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I’m flying out to Auburn to attend the Mises economics seminar thing, so don’t count on me for “turning japanese” material this week. Also, feel free to leave Erin and Katie a comment too.

- Francis Crick RIP: DNA structure’s discoverer gave shoulders to stand on - “Crick and Watson famously puzzled out in 1953 that molecules of DNA, which stands for deoxyribonucleic acid and which makes up the genetic code of every living thing, string together in the form of a double helix.”

- How my program passed the Turing Test - “So, it’s Tuesday 2nd May 1989, 8.12pm in Ireland. I’ve logged out and gone off with my girlfriend, leaving Eliza (or “MGonz” as I called it) to mind the fort. So some guy on the Net decides to call me up for a chat. Someone from Drake University, Iowa, USA (the node DRAKE on BITNET) where it is early afternoon. He stays talking until 9.39pm Irish time, unaware that no one is at home. You could say therefore that my program passed the “Turing Test” (see What is the Turing Test?).”

- Iraqis pump, flex to honor Schwarzenegger - “It was the governor of California’s 57th birthday, and thousands of miles away in blisteringly hot Baghdad members of the Arnold Classic gym celebrated too, staging what they said was the country’s first postwar bodybuilding competition.”

- What is Lucid Dreaming? - “[L]ucid dreaming is simply dreaming while being aware you are dreaming. You can think of lucid dreaming as being conscious while dreaming. If, by chance, during a dream it suddenly dawns on you that you are dreaming, then you have experienced a lucid dream, regardless of whether you have been able to attain control of your dream.”

- AllofMP3.com - You can get entire albums for $2-3 in a number of different formats (including MP3, WMA, OGG AAC, etc.).

So the results came back, I’m not pregnant. Neither is she. Score one for modern science.

- Oscar-Winning Composer Jerry Goldsmith Dies in L.A. - Goldsmith’s widow, Carol, told Reuters her husband always refused to choose a favorite among his works saying, “My favorite score is the one I haven’t written yet.” Via J.H. Huebert.

- John Carmack: “This sucks.” - “Creative is allowing id to use the patented algorithm for free. Except, of course, for the deal to integrate the EAX technology into the Doom 3 engine. Some analysts are going as far as to openly speculate that this deal amounts to blackmail — with patent in hand, Creative could easily have caused a legal quagmire for id Software. What’s really irritating about this situation is that the issue is not about the patented code itself — Creative’s patent covers a similar technique, and they are using that patent to lay claim to the idea of Carmack’s Reverse.”

- Political Joke of the Day - Peat needs to start titling his entries with witty headlines comprised of ’80s lyrics.

- Hawking changes his mind on black holes - “After almost 30 years of arguing that a black hole swallows up everything that falls into it, astrophysicist Stephen Hawking backpedaled Thursday. In doing so, he lost one of the most famous bets in recent scientific history.”

- Quantum leaps - “But science, ever fluid and open to review, might yet take Hawking into another reversal; some physicists question whether he has really disproved his 1975 argument. So he could be the star of a future conference, coming forward again to tell the world: I was wrong about being wrong.” Note: this is not the same story as above but rather a kick in the pants to Mr. Hawking for acting like only “the great Hawking can prove his own error.” Props to Margaret.

- SKANKS, PARTY GIRLS AND SCANDALOUS WOMEN - “Here we may have the first reference I’ve seen to the diminishing marginal utility of relationships. If you have enough relationships–especially physical encounters–they soon decline in importance?”

I went autocrossing this past weekend with some friends from Dallas and took some pictures (it was a TAMSCC event). I’ll try to put them up sometime, in the meantime here are some droppings to keep you busy with:

- How-To Turn your iPod in to a Universal Infrared Remote Control - Phillip Torrone created a step-by-step tutorial on doing just as the title suggests: taking your iPod and cramming the functionality of your TV, DVD Player, Direct TV, Ultimate TV PVR, Media Center PC, Xbox, XM Radio and the kitchen sink into it.

- Council bans goldfish bowls - Council official Giampietro Mosca states resolutely that, “A fish kept in a bowl has a distorted view of reality…and suffers because of this.” [jerk off motion]

- Extreme Engineering: Transatlantic Tunnel - “A magnetically levitated train could theoretically take you from New York to London in 54 minutes. But you’d have to go 5,000 mph through a 3,100-mile-long tunnel that was itself floating in the Atlantic Ocean. How might that work?” MacGyver would simply use a stick of gum and a paperclip to divert the magnetic poles into… Via Mahalanobis.

- Girl goes back to school with Gateway and Dell - The model is quite the two-timer.

- Space Science Pioneer Van Allen Questions Human Spaceflight - Supporters of human spaceflight “defy reality and struggle to recapture the level of public support that was induced temporarily by the Cold War,� van Allen charges.

- You rock my small, self-center universe - Will, the Idiot, linked to some shirts that are cool to look at, but not to wear (as BNH would say, “Girls will still sense that shit 20 years later”). Just say no to cock-blockery.

- Which Annoying B-list Celebrity Are You? - They should add the Chuck Norris personality to the list of possibilities. Via please don’t eat me!

Tell me this trailer is not fan-diddly-tastic.

Be sure to check out the instant classic: Batman: Dead End as well (it’s Batman vs Alien vs Predator, same guy plays Batman).

Via DaveDorm.

So I found a couple of the links I wanted to impart my knowledge to you with:

- Bitpim - This is basically a free open-source workaround to send and receive data to your cell phone without having to pay your provider any $$$. In the words of Justin Otis, “It’s freaking sweet.”

- Reality TV hits home in Baghdad - A new reality show dubbed “Labor and Materials” partakes in the rebuilding of Baghdad (similar to Extreme Home Makeover which I have to admit is a pretty swankin’ show).

- The Methuselah Foundation - “Promoting Research to Extend the Healthy Human Lifespan.” The foundation put together a cash-prize contest in which whomever is able to keep a Mus musculus (generic lab mouse) alive the longest wins big money (and no wammies). It’s a fairly novel and innovative endeavor at tackling the disease known as “ageing.” [Get it off, it wrinkles!]

- Meteor clue to end of Middle East civilisations - “SCIENTISTS have found the first evidence that a devastating meteor impact in the Middle East might have triggered the mysterious collapse of civilisations more than 4,000 years ago.”

- Marathon Man: Astronomer Sleuths Revise Date of Ancient Run - It’s the BC equivalent to Y2K. Sparta was using a different calendar system than Athens was, therefore a month was lost in the process. As a result, everyone lost their virginity.

- Ancient Olympians: not exactly heroes - “While the Olympics’ 3 000-year history is dotted with the heroic champions like the wrestler Arrhichion who fought to the death, researchers say they also were plagued by cheating, scandal, gambling and outsized egos.” Via Lying Luke.

- Monkey Apes Humans by Walking on Two Legs - “A young monkey at an Israeli zoo has started walking on its hind legs only - aping humans - after a near death experience, the zoo’s veterinarian said Wednesday.” Dude, check out the pic below, kind of freaky deaky like that ET home video scene in Signs.

After reading their exchange, choose the bigger primadonna dickhead.

I would pay good money to have seen this ringside. Other first-class asshole match-ups:

Coulter vs. Franken
Farah vs. the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia
Falwell vs. Omar

Via Drudge.

SuicideGirls, I first bumped into this site a month or two ago and didn’t think much of it at the time; just another portal of slutty teenie boppers looking for an outlet to vent their self-loathing ineptitudes.

I’m wrong of course. As of this writing Technorati ranks the journals of Erin and Katie in the top 100 of the blogosphere based upon the number of inbound links to each blog. Dumbfounded, I reread their various disjointed posts consisting of:

i’m super lonely lately tho. my friend trev is gone for eeeever on tour now, i’m really happy for him, he just got signed to a great band, but i will miss out jamba juice and movie nights and long talks. a lot of my friends are gone a lot. it makes me sad. i miss ann, and robin, and amina, and the “chidders”
i miss brandan tons, tho he prolly doesn’t believe me. i miss smelling angl for men all over myself, and feeling sore in weird places. i miss a lot of things. i was looking at calanders, and i’ll se him in 2 weeks, then not again for over a month. we shall see tho.
stupid heart. i let it off it’s leash and it got hit by a car again. cpr! cpr! i think that there still may be hope yet.

And this euphonic gem:

If you can’t tell, I’m feeling pretty blah. Like, physically and mentally well and everything but almost like you would expect to feel on antidepressants. Apathetic. People talk to me but I only half hear them and guess at what I should say in reply. Does anyone else feel like that? If only I could remember something I felt passionately about….

Wow, granted I post a lot of random tangental crap about phallic images, but Prozac tweedledee and tweedledumb take the cake. It’s like a parfait blend of whiny LiveJournal goths and skanky cam whores. Actually, in all honesty I really just wanted an excuse to say cam whores in a post because I wanted to be one when I grew up. I’m jealous.

Quandary:

Via Catallarchy.

Note: thanks to a thunderstorm I lost all of the links and useless infonuggets you love me for. Those should be illegal.

Caption this photo:

Maybe the organizers think another 1968 will occur.

Via LRC.

CIA Warning: Al Qaeda Forms Olympic Bobsledding Team -

Washington, D.C. — According to a CIA intelligence report, the al Qaeda terrorist organization is busy putting the finishing touches on a new bobsledding team, as a means of infiltrating the Olympic games in Athens this summer. “Our agents uncovered the fact that there is absolutely no bobsledding event at the summer Olympics,” Acting CIA Director John McLaughlin said. “We are proud that with cooperation and coordination of several government agencies, we were able to verify this was the case and confirm they are probably up to no good.”

The reports disclose that al Qaeda is now actively operating a training facility for the new bobsledding team and have even acquired a partially operational bobsled from the French.

I honestly do not think I will be able to sleep tonight. Where is Adam West when you need him?

Thank You, Aggie Fans!:

Texas A&M’s 12th Man has been getting lots of press lately.

Sports Illustrated On Campus recently named Olsen Field the best place to watch a game in all of college baseball.

CBS Sportsline.com rated Kyle Field the No. 1 college football stadium in the nation, while ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit tabbed Aggieland as having the best stadium atmosphere.

You’d also be hard-pressed to find a better collegiate soccer atmosphere than at the Aggie Soccer Complex, or a better collegiate tennis experience than the Mitchell Tennis Center. G. Rollie White Coliseum is near the top of the list in college volleyball. Other coaches and athletes from teams across the country say as such quite often.

Pat yourselves on the back, Aggie fans. You create the atmosphere, you help our athletes succeed and you make Aggieland’s venues very tough places for opponents to succeed. Not only do you accomplish all that, but you do it with a class and dignity not found in very many places in collegiate athletics.

You were the story in 2003-04. Texas A&M is a special place to watch an athletic event, no matter what the sport, and it’s that uniqueness caused by you, the Aggie faithful, that has caught the eye of those around the country.

I hate to sound like a cynic, but it was unfortunate that we have had more football players arrested in the off-season than we have won games for the past two years, combined.

And despite the demagogic neoconservative brownshirts and sanctimonious bible-thumpers on campus, attending sporting events is worth it as the camaraderie and team spirit is mind-numbingly exhilarating and all-consuming. I remember attending my first home game at Kyle Field (2001), watching 80,000+ devoted fans “yell” in synchronized harmony (we don’t have cheerleaders, we have five Yell-leaders which coordinate various Yells throughout the game — wearing Converse shoes no less).

If you are in Brazos County this fall, shoot me an email and I’ll try to get you a ticket to a game (no promises on us winning though).

Via Sharleen Mondal.

Circa 1960:

Via Peat-black-helicopters-are-chasing-me-Luke.

Vandal Edits Swear Words in Library Books:

LAYTON, Utah — A self-appointed editor of library books has given new meaning to “purple prose.” The do-it-yourself censor is turning swear words into “darns” and “hecks” — in purple ink.

“They believe it’s within their right to deface public property and impose what they believe on others,” library director Pete Giacoma said.

“It’s a crime. It would be prosecuted if we were to find who did it, by luck or accident,” he said.

Destroying or defacing library materials is a class B misdemeanor. It’s punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine, but Giacoma said the library usually will settle for restitution.

“I think the worry of the public, every once in a while, is that we’re doing it,” he said. “We’re not.”

Giacoma said in cases like this, the vandals will usually tire of editing books and stop on their own.

My first semester at A&M included numerous run-ins with Savonarola-wannabe’s who would partake and condone in sanctimonious activities like that. Bunch of griefers.

Via Fun With Headlines.

Report: Bigger breasts offered as perk to soldiers:

NEW YORK (Reuters) — The U.S. Army has long lured recruits with the slogan “Be All You Can Be,” but now soldiers and their families can receive plastic surgery, including breast enlargements, on the taxpayers’ dime.

The New Yorker magazine reports in its July 26th edition that members of all four branches of the U.S. military can get face-lifts, breast enlargements, liposuction and nose jobs for free — something the military says helps surgeons practice their skills.

“Anyone wearing a uniform is eligible,” Dr. Bob Lyons, chief of plastic surgery at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio told the magazine, which said soldiers needed the approval of their commanding officers to get the time off.

Between 2000 and 2003, military doctors performed 496 breast enlargements and 1,361 liposuction surgeries on soldiers and their dependents, the magazine said.

The magazine quoted an Army spokeswoman as saying, “the surgeons have to have someone to practice on.”

Wow, I’m definitely going to reenlist — sign me up!

PBS aired a show entitled “In Search Of China� which ironically deals with the history and transition of a centrally planned top-down economy to that of a entrepreneur-based market economy. I should note that this is similar in vein to the Commanding Heights series, albeit shorter (only one volume) and with a reduced emphasis on the academic and theoretical nature of economics.
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Yea, the movie reportedly had some promise as the book was pretty good for it’s time (or so I heard…). However, the dystopic atmosphere and omnipresent drab melancholy reminded me of both A.I. and Minority Report (remember, in The Futureâ„¢ everything has a greyish hue to it, unless you are in Universe Gattaca where everything has a tint of green).

Barnone the biggest problem was that both the character development and script were filled with trite hackneyed clichés. You learn this early on and I distinctly remember telling members of the peanut gallery what Will “I-still-wear-do-rags-and-hip-hop-Converse-shiyat” Smith was going to do next.

His dress and attitude were entirely anachronistic, granted there is out of place like Marty McFly visiting his parents when they were in high school but then there is out of place like Neo porking Trinity in Reloaded. Remember, this is throughout the entire movie — he wasn’t even a token black guy. At least in Demolition Man, Sandra Bullock did a believable job playing a ditzy girl infatuated with the nostalgic years of yore, Smith came off like a bellicose Ben Affleck in Boiler Room (maybe if he said “Oh hell no” one more time it would provide that much more comic relief, like that “For me to poop on” dog).

Additionally, the lack of any real chemistry between the human characters was reminiscent of Tim Burton’s remake of The Planet of the Apes — what was up with Marky Mark and that blond?

So yes, despite the climatic 1930s street fight, which was real classy and believable, the movie stunkith.

Go watch Shrek 2 or better yet, read the book.

Oh hell no!

Because I’m officially infected with the disease obesity, I can now earn subsidies and browse the blogosphere simultaneously (thanks to Government in a Bottle):

- My Best of Mac OS X Software - undercasephiliac john at inluminent shares his favorite wares to world + dog (windows)
- Half of Cell Phones Will Be RFID-Enabled by 2009 - Technojunkie Roland Piquepaille (of ProBlogs fame of course) outlines the capabilities of our good friend RFID and where it is headed
- A New Issue of “The Daedalus Project” - If you play or follow MMORPG news the latest issue offers yet more content synthesized by the ongoing survey
- Yet another Blog Survey - Ozzie Richard Giles gives us the 411 on an academic survey of the blogosphere
- Dark Horse on the Third Ballot - Interested in 3rd party behind-the-scenes drama? Well, regardless of whatever your non-me-centric views are, R.W. Bradford illustrates the bittersweet metamorphosis that occurred at the recent LP Convention
- Merriam-Webster`s Flappers 2 Rappers: Youth Slang - “An entertaining and insightful look at the creative use of language by teens through the years. Learn the history of slang — words and phrases that became popular in each decade of this century.”
- Engadet - The Doctor Recommended site of the day, neat-o gizmos and widgets for you consumer whores
- Ipso Facto - Latin Phrase of the day; “Whatever the captain does is right ipso facto [i.e. because it is done by the captain], and any opposition to it is wrong, on board ship.”

Peat, the slavishly rabid Christian fundamentalist, posted a link to the Presidential Prayer Team (and they all said, amen). Unfortunately, it’s a real group of living, breathing individuals that genuinely believe in prayer and that prayer works and that the neoconservative cabal are God’s chosen people (”Let my people go!”). Gesundheit.

Anyways, what beats that is the NeedHim.org evangelical outreach site that looks like a self-help AA site:

Why am I here?
How do I beat this loneliness?
What makes my life so hard?
Where is that one special relationship?

This has public-service announcement written all over it, like MADD or DARE — it’s not though. Truth be told, while I honestly have nothing against the sincerity and austere passion these individuals have towards this specific belief system, their marketing tactic smacks of manipulation and John-Edwards-vagueishness.

Who hasn’t been lonely at some point in their life? Or hurt or had difficulties? Or introspectively pondered existential questions? Does that mean that you should codependently attach yourself to a drug that never gives back?

Now my own questionnaire:

Significant other cheat on you?
Do you feel confused?
Not sure of what to do?
Want to dull out the pain?

Grab-a-God is here for you 24×7, rain or shine. This marvelous over-the-counter painkiller can whip the worst migraine your body can dish out. From the makers of “I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-Jesus” comes a product so sensational and supernatural that you will have to try it to believe it. Lack of sex depressing you? Don’t worry, after a couple blunts of Jesus, all your friends will want to get their hands on some good quality cuts. And trust me, this shit literally sells itself.

How many hits of Jesus have you had lately?

Carl Sagan wrote a book entitled, The Demon-Haunted World in which he debunks the supernatural, the paranormal and crank pseudoscience (Penn & Teller’s Bullshit! does the same thing). In the world of economics, one contemporaneous facsimile is that of outsourcing. According to labor unions and others, this evil troll lurks behind every corner waiting to pounce on unsuspecting and hapless denizens with jobs.
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You know what the web is missing? Drudgy skintitilating gossip. And aside from full frontal nudity, I’m going to do my part in spreading hard hitting rumors — and make money doing it. So I need a deep throat. Does anybody want to be my deep throat? Does anybody have a deep throat? Auditions will be this weekend behind the school buses, call me for more info (867-5309).

As far as business plans go, I hammered out a few details during dinner tonight:

1. Spread rumors
2. ???
3. Profit!

To kick things off, Ellen Feiss is pregnant with Fred Savage’s daughter. You read it here first folks.

Vote Quimby.