Exploring Vegas Storm Drains

Crouched over, he began sideways down the tunnel. His left hand gripped the Mag-Lite; his right hand tickled the kukri, which dangled between his belt and the waist of his pants in the small of his back. He disappeared into the darkness. Silence ... I leaned into the tunnel. "Josh?"I heard shuffling ... and then a figure emerged from the darkness.
http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/display/inn_cover_story/cover.txt

Tax Freedom Day!

Starting Friday, average Canadians can keep for their own use all the money they earn for the rest of the year, says the free-market think-tank, which promotes Tax Freedom Day as a representation of governments total take of the overall economy. This years taxes - including federal, provincial and municipal income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, health taxes, import duties, licence fees, and taxes on fuel, tobacco and alcohol - took two more days of work than last years.
http://www.canada.com/national/story.asp?id={CAE776CC-5A22-4611-989D-4D810242C703}

Das Vedanya: Russion Pilot To Jump From Space -- Without A Chute

Instead of using a chute, hes going to use an inflatable shuttlecock device to slow his descent from 50-60km up. The test will cost $2M, and he will enter the atmosphere in a spacesuit at 8km/sec (or 28800km/hr).
http://english.pravda.ru/main/2002/06/28/31335.html

2600 Defeats Ford

Excellent news: Ford Motor Company has officially and unconditionally conceded its complete, utter, and perpetual loss on the merits of the FORD v. 2600 "FuckGeneralMotors.com" case. Ford has dismissed its appeal to the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, meaning that Ford has completely given up all attempts to reverse the victory that 2600 Enterprises won on December 20, 2001. The mutually agreed dismissal papers were officially entered by the Sixth Circuit on June 27, 2002.
http://www.2600.com/news/display.shtml?id=1225

Ocean Base One

Marine scientists have kicked off the Ocean Atmosphere Seafloor Integration Study, which will primarily consist of a 40K sq ft permanent base 550 feet down. It will offer the latest in conveniance: a pressurized elevator going all the way down. I wonder if theyll find aquaman?
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.07/start.html?pg=7

Spam Map!

Its long been known that spammers sell victims addresses to each other. Keep that in mind as you look at the map... and remember that ? despite their cries of "Permission Marketing Works!" ? I have not given my email address to a single one of the companies that appear on the Spamdemic Map, nor have I given them permission to send me email... yet nearly all of them seem to have one or more of my addresses, and most are spamming me. Items in black on the map indicate entities that have spammed me or are involved in supporting the spammer; grey indicates companies that havent spammed me, but may now have my address, due to their relationships with the spammers; green indicates ownership; dashed lines indicate tentative connections.
http://www.cluelessmailers.org/spamdemic/mapfullsize.html

Star Trek: Nemisis Trailer Online

This one looks good. Also see the Nemisis database at startrek.com.
http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/star_trek_nemesis/

CIA Admits To Covering Up Military UFO Sightings

Interesting document. Seems that many CIA investigators knew that many of the UFO sightings in the 50s and 60s were U2 spy planes. It seems that high ranking CIA officials realized too late that the growing public mistrust of the authorities on the issue would reach the heights that it has; misinformation and ridicule didnt work as well as planned. Interesting quote: Circa 1984, a series of documents surfaced which some UFOlogists said proved that President Truman created a top secret committee in 1947, Majestic-12, to secure the recovery of UFO wreckage from Roswell and any other UFO crash sight for scientific study and to examine any alien bodies recovered from such sites. Most if not all of these documents have proved to be fabrications. Yet the controversy persists.[Italics mine.]
http://www.odci.gov/csi/studies/97unclass/ufo.html

Cool Tech: Tiny Nuke Sniffers

The U.S. Department of Energys Argonne National Laboratory has developed a small, portable detector for finding concealed nuclear weapons and materials. When the device is completed, it could assist international inspectors charged with preventing smuggling and unauthorized use of nuclear weapons and materials. The heart of the Argonne device is a small wafer of gallium arsenide (GaAs), a semiconducting material similar to silicon. When coated with boron or lithium, GaAs can detect neutrons, such as those emitted by the fissile materials that fuel nuclear weapons. Patents are pending on several detectors and their components.
http://www3.cosmiverse.com/news/tech/tech06260201.html

Light Loses Energy Escaping A Black Hole

Nother confirmation Of einstein... the first images of light escaping a black hole show that they lose energy. In this case, it was a supermassive black hole in the heart of galaxy NGC 3516. A side benefit: measuring a black holes spin.
http://www3.cosmiverse.com/news/space/space06270202.html

Aikido As Budo Practice

I find it unusual that you sometimes have to rimind Aikido practictioners that Aikido is a martial art. We have to remember and respect that people approach it for different reasons, but it is what it is: a budo. And we should remember that on and off the mat.
http://www.aikiweb.com/training/ledyard2.html

Photons Orbital Angular Momentum Measured For First Time

Interesting... a team from Scotland has managed to measure a photons orbital angular momentum, (see this paper.) which can be used to encode information. Seems kinda like an optical MUX has been written into the source code of the universe. Also has implications for quantum cryptography.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,53387,00.html

All Eyes Are On You

Tollbooths, ATMs, doctors offices, online chat: You leave critical personal data behind wherever you go. Lets follow one American as he scatters his digital DNA. First, Meet Mark, a graphic designer in Chicago. Like most of us, Mark knows his boss can read his e-mail, insurers can access his medical data. but hes blind to the bigger truth: personal data is collected, and sometimes shared, at a fantastic rate.
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/article/0,12543,260388,00.html

Destination: Comet

A new golden age of space exploration is set to begin next month with the launch of the first in a series of missions to explore comets. On 1 July the American space agency (Nasa) will send up a probe destined to fly past two of the icy bodies. The Comet Nucleus Tour (Contour) will be followed next January by the launch of a daring European Space Agency (Esa) mission. Rosetta will chase a speeding comet and then, for the first time ever, try to land on it.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2057000/2057529.stm

Jamming of Radio Signals Authorized

The Canadian military and the RCMP have been given special authorization to jam radio and cellphone signals during the G8 Summit next week and the Popes visit to Canada in July.Its the first time police or the military have ever been allowed to block signals, an official said.The authorization allows the Department of National Defence and the RCMP to use jamming devices around Calgary and Kananaskis, Alta., from June 17 to June 29 for the summit of leaders from Group of Eight nations. They will have the same power to jam signals in Toronto from July 16 to July 31 -- the Pope is scheduled to arrive in Canada July 23 and depart July 29, with three Toronto appearances in between.RCMP spokesman Corporal Benoît Desjardins said jamming is an important part of the security measures for both events.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/printarticle/gam/20020621/UJAMMNSB2

15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense

When Charles Darwin introduced the theory of evolution through natural selection 143 years ago, the scientists of the day argued over it fiercely, but the massing evidence from paleontology, genetics, zoology, molecular biology and other fields gradually established evolutions truth beyond reasonable doubt. Today that battle has been won everywhere--except in the public imagination. Embarrassingly, in the 21st century, in the most scientifically advanced nation the world has ever known, creationists can still persuade politicians, judges and ordinary citizens that evolution is a flawed, poorly supported fantasy. They lobby for creationist ideas such as "intelligent design" to be taught as alternatives to evolution in science classrooms. As this article goes to press, the Ohio Board of Education is debating whether to mandate such a change. Some antievolutionists, such as Philip E. Johnson, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley and author of Darwin on Trial, admit that they intend for intelligent-design theory to serve as a "wedge" for reopening science classrooms to discussions of God.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000D4FEC-7D5B-1D07-8E49809EC588EEDF&catID=2

Movie Physics Rating System

Technonerds go to movies strictly for entertainment, and of course, the most entertaining part comes after the movie when they can dissect, criticize, and argue the merits of every detail. However, when supposedly serious scenes totally disregard the laws of physics in blatantly obvious ways its enough to make us retch. The motion picture industry has failed to police itself against the evils of bad physics. This page is provided as a public service in hopes of improving this deplorable matter. The minds of our children and their ability to master vectors are (shudder) at stake.
http://intuitor.com/moviephysics/index.html

Bloop Goes the Giant Squid

Scientists have revealed a mysterious recording that they say could be the sound of a giant beast lurking in the depths of the ocean. Researchers have nicknamed the strange unidentified sound picked up by undersea microphones "Bloop." While it bears the varying frequency hallmark of marine animals, it is far more powerful than the calls made by any creature known on Earth, Britains New Scientist reported on Thursday. It is too big for a whale and one theory is that it is a deep sea monster, possibly a many-tentacled giant squid.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/06/13/bloop/index.html

Could superconductors transmute electromagnetic radiation into gravitational waves?

His analysis, like most discussions of gravitational radiation, proceeds by analogy with electromagnetic radiation. Just as changes in an electric or magnetic field trigger electromagnetic waves, changes in a gravitational field trigger gravitational waves. The analogy is actually quite tight. To a first approximation, Einsteins equations for gravitation are a clone of Maxwells equations for electromagnetism. Mass plays the role of electric charge, the only difference being that its value must be positive (at least in classical physics). Masses attract other masses via a "gravitoelectric" field. Moving masses exert forces on moving masses via a "gravitomagnetic" field. Gravitational radiation entwines gravitoelectric and gravitomagnetic fields. Over the years a number of physicists have suggested that if a superconductor can block magnetic fields--giving rise to the famous Meissner effect, which is responsible for magnetic levitation over a superconductor--then it might block gravitomagnetic fields, too. When Chiao adds the gravitomagnetic field to the standard quantum equations for superconductivity, he confirms not only the gravitational Meissner-like effect but also a coupling between the two breeds of magnetic field. An ordinary magnetic field sets electrons in motion near the surface of a superconductor. Those electrons carry mass, and so their motion generates a gravitomagnetic field.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=00032353-36AB-1CDC-B4A8809EC588EEDF&catID=2

Powers of Ten

View the Milky Way at 10 million light years from the Earth. Then move through space towards the Earth in successive orders of magnitude until you reach a tall oak tree just outside the buildings of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory in Tallahassee, Florida. After that, begin to move from the actual size of a leaf into a microscopic world that reveals leaf cell walls, the cell nucleus, chromatin, DNA and finally, into the subatomic universe of electrons and protons.
http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/

David Bowie Predicts The End Of Copyright

His deal with Sony is a short-term one while he gets his label started and watches the Internets effect on careers. "I dont even know why I would want to be on a label in a few years, because I dont think its going to work by labels and by distribution systems in the same way," he said. "The absolute transformation of everything that we ever thought about music will take place within 10 years, and nothing is going to be able to stop it. I see absolutely no point in pretending that its not going to happen. Im fully confident that copyright, for instance, will no longer exist in 10 years, and authorship and intellectual property is in for such a bashing.""Music itself is going to become like running water or electricity," he added. "So its like, just take advantage of these last few years because none of this is ever going to happen again. Youd better be prepared for doing a lot of touring because thats really the only unique situation thats going to be left. Its terribly exciting. But on the other hand it doesnt matter if you think its exciting or not; its whats going to happen."
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=33907&threshold=3&commentsort=0&tid=141&mode=thread&cid=3668573

Hydro-Drive?

If one of NASAs newest rocket concepts works, it wouldnt just get humans farther out into the universe, it would redefine the place. The space agency is funding a study of an engine based on a novel conception of the structure of hydrogen, the central idea behind a maverick New Jersey researchers Grand Unified Theory. This theory has been derided as a "crackpot idea" and "voodoo science" by respected experts in physics. Anthony J. Marchese, a mechanical engineering professor specializing in propulsion at Rowan University, is getting modest funding ($75,000) from the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts to build and test a BlackLight Rocket. NIACs mission is to take a flyer on wild ideas. "Dont let your preoccupation with reality stifle your imagination," is the catch phrase on the groups website, which defines its mission as finding "grand, revolutionary concepts for architectures and systems."
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,51792,00.html

China Paper Bites on Onion Gag

Beijings most popular newspaper has unwittingly republished a bogus story about U.S. Congress threats to skip town for Memphis or Charlotte unless Washington builds them a new Capitol building with a retractable dome. The source? Americas celebrated spoof tabloid, the Onion. The Beijing Evening News, which claims a circulation of 1.25 million, translated portions of the Onions tall tale word-for-word in the international news page of its June 3 edition.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,53048,00.html

Canada, Mexico Discuss Problem Neighbour

The challenge of having the United States as a neighbour was one of the topics discussed Tuesday during a meeting with Mexican President Vicente Fox, International Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew said Tuesday.Mr. Pettigrew, heading a trade mission to Mexico, told a news conference that he and Fox talked about how Canada and Mexico have to cope with issues that arise from "sharing a continent with the U.S."
http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/RTGAMArticleHTMLTemplate/C/20020604/wpett0406?hub=homeBN&tf=tgam%2Frealtime%2Ffullstory.html&cf=tgam/realtime/config-neutral&vg=BigAdVariableGenerator&slug=wpett0406&date=20020604&archive=RTGAM&a

Dead Mans Switch

Whatever gets your attention. Anyway, there was a thread last week about what would happen if one of us were to shuffle off to that Great Motherboard in the Sky. Software which would act as a proverbial "Dead Mans Switch" came up, which is basically a system that, if not reset by a given time, will automatically carry out a series of tasks, such as posting messages to websites like Ars, sending e-mails to loved ones (or hated ones), and encrypting or destroying sensitive files (*cough* pr0n *cough*). Interest was expressed for the creation of such software, and well, here it is. The software is designed to run without installation. Just stick it in a convenient directory, and it will create all the necessary registry entries the first time it is run. Any additional files that it creates will be in the same directory, and will have the extensions .dwp and .dem, for easy portability.
http://daisyman.arsware.org/dms/

Dead Men Tell No Passwords

The man in charge of archiving and maintaining electronic copies of Norways most important historical documents is dead and so is access to those archives. So the director of the Norwegian cultural center is pleading for hackers to help him crack the centers password-protected database. The problem started when the technician responsible for the archives at Norways National Center of Language and Culture never divulged the password before he died a few years ago. Since then, employees at the center have been unable to access some of the password-protected archives that contain data on a collection of thousands of documents and books. A national database that allowed researchers access to those documents is also partly inaccessible.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,52997,00.html

Number Of Computations Done Since The Universe Began

A physicist has worked out how many calculations have happened since the Big Bang. We are all living inside a gigantic computer. No, not The Matrix: the Universe. Seth Lloyd, a physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, has estimated how much information the Universe can contain, and how many calculations it has performed since the Big Bang. Lloyd views every process, every change that takes place in the Universe, as a kind of computation. One way of looking at the exercise is to imagine setting up a simulation of the Universe, particle for particle, on a hypothetical super-duper computer.To simulate the Universe in every detail since time began, the computer would have to have 10^90 bits - binary digits, or devices capable of storing a 1 or a 0 - and it would have to perform 10^120 manipulations of those bits. Unfortunately there are probably only around 10^80 elementary particles in the Universe.
http://www.nature.com/nsu/020527/020527-16.html

Some Thoughts On The Idea Of Hacker Culture.

The main principle at work here is the so-called "Hackers Ethic". And its practice is the usual, daily activity of hackers. To put it very simply, without going deeper into its precise content, the hacker ethic runs strikingly parallel to the formula "lart pour lart (art for arts sake). What matters here, is the realisation that, unlike activists, hackers are focused on the pursuit of knowledge and the exercise of curiosity for its own sake. Therefore, the obligations that derive from the hacker ethic are perceived by genuine hackers as sovereign and not instrumental, and always prevail above other aims or interests, whatever these may be - and if there are any at all. This consequently makes the hackers movement to be wary of any particular blueprint of society, however alternative, and even adverse to embrace particular antagonism (some hackers, and not minor ones, are for instance loath to demonise the Microsoft Corporation). Hence the spread of political and philosophical opinions harboured by individual hackers, without any loss of their feeling of identity and belonging to the mouvance at large or even their particular group, is truly astonishing, and very unlikely to obtain within any other new social movement. In fact, the militant defense of individual liberties and a penchant for rather unequalitarian economic convictions one encounters in tandem among a good many hackers has provided for bafflement among networked political (i.e. left-leaning) activists coming to be better acquainted with their natural allies. Yet it is neither fortuitous nor aberrant that the Californian transmutation of libertarianism enjoys such widespread support among hackers.
http://cryptome.org/hacker-idea.htm

The Unfolding Universe

An hour-long documentary to be shown on The Discovery Channel (9 p.m. EDT) -- tells the story of a spinning disc of a hundred-billion suns orbiting a globe of stars and stellar remnants with a gigantic black hole in the center. Seen from above, the Milky Way is an unremarkable spiral galaxy dotting intergalactic space. And yet, for all its blandness, its story is both familiar to scientists and emblematic of the universe as a whole. "Its a good way to get a snapshot in the course of an hour of the breadth of cosmic history," said Tom Lucas, director of the program.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,52891,00.html