Category: goo brain

Not Exactly Three Days Of The Condor

Spy vs. SpyI was stumbling around wikipedia, doing some research, and I came across an article entitled “Israeli animal spy conspiracy theories“, which, frankly, I found to be comedy gold.

Israel has been accused of sending a spy pelican and a spy vulture to Sudan. The birds, wearing a GPS device and a tag with the sign “Tel Aviv University,” were captured by local officials. Sudanese authorities refused to return the GPS transmitters.

I’m no expert on bird enslavement, but, to me, this sounds suspiciously like a tag-and-release program to track migratory habits – although I understand that the situation is easy to confuse with an undercover pelican.

In October 2008 Iran captured two pigeons, who reportedly showed unusual interest in Iran’s nuclear facility in Natanz.

I wish they were a little clearer about what makes up “unusual interest”; were the birds wandering around the entrance begging for cigarettes and trying to seduce the facilities’ employees into revealing some of the secrets within?

In 2007, Iranian media reported that 14 large squirrels carrying espionage equipment were intercepted near their border.

Define large? Are we talking large for a squirrel, or large for a mid-size SUV?Spy squirrelI do love the mental image of squirrels with tiny satellite dishes strapped to their backs and secret service-style earpieces equipped, but, again, I rather suspect this is a bit of a case of mistaken science identity, probably related to migration. Even in this day and age, enforced ignorance of what’s actually possible can put people into the realm of Clarke’s third law.
Clarke's Third Law

(Poster made at bighugelabs.com using a picture from ActingLikeAnimals.com)

RT Saturday

The Walk Home From Work

In that great Saturday tradition, here are some of my tweets from the last week, slightly used.

http://twitter.com/#!/JRDSkinner/status/25576746380169216

http://twitter.com/#!/JRDSkinner/status/23894846469050368

Mr Eight's new notebook

http://twitter.com/#!/JRDSkinner/status/22742317010001920

http://twitter.com/#!/JRDSkinner/status/24876716832849920

Pre-meal Games

B-B-B-Bennie (A Question Of Safety)

a Jet

This is actually a question, but I’m going to phrase it in the form of a bit of imagineering:

It’s the future, but not by much, and you’re in a passenger jet.

Despite the fact that you’ve heard the instructions a hundred times previous, you’ve been a good customer and listened to the safety talk at the start of the flight – even though it meant having to strain to hear over the pair of teenage brothers arguing for the window seat in the next row. You’re feeling this was an especially good idea, as the tinny voice of the Captain has recently broken out from the speakers to inform you that the plane is currently suffering some technical issues.

Passengers

Your suspicions that it might have something to do with the flaming engine on the left wing are well founded.

The harness you’ve buckled yourself into was a little unwieldy, but the low chime the jet’s computer made to indicate you’d done it properly was actually oddly soothing. The flight attendants continue to coo for everyone to remain calm, but you can’t stop staring at the roasting wing, and thinking about the first episode of LOST.

Without warning, the plane starts to lose altitude.

Thrashing your head around, you note that smoke is now also billowing from the opposite side of your conveyance.

For a brief moment, vocal anarchy breaks out. You can hear the teenage boys shrieking, even over the cacophony of sudden cursing and prayer, and your mind goes into a red panic at the idea that this might be your last breath.

In fact, the only thing that isn’t alarmed is the central brain, nicknamed Bennie, that the folks at Boeing have programmed and prepared for just such a situation. The machine doesn’t care if it’s narcing on bathroom smokers or preparing for a crash, it purrs along, unaffected. It runs some equations and decides that a proper landing is now impossible.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjUk3Bp16zs]

Long seconds into the drop, there’s a quick series of pops, and a strip of roof running the length of the jet catches the wind and blows away, exposing the blue sky and clouds above.

The fluffy white puffs seem to be moving upwards at a terrible speed.

At 30,000 feet the seats start flying. The rapid fire process could never be controlled by a human hand, but Bennie has no issues with the micro-timing required to prevent mid-air impacts during the departures. By the 15,000 foot mark the tube is an empty egg carton, and the wind is full of parachutes.

You, the seat your buckled to, and your similarly situated fellow passengers, all begin the slow descent to the farmland below, feeling like the world’s laziest paratrooper invasion.

The plane’s final impact is spectacular, and your view of it will remain in your memory for the rest of your life.

Now, my question – why not?

Evolving Talk Radio

Radio Announcer, as photographed by LIFEAn odd thought came to me yesterday, pre-FlashCast, while considering the tale of Ted Williams.

Is the reason we like a deep radio-voice dispensing our news and weather related to an instinct for putting the fellow with a booming delivery at the mouth of the cave, to warn of sabre-tooth attacks?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rPFvLUWkzs]

Star Truth

Enterprise SchematicsIf it were designed by NASA, Star Trek: The Next Generation would have probably just been Data exploring the depths of space while standing on the tip of a warp nacelle, watching passively through a bell jar which would double as a transporter when he finally arrived somewhere.
The Mars Rover

Hobie & The Robots

Robobaywatch, as found at popsci.comThe device above is actually a lifeguard, and the picture and quotes were taken from a popsci.com article.

This summer, EMILY (for EMergency Integrated Lifesaving lanYard) began patrolling Malibu’s dangerous Zuma Beach and will watch over about 25 more by December. Although lifeguards operate this version by remote control, next year’s model will autonomously save potential drowning victims as reliably as a human. Once a lifeguard tosses EMILY into the surf, its sonar device will scan for the underwater movements associated with swimmers in distress.

Usually I’m a huge fan of this sort of automation, but I’m not sure how I’d feel about having a red torpedo zipping at my face while I was busy panicking and sinking below the waterline.

The idea of it self-determining when someone needs saving is fantastic, but I do wonder how easy it is to differentiate between a drowning victim and a spastic child in the middle of a splash fight – and I’m unwilling to do any odd-making on how soon hooligan teenagers will be faking it out so they ride it around the beach.

Still, the fact that the current model is remote-controlled means that my years of console gaming may finally pay off in a sweet beach patrol gig.

Crushing Observations

Indian JuggernautYou’re familiar with the concept of a “juggernaut”?

The word is derived from the Sanskrit जगन्नाथ Jagannātha (meaning “Lord of the Universe”), which is one of the many names of Krishna from the ancient Vedic scriptures of India.

One of the most famous of Indian temples is the Jagannath Temple in Puri, Orissa, which has the Ratha Yatra (“chariot procession”), an annual procession of chariots – wikipedia

“Chariots”, in this case, really meaning “massive rolling temples”.

Another Indian Juggernaut

So, it seems like a fairly simple bit of logic to connect those colossal wagons with the modern definition of an unstoppable force that we currently use – but, oh, those wacky explorers and colonialists had to embellish an already impressive tradition.

A popular 14th-century work, The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, apocryphally describes Hindus, as a religious sacrifice, casting themselves under the wheels of these huge chariots and being crushed to death.

Based on this claim, British colonials promulgated the claim that Hindu devotees of Krishna were “lunatic fanatics who threw themselves under the wheels of these chariots in order to attain salvation”. – wikipedia

This, it seems to me, is something like having an alien observer of Earth determine that there must be a subset of human assassins who roam the highways in an attempt to cull the herd, since we so often hold a celebration, with plenty of drinking, then allow wobbly-handed executioners out onto the road to slam into unexpecting parties.

Others have suggested more prosaically that the deaths, if any, were accidental and caused by the press of the crowd and the general commotion. – wikipedia

Hindu Celebration

Oh, That Guy

Come with me for another stroll down Random Trivia Lane.

Are you familiar with the Hitchcock film Rear Window?

I bet you’re familiar with the man in this picture, or at least his son.
The Musician in Rear Window (and some other guy)No, not the fellow with the ethereal glow, that’s the film’s director making his usual cameo – no, the other, the musician who spends the film composing a song entitled “Lisa”.

That composer is the original lead singer of one of the most commercially successful vocal groups of the last half century, and yet you likely wouldn’t recognize his voice if you heard it.

His name is Ross Bagdasarian, Sr., and I’ll let wikipedia dispense his legend:

According to his son, Ross Bagdasarian, Jr., they were down to their last $200 when Bagdasarian spent $190 on a V-M tape recorder that would allow him to vary tape speeds.

This monstrously large hit was the result (there’s a bit of an intro, feel free to skip through the first 40 seconds or so):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBMEZvZSWFQ]

The first Chipmunk record, “The Chipmunk Song,” had Bagdasarian doing all the voices. (The spoken coda, when played slowly, reveals Bagdasarian enacting the roles of Theodore, Simon, and Alvin.) Thereafter, most of his Chipmunk records used female voice artists, recorded only about 1/4 slower than the normal playback speed. – wikipedia

– that is, until he died of a heart attack in 1972.

Like so many dynasties, the Chip-mantle was eventually taken up by his namesake, Ross Bagdasarian Jr., who, if you’re like me and know the Chipmunks best through the endlessly re-rerun 1980s cartoon, you may be most familiar with as the voice of Dave and the rodents – except for Theodore and The Chipettes, who were played by his wife, Janice Karman.

Before the show, however, Bagdasarian Jr. released a comeback album. His choice of platform for the beloved family property?

Chipmunk Punk.

I’ll let the boys play me out with a song about a drunk driver seducing a lady:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7zNNRpWCK0]

Indications

ChampixHave you heard of Champix?

I hadn’t – at least, not to the best of my knowledge – until last night.

(All quotes are from the Wikipedia, emphasis is mine.)

Varenicline (trade name Chantix in the USA and Champix in Canada, Europe and other countries, marketed by Pfizer, usually in the form of varenicline tartrate) is a prescription medication used to treat smoking addiction.

That quick blurb actually contains more information than I managed to derive from their commercial, as it was one of those carefully generic bits of sentimental pandering that utterly avoided displaying anything as unsightly as someone interacting with, or attempting to shun, a cigarette.

Although it operates under “Chantix” in America, (which, frankly, sounds like something people take to increase their ability in occult muttering,) it’s the “Champix” title that really gets me; might I suggest these alternate names for the inevitable knock-offs?

  • Winneryl
  • Fantastix
  • Phenomenol
  • Awesomesauce

Beyond a description of the product, there was an extra something-else missing from the ad I saw:

Varenicline is also strongly suspected of causing severe psychological side effects. The US Food and Drug Administration requires varenicline and Zyban (bupropion) to carry a black box warning, the agency’s strongest safety warning, due to side effects including depression, suicidal thoughts, and suicidal actions.

Which has me eagerly anticipating the Pfizer corporation’s newest pharmaceutical, “Unicornolox”, an anti-aging cream which may cause the adverse reaction of murder.