Category Archives: Science/Engineering

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Foul Weather

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Posted on January 26, 2007 in Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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Metric moon

Posted on January 26, 2007 | Comments Off on Metric moon

Put away your inches and miles, Americans, and start thinking along with the vast majority of the world in centimeters and kilometers. If, that is, you plan to go to the moon after 2020 when American space policy says we’ll have a base there. NASA has so decreed, deciding only the metric system will be in use on our portion of lunar soil. Set aside the fact of it being thirteen years in the future, far enough away that the current Congress won’t have to worry about justifying spending tax money for it, which suggests it may not, in fact, become reality. In which case maybe it won’t actually ever influence our continued stubborn use of English measurement (which not even the English officially use anymore, but only us, Liberia and Burma). Which might be a good thing when you think of all the vehicle mechanics and home handymen who would have to switch out their inch-based wrenches, nuts, screws and other devices for metric ones. But there’s already some betting that the residents of any future moon base may, in fact, be speaking Chinese, and they use the metric system, so maybe it’s a good time to start prepping for the inevitable. Me? I’m too old to worry about it.

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Posted in Science/Engineering, Scribbles, Space

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Ball lightning in the lab

Posted on January 24, 2007 | Comments Off on Ball lightning in the lab

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 Still photos taken from a Brazilian lab’s video shows scientists applying an electrode to silicon wafers (top left) to create golf-ball-sized balls of electrified silicon vapor. The vapor sparks orbs of ball lightning that bounce across the lab floor/images by Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil.

Via Technology Trends

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Posted in Science/Engineering

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The grumpy old science judge

Posted on January 24, 2007 | Comments Off on The grumpy old science judge

I had to leave the science fair at Mr. B.’s elementary school after judging only five entries as I realized I was feeling too grumpy to continue without being unfair to the kids. I was judging third graders, the first year the kids at the school are required to enter the science fair, and a few of the ones I judged were so dopey I was tempted to give them the worst possible marks. I didn’t because, well, just because. Too tender-hearted under the grumpy old man veneer, I suppose. It’s hard to be harsh on third graders, on any kids really, they have so much to do and so much competition and confusion to cope with. And the schools don’t really help much. Mr. B. and his peers are called "awesome" forty times a day, a word I am thoroughly sick of, which leaves no room for achievement as far as I can see, if even the worst is judged "awesome" alongside the best. But I’m probably being too harsh. It’s a common failing of age. I probably should stick to volunteering for the landscaping committee.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Science/Engineering, Scribbles

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You might be assimilated

Posted on January 23, 2007 | Comments Off on You might be assimilated

From fixing blindness in cats now to enhancing our bodies later, or Mr. Boy’s fav toys, the bionicals.

"We are approaching the technological inevitability when replacement body parts may surpass the abilities of our natural ones.  Legs that run faster or eyes that can see farther, sharper, or in the dark.  Would you get one implanted?"

You’d almost have to, just to keep up. 

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Posted in Science/Engineering

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Biotech choices

Posted on January 21, 2007 | Comments Off on Biotech choices

Things aren’t always what they seem to be, and that’s becoming truer all the time, thanks to medicine’s increasing ability to shrink, lengthen, enhance, restore, bulk up and reduce.  The ordinary have never seemed, well, more ordinary:

"Everywhere you turn, people are engineering their bodies to fit in. Chinese people are lengthening their legs with surgery to raise their status and career prospects. American men are bulking up on steroids to look good in gyms. American women are getting 300,000 breast implants a year. Some are having toes trimmed to fit fashionable shoes."

Read it all here. Via No Left Turns

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Posted in Science/Engineering, Scribbles

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The comet’s tail

Posted on January 19, 2007 | Comments Off on The comet’s tail

Comet McNaught has left the sun behind but it isn’t through with the inner solar system yet, and although it’s no longer fully visible in the northern hemisphere, a part of it can still be seen low on the western horizon: the comet’s extravagant tail, according to Space Weather:

"Even experienced astronomers say they’ve never seen anything quite like it.  McNaught’s tail materializes at sunset in the southern hemisphere and is visible to the unaided eye as a majestic fan of pale streamers…but its tail sweeps all the way back into northern skies. People in California, Colorado and Hawaii have seen it peeking above the western horizon about an hour after sunset. This ‘northern tail’ is faint but pretty, and resembles a pale aurora borealis. (Dark skies are absolutely required.)"

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Posted in Science/Engineering, Space

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