Musician Uses Sound to Manipulate Tesla Coil, Fire, and Matter

Spectacular visuals: "Musician Uses Sound to Manipulate Tesla Coil, Fire, and Matter". (Via J.B.)

Google Glass Is Dead; Long Live Smart Glasses

"Google Glass Is Dead; Long Live Smart Glasses"

App To Protect Your French Fries

"McDonald's Has Released An App To Protect Your French Fries".  Here's the iTunes link.

Mathematical Time Law Governs Crowd Flow

"Mathematical Time Law Governs Crowd Flow"

The First Object Has Been 3D Printed In Space

Alex Knapp: "The First Object Has Been 3D Printed In Space".

As David Jilk noted online, it's appropriately meta: "a faceplate for a printhead extruder on the printer itself".

Ranking of Thanksgiving Sides

"A definitive ranking of Thanksgiving sides".

Includes the crucial Availability Theorem and Leftover Theorem.  (Click through to see all the graphs.) 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Light Posting

Admin note: Posting may be light for the rest of the week due to the US holiday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

[Update: Typo fixed!]

[Off Topic] Hsieh Forbes Column: "How Mandatory Calorie Labeling Hurts Consumers"

[Off Topic] My pre-Thanksgiving Forbes column is up, "How Mandatory Calorie Labeling Hurts Consumers".

If the FDA wants a "War On Bacon", I know what side I'm on!

Full Duplex For Cell Phones

"Simple Circuit Could Double Cell Phone Data Speeds". (Via H.R.)

When Should You Book That Flight?

"So when should you book that flight? The truth on airline prices"

Robot Bartenders

"I spent a weekend on a cruise ship staffed by robot bartenders"

Real Life Spider-Man Gloves

"Watch This Scientist Climb a Wall in Gecko-Inspired Spider-Man Gloves"

Photography Is Not A Crime: Denver Edition

Denver Police Department seizes legal recording showing apparent misconduct, file "disappears", but saved on cloud server.

Printable Lighting

"Rohinni's Lightpaper Is Incredibly Thin, And Printable"

Candy Crush's Puzzling Mathematics

Candy Crush's Puzzling Mathematics

You Might Be Surprised When You Take Your Temperature

NPR: "You Might Be Surprised When You Take Your Temperature"

How Many Melodies Are There?

"How many melodies are there?" (Via H.R.)

Building Christopher

"How Designers Recreated Alan Turing's Code-Breaking Computer for Imitation Game"

Super-Intelligent Humans Are Coming

"Super-Intelligent Humans Are Coming"

More Memory

Ars Technica: "Researchers craft molecule that works as flash storage". (Via H.R.)

How To Fold The World's Best Paper airplane

How to fold the world's best paper airplane.

Extreme Commuting

"Extreme commute: From New Zealand to rural Iceland".  (Via Tyler Cowen.)

New Tool Detects Spyware Used By Governments

"New Tool Detects Spyware Used By Governments"

The Secret Life of Passwords

NYT: The Secret Life of Passwords

Cheap, Painless Blood Tests

"Every Walgreens Is About to Offer Cheap, Painless Blood Tests". (Via H.R.)

Interview With Sculptor Michael Wilkinson,

Linda Cordair interviews sculptor Michael Wilkinson.

Why Coffee Is More Prone to Spills Than Beer

"Physicists Explain Why Coffee Is More Prone to Spills Than Beer"

NYT On Randi

The New York Times has a nice in-depth profile of James Randi, magician and defender of reason. Randi has done a magnificent job over the years debunking bogus paranormal claims.

Lawyers Using Fitbit Data In Personal Injury Cases

Forbes: Lawyers have started using Fitbit data in personal injury cases.

10 Science Fiction Tropes We Will Never Get Tired Of

"10 Science Fiction Tropes We Will Never Get Tired Of"

Zoom Into A Computer Chip

"Zoom into a computer chip: Watch this video to fully appreciate just how magical modern microchips are".

As the article notes, this isn't even a state-of-the-art advanced chip.

Daily Aspirin May Not Prevent Heart Attacks

"Daily Aspirin May Not Prevent Heart Attacks"

London Taxi Driver Test

NYT: "The Knowledge, London's Legendary Taxi-Driver Test, Puts Up a Fight in the Age of GPS". (Via G.B.)

Navy Laser

"US Navy Deploys Its First Laser Weapon in the Persian Gulf":

The laser can be adjusted to fire a non-lethal dazzling flash at an incoming vessel so they know it’s there “all the way to lethal,” [Rear Admiral] Klunder said. The laser’s range is classified. 

Interview With Mark Weir (Author Of The Martian)

Ars Technica has a great interview with Mark Weir, author of The Martian.

This was one of my favorite summer SF reads, and I'm glad it's being made into a movie.  (Via Howard R.)

Pixar Animation Math

"Interested In The Math Of Pixar's Animation? This Video Is Must-Watch"

NZ Gets No Respect

"World Maps Without New Zealand"

How Did The Enigma Machine work?

"How did" the Enigma machine work?" A nice clear, nonmathematical explanation.

Here's the graphic from the article, below (click through to see full sized).  And a positive review from IEEE of the upcoming movie, The Imitation Game.

Sonar Watch

"Researchers Develop $60 Sonar 'Watch' to Help Blind People Navigate". (Via Howard R.)

How Much Does Google Glass Distract You While Driving?

"How Much Does Google Glass Distract You While Driving?"

Smart (Or Too-Smart) Bombs?

NYT: "Arms makers have crossed into troubling territory: They are developing weapons that rely on artificial intelligence, not human instruction, to decide what to target and whom to kill."

Regarding ShirtGate

Overall his shirt would have been considered inappropriate at a lot of workplace (including my own).

OTOH, I do tend to cut techie/geeky people some slack with respect to their intentions. I don't think he meant to deliberately send an anti-woman message. Rather, it's more like if he had worn a t-shirt with one of those retro Wonder Woman images on it -- wearing a costume meant to highlight her anatomy, but clearly inconvenient for fighting actual supervillains (see below).

Taylor undoubtedly thought his shirt was non-offensive, even if others might see it differently. In turn,  I might have regarded his shirt as worthy of a couple of minor eyerolls, then moving on.

I've been very surprised at the intensity and vehemence of the attacks against Taylor. I get what his critics are objecting too, but there seems something oddly disproportionate about the reaction relative to the magnitude of his deed. And I think that reflects something unhealthy about our culture -- but which I don't quite have a full handle on.

Update: For some reason, I had the scientist's name wrong -- it should be Taylor, not Martin!

Update #2: I wanted to post this thoughtful dissenting response from a female friend who is also a programmer (quoted with her permission):

I've worked with a lot of clueless poorly dressing geeks... Not a single one of them would wear a shirt like that to work. If they did their manager would do his job and tell them to change. The bigger problem here isn't that a lone man wore the shirt. It's that his management let him wear it on national TV... And if he is a manager then he should have known better.

As to why people would blow up over it?? The fact that it so casually was allowed to happen and so many of you think it's not a big deal is why. I've been lucky to not have to deal with the sexism that my fellow female programmers have had to.. But I know in the wrong company or place it is there.

This man took an amazing scientific achievement and at the same time knowingly or unknowingly slapped down thousands of woman who have worked to keep that type of imagery out of their work place. How the $&@? Can I let my little girls see that news conference with that shirt? People aren't yelling to destroy the achievement. They are yelling because they are shocked it was allowed to happen with such an achievement. The achievement deserved honor and not degrading imagery.

Imagine if it had been men in speedos or something that made another race look stupid. Would you still think it not a big deal? Women are extra angry because when it should be getting better junk like this keeps happening... And so many just give us the "oh there she goes again overreacting" stereotype.

Injunction To Enforce Godwin's Law?

Eugene Volokh: "Can one get an injunction to enforce Godwin's Law?"

Update: Link was broken -- fixed now!

Smart LED Bulb Knows When Someone Falls

"Smart LED Bulb Knows When Someone Falls":

The bulb has a 24 GHz milliwave radar, developed by Panasonic, pointing downward that can measure the distance to a person’s skull below it. If this distance suddenly and rapidly increases, the bulb assumes someone fell and uses an on-board networking chip to send a signal that can be picked up by a professional service or relayed to family or caretakers.

The bulb hanging at 3 meters above ground can cover an area of 13.2 square meters (142 sq ft). Having these bulbs throughout the house should be sufficient to cover most of the living space where accidents can happen.

Snow Rollers

"Snow Rollers: Nature's Winter Treat"

Universal Mobile Keyboard

This Universal Mobile Keyboard from Microsoft looks pretty good. And gets good reviews on Amazon.

Honest Academic Citation

"This Is What Happens When No One Proofreads an Academic Paper"

Not sure how this made it through proofreading, peer review, and copyediting. Via http://t.co/sWaswaM2X4 #addedvalue pic.twitter.com/8krLlvthAr
— Dave Harris (@davidjayharris) November 10, 2014

Gorgeous Time Lapse Of The Sun

"Gorgeous time lapse of the Sun"

xkcd On No-Rules NASCAR

xkcd: "If you stripped away all the rules of car racing and had a contest which was simply to get a human being around a track 200 times as fast as possible, what strategy would win? Let's say the racer has to survive."

Bostrom at Berkeley

"A video has been posted by Book TV of a talk by Nick Bostrom, a professor, Oxford University, about his book, Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, where he posits a future in which machines are more intelligent than humans and questions whether intelligent machines will try to save or destroy us.

Direct link to C-SPAN video.

Princess Leia Gets Catcalls From 'Star Wars' Characters

"Dark side of the walk: Princess Leia gets catcalls from Star Wars characters"

This isn’t the catcalling video you’re looking for. Actually, maybe it is.

Youtube user Are We There Yet? made a Star Wars-themed version of this now-famous GoPro video — in which we learn that even Leia Organa, princess of Alderaan, isn't immune to catcalling on the streets of New York. Watch as Leia is followed by a familiar bounty hunter and hollered at by Yoda, Han Solo, Lando Calrissian, a gang of Jawas, an anonymous Stormtrooper and Darth Vader.

Secret Cameras At Harvard

NYT: "Secret Cameras Rekindle Privacy Debate at Harvard"

Astronauts Put A Camera Inside An Orb Of Water

"Maybe you've seen videos of astronauts playing with floating blobs of water, but how about a video shot from inside the watery blob? That's just what we have here..."

Cyborg Cockroaches

"Cyborg Cockroaches Could Save Your Life":


If you're trapped under the rubble of a collapsed building, the last thing you want to see is a swarm of cockroaches headed your way. But thanks to a group of North Carolina State University researchers, those creepy crawlies could just save your life.

The scientists have developed a technology allowing cyborg cockroaches, or biobots, to pick up and seek out sounds with a miniscule microphone, meant to help emergency personnel in the aftermath of a disaster.

(Click through to see video.)

Kids React To Old Cameras

"Kids React To Old Cameras"

What North America Would Look Like On Other Planets

"Here's What North America Would Look Like On Other Planets"

On Jupiter and on Mars:

Asimov's "Foundation" trilogy coming to HBO.

"Interstellar's Jonah Nolan Developing Foundation Series for HBO, WBTV"

Italian Seismologists Cleared of Manslaughter

Nature: "Italian seismologists cleared of manslaughter".

I'm glad rationality finally prevailed!

The True Stories Behind Classic Fairy Tales

"The True Stories Behind Classic Fairy Tales"

FB Gives Users More Control Over Newsfeed

"How Facebook Will Allow Users to Change Their News Feeds"

3D Dodo

Scientists make the first 3D scan of a dodo bird. (Via Debby Witt.)

The 36 People Who Run Wikipedia

"The 36 People Who Run Wikipedia"

Balance Wizard

"Man/wizard balances objects on seemingly impossible positions". (Via H.R.)

The Bullet That Could Make 3-D Printed Guns Practical Deadly Weapons

Wired: "The Bullet That Could Make 3-D Printed Guns Practical Deadly Weapons"

Exchange Encrypted Messages on Any Website

"Browser Extension Brings Encrypted Messaging to Facebook, Twitter, and Any Other Website"

Knockout Models Email This Entry

Human genetic knockout models. (Via Howard R.)

3D-Printed Organ Update

CNN: "3D-printed organs are on the way"

AI >> High School Senior

WSJ: "Artificial Intelligence Outperforms Average High School Senior"

Confessions of a Smartphone Thief

CNET: "Confessions of a smartphone thief"

Snake Knots

"Can a snake tie itself into a knot it can't get out of?"

Foldable OLED For Pocket-Friendly Tablets

"Three-fold OLED touchscreen paves way for tablets that fold up to phone size"

How Uber Is Changing Night Life in Los Angeles

NYT: "How Uber Is Changing Night Life in Los Angeles"

A night out in Los Angeles used to involve negotiating parking, beating traffic and picking a designated driver. Excursions from one end to the other — say, from the oceanfront city of Santa Monica to the trendy Silver Lake neighborhood on the eastern side — had to be planned and timed with military precision, lest they spiral into a three-hour commute. More often than not, they were simply avoided.

“Before Uber was a thing, I would rarely go to Hollywood,” said Drew Heitzler, an artist who lives in Venice, a potentially treacherous drive away. “The prospect of going to Hollywood on a weekend night, if I was invited to a party or an art event, it just wouldn’t happen. I would just stay home.”

Now Mr. Heitzler, 42, uses the ride-sharing app at least weekly, gladly leaving his car behind when he socializes. “In Los Angeles, you have the ubiquitous D.U.I. checkpoints everywhere,” he said. “If you’re going to go to a party, you either don’t drink or you Uber there and Uber back, and problem solved.”

Sex After Ebola

"Ebola Survivors and Sex".

Short answer: No unprotected sex for 3 months, instead use a condom.

Smart Spoon

"Food bland? Electric spoon zaps taste into every bite"

Ultrasound-On-a-Chip

"Will ultrasound-on-a-chip make medical imaging so cheap that anyone can do it?"

Speaking as a radiologist, I think this is a very encouraging development.  It could make it much cheaper to acquire images.

However, getting medically useful images also requires a certain amount of skill (which is why sonographers still need to go to school).  And interpreting them accurately is still non-trivial.  So I don't think "anyone" will be able to do it.  But it could help a lot of people, especially in remote areas or in time-sensitive emergency settings.  (Link via Howard R.)

[Off Topic] Hsieh Forbes Column: Who Hasn't Gotten Ebola

[Off topic] My latest post in Forbes discusses some important groups of people who have not contracted Ebola and now have the green light to resume their normal lives: "Who Hasn't Gotten Ebola".

Twitter-Augmented Memory

"This Man Uses Twitter To Augment His Damaged Memory". (Via Trey P.)

Butter Size

"Why are sticks of butter long and skinny in the East, but short and fat in the West?"

900 Classic Arcade Games On Internet Archve

"Internet Archive now lets you play 900 classic arcade games":

The Internet Archive, a non-profit best known for backing up web pages, has added a collection of 900 video games from the 1970s to 1990s that can be played in your web
browser — no coins required...

Called the Internet Arcade, the collection includes familiar games such as Astro Invader and Pac Man, as well as more obscure titles from that era. Most include detailed background histories and links to play in the browser.

Giant Spider Web

"4-Acre Spider Web Engulfs Building"

Ridiculous Right-To-Be-Forgotten Request

"Pianist asks The Washington Post to remove a concert review under the E.U.'s ‘right to be forgotten' ruling"

Alternate WWI

"11 Intriguing Ways World War I Could Have Turned Out Differently"

Podcast Renaissance

"What's Behind the Great Podcast Renaissance?"

Enigma Simulator

"Enigma Simulator is a program that simulates the use of Enigma ciphering machines that were commonly used by Nazi Germany during World War II."

Don't Fart During an MRI

You have been warned: "Don't Fart During an MRI"