This kid is a genius…
Feel free to flame me…
Category: Random Rants
Google Talk Gadget on your Desktop for Group Chatting etc.
Made another video tutorial in response to a query…
[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8sKdqPHCu0"]
Musings
My feelings exactly.
More Slashdot Humour
Regarding Apple’s alleged patent infringements….
HiChris! said:
You can not enforce a patent until it is actually approved. So other people can go ahead and develop similar things, sell, and market them – and there is nothing you can do besides issuing them a stern letter from a lawyer. Now, once you get the patent it is a different story. You can sue and either get money (“forced” licensing) or get the other guys to stop. Of course the defendants will claim that the patent covers something obvious and try to get the patent overturned. Of course what is obvious now, may not have been so in 1999 or whenever Apple started selling iPods/using iTunes – so it will be fun to see what happens.
alta replied :
That’s exactly why I just filed for a patent for having sex with an android or similarly computer controled non-sentient beings. You may think this is stupid now, but in 10 years when I get my patent I’m going after whoever makes the iHooker!
It’s settled
How old is this Universe we live in ? How long have the particles and atoms collided, exchanged energies, and gone about their quantum business? The guesses have ranged from the few hundred billion years that redefine antiquity, to the ridiculous and laughable 6000 years.
And what does the scientific community do when that happens ? We build, specifically, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP). And we measure, specifically, the patterns of background cosmic radiation. I am tempted to say that this is like counting rings in a piece of wood – but I wouldn’t be doing justice to the feat.
This is the background energy distribution of the Universe – the very essence of reality that we live in. Mark Dragovan and Jeffrey Peterson observed it first using a small radio telescope. In a moment of enlightened humility, they called it “The Face of God”.
The 5–year wait is over. The data and findings from the WMAP, have been released. We now know for a fact the following :
1. The Universe is flat to an accuracy of 2 degrees in curvature.
2. The Universe is 13.73 billion years old, give or take 120 million.
3. The Universe is cold , with an average temperature of 2.725K, or roughly -271 deg Celsius
4. With our telescopes, we can see less than 5% of the Universe, we are missing the rest : 72.1 % of which is dark energy, 23.3% of which is dark matter.
5. Space expands, objects in it do not.
For a bunch of other cool things that we now do know, you can visit the technical resource.
I beleive the matter is laid to rest, the creationists have to invent another theory now, or it least pre-pone the alleged date of creation.
They’ve had it too good for too long
One of the reasons I read Slashdot is because the commments on postsare one of the best sources of geek humour around. Today I read a comment on a story about PayPal recommending that people stop using Safari, that had all the flair and passion of a classic post-apocalyptic era novel. I quote :
Well, if there’s group of users that has been told repeatedly that their computer is safe from viruses, that it “just works,” and that they don’t need to be concerned with computer threats of any kind…it’s Apple users. Sitting in their offices, wearing their turtlenecks and sipping their lattes, the only thing about phishing they’ve heard about is that it happens to other people. Uglier people. They’re not used to having to defend themselves, not like Windows users. Windows users have a battle-scarred paranoia…they’ve seen worms that can rewrite their BIOS, steal their credit cards, and kidnap their firstborn. Their 50 yard stares have been earned by fixing their mom’s computer for the eighth time this month, and damnit if they’re going to lose another computer to some Ethiopian scammer…not after the last time. Their nightmares are the stuff of Steven King novels, the earlier stuff with lovecraftian clowns and superplagues that are the start of apocalyptic battles between good and evil. Their best days on the internet involve life and death struggles against the next pop-up, because it might be their last. Ironically, Mac users have never had to live with the terror that clicking on that “win a free iPod” might just cause their computer to explode, spamming their grandmother with anal tranny porn on its way out. Maybe it’s time they should… …wait, what the hell was I talking about?
– SterlingSylver on Slashdot
Who won’t be moved by that piece, now ?
How to detect nerds…
Another gem from xkcd
Mistborn
I think I have gotten over it. I mean, I can now finally read books on a computer as comfortably as I can read them in their classical bound formats. A lot of people complain that its not the same thing….and I agreed. But having a portable computer like a laptop or a tablet PC lets you “lie on the bed and cozy up with a cup of tea”. Not to mention there are already those pretty e-book readers available , but at 400 Euro a piece, they are a bit out of my price range at the moment.
Why am I writing about this ? Well, because Tor, came up with the idea of sending a copyright-free e-book of various science-fiction/fantasy titles to subscribers on their mailing list. And the first one I’ve recieved is “Mistborn” by Brandon Sanderson.
I am only upto Chapter 5, and so I don’t really know what happens. But I am curious. Mr.Sanderson has managed to spin a world that with fantastic novelty, as well as subtly undertones that let us identify with the characters. This , in my opinion, is the hallmark of a good fantasy writer.
I shall say more about the book once I finish it…but its definitely one to go through if you’re a fan of the genre.
Darwin in Distress
This one forms part of my nature-of-religion-and-other-curiosities-department. Darwin, himself a priest, closed his seminal work “On the Origin of Species”, with the following words :
“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”
By the 3rd Edition though , the book had generated so much controversy in society that this paragraph had to be modified ever so slightly.
“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”
This unfortunate phrase has led to gross misconceptions and propagation of false beliefs that Darwin himself was a believer. Darwin was clearly on the fence, as we see in a letter he wrote in 1860 to Asa Gray :
“With respect to the theological view of the question: This is always painful to me. I am bewildered. I had no intention to write atheistically, but I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars or that a cat should play with mice… On the other hand, I cannot anyhow be contented to view this wonderful universe, and especially the nature of man, and to conclude that everything is the result of brute force. I am inclined to look at everything as resulting from designed laws, with the details, whether good or bad, left to the working out of what we may call chance.”
Viral ideas….funny how they work…but perhaps that is why every scientist thinks so highly of Darwin. While the influence of religion in early age shapes even the minds of scientists, the rational workings of the world that they discover makes them question and puts them (forgive the expression) squarely on the fence. We all face Darwin’s dilemma.
Sensationalism
A few days ago, I read an interesting news item from on ABC News, where a transplant patient seemed to completely acquire her donor’s immune system, even changing her blood type from Rh-ve to Rh+ve in the process. While this is quite astonishing, the way the news was presented irked me, and I wrote to the reporter, who turned out to be Australia’s National Medical Reporte Sophie Scott.
Ms. Scott was kind enough to answer, but left me wondering. My email was about the presentation of the article, yet the answer I received was completely devoid of any reference to the point of the message I sent.
Here is my email and Ms.Scott’s answer to it :
From: Nachiket Vartak []
Sent: Friday, 25 January 2008 2:57 PM
To: Sophie Scott
Subject: Teen takes on donor’s immune system
Ms.Scott,
This is in reference to your article “Teen takes on donor’s immune system” on ABC News[http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/01/24/2145289.htm].
While the news is quite surprising, I could not help but notice some sensationalism injected into the article caption. “…defied modern medicine”, it says. Since you are the national medical reporter, I am sure you would agree that no “defiance” has taken place here.
It was an unexpected observation, but nothing in modern medicine suggests that it cannot or should not happen. Transplantation physiology is still a developing science, especially when it comes to stem cells. As such, no physician or scientist is going to make claims that stem cells cannot migrate, or that unexpected events such as this may not occur.
What such sensationalism does, is that it subtly undermines the confidence of the public in the science – by suggesting that the science is not perfect (which is true) to the point where it is completely stumped by the reactions and that the human body simply proves the science to be rubbish (which is not true). I hope that as a responsible journalist, you would be precise about calling unexpected events as such. If anything, such events are very promising. I’ll quote Dr.Asimov to explain why – “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’ (I’ve found it!), but ‘That’s funny…’”.
Sincerely,
Nachiket Vartak
From: Sophie Scott []
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2008 5:03 AM
To: Nachiket Vartak
Subject: RE: Teen takes on donor’s immune system
Hi Nachiket,
Thanks for your comments. I agree that transplantation is a developing science. But I don’t think excitement about yesterday’s announcement would undermine the confidence of the public in science.
I think the contrary, that it would inspire people to think that what doctors thought could not happen .. can, and that would give them great optimism about the future.
regards
sophie scott