23:59 Rule

"Why 23:59 Is The Coolest Airline Rule For Travelers"

Trunk Cutting

"How tree trunks are cut to produce lumber with different shapes, grains, and uses".

Car Scam

"Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall"

Frozen Margarita History

"The Uniquely Texan Origins of the Frozen Margarita"

Robot Dragon

"Scientists built a transforming flying robot dragon".

Here's the video:

Exclamation Mark Inflation

"Read This Article!!! How many exclamation points do you need to seem genuinely enthusiastic?"

Droplets Vs Enigma

"How 2,000 Droplets Broke the Enigma Code in 13 Minutes"

Aldrin Vs. Family

"Buzz Aldrin Is Suing His Family for 'Elder Exploitation'"

Machine Learning Update

"Ways to think about machine learning"

[Off Topic] Hsieh WSJ Column On Doctors And Guns

[Off topic] I am honored and delighted to have been invited by the Wall Street Journal to write a column on the topic, "Should Doctors Routinely Talk to Patients About Gun Use?".

They invited two physicians to take opposite sides, with Dr. Megan L. Ranney of Brown University taking the "yes" side and myself taking the "no" position. Many thanks to all who helped provide quotes!

(I know that some readers might not be able to read the full piece because of the paywall. I'll see if I can post screenshots or excerpts of my piece later. You can often read the full text of the piece by searching for the title on Twitter and then viewing the piece through the Twitter link -- for example via this Tweet by Ari Armstrong.)

The link to the pair of pieces can be found here.

Faucet Plinks

"The Physics Behind a Leaky Faucet's Maddening 'Plink'"

Robot Overlord Update

"A new kind of deep-learning machine has taught itself to solve a Rubik's Cube without any human assistance."

Detecting Fake Art

"How to spot a perfect fake: The world's top art forgery detective"

Spotting Fake Photos

"Adobe is using AI to catch Photoshopped images". (Via H.R.)

Privacy Update

"Supreme Court says police can't use your cellphone to track you without a court order"

Bad Mars Simlulation

"When a Mars Simulation Goes Wrong"

Light Posting Notice

Admin note: Posting may be lighter than usual the rest of this week and all next week due to external obligations.

Body Power

"How the body could power pacemakers and other implantable devices"

No Star Wars

"What if Star Wars never happened?"

Modified 7 Minute Workout

"Can't Do the 7-Minute Workout? Neither Can I"

Bottomless Pits

"Could We Create A Bottomless Pit On Earth?"

Amazon LOTR

More details on the 5-season Tolkien series from Amazon.

Psychopath AI

What happens when you train a machine learning system using Reddit? You get "the world's first psychopath AI".

Lost Videogames Found

"70 Long-Lost Japanese Video Games Have Been Discovered in a 67GB Folder of ROMs on a Private Forum. They were found in a folder called 'DO NOT UPLOAD.'"

Armed Birds

Drawing armed birds.

Pneumatic Email

"How to email a cat". (Via H.R.)

Military WinXP

"Why the Military Can't Quit Windows XP"

The Psychology of Money

"The Psychology of Money"

Studying Videos

"Quiet! I'm Cramming for Finals -- By Watching Someone Else Study"

Vanilla Vs. Silver

"Vanilla is worth more than silver"

Male Contraceptive Update

Male contraceptive update.

How Tolkien Created Middle-earth

"How Tolkien created Middle-earth"

More Private Spaceflight

"With a simple and cheap rocket, Virgin Orbit aims for the extraordinary". (Via H.R.)

Future Avis

"As Rental Cars Fade Away, Avis Will Try Anything to Survive"

Sterile Neutrino?

"Evidence Found for a New Fundamental Particle":

The MiniBooNE experiment has detected far more neutrinos of a particular type than expected, a finding that is most easily explained by the existence of a new elementary particle: a “sterile” neutrino that’s even stranger and more reclusive than the three known neutrino types. The result appears to confirm the anomalous results of a decades-old experiment that MiniBooNE was built specifically to double-check.

What Is Li-Fi?

"What Is Li-Fi? The New Alternative To Wi-Fi"

Secret Government Phone Tracker

"How a Hacker Proved Cops Used a Secret Government Phone Tracker to Find Him, And how it might change what cops can do with our smartphones"

Regenerating Dental Enamel

"New material regenerates dental enamel". (Via H.R.)