Geek: a video on compression and Kolmogorov complexity...

Geek: a video on compression and Kolmogorov complexity...  It's sort of a video abstract of a paper.  These guys had more fun than I'd have expected in such an effort :)

Why are ferns still alive?

Why are ferns still alive?  It's an interesting story, involving botany, detective work, an unlikely accident, and DNA analysis...

Holy rotating air foils!

Holy rotating air foils!  I had no idea these things were possible in a helicopter.  My mind boggles at the stresses on those rotor blades.  You'll definitely want full screen for this one...

The wisdom of centenarians...

The wisdom of centenarians...  It may not be what you expect :)

The elephant in the room...

The elephant in the room ... for manned space travel outside the Earth system (such as a trip to Mars) is the effects of cosmic rays on humans: basically the same as any other high doses of energetic ionizing radiation.  Think cancer and ugly deaths. 

The van Allen belts around the Earth protect our astronauts in Earth orbit, and the trip to the moon is so short that total exposures are small enough to not be life-threatening.  None of this is true on long and distant voyages, and nobody knows how to fix that.  This is a good backgrounder on the topic, which seems to be studiously ignored in all of NASA's breathless pressers. 

Personally, I think all manned space exploration should be stopped until and if a solution for this problem is found.  The presence of this problem is enough of a reason all by itself to have NASA (and any other government-funded space program) to focus exclusively on robotic exploration.

Not that either common sense or my opinion counts for anything, of course.  I'm just whistling in the wind here...

I miss my dogs...

I miss my dogs...  But not as much as these dogs missed their soldiers...