near Elida, New Mexico
May 20, 2012

About the Database: The Mind is a Metaphor, is an evolving work of reference, an ever more interactive, more solidly constructed collection of mental metaphorics. This collection of eighteenth-century metaphors of mind serves as the basis for a scholarly study of the metaphors and root-images appealed to by the novelists, poets, dramatists, essayists, philosophers, belle-lettrists, preachers, and pamphleteers of the long eighteenth century.

Look at Microsoft, Apple, Google and Facebook. All of them created a massive amount of value -- and all have become phenomenally successful companies -- but all of them did so by also letting others monetize large portions of the value they created. It's how you build a more long-lasting ecosystem from which you can continue to profit from over time. If you seek to capture all of the value yourself, you don't last very long.

The net changes the world’s power structures in a much more fundamental way than changing the way a few groups of entrepreneurs are able to make money. The net is the greatest equalizer that humankind has ever invented. It is either the greatest invention since the printing press, or the greatest invention since written language. The battles we see are not a result of loss of money; they are caused by a loss of the power of narratives.

The skirmish over how we talk when we talk about copyright has a long history.

Obama spending binge never happened

I worked for Reagan and wrote for National Review. But the new hysterical right cares nothing for truth or dignity

oldfred

Overall, for the 5 devices tested, we found that none are very sensitive to different IO scheduler algorithms and no consistent results were observed across all devices.

Audiovore is an online platform dedicated to the documentation and promotion of Colorado’s music and arts scene through the production of high quality audio and video content.

Remastersys is a tool that can be used to do 2 things with an existing Debian, Ubuntu or derivative installation.
1) It can make a full system backup including personal data to a live cd or dvd that you can use anywhere and install.
2) It can make a distributable copy you can share with friends. This will not have any of your personal user data in it.

blogs, comics, cool, delightful, farout, favs, funny, hopped, jack, shiny, silly, wtf

Propaganda that was supposed to target foreigners could now be aimed at Americans, reversing a longstanding policy.

In the tropics, carbon from cleared forests goes straight to the atmosphere.

Since the paper was published, a project to do just this has been attracting investors, Google among them. This week, the Department of the Interior announced that it took the first step toward approving an early stage of the offshore connector. The venture is looking to put a high-voltage, direct-current line in federal waters between northern New Jersey and Virginia. The DOI has recognized that no other company is planning to do so, and has given the project the go ahead to seek an environmental review. The approval came despite the fact that there are no offshore wind farms in place at the moment. As it turns out, the project makes a degree of financial sense on its own, and could be a key enabler of wind farm installation.

Being discussed on the final day of the Ubuntu Developer Summit in Oakland was "GNOME Flavor" with the point being to "Discuss what demand there is to make a GNOME flavor of Ubuntu

what Google would have looked like in the 80s

photos of everyday objects exploding

DuckDuckGo and Ixquick take a tiny bite out of Google.

Science Friday (audio)

When homo sapiens made their entrance 100,000 years ago they were confronted by a wide range of other early humans - homo erectus, who walked better and used fire; homo habilis who used tools; and of course the Neanderthals, who were brawny and strong. But shortly after their arrival, something happened that vaulted the species forward and made them the indisputable masters of the planet.

Did our Neolithic ancestors turn to agriculture so that they could be sure of a tipple? US Archaeologist Patrick McGovern thinks so. The expert on identifying traces of alcohol in prehistoric sites reckons the thirst for a brew was enough of an incentive to start growing crops.

TapTronic is a progressive fusion of Irish dance and electronic music

Stuart A. Kauffman studies the origin of life and the origins of molecular organization. Thirty-five years ago, he developed the Kauffman models, which are random networks exhibiting a kind of self-organization that he terms "order for free." He asks a question that goes beyond those asked by other evolutionary theorists: if selection is operating all the time, how do we build a theory that combines self-organization (order for free) and selection?

By revamping radiocarbon dating, Tom Higham is painting a new picture of humans' arrival in Europe.

(ReoCities)

Both pairs of photons are entangled, so that the two particles in the first set are entangled with each other, and the two particles in the second set are entangled with each other. Then, one photon from each pair is sent to a person named Victor. Of the two particles that are left behind, one goes to Bob, and the other goes to Alice. But now, Victor has control over Alice and Bob's particles. If he decides to entangle the two photons he has, then Alice and Bob's photons, each entangled with one of Victor's, also become entangled with each other. And Victor can choose to take this action at any time, even after Bob and Alice may have measured, changed or destroyed their photons.

"delayed-choice entanglement swapping."

Imagine a search engine that simply removed the top 1 million most popular web sites from its index. What would you discover?

A quick update for Ubuntu 12.04 Precise Pangolin users running GNOME Shell: I've updated some of the extensions available in the WebUpd8 GNOME 3 PPA to the latest version which works with GNOME Shell 3.4.

Roanoke Island

from “The Brain Wars: The Scientific Battle Over the Existence of the Mind and the Proof That Will Change the Way We Live Our Lives.” – Mario Beauregard

We are, he explains, the only species to experience a distinct plateauing in mid-life, as opposed to the steady wind-down from young adulthood to death experienced by everything from hamsters to elephants. And this, he insists, is thanks to centuries of evolutionary biology.

"We have found a neuropsychological basis for spirituality, but it's not isolated to one specific area of the brain," said Brick Johnstone, professor of health psychology in the School of Health Professions. "Spirituality is a much more dynamic concept that uses many parts of the brain. Certain parts of the brain play more predominant roles, but they all work together to facilitate individuals' spiritual experiences."