Saturday 28 July 2012

10 stories and links I found educative, interesting or simply weird!

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The Scrap Room: 1915
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
The Scrap Room: 1915
Wyandotte, Michigan, circa 1915
“Detroit Shipbuilding Co., scrap room”
8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company
View original post and do please look at the comments. One of them says that there are still workplaces like this – I wish I didn’t believe it.

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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Physics has undermined logic. Even nothingness is not what it seemed. The universe is devoid of meaning. That’s not such a bad thing... more

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The Flaws in Defending Morality With Religion
via Big Think by Tauriq Moosa
When we think of those opposed to homosexuality – which still sounds weird to me, like opposing left-handed people* – or stem-cell research or euthanasia, we tend conclude they’re justifying themselves because of religion.
View full story

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What’s your Technology Quotient (TQ)?
via Big Think by Parag and Ayesha Khanna
A new era requires a new vocabulary. Will we still talk about the “mobile” phone when all phones are mobile, or when they are implanted within us?
Does “evolution” really capture our deepening entanglement with technology today, or should we instead speak of human-technology co-evolution?
Read More

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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
A home-goods behemoth with a knack for social order buys acres of urban blight, turning it into a chic address. Ikea is building a city... more

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Finches
via Credo Reference Blog by Credo Reference
Finch
As researchers from Liverpool John Moores University and The Royal Veterinary College recently discovered, Gouldian finches – a colourful, social finch that lives in Australian woodlands – have very distinct personalities which may be related to the colour of their heads. Finches, also known as the family Fringillidae, come in many shapes and sizes including sparrows, canaries and cardinals. Finches have long been an inspiration to ornithologists and biologists in general, ever since Charles Darwin used his observations of several different finch species on the Galapagos Islands as the foundation of his theories of evolution.
I showed this picture to my husband who said, in a tone of disgust, “My dad had some in 1966 which cost him a fortune and they were much more colourful than that one”. I had to go and find an image which looked more as he remembered.
Thank you, Wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gouldian_Finch

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Clever sucker-bets
via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow

Here are ten clever sucker bets from Richard Wiseman. They’re a good mix of physics, logic, low trickery, concept-shifting, misdirection, topology, and breathtaking chutzpah. Seriously, I can’t believe that he ever tried #10, because he is still breathing.

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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Cubism, pointillism, synchromism: Thomas Hart Benton “wallowed in every cockeyed ism that came along” before finding realism... more

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Pond’s Celebrity Endorsement Ads, 1920s
via Retronaut by Amanda
I was not sure which of these beautiful, pampered ladies to include but settled for the Queen of Romania.

Source: Duke University Library
See the rest of Amanda’s selection here.

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Decisions Are Emotional, not Logical: The Neuroscience behind Decision Making
via Big Think by Jim Camp
Think of a situation where you had bulletproof facts, reason, and logic on your side, and believed there was absolutely no way the other person could say no to your perfectly constructed argument and proposal. To do so would be impossible, you figured, because there was no other logical solution or answer.
Read More


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