NickPost

AAAAaaahhhdorable

Carl Sagan sings

A Glorious Dawn featuring Stephen Hawking.

Sand animation

Just found this link on Reddit: the winner of Ukraine's Got Talent in 2009, this 'sand animation' depicting the invasion of Ukraine doing World War II. It's very touching, even for somebody unfamiliar with the cultural symbols depicted. A lot of folks in the crowd are moved to tears. I've never heard of this medium before, but it's a lot of fun to watch.

More randomness from the Internet: Adam

http://mediafetcher.com/article_full.php?id=112369

EntertainMe: The Nick Thread

Annoy me: The Eben Thread

If you remember from the ill fated PbP boards, Nick and I had dueling threads. I would like to revive some of that via the post labels. I suggest labeling entertaining posts as "entertainme" or "nickthread" and annoying posts as "annoyme" or "ebenthread."
You know, for kids!


Anyhow, the reason for the season is this here link.

Yes, I do have a fever right now, why do you ask?

Autism as specialization

There's a short piece on Wired about this guy who started a company that searches for bugs in other peoples' software. The interesting thing is that the company employs mostly autistic individuals, whom he believes have an advantage doing this kind of work.

AIDS vaccine

AIDS vaccine

Schizophrenia

I have a love affair with comics that explain things, and this is a particularly good one. Presumably made by an afflicted individual, it discusses the nature of schizophrenia in society and from the perspective of a sufferer.

A Reminder:

Robo Geisha

From the country i love the most comes the movie i understand the least...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo-gGes6qig

President Obama Wan Kenobi

Noam Chomsky: a little cynical about US foreign policy

... and in particular, US/Latin American relations and the 'War on Drugs'. Makes for an interesting read, especially since there is almost no outlet for these views in the MSM.

Also, Chomsky is obviously a stylish dude.

Another win for science

You know how the widespread use of antibiotics has caused a wide spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria? Researchers at NYU have discovered a mechanism responsible for much of this trait: an enzyme that produces nitric oxide. Armed with this information, current drugs can be made more potent and even work against infections that were formerly immune.

Texts From Last Night Dot Com

I know all of you computer literate folks have probably already heard of this site, but this here is gold.

(480): You were running around the house covered in syrup, with shredded down pillow feathers on your body screaming "AFLACK!" at everyone.

Turns out economists aren't perfect

...and neither are the markets. Paul Krugman recently published a piece in the NYT saying what he's been saying for a while: the dominant school of economic thought in the US, which dictates that markets are perfectly efficient and investors are perfectly rational, might be a little inaccurate.

He presents an interesting story about the academic culture in the economics world with respect to dissenting opinions; the audience at conferences will begin to talk and giggle if a presenter appears to take a Keynesian standpoint. The dogma of the perfectly efficient market is never questioned, even when evidence suggests otherwise. Naturally, Krugman has his own biases and the article is a simplifcation for layfolk, but I find it truly unsettling that this powerful, high-paid people in charge of vast sections of the economy simply don't accept that people and corporations do not always act rationally.

Placebo

Apparently, an increasing number of promising drugs have failed the standard double-blind placebo test in recent years. Part of the reason is that the placebo effect is getting stronger.

The article explains that though placebos are crucial to the practice of medical science, they have never been thoroughly studied until recently. This article answers a lot of interesting questions:

-Why it matters where you conduct your study

-Why aspirin doesn't work as well on alzheimer's patients

-Why antidepression medication works better in conjunction with therapy (or analrapy)

-Why Dr. House may in fact not be such a great physician at times (he is pretty good when he is tasked by the writers of the show to do some lengthy exposition to the patient; he is not so good when he is acting imperious and unapproachable, or stabby)

-Whether 'nocebo' is a real word

Hobo Code

The one that was not discovered by John
Hodgeman.

MacGyver!

If you have some (lots of) time, you can watch MacGyver at CBS.

Only a matter of time

Before we have these things rampaging through our neighborhoods murdering children. CHILDREN!

http://www.wired.co.uk/wired-magazine/archive/2009/09/start/the-robot-lumberjack-fire-fighter.aspx