175 Times. And Then the Catastrophe.
The laws of thermodynamics, unfortunately, have no regard for human life at all. They cannot be brushed off or bargained with, and if you do not pay attention to them they can cut you down.
Category Archives: Other science
Medieval GPS?
Stone Age satnav: Did ancient man use 5,000-year-old travel chart to navigate across Britain
When did a chart become satellite navigation?
It’s considered to be one of the more recent innovations to help the hapless traveller.
But the satnav system may not be as modern as we think.
On the contrary. I think the satnav system is precisely as old as we think.
He analysed 1,500 prehistoric sites in England and Wales and was able to connect all of them to at least two other sites using isosceles triangles – these are triangles with two sides the same length.
This, he says, is proof that the landmarks were deliberately created as navigational aides. Many were built within sight of each other and provided a simple way to get from A to B.
Or, settlements were quasi-equally spaced, as the terrain allowed, because most people making a new settlement probably wouldn’t choose a site too close to an existing settlement, for fear of conflict.
Mr Brooks added: ‘The sides of some of the triangles are over 100 miles across, yet the distances are accurate to within 100 metres. You cannot do that by chance.
I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you could. Given the kind of packing restrictions present, I’d bet a semi-random distribution of sites would yield many such triangles.
(The comment about ET helping out is icing on the cake; I wonder if it the information was offered or solicited)
Give Us Your Brains
NFL players promise brains to concussion research
I trust that there are no zombies hiding on the staff at the institution(s) doing the research.
Tasty
New and Improved. Now With More Math!
What I Would Do With This: Groceries
I’ve known this for years: the express line isn’t necessarily the fastest lane at the grocery store, or fastest per item, because of the overhead of the transaction (paying, getting change, etc). I knew this even before Apu spilled the beans (Mrs. Simpson, the express line is the fastest line not always. That old man up front, he is starved for attention. He will talk the cashier’s head off.) but now someone has actual data and done a real analysis.
Check is slower than credit which is slower than cash. Students are sometimes surprised that cash is faster than credit. From my observations, the fastest cash transaction will outpace the fastest credit transaction by a wide margin but there is also huge variance in credit transactions. I mean, some people have absolutely no idea what they are doing with that thing. The same can’t really be said of cash.
I’m secretly amazed every time someone behaves like it’s the first time they’ve ever swiped a credit card at a checkout line, and it’s rocket science to figure it out. Hint: you can swipe the card before the clerk finishes scanning them!
When figuring the transaction overhead, there is a huge penalty for a non-tech-savvy shopper paying with credit. Of course, there is a large overlap with the cash paying “Oh, I have exact change. Let me get my coin purse!” customer, often a senior senior citizen. (That’s not age discrimination, it’s profiling)
Not a Myth
One of the things I had wanted to do on vacation was film a hummingbird in slow-motion. Alas, I did not see any visiting the feeder I set up . Our condo was not situated in a good spot; location, location, location.
However, I thought I had hit the jackpot while out geocaching one day, when I stopped to film some butterflies and bees pollinating some flowers. It looked like a small hummingbird.
This is probably a hummingbird clearwing moth, Hemaris thysbe.
Homo sapiens
Zoo visitors and staff have been surprised by the addition of a new and unexpected enclosure at Bristol Zoo Gardens.
A mysterious sign has appeared on the side of the Zoo’s popular Coral Café, designating the area as a place to spot one of the world’s most widespread species – Homo sapiens.
The notice, which appeared without warning this week, shows humans ‘on display’ inside the café and includes tongue-in-cheek description of the species and its characteristics.
Ankle-Breaker-osaurus
CT Scans Show Dinosaur Tail Was a Bone Crusher
To estimate just how hard Ankylosaurus could hit with its tail club, Canadian researchers examined CT scans of several fossilized tails from dinos of different sizes. Combining the imaging data with measurements of the dinosaur’s backbone, they determined the Ankylosaurus could swing its tail in a 100 degree lateral arc, and that larger clubs could generate forces strong enough to crush bone.
Erwin's Other Cat
I pointed out to Iain what she was doing and said, “Our cat is doing science experiments.”
If this were a Far Side cartoon, the cat would have a chemistry set, or something similar. But no, this is real life; it’s optics.
Thar She Blows!
Learn how to blow bubbles with your old plastic CDs in this edition of ‘It’s Effin Science.’