An electron microscope image of a spider’s spinneret. Fascinating.

Pedal energy

We should see about getting one of these. Alupa is concerned about the armogeddeon. So after the bomb, or after our google histories put us all on big brother’s list and we can’t use the banking system anymore, or just generally after we run out of natural resources and the grids collapse, we should move to the country and form a real self-sustaining cooperative, with this jobbie keeping us juiced up. We can take turns : )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y5eBRWQerY

That dapper band in the background is “Pulp.” Shatner covered this song (Common Peoples) on his 2004 album “Has Been.”

This has been your VH1 popup video moment of the blog.

How to charge your ipod with an onion and gatorade.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfPJeDssBOM

How to make your own ‘zine
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Xh1W15BWCUk

How to make your own vertical wind turbine
http://youtube.com/watch?v=9UPe6A_UVPc - Part 1
http://youtube.com/watch?v=24LSnATIZhw - Part 2

How to embalm someone at home
http://youtube.com/watch?v=TYUiZxDFi1c

“Walking as bad as driving for global warming” was the headline on Glenn Beck’s show.  This ‘news’ was based off this article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article2195538.ece

“Driving a typical UK car for 3 miles [4.8km] adds about 0.9 kg [2lb] of CO2 to the atmosphere,” a calculation based on the UK Government’s official fuel emission figures. “If you walked instead, it would use about 180 calories. You’d need about 100g of beef to replace those calories, resulting in 3.6kg of emissions, or four times as much as driving.

“The troubling fact is that taking a lot of exercise and then eating a bit more food is not good for the global atmosphere. Eating less and driving to save energy would be better.”

Ok, sure let’s not bring transport into the equation for gasoline, but just for food.  That makes sense.  Secondly, beef, milk?  Both inefficient ways to get calories.  What about the energy use of the treadmill that wouldn’t get used that day?

Point is, this article uses terrible ’science’ - an actual, thorough comparison was not done.  And Glenn Beck just reported it that way without actually doing any journalistic research.  Brilliant.  The message was “Why do anything?  Everything causes global warming.  Don’t let those liberals fool you that we can make any difference.”  Frankly, the reporting was so irresponsible I was disgusted.

Apparently out space has a smell that is “a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation.” That is according to astronaut Don Pettit from his last mission into space. I think we need confirmation of this. Dillon, would you mind launching yourself into space and taking a big, deep breath? When you get back you can report your findings here.

The physics world is abuzz. This 248-dimension structure (graphical representation and explanation of its immense size) has been solved. It is being sold by a surfer/physicist (no university affiliation) as the new grand unifying theory.

if mirror neuron theorists are right, the advantages of directly understanding others may be so great that it blows the evolutionary cost of occasional self-sacrifice out of the water. What’s selected for might be the ability to imitate others, and to understand and feel what they are feeling. Self-sacrifice and altruism might be mere byproducts of mirroring and not themselves adaptive in a way selected for by evolution

I no longer have to steal, ahem, borrow a premium membership to nytimes. You can read all the articles for free now!

Thomas Friedman kicks ass…

Article

“switching to a plant-based diet does more to curb global warming than switching from an S.U.V. to a Camry,”

NYTimes article