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3105.1412
Serialized in the thirties, novelized in the fifties, Edward Smith PhD.'s Lensman series is one of the first epic space operas.
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311324.1112
Two views of the Earth from the moon:
Lyman-alpha glow of the geocorona.
Extreme UV airglow.
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311276.1641
An Anthro-Bio-Chemist, Ott has botanically observed hundreds, perhaps thousands of plants that yield varying amounts of altered states, from a library and research lab in Mexico, recently damaged by arson. For proof of his studies, check out Pharmacotheon. He analyzes many chemical forms, shows inferior paths, and discusses policy and history. Footnotes tell the real story, and are half the size of each chapter. Continuing Gordon Wasson's unusual and maybe ground-breaking constructions of ancient ceremonies utilizing medicinal tools that altered users, Ott writes the only ethnopharmacogosy of entheogenic drugs. A chemical zoom lens into the brain. Volume 2 is delayed, but Volume 1 is a must have.
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311257.1435
Zenon Pylyshyn, Cognitive Scientist, who's discovered rotational aspects of memory.
Why is this important? It may be a key to building the first conscious language, which may in-turn unlock the brain's full capabilities.
See: Seeing and Visualizing, It's Not What You Think. Winner, Best ABA Scholarly Book, 2006
Below: Gobors have dual rotational lines, column a are snapshots every 250ms. They illustrate human objectification in motion and space.
Some think 300ms is the human 'shutter' rate.
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311221.1954
Google was introduced through books like The Search by Battelle and Googled by Ken Auletta and now James Gleick analyzes four new books, the essay is a must-read:
"The logical conclusion of our relationship to computers: expectantly to type 'what is the meaning of my life' into Google.
You can do this, of course. Type “what is th” and faster than you can find the e Google is sending choices back at you: what is the cloud? what is the mean? what is the american dream? what is the illuminati? Google is trying to read your mind. Only it’s not your mind. It’s the World Brain. And whatever that is, we know that a twelve-year-old company based in Mountain View, California, is wired into it like no one else."
-James Gleick's How Google Dominates Us NYRB
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311184.1025
"We see...what experimental facts lead us to ascribe three dimensions to space. As a consequence of these facts, it would be more convenient to attribute three dimensions to it rather than four or two, but the term convenient is perhaps not strong enough; a being which had attributed two or four dimensions to space would be handicapped in a world like ours in the struggle for existence." H. Poincaré
Barrow and Tipler's 1988 book is a groundbreaking summary of biology, physics and geology, all wrapped up in a semi-tidy box. Posing the thesis that consciousness (Anthropic) is a facet of the cosmos (Cosmological) that, in reverse, can explain the overall principle inherent in its physical make-up, their goals are to unify theory around pivots in ratios and numbers, big ticket items, that lead somewhat to a conclusion that dimensions and time-scales operate with valences of one another. It's the book you hand to someone who claims a universe is inside their fingernail. Although deeply western (their first chapters list no comprehension of eastern thinking or myths of time and scale), the book is meant to universally explore the human nature of cosmology. Be warned, Tipler's later work without Barrow enters crackpot territory as he unifies Christianity and physics with bizarre, self-centered results (he excludes other religious myths as well as hints he believes in intelligent design). Tipler's other disconnect whopper is his insistence we are the sole vessels of conscious life in the galaxy, so be wary. Although heavily built on equations, the book explains its progressive use of them carefully so that non math thinkers can extrapolate as well. Quotes are astonishing. Illustrations as well. First published in the aftermath of the PC revolution: 1986.
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311165.1216
Completely stunning. The thin line is Saturn's ring shot dead-on.
CASSINI MISSION from Chris Abbas on Vimeo.
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311164.0754
From The Economist, Hydrogen antimatter now can be stored, observed and then destroyed to examine the remains. The video attached to the article is essential.
