Strangely Perfect

One Small Step for Man, one Giant Leap For Mankind When Armstrong said those words (except I missed out the ‘a’), it looked like men & women would be walking tall on all sorts of astronomical bodies in a continuation of the Apollo programme.  As we no know, things didn’t quite work out like that [...]

Introduction Some time ago I tried out Flickr, ultimately deciding to host my own pictures on-site.  I don’t the idea of someone having MY picture resource at THEIR beck and call… Whatever.  FlickrHQ sent me an email today (from “The Flickreenos” by gad!) introducing me to something they call, People in Photos. As they say, [...]

Coroner and Law I’m often struck when reading the papers or news, to see the coroner’s verdict on someone’s death as: Ending his own life while the balance of his mind was disturbed Well they have to say something, it’s their job, but the phrase is very peculiar. Take this couple, the Milners, who were [...]

Continuing on From…  What Killed Flight AF 447 Since the search for the ‘black boxes’ of Flight 447 was abandoned a few days ago (20th Aug 2009 – see news item),  only 3 days later, Nature’s On-line version has published reports of the jet things I was going on about in my first article about [...]

Exploring the Simultaneous Nature of Cause & Effect Star Trek: The Next Generation: Finale, Episode – “All Good Things…” I’ve just watched the double episode finale to the TNG Picard series just after the cyclists finished their ascent of Mont Ventoux in this years Tour de France.  It was “All Good Things…”(see link, link & [...]

New Jaguar XJ In common with most cars like this, it’s a lovely looking machine – a style marvel; sleek and vapid, mercurial. It’s also a waste of space and a waste of effort. It’s two tonnes of mass for a 400kg payload is pants.  An ecological disaster zone. Money for Old Rope Not only [...]

Oleg Deripaska? Oleg is one of the world’s richest men.  Getting his Physics degree as the old USSR collapsed, then buying up shares in Aluminium smelters, getting an Economics degree and then setting up Basic Element, a vast metals empire, he somehow rid the company and industry of the Mafia, but no-one knows how. But [...]

Data, and Trust in Science The Burden of Proof is on Science but ’twas ever thus…. The arguments from climate change sceptics ultimately hinge around the general perception of aloofness and intangibility that hang round science and scientists.  The trouble is that some people are basically innumerate and no amount of trying will make them [...]

Books by Clark Ashton Smith It’s important to realise the impact that this funny, eclectic, multi-talented, poor, skinny man has had on the world.  The whole genre of science fiction and fantasy and whole industries that hang off the backs of people like Tolkien, are also standing on the shoulders of people like H.P. Lovecraft. [...]

Following on from Ukraine getting it’s gas shut off  (which I mentioned in passing as BBC and Weird Pravda Report on Gas), I thought I’d pedantically point out a small error in a statement from Ukraine. It’s meaningless as a point, but does emphasise the tit-for-tat nature of the current impasse with Russia (GazProm).  Specifically, [...]

Garrett Lisi’s Campervan Theory of Everything I love the way he’s freed his life of encumberances to allow himself time to think…. Garrett’s mind seems to hinge on symmetries and the resolution of everything into clearly recognisable patterns, which, as he states with his Galileo reference, harks back to earlier times and theories. He’s wrapped [...]

It’s True! Record profits at Gazprom as it forms Opec-style gas cartel The news that yesterday,… (new bad guy?) Russia (aka Putin Inc), Iran (axis of evil?) and (our friend?) Qatar have decided to collude together like OPEC to drive up gas prices (sorry, control the market in a uniform way beneficial to suppliers and [...]

I hope so.. To say that I’m dissatisfied with the affairs of men on our world and how they behave towards each other would be a bit of an understatement.

Two days to go! The End of the world is nigh! In CERN, the LHC is having it’s first big switch on in two days time, the 10th of September.  All the news is full of it currently, and they especially focus on the possibility that we’re all gonna die.  ( A small test has [...]