Millimeters matter Comments Off

Via kottke.org here’s an video of a mini-catapult shooting min-pies at insects.

Don’t know if it’s related but here is as an almost as impressive mini-canon.

Time for some heresy Comments Off

Religion is always a tough subject to discuss, people are touchy about it, my mother called me a pagan the other day when I made a smart-ass remark about something in front of some people we didn’t really know. In fact she was right, people are so touchy about it that it’s better to be carefoul what you say and to who or you are likely to be smithed with a brick between your eyes by some lunatic who hears God talking to him/her. Or was that J.C? Whatever.

Before I get into to what I actually want to say in this post I want to clear 2 things: how I got the idea that I’m gonna explain to you in a sec and why, unlike my mother, I don’t consider myself being a pagan… sort of. First lets start with the last thing, because I’ve read somewhere that the last shall be first.

I believe in God, I’m not an atheist, but I do my believing in my own way. I don’t believe in the church as the instrument of God, or God’s house on earth or whatever you want to call it, because of the flawed people that pretend to be His voice. I just can’t get over it and I keep doubting the good intention of whoever wrote what I consider to be the greatest propaganda work of all time, the Bible. Now you understand the pagan part.
However, all this aside, I do believe in the existence of some force we cannot explain that holds the universe together and I do pray and I do see the power of the Church as the greatest humanitarian organization in the world and as a place for meditation.

Second, what made me write this. Well, every year I have to watch how people come from all over the country to touch some bones in a box at the Patriarchate. The bones were once the proud possession of St. Dimitrie, no doubt a great man who must be remembered (no irony). Yesterday there was also a great protest before the Parlament, people from all over the country came together to let our mighty leaders what they thought about them. Both things were happening no more than 1km away from each other. On one side a mass of people ready to smash heads because they can barely afford to buy food on the other side a mass of people praying they won’t end up like the other poor bastards. Very… Christian, isn’t it? I am quite sure more people touched the dusty old bones than there were in front on the Parlament, and there were some 50.000 people at least, so no small thing. I cannot wrap my head around how an institution that in theory should inspire people to be good to one another can create such egoism and lack of empathy! My small short conversations with the true believers that go to the Patriarchate always leave me with a sorrow taste in my mouth. There is more Christianity in the mud that sticks to my shoes than in many of those people. But hey, I’m the pagan! Anyways, let’s continue.

By looking at that mass of people waiting in the rain to see and touch the holy bones a thought flashed. I bet you that in a densely populated are like Bucharest at any given time there are at least 2 people who pray for exactly the opposite thing. One wants rain, so his crops can grow, the other one wants sun, so he can have a beautifully wedding / birthday party / bbq. One desires this the other that. As always there is the “God works in mysterious ways” thing, so if you don’t get what you want, it’s nobody’s fault. Or better say it’s your fault because you haven’t been pious enough and didn’t give the priest enough monetary support to “rebuild the church”. But what if God, as almighty as he is, choose to make a world were everybody in a acked place like one of the modern big cities would get their wish? What would that world be like? My take is that it would bee a boring beyond imagination kind of place where it’s always the same weather, there are no seasons, everybody has exactly the same amount of everything, all are healthy, nobody has any ambitions, and there are no things that would make us want anything more or less. No thank you, I’d take door number 2 any day.

Here is the conclusion. In a densely packed place the prayer model doesn’t really work. There are too many conflicts of interest, therefore whoever wrote the Bible and other holly texts never imagined us living like termites, piled one on top of each other is such numbers. In a small village it’s much easier to imagine that it is your prayer that was answered. The priest need to do some rewriting to make the stories stick. At least that’s my opinion. The God hears all algorithm is hard to apply to a modern-day city.

And to end let me tell you something I’ve read or heard somewhere. Do you know why the Indian rain dance works? Because the Indians dance until it starts to rain.

Peace!

Deciding to be different Comments Off

Some of the most amazing people I’ve met or heard about made just one decision that took them there: they decided to be themselves, and, by doing that, to be different. Below there are 4 great stories about people who decided to do the things they like and do it the way they wanted it. We can all learn from them.

Story 1: The pizza maker who never grew beyond having just one pizza-cook – himself

Story 2: The kid who liked soda-pop so much that he grew up to build a playground for himself

Story 3: The photographer who swims the roughest waves

Story 4: Two brothers and a lot of chocolate

Clarification of geeks (infographic) Comments Off

Mashable had this funny inf0-graphic of different types of geeks. And since I voluntarely proclaim myself to be a geek, I thought it was appropriate to post about it.

(Click on the image to see the larger version)

How to drink from a cup in zero gravity Comments Off

Simple! Make a special cup. However, you will be amazed that it’s not something high-tech which you first have to program in order to use. Watch the video and see how the understanding of physics gives birth to a very simple solution to a very difficult problem.

Parkour on a bicycle / skateboard / rollerblades Comments Off

As a reader of kottke.org I came across a series of clips from guys jumping over and under all kind of obstacles with such an ease that astonishes me and leaves me thinking that most of us forgot how to use our bodies and what powerful machines we control. Kottke calls the following 3 clips as parkour. I wouldn’t go that far, but since I’ve heard about them on his blog, I’m keeping the parkour theme.

Watch, be amazed, weep for how out of shape you are, get off your ass and go to something about it.

Parkour on rollerblades

Parkour on a skateboard

Parkour on a bicycle

The science of marathons – calculating how far The Wall is Comments Off

In marathons and most any other endurance race there is such a thing as The Wall, or the moment where your source of carbohydrates runs out. Basically when you run out of energy and you start dragging your feet.

Any athlete can tell you that it’s very important to do carbo-loading before the race day, to store as many carbs as you can, for the big day. More you have – more energy you have. However, the sad truth is that the amount you can actually store is limited by your weight, age, and the amount you eat through that precious resource (your miles per gallon) is given by how much fuel your (un)trained body uses with every step.

Experienced athletes have found their limits and know how much carbs to take in, how fast to run, not to burn out, how to hidrate, and so on, basically, they know all the tricks in the book to avoid the dreaded Wall.

Ben Rapoport takes Erin Wyner’s pulse as she runs on a treadmill to determine how many carbohydrates she should eat to run a successful marathon (NPR).

But us mortals don’t have that luxury… or didn’t… until now. Benjamin Rapoport, , claims he managed to figure out of formula that will help any of us to calculate how to run a marathon scientifically and to keep away from that wall.

I’ve originally heard about the story in Wired. But I recommend you to read the NPR article too.

And, if you have the stomach for it, read on the Benjamin Rapoport’s paper published in Public Library of Science (PLoS) Computational Biology.

Because his formula looks like a lot of mambo-jumbo to most people, me included, there is a nifty little online calculator, which Ben swears he will improve.

And there you go, now you have a way to calculate that you will burn out and hit the wall half way though the competition!