Rules of the Sale: 1920
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
Washington, D.C., circa 1920
“Coubro [?] clothing store, interior”
Happy shopping, everyone.
National Photo Company glass negative.
View original post and note when you get there and view the larger image that it’s only the salesmen who appear to be aware of the camera.
Off the Clock: Disrupted Daily Rhythms Hinder Fertility in Mice
via 3quarksdaily by Azra Raza
From Scientific American:
Image: Flickr/woodleywonderworks (via Scientific American)
“My biological clock is ticking.” The phrase typically pops up in movies about middle-aged women who want to start a family before menopause makes it impossible. But a new study published in PLoS ONE indicates that another clock may also be important for females trying to conceive: the one that regulates our waking and sleeping cycles.
A strong body of evidence links daily wake-sleep cycles to feminine reproductive cycles. When scientists remove a female mouse’s suprachiasmatic nucleus – the pacemaker in her brain that regulates daily circadian rhythms – her estrous cycle ceases, and she becomes infertile.
In human females, working night shifts and frequently travelling across time zones has been associated with menstrual irregularities, reduced fertility and a greater number of negative pregnancy outcomes such as low birth weight, pre-term birth and miscarriage. But “one of the issues with these epidemiological studies,” says Keith Summa, a medical and doctoral student at Northwestern University, “is that there are other factors associated with shift work that may also be playing a role.” For example, women who work night shifts also tend to sleep less. “Our study provides stronger evidence that reproductive problems are due to circadian disruption itself,” Summa says.
More here.
In the News: Koalas in Danger via ipl2 - news and information by theipl2blog
Here’s a really great source that I rarely use in my weekend miscellany; mainly because the “In the News” items tend to be US-centric (not surprising, this is a US-based resource). It is, however, a resource I use extensively for information retrieval.
Try it for yourself http://www.ipl.org/
Koalas may be synonymous with Australia, but lately many Australians have been seeing less and less of the animals. According to research, koala populations are dwindling and threats such as climate change and urban sprawl are destroying their habitats. Conservationists have been fighting hard for years to have the animals listed as a threatened species and this month Australian officials helped accomplish this mission. We may think of koalas as cute and cuddly now, but we may soon be thinking of them as an endangered species as well.
Australian Koala Foundation (AKF)
In existence for over 25 years, this non-profit organization is dedicated to spreading awareness about the conservation of koalas as well as promoting both research and habitat protection. AKF provides information on koalas, their plight and ways to help. There are also resources for kids, videos and photos. And a retail outlet
National Geographic Creature Feature
National Geographic Kids features fun facts for kids about koalas, a variety of photos and a map that highlights the animal’s natural habitat. This website allows visitors to print out the information or email it to friends.
Australian Government: Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities
Sponsored by the Australian government, this website details the official evidence for adding koalas to the threatened species list. Petitions relating to this ruling along with recovery plans, conservation and management programs are available to view.
ARKive Blog
Devoted to showcasing pictures and videos of endangered species, the blog produced by ARKive discusses the recent threats koalas have been facing and the ways in which changes in climate and habitat loss have adversely affected them. Details concerning what steps are being taken to save them can also be found here along with links to photos and videos of the koala captured by ARKive.
The Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife
This website provides background information on the koala as well as its habitat. There are additional resources listed that relay the types of projects and programs the Foundation has put in place to save the endangered animal and restore its natural home so it can thrive in the wild.
Thank you for supporting the ipl2.
We hope you found these resources informative.
Indeed I did. In fact I spent far too long being informed and not enough reformatting for inclusion into my blog post!
And, because I couldn't have an item about koalas without a picture I then had to go and hunt for a copyright-free one. And here it is – thanks to Wikipedia Commons.
Driving Speed 2 – A Free Racing Game With Amazing Graphics [MUO Gaming]
via MakeUseOf by Chris Hoffman
You’re probably aware by now that the How-to Geek blog provides information about a free game – and a walk-through of the process – most Fridays. Many of these games I bring to you as they’re usually quite fun if only for “play once and forget it” use.
However, when MakeUseOf provides information about a game then I sit up and take notice, lots of notice.
This one is car racing which is not my favourite but just read the introductory enthusiasm!
Picture a racing game with high-quality graphics, eight-player multiplayer, and realistic physics. You’d probably assume that this game costs money – but it’s named Driving Speed 2, and it’s free. This isn’t an arcade-style racing game where cars fly up into the air – it’s got realistic handling. There are lots of great freeware games out there, but free racing games with high-quality graphics are a rare breed. Driving Speed 2 runs on Windows 7, Vista, and XP.Read the rest on the Makeuseof blog post (and at least see the adverts that allow this great source of information to remain free at point of use).
Be careful when installing it – it tries to install a toolbar by default. It’s understandable that the developers want some revenue, but bloatware toolbars are bad.
Dark Matter Makes a Stunning Comeback
via Big Think by Orion Jones
Last month, a team of researchers found dark matter mysteriously absent in the region around our sun. Having mapped more than 400 stars, spanning a region roughly 26,000 light years in diameter, the European Southern Observatory identified a quantity of material that matched what could be directly observed, such as stars, gas and dust.
Read More
Batteries Not Included - a collection of vintage toy commercials
via Boing Boing by Mark Frauenfelder
From Archive.org's wonderful Classic TV archive, an hour long video of old toy commercials.
Batteries Not Included
The Skeptic: 1915 via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
March 28, 1915. Washington, D.C.
“Argo station wagon at Square Deal Auto Exchange”
Who’ll be the first to Street View this location?
View the original post to find the answer. And remember that comments in Shorpy have the most recent at the top so to follow the thread you need to go to the bottom and work up.
Moving the goalposts
An interview with British conceptual artist and writer Stewart Home
via Eurozine articles by Anna Aslanyan
Situationism’s journey from its Parisian origins into Anglo-Saxon culture has been littered with feuds, schisms and excommunications. Writer and conceptual artist Stewart Home recalls the history and politics of Situationism and its British pendant, psychogeography.
Full text (PDF 6pp)
So today’s reading has brought me “libertarian Cartesianism” and now “situationism”. Oh the places you’ll go – and the things you’ll learn (to misquote Dr Seuss) when picking items for the weekend miscellany!
Actually, it was only as far as Wikipedia.
The Neuroscience of Religious Experiences: Andrew Newberg LIVE on Big Think
via Big Think by Jonathan Fowler and Elizabeth Rodd
A pioneer of neurotheology, Dr. Andrew Newberg uses fMRI and other neuroscientific tools to study religious experiences in the brain. He has the rare distinction of having studied Franciscan nuns and Tibetan monks in his lab.
Read More and link to the video of the broadcast (20 minutes).
How Facebook Makes You Immortal
via Big Think by Orion Jones
Australian philosopher Patrick Stokes argues that the persistence of our online profiles after our physical death makes us immortal in a very meaningful sense.
Read More
This is not necessarily the sort of immortality that I want. I have, therefore, provided my elder daughter with the information she needs to close down all of my online accounts – once she has told all my social contacts that I am no longer around to maintain the contact. And, if appropriate, the date and time of the funeral!
The Drugstore: 1913
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
1913. No location given. “G.W. Armstrong drugstore”
Seidlitz Powders only 25 cents.
8x10 glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company
View original post – and find that the location may not have been given in 1913 but nearly a hundred years later people have managed to indicate where this store was [see comments]. This is another picture that you could spend a long time looking at, there a mass of detail in it.
Political and Tariff Reform Posters
via Peter Scott’s Library Blog
This collection covers the period c1892-1910 and consists of 88 posters produced for the Conservative and Unionist Party, the Labour Party, the Liberal Party, the Liberal Unionist Council and the Tariff Reform League.
In the main they cover the period when Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, Arthur Balfour, Henry Campbell-Bannerman and Herbert Asquith successively held the post of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
The main themes of this collection are the Second Boer War (1899-1902), Tariff Reform and the conflict between Protectionism and Free Trade, the question of Irish Home Rule and issues around Immigration.
They have been arranged by political party rather than in the themes of the collection.
LSE Digital Library
No Technology Dies
via Big Think by Tyler Willis
Kevin Kelly’s What Technology Wants [amended link to Amazon UK] is one of the most important books I’ve read in the past decade. If you’re at all involved in technology innovation, it’s required reading. I use several of the ideas originating from this book on a weekly basis.
Read More [but beware, as always with Big Think, of the spammy comments.]
Sugar and Spice: 1900
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
Detroit, Michigan, circa 1900 “Merry-go-round in Clark Park”
8x10 inch (cropped) dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company
View original post
Theatre Comique: 1910
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive - Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
Detroit, Michigan, circa 1910
“Theatre Comique”
Bring the kids!
8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company
View original post
How a Distracted Brain Works Like a Painkiller
via Big Think by Orion Jones
New scientific evidence supports the advice that keeping your mind off a painful experience, whether physical or emotional, is an effective way to reduce the severity of physical pain you feel.
Read More
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