An interesting piece on the difficulty in dividing the world between Left and Right, politically:
Feb 062012
Feb 062012
3000 women in Scotland ‘are victims of mutilation’
Genital mutilation, that is. Certain descriptions are left out of the story… descriptions that might help identify the cultures that would do this.
And in a wholly different story…
KEY SARKOZY ALLY: ‘For Us, All Civilisations Are Not Of Equal Value’
“Those which defend liberty, equality and fraternity, seem to us superior to those which accept tyranny, the subservience of women, social and ethnic hatred.”
Well, duh.
Feb 062012
Japan Population Decline: Third Of Nation’s Youth Have ‘No Interest’ In Sex
Short from: for those aged 16 to 19, 36% of males have no interest in sex; 59% of females have no interest in sex.
Years ago I read a short story in “Analog” magazine where an alien species brought in a human investigator. Turns out that for reasons unknown the aliens’ sex drive had essentially evaporated, and consequently they weren’t reproducing. IIRC, the human investigator discovered that a third alien species had introduced something into the environment to suppress the first alien species sex drive… in order to slowly and non-violently wipe them out so species 2 could move in. If I were Japanese, I’d be looking to China or Korea.
But then, this is Japan. There might be another explanation.
[youtube BtqGTn7PCBw]
Feb 052012
Ah, yes. Remember the good old days when Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama was going to restore the world’s faith in the US by not being such a meanie as that nasty ol’ dummy George Bush? Yeah, about that…
U.S. drones targeting rescuers and mourners
When even the screamingly leftist rag “Salon” is taking some notice of Saint Obamessiah targetting civilians, you know that something’s up.
As Fark.com put it:
Feb 052012
Conceptual artwork from 1967 depicting a Mach 10 to Mach 14 hypersonic transport. Hydrogen burning scramjets would provide cruise propulsion at an altitude of 110,000 to 140,000 feet. No further data is available apart from what can be determined from the artwork. There are 136 seats, relatively few for an aircraft that is clearly quite large. The general configuration is similar to the hypersonic testbed previously posted HERE, especially the propulsion system & inlet arrangement.
A very hi-rez version of this can be downloaded HERE.
Feb 042012
A drilling expedition in Antarctica has mysteriously disappeared. I’m pretty sure the boys from Miskatonic U could have given ’em a warning or two.
Feb 042012
A comparison between solid rockets and pressure-fed liquid boosters for the Shuttle.
Feb 042012
Britain on snow alert as ‘stubborn’ cold spell takes a hold in the east
Drivers and pedestrians have been warned there could be significant snow and ice over much of central and eastern Britain over the weekend, with some snow falls leaving up to 10cm (4in) on the ground over Saturday night.
Oh no! Four whole inches of snow!
Feh. Four inches of snow just barely covers the grass. Now *THIS* would merit a snow alert:
Feb 032012
[youtube YQIMGV5vtd4]
Feb 022012
Continuing to plink away on this one. The first set of illustrations show the whole setup; the second set shows a further refinement with the ramjet innards in place.
