Oakfairy

CBS merely announced the name of the upcoming Star Trek TV series, and gave us the briefest glimpse of its titular ship, the Discovery. What could it possibly reveal about the show? Well, if you’re a Star Trek nerd like we are, it can tell you a lot—including when in the timeline the series might take place.

The Discovery is pretty obviously based on Ralph McQuarrie’s design of the Enterprise for the never-made Star Trek: Planet of the Titans. Here’s the Discovery:

And here’s McQuarrie’s design:

Star Trek: Discovery executive producer Bryan Fuller was asked how much the Discovery was influenced by this design, and his answer was that it was “to a point that we can’t legally comment on it until we figure out some things.” So maybe the design of the ship will change between now and when the show actually comes out—in fact, executive producer Heather Kadin has said that this design isn’t final.

But, assuming the ship stays the fundamentally the same, there are some interesting details to note. First is that there were actual models produced based on McQuarrie’s designs. And, even though Planet of the Titans was never made, the models have shown up in Star Trek.

According to Memory Alpha, the Star Trek canon wiki, one of the models turns up in Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, docked near the Enterprise. Another one made an appearance in the Next Generation episode “Unification I.” Both of them are supposedly also in the rubble of the Borg attack at Wolf 359 in “Best of Both Worlds, Part II.”

That does make is possible that this flatter, more angular design was prevalent in Starfleet during the time of the movies, and that maybe the ships seen in The Next Generation were older ships. Another option is that the design is a class of ships that was made during that period. Either way, this might support the rumor that the show will be set in the period after the Undiscovered Country and before The Next Generation.

(UPDATE: A rumor that Bryan Fuller has denied.)

This is further backed up by the fact that the Discovery is registered as NCC-1031. There’s no canonical reasoning behind the numbers, but the Enterprise is NCC-1701, the Defiant from Deep Space 9 is NX-74205 (“NX” denoting experimental or prototype ships), and Voyager from Voyager was NCC-74656. All the later ships have five numbers. The Discovery, with four like the Enterprise and without a letter like the later Enterprises, might be older. Assuming that Starfleet does the logical thing and numbers its ships in production order, the Discovery might even be older than the Enterprise.

As for the ship name, there was a starship Discovery in operation during The Next Generation. It had a tiny, tiny mention in the first season episode “Conspiracy.” It shows up in Starfleet’s files, where an order regarding the Discovery’s rendezvous and personnel transfers with other ships is read by Data.

Since Star Trek: Discovery does take place in the prime universe, that means it shares continuity with that episode. It’s likely not the same ship, but if this show is set before The Next Generation, it’s nice to know that it still has a namesake in the 24th century.

animalrates:

animal rates?

catgifcentral:

Attack kitten at it again 

Mozilla has become the latest browser maker to start phasing out support for Flash. It will start blocking some elements next month before a total block next year.

The developer says it has already tweaked Firefox to reduce the reliance on plugins for features such as video streaming and microphone access. But it says its expanding that program because having stability and usability failures in order to get enhanced Web experiences is no longer “a trade-off users should have to accept.”

The gradual program will start next month when Firefox will block a specific list of Flash content types that it says are invisible to users. The list will only include content where there’s a specific HTML alternative available to developers and the list will be expanded over time.

The next step will come later this year when Mozilla will block any Flash that is used “to check content viewability” which is something that’s mainly used for what have been dubbed supercookies. Again, the change will come only as and when an equivalent HTML API is available.

The gradual approach won’t last forever. At some point in 2017 (on what should perhaps be called F Day) Mozilla will introduce a blanket rule that any Flash plugin is blocked by default and can only be run after a user clicks to activate it. Mozilla is strongly suggesting developers switch to HTML alternatives before that policy takes effect.

The post Mozilla: Flash’s Firefox Days Are Numbered appeared first on Geeks are Sexy Technology News.

catsbeaversandducks:

“Gave my cat some catnip and he’s been laying like this for 2 hours.”

Photos/caption by YA BOY DANNY TANNER

We’ve gone over this before in our post on low and high-rep training , but it bears repeating: Whether you lift light or ultra-heavy weights, your muscles can still grow, provided you push yourself to the point of being unable to physically lift an additional rep. In the end, it’s all about intensity.

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It ends up A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin was always a stickler for detail. Redditor kirke0222 recently posted a very telling letter a 16-year-old Martin wrote to legendary comic book pioneers Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in 1964, regarding a plot point in their Fantastic Four comic, then in its early days. Read on:

This letter was published in Fantastic Four volume one, issue No. 32, in 1964.

I don’t what I love more: that George R.R. Martin was already developing a very descriptive writing style at such a young age (“hydrogen bombs exploded inside my brain and I was swept away by the sheer magnificence of it”), or that he was so polite to Lee and Kirby while criticizing their work.

And I can’t help but see shades of the author Martin would become here. A Song of Ice and Fire is marked by, among other things, Martin’s prodigious attention to detail. Fans can complain that books like A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons meander somewhat, but it’s hard to complain that their plots don’t hold up under scrutiny. Of course that kid wouldn’t be satisfied that Red Ghost suddenly showed up with a cadre of obedient super-powered apes when they’d been furious with him mere issues before.

Young George R.R. Martin will suffer none of your foolishness.

(This image is from George R.R. Martin’s website, and looks to show him at 18.)

To their credit, Lee and Kirby responded, matching Martin’s good humor.

So a deadline forced Lee and Kirby to forget a plot detail, huh? The long waits between Song of Ice and Fire books are starting to make more sense.

h/t Business Insider

Unless you’ve had a sushi chef grate a $50 wasabi stem right onto your plate, you’ve probably not had the real thing. Find out what that green paste next to your tuna roll really is and how compounds in authentic wasabi may one-day treat a variety of medical ailments.

[Reactions]

The post Speaking of Chemistry: The Truth About Wasabi [Video] appeared first on Geeks are Sexy Technology News.

In an ideal world, you’d have a perfect amount of work to fill your day. But let’s be real: The odds that you’ll just show up and be met with the exact right number of tasks are slim. It’s a lot more likely that you’ll (at least at times) feel overwhelmed, underutilized, or downright bored.

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kitster:

lolzpicx:

If I fits, I sits

HE LOOKS SO FUCKING PLEASED WITH HIMSELF OH MY GOD

awwww-cute:

sleepy Shiba trusts his human (Source: http://ift.tt/29EGfJs)

I’ll take an unagi roll, some tuna nigiri, and a side of lies, please.

The dab of spicy green paste that accompanies your sushi may go by the name wasabi, but it’s actually something else entirely. What we call wasabi is almost always just a mix of horseradish, mustard, and a bit of green dye.

Because of similarities in their chemical compounds, which you can see detailed below in a new video from the American Chemical Society’s Reactions series, horseradish makes a less-spicy (but passable) substitute for wasabi. Why aren’t sushi restaurants just serving the real thing?

Wasabi has a reputation as one of the hardest crops to successfully farm. It doesn’t like direct sunlight, but doesn’t want complete shade either. It does well only in mild climates that aren’t ever very hot or cold. And, even when you do manage to get wasabi to grow, it tends to do best in small plots, not large farms.

Given how hard it is to grow, and how often it fails, it’s no big surprise that real wasabi is extremely expensive, costing about $160 per kilogram. Restaurant guests aren’t used to paying for the condiment at all, much less paying more for it than for the sushi itself. So instead of real wasabi, a much cheaper substitute is served—one that people won’t be able to distinguish from the real thing because they’ve never had the real thing.

But how can you tell if your wasabi is real? If you’re eating real wasabi, you almost certainly grated it yourself or had it grated in front of you. If it came out in a paste on the plate, then you probably had some lightly-dyed (but still tasty) horseradish.

After the massive success of Pokémon Go, Nintendo will be releasing another amazing product, a mini edition of the oldschool NES consoles with 30 pre-loaded games! The console will be released on 11/11 for $59.99 and will include the console and one controller.

Included games:

Balloon Fight, Bubble Bobble, Castlevania, Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Double Dragon II: The Revenge, Dr. Mario, Excitebike, Final Fantasy, Galaga, Ghosts’ N Ghoblins, Gradius, Ice Climber, Kid Icarus, Kirby’s Adventure, Mario Bros., Mega Man 2, Metroid, Ninja Gaiden, Pac-Man, Punch-Out!! Featuring Mr. Dream, StarTropics, SUPER C, Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 2, Super Mario Bros. 3, Tecmo Bowl, The Legend of Zelda and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link.

Now how awesome is that?

Now I want a N64 mini!

The NES is coming back to stores! Pick up the new mini NES Classic Edition on 11/11 w/ 30 included games! pic.twitter.com/wFDw7lHWb7

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) July 14, 2016

The post Nintendo to Release Mini NES with 30 Pre-Loaded Games in November! appeared first on Geeks are Sexy Technology News.

Nu har jag varit i Sverige i 12 dagar och jag skrev ett inlägg om hur jag gått tillbaka till min ”noob-LCHF” med massa smör, grädde och andra feta mejerier. Jag har ju levt mejerifritt ganska länge nu, och nu förstår jag varför.

Efter 10 dagars mejerifrossande fick jag mycket ledsna och inflammerade tarmar. Hela buken var helt öm och uppspänd på höger sida (där alla viktiga organ sitter) och det kändes allmänt olustigt. Är det blindtarmen? Håller min lever på att kollapsa? Vad händer? Men så kom jag på det… ahh… jag har ju gått från 0 till 100 – från clean eating till dairy mania!

Fluffig och fin grädde på jordgubbar och blåbär samt en kopp gräddkaffe

Nej!

Mejerier innehåller kasein, ett mjölkprotein som irriterar tarmslemhinnan och som (vid läckande tarm) kan ta sig ut i kroppen och reta immunförsvaret. När jag var hemma hos Maggan och gosade med hennes katter, blev jag superallergisk trots att min allergi blivit mycket bättre med LCHF. Då kände jag mig kass och undrade vad som hänt… har jag inte lagat min tarmflora trots allt?

Jo men… 4 dagars mejerifrossa gjorde att immunförsvaret fick sig en knäck. Histamin overload. Det är min tolkning i alla fall, för jag märker verkligen stor skillnad när jag äter mejerier jämfört med när jag inte äter mejerier. Stor skillnad!

Keso med lite turkisk yoghurt ovanpå samt bär 

I ketos men ”fluffig”

I vanliga fall i ketos brukar kroppen kännas väldigt tight, men nu är jag i full fräs ketos och kroppen är allt annat än tight! Jag känner mig supersladdrig och mjuk som en deg, och det är en typisk mejerieffekt har jag märkt. Särskilt ost tror jag. Ost och fitness går inte hand i hand och så är det med det.

Jag kan vara fluffig, det är helt okej jag bara noterar effekterna som mejerifrossandet har på min kropp. Jag hade tänkt att mejerifrossa hela Sverige-vistelsen men nu får jag nog hejda mig lite!

Relaterade länkar

• Mjölkproteiner och molekylär mimikry
• Varför smör är undantaget i ”mejerifritt” 
• Mejerier mer beroendeframkallande än heroin!?
• Dags att fimpa mejerier

Inlägget Slut på mejeriromansen! dök först upp på Martina Johansson.

It’s a common misconception that the only way to sleep is to stay in bed for 7-8 straight hours until you’re done. If you have trouble staying asleep for that long, try sleeping twice at night.

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animal-factbook:

Using a fake ID to get into the club

The great grudge match of bread spreads—butter vs. margarine—has a new champion. After several decades of inexplicable margarine-dominance, the trend has finally flipped in butter’s favor.

The USDA took a look at the last 100 years of per-person American consumption of butter and margarine, including a graph comparing the rise and fall of both through the decades. At first, margarine is clearly a novelty food. But then in the ’40s, it perks up and enjoys an almost six-decade stretch of supremacy that goes right up until our current decade, when people finally started eating butter again.

So what happened to finally turn the tide? A not-unreasonable assumption is that we simply remembered how good butter tastes. But a lot of it also has to do with a series of shifts over the last century in how people think of both margarine and butter.

Today, if you look at a package of butter and a package of margarine, they’re essentially the same from the outside. But, 100 years ago, that wasn’t the case at all. In fact, margarine in the late-1800s was dyed bright pink to make it clear that it wasn’t butter (yellow dye was, in some cases, prohibited by law).

But—with butter genuinely not available during shortages in WWII—the push to make margarine a true substitute began in earnest. The packaging began to mimic that of butter; marketing campaigns claimed almost indistinguishable buttery tastes and textures at a fraction of the costs. Margarine continued to rise, and then coast, off low-saturated fat diets through the ’80s. Even after those diets fell out of favor, butter only recently began to see an uptick its reputation—an uptick that was mirrored in rising consumption over the last 10 years.

There’s also one other big takeaway, however, in the data that helps explain the shift. We eat less of both overall. One hundred years ago, the average person was consuming 20 combined pounds of butter and margarine. Today, it’s about half that. Perhaps it’s no big surprise that, when they have less to taste overall, people prefer the flavor of butter over margarine.

Yep, that was pretty much how I felt back when I was in my 20s.

[Source: Electric Bunny Comics | Like “Electric Bunny Comics” on Facebook]

awwww-cute:

You are all my children now (Source: http://ift.tt/29jSUEl)

babyanimalgifs:

more baby animals here

[Source: The Very Near Future | Follow “The Very Near Future” on Twitter]

larstheyeti:

Amazing!

There’s no real way to really discuss this without spoilers, so let me put it this way: If you had any lingering doubts about that scene, you may put now them away.

The scene, of course, was atop the Tower of Joy, as young Ned Stark arrived to rescue his sister Lyanna, only to find her dying after giving birth to the artist eventually known as Jon Snow. We didn’t hear everything Lyanna told Ned—and we certainly didn’t hear who Jon’s father was. We did, however, hear her beg Ned to protect the baby because “he” would kill him—presumably Robert Baratheon, who was on a Targaryen murder spree after Rhaegar abducted Lyanna—which implies that little Jon has Targaryen blood in him.

Certainly it has always stood to reason that Rhaegar would be Jon’s father—he’s the one who wanted Lyanna enough to steal her despite the fact he was married and Lyanna was betrothed to Robert, and he had kept her for many months before Ned finally arrived at the Tower of Joy to rescue her. But without audible confirmation that Rhaegar was the babydaddy, some people have been speculating that Jon’s father may be someone else entirely.

These people are wrong, which we know thanks to this handy infographic just released by HBO:

As you can see, it’s a list of relationships which very clearly lists Rhaegar Targaryen as Jon’s parent, along with Lyanna. If the show still wanted to present Jon’s father as an unknown, then at the very least it would have left this particular line out.

So if you’re one of the people who thought the show was presenting the formula that x + L = J (as opposed to the infinitely more prevalent even before the episode aired R + L = J). you may put down your pencils. HBO just solved for x.

[Making Game of Thrones]

southernsideofme:

Majestic AF

tastefullyoffensive:

If Dogs Had 911 by Reverend_Scott (via Greta J.)

bobbycaputo:

“If My Small Dog Was As Big As She Thinks She Is”

“Vivian the Dog Moves to Brooklyn,” is a book about a big dog moving from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Brooklyn, New York. It’s 32 pages long and will be full of beautiful photo-illustrations created by Mitch Boyer and starring Vivian, with some pretty fantastic letterings and drawings by the talented, Valerie Navarro.

An ambitious but controversial plan to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch moves closer to reality this week, with the deployment of an ocean plastic cleanup boom off the coast of the Netherlands in the North Sea.

The 100-meter floating boom is a scaled-down version of a 100-kilometer long system that Dutch nonprofit The Ocean Cleanup eventually hopes to deploy in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. The boom is meant to slurp up the millions of tons of unsightly plastic comprising the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The prototype, aptly named “Boomy McBoomface,” will sit roughly 20 kilometers off the Dutch coast for a year in a critical field test of the system’s survivability.

The Ocean Cleanup’s mission has garnered international media attention, thanks in no small part to the nonprofit’s charismatic founder, 21-year-old Boyan Slat, who was just 18 when he started working on the idea. The basic concept is to use currents, wind, and waves—the natural motion of the ocean—to push plastic garbage into screens that extend outward from floating booms. The booms, which are anchored to the sea floor through a system of cables, form a V-shaped structure that concentrates plastic at the center, where it can be easily harvested by collection vessels.

To bring that concept to life, the nonprofit has assembled a team of engineers, who’ve spent the last year testing a small-scale model at a maritime research institute in the Netherlands. That the team is already moving to field trials speaks to the strong public support for the project, which raised over $2 million in a crowdfunding campaign in 2014, and secured an additional million dollars for its prototype test from the Dutch government and private supporters. The full-scale structure is expected to cost roughly $350 million.

But the plan is not without its critics—namely, members of oceanography and marine biology community, many of whom feel the design hasn’t been properly vetted and are worried about the potential ecological impacts of what would become the largest offshore structure ever assembled.

After The Ocean Cleanup published a lengthy feasibility study in 2014, oceanographers Kim Martini and Miriam Goldstein responded with their own technical review, which found “major issues” with the plan. These included the use of average rather than extreme current speeds, which could cause engineers to significantly underestimate the loads and tensions the structure will be subjected to in the field. The feasibility study also failed to address biofouling—the accumulation of life forms that’ll add weight to the booms over time. What’s more, it’s unclear how the company will fix the system should a catastrophic failure occur in the middle of the ocean.

Others have raised concerns about the effects of the boom structure on marine life, either through direct by-catch or by impacting the behavior of migratory species. As deep sea biologist and Southern Fried Science blogger Andrew Thaler pointed out in a blog post last year, The Ocean Cleanup boom system is, by definition, a Fish Aggregating Device, or FAD:

In it’s crudest form, an FAD is any floating, semi-stationary structure in the open ocean. Prey species tend to aggregate under floating structures, and predators naturally follow. The Ocean Cleanup won’t simply act as a barrier to migration, but will also attract pelagic species. Long term, this could create permanent or semi-permanent communities, resulting in changes to migratory patterns.

“Our engineers take all criticisms and concerns very seriously,” said Ocean Cleanup spokesperson Jan van Ewijk, adding that the organization was aware of the scientific community’s response to its feasibility study. (Gizmodo was referred to the group’s engineering team for response to technical questions about environmental impacts, and we will update when we hear back.)

Goldstein and Martini, meanwhile, received no feedback to their analysis outside of a video response from Slat, which downplayed their qualifications for commenting on engineering issues but acknowledged that they made many “valid points.” How many of those valid points are being acted on is unclear.

“There are some changes to the version 2.0 of the feasibility study, but none that allows us to easily see what is different, as would be the case in normal peer review,” Martini told Gizmodo in an email, adding that the limited response to her review and an earlier offer for review by the Scripps Institute of Oceanography “has discouraged engagement from other scientists.”

It’s possible that The Ocean Cleanup will address many of the concerns its critics have raised before deploying the full-scale array in 2020. The nonprofit is reportedly conducting an environmental impact analysis with Royal Haskoning DHV. And with its newly deployed prototype, the group stands to learn a lot more about how the system will fare and how it may fail under stormy conditions.

Update 6/23/16 4:15 pm: Kim Martini has just posted some additional thoughts (and great questions, including why the heck is The Ocean Cleanup using RO-BOOMS, which have been around since the ‘90s?) on the blog Deep Sea News. Check out her post here.

kikuzu:

(via サラミさんはTwitterを使っています: “貴重な押し込まれる着ぐるみ画像が増えましたありがとうございます https://t.co/3mVPgFuGG9”)

Många påstår att de absolut inte klarar sig utan kolhydrater för att de blir sååå deppiga och nedstämda utan sin snuttefilt fikabröd, glass, bröd, pasta eller lösgodis. Snuttefilt – det är vad det är. Ofta när intentionen finns att äta nyttigt (till exempel sockerfritt) kommer nedstämdheten tillsammans med orkeslöshet, på grund av för lite energi. Eftersom man håller sig mätt längre på lågkolhydratkost är det lättare hänt att man ”glömmer” äta eller äter mindre och sen inte har de vanliga hungersignalerna som påminner en om att äta. Den nya signalen blir då deppighet eller allmänt dåligt humör. Lösningen är att våga ÄTA ordentligt och att äta fett. Då försvinner nedstämdheten med en gång. Kroppen behöver energi och det är vad den försöker förmedla.

Snuttefiltar som är beroende

Vissa snuttefiltar är lite mer dramatiska och i klass med beroende. Detta gäller typiskt kombinationen MAGBESVÄR + en besatthet av BRÖD och produkter med GLUTEN i. Dessa går hand i hand, jag kan inte ens räkna ihop alla smala/underviktiga tjejer med svår IBS eller inflammerade tarmar som i ren förskräckelse säger ”men jag MÅSTE äta BRÖD, det är det ENDA jag äter! Jag kommer försvinna om jag inte får mitt bröd, titta på mig! Jag är ju redan så smal”

Att sen leva med kroniska smärtor på grund av denna envishet är något som i förlängningen ökar risken för tarmcancer.

Det kan handla om ett fysiskt beroende till gluten, eller en psykologisk hang-up och här är det bara COLD TURKEY som gäller. UT med allt bröd NU.

Samma resonemang gäller sockerberoende där man också kan uppleva att ett liv utan socker inte är värt att leva. Titta på dessa tankar, undersök dem. Är de verkligen förankrade i verkligheten? Titta gärna på min bok Beroendehjärnan för lite praktiska kognitiva knep att hantera beroende.

Kasst humör på LCHF – med lösningar

Okej du är inte beroende av något särskilt eller har ditt beroende under kontroll, och du äter tillräckligt med energi? Fortfarande kass humör?

Här är några lösningar du kan testa!

1. Keto adaptera – om du vill göra LCHF/Keto till din livsstil behöver du ha ett förhöjt fettintag lång tid. Inga avsteg. 200g fett om dagen i många månader innan orken och energin kommer tillbaka.

2. Om du inte orkar keto-adaptera kan du lägga in lite rotfrukter, bönor och andra grönsaker i kosten, särskilt de som är rika på tryptofan.

3. L-tryptofan eller 5HTP som kosttillskott (vet att 5HTP inte längre är tillgänglig i Sverige men L-tryptofan och vitamin B6 är bra ersättare)

4. Träna! Många blir nedstämda som effekt av bristande fysisk aktivitet. Att komma ut och röra på sig, promenera, dansa och gymma är bevisat serotoninhöjande aktiviteter. Om du försöker keto-adaptera är det toppen att träna samtidigt, då går adapteringen snabbare.

5. Husknepet – 1 kokt kall potatis före sänggående. Detta lilla knep har förändrat livet för många nedstämda LCHF:are! Testa gärna om du inte kommer runt deppigheten efter din koständring.

Inlägget Deppig på LCHF? – 5 Lösningar! dök först upp på Martina Johansson.