, Cynic!

Filed under As If I Needed Another Reason to Lose Weight: Being fat affects your memory. What was I saying? Oh, it was that if I have to subsist on celery and water, I’d rather not remember lunch. It’s a vicious cycle,too, because other studies show too much thinking can make you fat—well, they show that brain-work and mind-intensive tasks rely on the brain’s glucose energy sources, thereby increasing carbohydrate cravings and chances of overeating. Sigh. My mom often wonders to herself (unjustifiably), “Don’t know if I’m fat because I’m lazy or lazy because I’m fat.” But my complaint is: Thinking makes you fat, and fat makes it so you can’t think anymore—you’d think not thinking would cause you to lose weight. Judging by the current obesity rates in the US and subsequent pandemic lack of thinking, that’s obviously untrue.

Filed under Royal Mind Bleep and Being Aware of the Time Warp Means You Can’t Do the Time Warp: In general, time moves only forward, but if light enters a state of zen and perfect unawareness, it might be able to move in time circles, but it won’t know that’s what it’s doing, and the moment it starts to perceive anything, it can only perceive moving forward in time. Hey man, this is science! Erm, maybe.

Filed under Eventually Misappropriated Military Technology: Though this fabric was developed for protection against noxious gases, how long you think before it’s sold to the general public as anti-fart technology?