firehose

Station-ery

Cute title. Made back in 2007, so the Circle Line is actually a loop, rather than the… ahh.. paperclip… it is now. Nicely done piece of whimsy.

(Source: Zach_ManchesterUK/Flickr)

The unique flavor of a whiskey or scotch might be more than pure luck--it might be a science.

Longtime retailers Buddy and Judy Saunders have sold the remaining two locations in their Dallas-Fort Worth area Lone Star Comics chain, leaving them with the online store MyComicShop.com. They announced in July that the locations in Mesquite, Hurst and Plano had been sold, and on Monday added the Fort Worth and flagship Arlington stores to [...]

Believe it or not, primates may have invisible hands as well as opposable thumbs. New research published this month (registration required) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), and reported at Phys.org, suggests that monkeys can be rational economic actors, just like humans.

Scientists spent 20 days training rhesus macaques to gamble by choosing between pie charts which presented different probabilities of winning water. They were presented with two options: the safe choice offered them at least a little water for sure, while a risky choice generally offered them a bigger ration of water but only a fifty-fifty shot of getting it.

“Wealth” in this experiment was also determined by water—specifically by measuring the concentration of chemicals in the monkeys’ blood to determine how well-hydrated they were. Researchers classed dehydrated monkeys as “poor” and well-hydrated ones as “rich.”

Wealthy monkeys, researchers found, generally took greater risks than poor monkeys. As a macaque became more dehydrated, it became more likely to choose the safe option. A wealthy macaque was more likely to chance getting no water at all for the possibility of getting a lot of it. Taken as a whole, the monkeys were slightly risk-averse; they were a bit more likely to choose the safe option on average.

This pretty much approximates the kind of rational human behavior economists assume when they construct economic models. Poor people tend to invest their money in assets where they know they won’t lose it, like US Treasurys or simple stock-market indices. Richer humans are more comfortable taking risks where they can lose money so long as the reward is sufficiently large.

But the behavior goes beyond the pecuniary domain. The experiment suggests that risk-analysis is genetic. Humans and monkeys make rational decisions based on risk and reward. In similar experiments, birds did not.

“The monkeys… seem to share human risk preferences. They were slightly risk averse and we know that humans would behave similarly in these experimental conditions,” Agnieszka Tymula of the University of Sydney’s School of Economics, one of the researchers, told Phys.org. ”Understanding the biological mechanisms underlying risky behaviours that evolved around satiety may provide unique insights about decision-making and consumption wealth.”

Minneapolis inventor Glenn Auerbach of Saunatimes and his team of friends have developed the “nICE Mug,” a reusable mold that creates a drinking mug made of ice. Glenn is raising funds on Kickstarter for its production.

After much research and experimentation, I have designed a patent pending mold that is shaped how nature freezes water in a container: thicker at the bottom and thinner along the sides. The material is food grade reusable plastic. The nICE hold feels good in your hand, insulating your hand from the ice. There’s a sponge at the bottom of the nICE hold to absorb the melting ice. I love how the product is all 100% reusable. Yea, it takes energy to freeze nICE mugs, but it’s nice to know that there’s no waste: your nICE mug melts and you can use what’s left to rub on your sore shoulder.

Here is a video where Glenn explains how the idea was born:

videos and image via nICE Mug

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

scarygoround:

MERMAIDS! Watch out for mermaids

The Federal Government's budget sequester has left the nation's science and technology funding at its lowest in years. As predicted, labs are ditching projects and scientists; researchers are looking overseas for jobs and funding; health initiatives are being hamstrung; and federal agencies across the board are floundering. Here's what you need to know about the state of science in America.

Read more...

PSMania has created an infographic detailing the evolution of the iconic PlayStation controller since it was first released in 1994. The first iteration of Sony’s controller didn’t even have analog sticks, but it has since evolved to include a touch pad, a dedicated Share button, a light bar, a Sixaxis sensor, a speaker, and a stereo headphone jack. For a larger version of the infographic, head over to PSMania.

image via PSMania

via Visually

River City Ransom: Underground is now on Kickstarter, seeking $180,000 (CAD) by October 9. Developed by Conatus Creative, the game is an officially-licensed follow-up to the original Technos Japan NES game. The developer acquired rights to the beat-em-up in April.

River City Ransom: Underground will feature an 8-bit-style look while also expanding to include more playable characters and four-player cooperative multiplayer. The game is currently in development for PC only, though the developer noted that with enough support, it could appear on consoles as well.

River City Ransom follow-up goes live on Kickstarter originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 10 Sep 2013 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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cpnblowfish:

Holmes
(1854/†1891?)

Couverture de bande-dessinée.

Récit de Luc Brunschwig. Dessin et couleurs de Cecil.

The band broke up this year. Or it went on “indefinite hiatus,” like R.E.M. or The Pixies—titans that didn’t flare out in a blaze of glory but simply went to bed after a slow, strong fade. Harmonix, the Boston-based developer behind Rock Band (and the entire plastic-instrument-game phenomenon of the last decade) released its last downloadable songs for the game on April 2, two and a half years after the release of the final game in the series, Rock Band 3.

Don McLean’s “American Pie” closed out 281 consecutive weeks of new songs for living room partiers, each one almost rewritten from the ground up by the studio to be played by amateurs with plastic instruments. Classic songs, underground indie bar burners, metalhead thrashers—they were all reimagined as video game feats of dexterity, each one adapted for all kinds of skill levels.

“Rock Band ...

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By design, Janelle Monáe doesn’t fit neatly into any musical genre. Her EP Metropolis: Suite I and 2010’s The ArchAndroid combine lush soul, catchy pop hooks, and carefully arranged orchestral backing with futuristic influences, all while she remains in character as alter ego Cindi Mayweather, a rebellious android from a dystopian future. Monáe is equally distinctive off-stage, maintaining creative partnerships with, among others, Erykah Badu and André 3000 and business relationships with both Diddy and CoverGirl. Her new record, The Electric Lady, has already spawned catchy singles with more direct crossover appeal than ever, including “Q.U.E.E.N.” with Badu and “Primetime” with Miguel. In preparation for the release of The Electric Lady, Monáe spoke to The A.V. Club about choosing collaborators, Michael Jackson, and what music she would save from the apocalypse.

The A.V. Club: How did your collaboration with ...

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Vernon Chatman and John Lee have created three of the weirdest, most subversive, and ridiculously wonderful television shows of the last decade: Wonder Showzen twisted the idea of a children’s show into a mix of social criticism and gross-out jokes (with puppets!). Xavier: Renegade Angel paired a philosophy-spouting man-beast with deliberately bad videogame-style animation. And The Heart, She Holler—which begins airing its second season on Adult Swim September 10—is like a Southern Gothic fairytale delivered in soap-opera form (it even runs nightly, instead of once a week). Holler stars Patton Oswalt as a man-child who grew up alone in a cave, only to be released once his father—the boss of a town called Heartshe Holler—has died. The show is once again sort of deliberately repellent, with silly gore and awful people delivering some of the bluntest, weirdest satire (or is it?) ever filmed. Amy Sedaris ...

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grrspit:

note-a-bear:

who’s a fluffy silent bird of prey?

who’s the fluffiest killer of mice?

it’s you, it’s youuuuuu, fluffywuffymurdermachine

I feel like it’s gonna turn into David Bowie and take my baby brother away.

PlayStation Vita game Assassin's Creed 3: Liberation is coming to Xbox 360, PS3 and PC as Assassin's Creed Liberation HD. The download-only release will not only benefit from updated graphics, but new missions and other enhancements as well.

An extensive Q&A from Ubisoft, available past the break, sums the improvements made to Liberation HD, touching on the new tutorial system, new combat (protagonist Aveline can dual-wield weapons now), polished free-running and improved facial animations and cutscenes. In addition to this, each mission has been "reworked" to provide better "pacing and challenge" for players. "And one more thing; we have worked heavily to improve the frame rate. The game will be smooth," says producer Momchil Valentinov Gindyanov.

AI and crowd behavior will also behave like Assassin's Creed Liberation HD's console brethren. "Using the AnvilNext engine and existing Assassin's Creed technology has really allowed us to push the crowd and AI behaviour," Gindyanov writes. "Liberation features all the crowd behaviour you've come to expect from an Assassin's Creed game, tailored to our own specific locations, so you can expect to see all sorts of activities unique to New Orleans, including Mardi Gras!"

Assassin's Creed Liberation HD is due on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC from developer Ubisoft Sofia. Neither timetable nor price has been announced.

Continue reading Assassin's Creed Liberation HD scampers to PS3, Xbox 360, PC

Assassin's Creed Liberation HD scampers to PS3, Xbox 360, PC originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 10 Sep 2013 03:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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fuckyeahstartrektos:

The Horta cosplay as promised

“It’S all true…”

Last month, director J.J. Abrams and his Bad Robot production company released a mysterious teaser trailer for an unknown “Stranger” project. A new trailer has recently been put out by Bad Robot revealing that the project is an upcoming novel conceived by Abrams and written by author Doug Dorst, titled S.. The novel will release on October 29, 2013 and is available to pre-order online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and iTunes.

One book. Two readers. A world of mystery, menace, and desire.

A young woman picks up a book left behind by a stranger. Inside it are his margin notes, which reveal a reader entranced by the story and by its mysterious author. She responds with notes of her own, leaving the book for the stranger, and so begins an unlikely conversation that plunges them both into the unknown.

The book: Ship of Theseus, the final novel by a prolific but enigmatic writer named V.M. Straka, in which a man with no past is shanghaied onto a strange ship with a monstrous crew and launched onto a disorienting and perilous journey. (read more)

Here is the new teaser trailer for the novel:

images and video via Amazon, Stranger and Bad Robot

via Entertainment Weekly

hodad

I came back from California to find a bunch of plasmodial slime molds in the yard.

A bright yellow slimy blob is commonly seen in the summer on mulched flower beds. It is not pretty, unless you like yellow, and it soon gets uglier. The yellow blob turns gray, becomes hard, then breaks down into a brown powder. People complain that the yellow blob looks like dog vomit and that the brown powder stains sidewalks.

The blob is a slime mold called Physarum polycephalum. The brown powder is made up of the millions of spores it makes in order to reproduce. Other slime molds are tiny and difficult to find. Their spore-producing structures are not an ugly crust like Physarum, but rather beautiful colored spheres or popsicle shapes.

Slime molds may be slimy, but they are not molds. Molds are fungi. A century ago, fungi, were defined by what they did not have, or did not do:

• They did not move, like animals.
• They did not have the green pigment chlorophyll, which meant they were not plants.
• They were not as small as bacteria.

Today, organisms in the Kingdom Fungi are defined by:

• having chitin in their cell walls. The hard shells of insects are also made of chitin
• not being able to move during any stage of their life cycle
• lacking chlorophyll
• being larger than bacteria.

Slime molds move, and lack chitin in their cell walls. They are now classified as belonging to the Kingdom Protista (Protoctista). Mycologists have studied them for so long that slime molds are still included in mycology textbooks.

Physarum polycephalum is a plasmodial slime mold. The yellow blob we notice is a huge single cell. Unlike most cells, which have only one nucleus, this cell contains millions of nuclei. Physarum plasmodia are usually 3 or 4 cm ( ½ - 1 " ) in diameter, but can get to be 30 cm (about 1 foot) or more in diameter, and 3 to 5 cm thick. This giant cell moves, but only pictures taken over several days can show its progress. Its top speed is 1 mm per hour.

The plasmodium may be ugly to some, but it is not harmful. Slime molds cause very little damage. The plasmodium ingests bacteria, fungal spores, and maybe other smaller protozoa. Their ingestion of food is one reason slime molds are not considered to be fungi. Fungi produce enzymes that break down organic matter into chemicals that are absorbed through their cell walls, not ingested.

One fascinating thing about plasmodial slime molds is that the millions of nuclei in a single plasmodium all divide at the same time. This makes slime molds ideal tools for scientists studying mitosis, the process of nuclear division.

If the plasmodium is not stressed by its environment, it will produce a stalked reproductive structure that looks like a sphere or is popsicle-shaped. These structures contain the spores. The spores are usually spherical with a thick wall that may be smooth or ornamented with pits, spines or warts. Spores are extremely resistant to unfavorable growing conditions. Some spores can stay dormant for 75 years and then germinate.

If the plasmodium begins to dry out too quickly or is starved, it forms a survival structure called a sclerotium. This hard-walled mass protects the dormant cells inside until better conditions for growth return. Inside the sclerotium, the plasmodium divides into "cells", each containing from 0 - 4 nuclei. The cell-like structures which contain nuclei can grow into new plasmodia when moisture and temperature conditions improve.

Cellular slime molds, the second major group of slime molds, exist as minute "slugs" during their growth phase. Each slug contains a single nucleus. The slugs crawl through dung, soil, rotting mushrooms, decaying leaves and other organic material at an average speed of 1 mm per hour. When conditions are right, all the slugs in an area join together to create a pseudoplasmodium, a "fake plasmodium".

Scientists once thought that the signal that caused the slugs to aggregate was issued by a few "leader" slugs. Recent research has shown that there are no leaders. Each slug pumps out a chemical that leaves an invisible trail. When other slugs cross the path of this trail they follow it, strenthening the chemical trail by adding to it. Even more slugs are attracted by the stronger concentration of the chemical. Eventually all of the slugs in an area gather themselves into a pseudoplasmodium. Then, as part of preparing to reproduce, they stop eating.

The plasmodium is "fake" because each slug in it remains an individual even though they become glued together into a larger mass. As a single mass, they act together to produce a single stalked spore-producing structure. About a third of the slugs in in the pseudoplasmodium become the stalk. The other slugs are transformed into spores. The spore walls are smooth and contain cellulose, which is found in the cell walls of plants, but not fungi.

Mathematical equations written to explain the process of slime mold aggregation have been changed slightly and used in the programming that controls some of the behavior of action figures in video games. The original equations were developed by two scientists, Mitch Resnick and Evelyn Fox Keller, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Their equations have also become the basis of the program StarLogo. StarLogo mimics the activities of groups such as ant colonies and flocks of birds. Like the aggregation of cellular slime molds, these organisms' orderly patterns of activity occur without the direction of a leader. Studying patterns and events with the aid of computer software is called "modeling".

Original Source

Washington Post

Bell: Chalk up RG3's disastrous return game to rust USA TODAY SHARE 14 CONNECT 24 TWEET 3 COMMENTEMAILMORE. LANDOVER, Md. -- Robert Griffin III came back and met Murphy's Law in his big return. There were interceptions and fumbles, missed blocks and sacks, disrupted rhythm and busted plays. Around the NFL: Kelly's fast-paced offense delivers in Eagles' opening winColumbus Dispatch Robert Griffin III, Washington Redskins lose opener to Philadelphia EaglesWashington Post Frenetic Eagles roll past RG3, RedskinsYakima Herald-Republic GoErie.com -The Tribune all 563 news articles »

seifukucat:

christ marie you’re so not sugoi

gailsimone:

beckyhop:

Yep, I can draw good DC comics nudity.

What? It’s good figure drawing practice.

THIS IS WHY I LOVE THE ENTIRE WORLD.

cute-overload:

Cutest stretch ever
http://cute-overload.tumblr.com