June 3, 2008
MetaCognition
You know the feeling that something is on the tip of your tongue? It offers deep insights into the nature of the mind. [Via The Frontal Cortex]
A moment in history; Obama Wins Presidential Nomination.
It's official. Obama has won the Democratic Party nomination for the US Presidency. In response, McCain has launched a "verbal sortie" against him and the media has already begun disecting Hillary's campaign.
The story of a giant rabbit
Insert Office Space Jokes here. Or don't.
When they grab you with those metal claws, you can't break free. Because they're made of metal. And robots are strong.
Build a robot for less than $50! Create your own evil robot of doom! Make an adorable red ladybug bot! Or a coat-hanger bot! Or another $50 robot! Or a 2-hour, $85 bot excellent for beginners! [more inside]
You mean they read?
"I can only answer in the negative: I want them not to read The New York Times, while subscribing to The Financial Times." The New York Times book review asks various writers for their suggested required reading for each of the three presidential candidates.
John Prine
John Prine released John Prine in 1971 with the songs Illegal Smile, Spanish Pipedream, Hello In There, Sam Stone, Paradise, Pretty Good, Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore, Far From Me, Angel From Montgomery, Quiet Man, Donald & Lydia, Six O'clock News and Flashback Blues. An interview from 1971.
Old Weird Europe
German newspaper Der Spiegel decided to take a look at Europe's oddest folk traditions and festivals. Perhaps you can have a metaphorical hard-on for the phallus festival of Tyrnavos, Greece. Maybe you're hungry for how a small Belgian town celebrates the practice of swallowing live fish. Or, alternately, you can look down on those bizarre practices... while chasing a giant wheel of cheese down a hill. [more inside]
The Amazing Race
The Great NYC Commuter Race! A short by Streetfilms about Transportation Alternatives' annual event that pits a cyclist against a car and a straphanger in a race to Union Square from Fort Greene. Guess who wins?
The Light The Dead See
30 years ago today, Frank Stanford, a young Arkansaw poet shot himself three times in the heart with a 22-caliber pistol. He was 29. By then he had become a powerful and unique voice in the American poetry landscape, dubbed "a swamprat Rimbaud" by Lorenzo Thomas and "one of the great voices of death" by Franz Wright. He left behind a strong (though often hard to find and/or unrecognized) body of work, most notably his immense epic The Battlefield Where The Moon Says I Love You, a 15,280 line poem with no punctuation or stanzas. [more inside]
Geekin' out on your Grandma's Gramophone
[PREVIOUSLY on METAFILTER] Each week between 2005 and 2007 (and sporadically thereafter), Basic Hip Digital Oddio's Kiddie Records Weekly offered children's recordings issued by big labels during the 1940's and 1950's. This cache now holds approximately 214 phonograph records, the covers and sounds therein lovingly digitized, ready for you to absorb.
Do the Uke!
The UkeCast The Ukulele Podcast
You've Been Left Behind & I Nailed Your Wife
We all know The Rapture is coming soon (although "no one knows the day or hour"), and many of us will want to send out appropriate taunting messages from our heavenly perch to our loser buddies that didn't get chosen. At last, a service provider has arisen to serve this need. At You've Been Left Behind, you can store up to 250 MB of documents to be sent to up to 62 separate emails addresses in the event of the Rapture. Rapture is determined to have occurred when 3 of the 5 team members fail to log in to the site over a 3 day period.
A tale of two Sonny Boys
It's just gotta make you feel so good to hear (and see) Sonny Boy Williamson sing and blow the harp. Keep in mind, of course, this is Sonny Boy Williamson II we're talking about here. Yes, there were two harp-blowing Sonny Boys, and here's a documentary on the legendary Sonny Boy the first: Part 1 and Part 2. [more inside]
"Afterward, the locust with its execrable teeth"
The Speculum theologiae is a beautiful medieval manuscript. Its diagrams demonstrate visually various aspects of the medieval worldview. The diagrams are explained and translated and most of them are expounded upon in a short essay. My favorite diagrams are The Cherub with Six Wings, The 10 Commandments, Plagues of Egypt and Abuses of the Impious and The Tree of Virtue and The Tree of Vices.
Slipping towards the Singularity
The current issue of IEEE Spectrum devotes itself to the sci-fi genre du jour, the Singularity. Neuroscientists such as Christof Koch and David Alder talk about our understanding of the brain and quantum computing, John Horgan argues that it's just too difficult to recreate consciousness in a computer any time soon. Robin Hanson writes on the Economics of the Singularity, and of course, Vernor Vinge - the person who originally postulated the Singularity - tells us how to spot its approach. [more inside]
Survivors reborn
First it was Blake's 7, now another Terry Nation cult classic sf television programme is to return. The BBC have announced they are remaking Survivors. Telling the story of the survivors of a plague that wipes out most of Britain, the original was famed for its gritty and somewhat controversial story-telling.
"Shall I not have intelligence with the earth?"
Allotments: how to get one, and what to grow in it once you've got it. Lots of people have allotments. Lots. Geddit?
Epsilon
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