Felted Anatomy
(via scinerds)
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A graphical representation of the Arecibo message – Humanity’s first attempt to use radio waves to actively communicate its existence to alien civilizations
Fascinating.
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A primer on 3D printing from Lisa Harouni. Then, 7 platforms that bring collaborative creation and the open-source ethos to additive manufacturing.
Sick TED talk.
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In the hot countries the human being matures in all aspects earlier, but does not, however, reach the perfection of those in the temperate zones. Humanity is at its greatest perfection in the race of the whites. The yellow Indians do have a meagre talent. The Negroes are far below them and at the lowest point are a part of the American peoples.
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Cairo Citadel and Mamluk Tombs, J. Pascal Sébah, Citadel date: 1176-ca. 1218,
Photograph date: ca. 1865-ca. 1889.
(via realfakescientist)
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Has anyone seen it?
This is an awesome movie. Absolutely hilarious and so well done. And its all (I mean, all!) done by one person.
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I AM IN LOVE. THIS PRINT IS FORMED ENTIRELY USING ONLY ARABIC CALLIGRAPHY. THE TEXT IN THIS PRINT IS THE ENTIRE 55TH BOOK OF THE QURAN.Having recently read the Quran, I have decided to write the entire Book, surah by surah in these abstract images. While this project will most likely take a couple of years to complete, I hope to eventually give a finished copy of all 114 Surahs, to the Islamic Center of Murfeesboro, just outside my home town of Nashville, TN. This Islamic facility has been victim to a great amount of vandalism, ignorance, and Islamophobia on a local scale. I also plan on sending a copy to the proposed Park 51 Islamic center in New York City which has been subject to racism and Islamophobia on a national scale.
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One of my proudest possessions is the flag that the SEAL Team took with them on the mission to get bin Laden. On it are each of their names. Some may be Democrats. Some may be Republicans. But that doesn’t matter. Just like it didn’t matter that day in the Situation Room, when I sat next to Bob Gates – a man who was George Bush’s defense secretary; and Hillary Clinton, a woman who ran against me for president.
All that mattered that day was the mission. No one thought about politics. No one thought about themselves. One of the young men involved in the raid later told me that he didn’t deserve credit for the mission. It only succeeded, he said, because every single member of that unit did their job – the pilot who landed the helicopter that spun out of control; the translator who kept others from entering the compound; the troops who separated the women and children from the fight; the SEALs who charged up the stairs. More than that, the mission only succeeded because every member of that unit trusted each other – because you can’t charge up those stairs, into darkness and danger, unless you know that there’s someone behind you, watching your back.
So it is with America. Each time I look at that flag, I’m reminded that our destiny is stitched together like those fifty stars and those thirteen stripes. No one built this country on their own. This Nation is great because we built it together. This Nation is great because we worked as a team. This Nation is great because we get each other’s backs. And if we hold fast to that truth, in this moment of trial, there is no challenge too great; no mission too hard. As long as we’re joined in common purpose, as long as we maintain our common resolve, our journey moves forward, our future is hopeful, and the state of our Union will always be strong.
All that mattered that day was the mission. No one thought about politics. No one thought about themselves. One of the young men involved in the raid later told me that he didn’t deserve credit for the mission. It only succeeded, he said, because every single member of that unit did their job – the pilot who landed the helicopter that spun out of control; the translator who kept others from entering the compound; the troops who separated the women and children from the fight; the SEALs who charged up the stairs. More than that, the mission only succeeded because every member of that unit trusted each other – because you can’t charge up those stairs, into darkness and danger, unless you know that there’s someone behind you, watching your back.
So it is with America. Each time I look at that flag, I’m reminded that our destiny is stitched together like those fifty stars and those thirteen stripes. No one built this country on their own. This Nation is great because we built it together. This Nation is great because we worked as a team. This Nation is great because we get each other’s backs. And if we hold fast to that truth, in this moment of trial, there is no challenge too great; no mission too hard. As long as we’re joined in common purpose, as long as we maintain our common resolve, our journey moves forward, our future is hopeful, and the state of our Union will always be strong.
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Ridiculously monstrous partnership this, just ridiculously monstrous, now the highest for Tests between these two countries going past the one between Dravid and Laxman in that Eden Gardens Test of 2001. Clarke and Ponting, captain and former captain, all over India at the moment, who would be flattered if one said they are going through the motions. Join us at 1.10 pm local time for the post-lunch session.
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I don’t do this a lot. But I gotta say it. Vidya Balan is seriously fucking hot. Like, hot. Ok, I’m done.
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cwnl:
Could Neutrons be Swapping Through The Multiverse?
Illustration: Energy // The idea that there are multiple universes present in further dimensions of space isn’t new, but a team of scientists think they may be able to lend it some credence by observing neutrons jumping from one universe to the next.
Physicists Hope to Catch Neutrons in the Act of Jumping from Our Universe to Another
The notion of multiple universes is one that cosmologists like to theorize about but generally don’t relish proving, mainly because doing so would be very difficult.
But a team of researchers that showed a few years ago how matter might travel between our universe and others now think they ought to be able to observe this phenomenon in action using existing technology, lending credence to the multiverse theory. All they need is a neutron bottle, some neutrons, and a year.
The experiments would require bottling neutrons in an ultracold state, a process that physicists have been performing for years to measure how quickly neutrons decay. These bottles—made of ordinary matter imbued with magnetic fields—are able to trap these super-cooled neutrons and keep them moving slowly enough that they can be observed. Physicists can measure the rate at which these trapped neutrons strike the walls of the bottle and how quickly this rate declines as the neutrons decay.
In a perfect experiment, the neutrons would always decay precisely at a rate equal to the beta decay rate, but this is never the case because neutron bottles aren’t perfect—the rate of decay is always a bit faster, presumably because some of the neutrons escape by means other than decay.
Or maybe they don’t. Michael Sarrazin at the University of Namur in Belgium and a few colleagues have postulated that maybe these neutrons simply depart for another universe. They have already shown how, theoretically, large enough magnetic potentials could provide the basis for inter-universe matter swapping.
Now, in a paper available at arXiv, they’ve used decay rate data to place an upper limit on how often this might be able to happen. They found that it’s probably quite rare if it happens at all—according to their figures, the probability of a neutron making the leap to another universe is smaller than one in a million.
But that doesn’t rule it out completely, especially considering how many neutrons there are out there. Moreover, Sarrazin thinks he has a way to observe this experimentally. A change in the gravitational potential should also affect the rate of matter swapping, and the gravitational potential here on Earth changes as the planet moves around the Sun.
Run a neutron trapping experiment for a full year, and you could see if there is a modulation in the rate of neutron decay based on some kind of annual cycle. If so, that means the neutrons probably aren’t just decaying, but swapping universes as well.
(via scinerds)
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I believe in an America where millions of Americans believe in an America that’s the America millions of Americans believe in. That’s the America I love.
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Without gravity, flames act in mysterious ways. This artistic image is a composite of three separate flames spreading over paper in microgravity. Each color represents a different chemical reaction within the flame: Blue is caused by chemiluminescence, or the light produced by a chemical reaction, while white, yellow and orange are caused by glowing soot.
This image, by NASA Glenn Research Center aerospace engineer Sandra Olson, won first place in the 2011 Combustion Art Competition at the 7th U.S. National Combustion Meeting.
(Source: livescience.com, via realfakescientist)
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Scientists analyzed billions of words from Twitter, a half-century of music lyrics, 20 years of The New York Times, and millions of books going back to 1520. After finding the 10,222 most frequently used English words from these four sources, they asked a group of volunteers to rate the emotional temperature of these words… There was an overwhelming preponderance of happier words among the top 5,000 words in each of the sources.
