Tadeu

 Another day, another insectobot connected to a small, audio-sensing cyborg harness. Two researchers at the North Carolina State University, Dr. Alper Bozkurt and Matt Shipman, have mounted a small circuit board to a live cockroach and connected leads to the bug’s brain. By playing special tones, the board can trick the cockroach into moving left or right, essentially turning the bug into… Read More

The Pangu development team today updated its jailbreak for iOS 8 and 8.1, bringing full support for the Mac. The update comes a week after the program saw an update for Windows that brought an automatic installation of Cydia and support for the English language.


Pangu's jailbreak tool for iOS 8 is the first that is compatible with any device running iOS 8.0 to iOS 8.1, including newer devices such as the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPad Air 2, and iPad mini 3. The jailbreak method allows users to install content like themes, tweaks, and apps from other sources than the App Store. The Pangu development team recommends that users backup their iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches before using the tool, and notes that devices upgraded over-the-air may need to be restored before being jailbroken.

Cydia administrator Jay Freeman noted on his Twitter that the Pangu jailbreak is "stable enough" and said that developers on Cydia are now able to mark their own apps as iOS 8 compatible. Members on our forums are also maintaining an active list of which Cydia apps are compatible with iOS 8 and Pangu's jailbreak, and interested users should look there for more specific information.

Pangu can be downloaded for OS X and Windows as an untethered jailbreak, meaning that users only have to apply the method once. The release of the tool follows an announcement by the Electronic Frontier Foundation yesterday stating that a new petition was filed with the Librarian of Congress to extend an exemption that allows jailbreaking to be legal. The exemption was last renewed in 2012 and created by the U.S. Congress in 2010.

While in college, artist John Bisbee was scavaging in an abandoned house looking for items to incorporate into a series of found-object sculptures when he kicked over a bucket of old rusty nails. To his astonishment, the nails had fused together into a bucket-shaped hunk of metal. He had an epiphany. Bisbee has since spent nearly 30 years using nails as his sole medium to create geometric sculptures, organic installations, and unwieldy objects from thousands of nails that are hammered, bent, welded, or fastened together in a seemingly limitless procession of forms. His mantra: “Only nails, always different.” He shares with American Craft, “A nail, like a line, can and will do almost anything. What can’t you draw with a line? The nail is just my line.”

Bisbee is currently an artist in residence at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, and had an exhibition at Shelburne Museum earlier this year. He was recently profiled in American Craft’s Material Crush issue featuring 30 artists working in unusual mediums, almost half of which have been featured right here on Colossal. Definitely worth a look. (via American Craft)

I'm contributing to this calendar by the cartoonists of The Nib.

Can you see it? [via]

Today, Nov. 12, 2014, at 16:02 UTC, a tiny robot landed gently down onto the surface of a comet.

Five hundred million kilometers away, millions of humans on Earth rode along with it.

After 10 years of travel through the depths of space, and at least that long beforehand filled with meetings, designs, construction, and a launch in 2004, the Philae spacecraft was successfully released from its Rosetta mothership. Then, seven hours later, it made history.

We have flown by eight comets before, impacted one with a 370 kilogram block of copper, and, now, for the first time ever, have landed on another. The robotic proxy of humanity sits on the surface of the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.

But only barely. For reasons yet unknown, the harpoons failed to deploy, so the lander may not be firmly anchored in place. In fact, from the telemetry received, it appears to have slowly hit the surface, bounced, spun a bit as it was over the surface (possibly due to the rotation of an internal flywheel used to change the attitude of the spacecraft), then landed again.

But it is down, and very nearly in the center of the planned target area. And if only for this reason, the mission has been a success.

It’s difficult to overstate this achievement. The comet is moving on an elliptical orbit that takes it just outside the orbit of Jupiter (850 million kilometers from the Sun) and as close as 186 million km sunward (just inside the orbit of Mars). The Rosetta spacecraft had to travel for a decade through space to catch up to its target, flying past two asteroids—Lutetia and Steins—as well as getting a gravitational boost by swinging past Mars and even Earth. It was a long, cold journey, which finally brought it alongside 67P in August 2014.

After that it slowly approached the comet, taking mapping images along the way, searching the bizarre terrain (cometain?) for a landing site. After much deliberation a suitable site was chosen. Rosetta moved in, dropped Philae, and the rest is history.

Except, again, we’re still waiting for more information. Philae is definitely down, and definitely working. It returned a few images, and engineers are still receiving telemetry from it. But it’s not clear what will happen next. The gravity on the comet is terribly weak—about 0.01 percent that of Earth—and the lander weighs half an ounce on the surface. That wouldn’t be a problem in the vacuum of space, except the comet is outgassing: The ice on and below the surface is warming as the comet approaches the Sun, and turns directly from a solid into a gas. This is a gentle wind, to be sure, but when you weigh less than a sheet of paper does on Earth, it doesn’t take much to set you flying again.

Philae has screws on the bottoms of its landing legs, and they did appear to deploy, but it’s not known how well the lander is secured. Nothing is clear right now. The European Space Agency held a press conference to give an update, but it won’t be until tomorrow that they know enough to take the next step. As soon as I know, I’ll let you know.

But, despite this sobering news, there is still joy and wonder to be had. The technical prowess to achieve this landing is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Math, science, engineering, even management and teamwork—in this case, across many countries in Europe—produced a breathtaking result: We have sent our work and our minds and our hearts across space, and done something truly remarkable.

Congratulations to ESA, to everyone involved with Rosetta, and yes, to all of us who care about exploring the Universe. It’s one of the noblest things we do.

“Do you know who you are talking to?” That is one of the most common statements one can hear from a Brazilian authority that is caught red-handed. An ongoing case shows how bizarre that can be. Traffic officer Luciana Tamborini was fined in about US$ 2,000 because she stopped a man that had no documents at all and whose car wasn’t bearing any plates. When the offender told the agent that he was judge José Carlos Paes, she replied: “a judge is not God.” So he held her for exceeding her powers and for contempt of court. The decision was confirmed by three other judges of Rio’s Court. The officer will appeal.

What is most interesting about this case is that for the first time in a while there was a revolt against Brazil’s baroque and shadowy Judiciary. Thanks to lawyer Flávia Penido, about US$ 8,000 were raised to pay the allegedly heavy damages suffered by poor judge Paes. Although many judges insist there is no mistake in the decision against the traffic officer who denied them Godly powers, even members of the highest court in the nation noticed the gap between them and average Brazilians was widening because of that case. So some of them came out with a very bold thesis: judges are like everyone else.

No doubt Brazil’s Supreme Court is very open if compared to international peers. We see their trials on TV and that has even sparked accusations of exhibitionism of some Justices. But the lower branches are poorly covered by the press, face little interference from their ombudsmen and even less from Brazil’s attorney’s bar. In those lower branches there is loads of decisions just like that one of Judge Paes — but few hit the news. Such leeway to act strongly discourages any willingness to reform, since Brazil’s endless appeal system keeps judges, law firms and authorities happy enough.

Another sign Brazil’s Judiciary truly believes they can be God is how little they care about budgets and excessive spending. Every Justice in the Supreme Court gets the same pay of President Dilma Rousseff: about US$ 10,000 a month. In the lower courts, bonuses, allowances and extras are so intere$ting that judges sometimes make more than the head of State. Recently all key members of the Judiciary decided they would get a US$ 1,500 extra to pay for their rent. That is about 20 times the average paid to members of social program Bolsa Família, which feeds poor families despite criticism of many of those judges.

Judges that are uneasy with the system could be punished

A judge in São Paulo went on TV to admit that the housing allowance was just a way to raise their salaries, since they needed to go to Miami and buy nice suits to be fit for their job. When President Rousseff rejected the budget sent by the Judiciary a couple of years ago, Justices of the Supreme Court went on camera to cry foul: it was unacceptable interference from the Executive. Despite rejecting that intrusion, Justices are usually glad in reinterpreting the Constitution to bypass Congress in matters that are allegedly in grey areas. No wonder it is so difficult for these guys to believe they are not a deity. Brazil allows them to.

Cats Who Look Like Other Things [boredpanda]

Previously: Dogs Who Look Like Other Things

gameraboy:

The Twilight Zone, “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” with williamshatner

muppetsational:

ladyincarnadine:

beautiful-thorn-beastly-rose:

thetoolazytothinkupacoolnameblog:

theinsanerobin:

Now, look at this:

That’s “Paul Mounet”, a french actor, who “died” in 1922.

His body never was found.

 

Then, look at this:

An unknown man, painted in 1530 by Parmigianino.

Compare them:

He’s a motherfucking vampire

His beard in 2011 even grows the same way as the painting in 1530

I totally believe this to be true.

by jhon

What the heck happened? [via]

Video: John Oliver Shoots Celebrities with a Salmon Cannon

asylum-art:

Paintings by Lesley Oldaker 

on deviantART| Facebook        

Gargamel, the early days.
Have fun and keep rocking #Halloween #9gag 😈

View

Brewster will play Francesca "Frankie" Dart, a consultant brought in to help whip the school into shape (good luck with that), while David plays retired scientist Elroy Patashnik.

curvynerdywordy:

yolandart:

Philip Jackson. 1944.

Winner of National Peace Sculpture Competition,
Manchester City Council, 1987.
Elected Fellow Royal Society of British Sculptors.

These are so cool.

(via himmelkei:Twitter)

catsbeaversandducks:

Owls Are Flying Cats