An eclectic assortment of stuff: food, archaeology, fun, books, history, geekery, etc.
Posted in science on Mar 31st, 2009
From the University of Toronto: Bad behaviour may leave bad taste in your mouth, says U of T research.
In everyday language, people sometimes say that immoral behaviours leave a bad taste in your mouth. But this may be more than a metaphor according to new scientific evidence from the University of Toronto that shows a [...]
Posted in books & lit on Mar 27th, 2009
This made me laugh until my tummy hurt. Put down your wine, kids, before you start on this Guardian article.
He has written more than 200,000 – yes, 200,000 – books to date, but today marked a first for Professor Philip M Parker, who picked up the Diagram prize for the Oddest Book Title of the [...]
Posted in food, history & archaeology on Mar 23rd, 2009
From the Times Online: Old beer’s secret is ale at sea.
A Scottish brewery claims to have produced the first authentic India pale ale (IPA) in almost 200 years by ageing the beer aboard a trawler in the North Sea.
BrewDog, a Scottish micro-brewery based in Fraserburgh, has used an original recipe to produce the ale, which [...]
Posted in art, history & archaeology on Mar 11th, 2009
From The Telegraph: Caravaggio used ‘photography’ to create dramatic masterpieces.
The 16th century master used modern darkroom techniques to create his masterpieces, more than 200 years before the invention of the camera.
Italian researchers claim the technique explained why many of his subjects were left-handed – the image projected onto the canvas had been reversed.
Art historian Roberta [...]
Posted in DNA, history & archaeology on Mar 11th, 2009
From the Independent: Mystery solved as tests prove Tsar’s entire family was murdered.
In the early hours of a July day in 1918, one of history’s most infamous murders was perpetrated on parents, their five children and their loyal servants in a cellar in the city of Yekaterinburg, central Russia.
The gunshot-and-bayonet murder of the Romanovs – [...]
Posted in privacy on Mar 10th, 2009
From the International Herald Tribune: Watch what you think.
…neuroscientists in the United States are cataloguing brain patterns to match up with actual words, sentences and intentions. One researcher explains, The new realization is that every thought is associated with a pattern of brain activity.
Dozens of volunteers, including a few journalists, have been invited by Carnegie [...]
Posted in language on Mar 9th, 2009
From spiegel.de: British Savant Learns German in a Week
Is it possible to learn German in just days? Linguistic savant Daniel Tammet managed to do so in the course of a week. Using his own special technique, the 30-year-old, who has a mild form of autism, has learned to speak more than 10 languages.
Daniel Tammet likes [...]
Posted in history & archaeology, unusual musical instruments on Mar 6th, 2009
From Science Daily: Scientists Reconstruct An Ancient Greek Musical Instrument, The Epigonion.
The ASTRA project, standing for Ancient instruments Sound/Timbre Reconstruction Application, has revived an instrument that hasn’t been played or heard in centuries.
Using the Enabling Grids for E-sciencE infrastructure for computing power, a team based in Salerno and Catania, Italy, has reconstructed the "epigonion," a [...]
Posted in environment on Mar 6th, 2009
From The Telegraph: Scientists discover the ‘No Parking’ tree.
The tree, a deciduous hybrid related to the rowan, was first noticed in a small lay-by at Watersmeet in North Devon in the 1930s with a no-parking sign tacked to the bark.
It is only recently that scientists have undertaken a biochemical analysis to confirm the tree is [...]
Posted in books & lit, internet, technology on Mar 2nd, 2009
Captchas are those words or non-words you see in squiggly letters when you try to comment on some websites. You’re commanded to type the letters you see into a little box to prove that you’re a human, not some automated spam machine. From the Walrus Magazine we have this article on the new and improved [...]
Posted in language on Mar 2nd, 2009
From the International Herald Tribune: Experts trying to decipher ancient language.
When archaeologists on a dig in southern Portugal last year flipped over a heavy chunk of slate and saw writing not used for more than 2,500 years, they were elated.
The enigmatic pattern of inscribed symbols curled symmetrically around the upper part of the rough-edged, yellowish [...]
Posted in animals, birds, insects, etc on Mar 2nd, 2009
From The Guardian: Psychedelic bouncing fish classified as new species.
A funky, psychedelic fish that bounces on the ocean floor like a rubber ball has been classified as a new species, a scientific journal reported.
The frogfish which has a swirl of tan and peach zebra stripes that extend from its aqua eyes to its tail was [...]