We enjoyed an unsual musical act at the Old Fire Station on Friday. Thomas Truax plays songs with an understated, whimsical, often dark humour, with the occasional help of an mechanical drummer (named Mother Superior — you can see her at bottom-right in my doodle.) Also starring were the Hornicator and the Stringaling, and an impressive selection of effects pedals and looping tools. Thanks Thomas!
Posts Tagged technology
My first comic creation act with my shiny new lightbox. (A lightbox makes it easy to copy a rough drawing to a final fair copy, or, in this case, to replicate shapes and objects to help keep them consistent from frame to frame.)
Another session at the Museum of the Histoy of Science, drawing objects through a microscope, and then monoprinting. It comes out in mirror image, and as I tried to write the ‘q’ of mosquito a sudden high pitched whining noise disturbed me.
Another interesting talk at the Oxford Skeptics in the Pub meeting — Mark Lynas is an eco-activist who came to the conclusion that GMO is not necessarily bad, and that Organic isn’t necessarily good, using the power of critical thinking. One interesting point he made is that the degree of scientific consensus supporting GMO safety is roughly the same as that supporting climate change. So if you think critically you have to accept both (or possibly neither?)
Trump for a reason - we abandoned reason.
Royal Society - Nullius in Versa
GMO - destruction of crops
Science support for climate change = science support for GMO saftey
Virus resistant cassava
an entire maize crop (drought in Tanzania)
BT aubergines
Dosimeter at Fukushima
Golfball sized piece of Uranium
Wind turbines won't be enough
E. Coli from Organic food - kidney failure
1961 technology -- you'd need this much extra land for agriculture [2 x USA]
join Refugees Welcome in Oxford
Gene drive vs. Malaria
40% coal (UK) -> 10% coal
identity bubbles get smaller and smaller
Plea: be an activist on critical thinking.
The very energetic and interesting Dr. Helen Czerski presented “We need to Talk about Physics” at today’s meeting of Oxford Skeptics in the Pub. We learnt why blueberry jam isn’t blue; why the Hubble telescope is like a raw egg; and why there is a lot of physics still to do to understand everyday phenomena (such as how bubbles move in a turbulent fluid.)
I’m afraid the likeness is worse than usual. Dr. Czerski doesn’t do standing still.
oceanographers
graph of time vs size: quantum / cosmos, life in the middle
benedicts' reagent and blueberry jam
slosh damping bubbles -- frequency of slosh depends on size of cup. Walk slower (or faster)
Mexico city eqrthquake: freq(quake) = freq(buildings) Tai Pei 101, pendulum inside resists toppling
Helium powered gas gun -- jelly diamond catcher
toaster: far more interesting* than a distant star -- and it makes toast! (*maxwell's laws, *black body radiation)
"What can you do when you know that?"
body - planet - civilization (life support)
physics ducks
Homework Experiments:
1. raisins in lemonade...
2. watch spilt coffee dry...
3. tap the rim of a tea cup...
4. slide buttered toast off the table...
Happy Halloween!
Itchy is just being himself today. I feel rather sorry for Knee, but what can you do?
Oh Itchy!
2. Itchy eats his pillow with gusto.
3. Knee: "Itchy! Why are you eating your pillow?"
4. Itchy: "BECAUSE, Knee, I keep forgetting things."
5. Knee: "Itchy! You're eating..."
6. Knee (face-palms): "Memory foam."
I have no idea if this is a universal joke or not. It works in the UK. At least, I hope it does.
Knee: "Itchy ... why is there a house brick in the filter jug?"
Itchy: "BECAUSE, Knee, it's to save water, OBVIOUSLY."
Another tale almost-from-life, and another experiment with watercolouring. I think the grain on this particular paper is too heavy for this kind of thing.
2. Knee: Hey itchy! Will you be long in the bath?
3. Itchy: I'll have you know, Knee, I'm REPAIRING the enamel [holds out a tube of Enamel Fix]
4. Knee [examining the tube]: Itchy! This is toothpaste!
Just a little doodle I found in my brain. The popularity of standing desks is burgeoning in my office (though very few of my colleagues are giraffe.)