Usually when a reporter writes about a scientific discovery, they go totally wild with the headline. Quantum tunneling becomes "'Star Trek' Transporters a Reality." Discover a gene that explains 10% of the variance in a particular kind of spiritual altered state of consciousness and they call it the "God Gene." But today I saw one that does the ( Read more... )

I trust Apple to produce reliable, high-quality software, but this is going too far.


( Read more... )

I just realized that when I use Google maps to get directions, I'm telling Google where I'm going in real life. And since I'm always logged in to my gmail... does this mean that if I get directions to 1701 Folsom (Rainbow Grocery coop) and 1023 Stanyan (the Real Food Company), I'm more likely to get Google ads for hippie foods and vegan cosmetics ( Read more... )

The subject of tonight's segment of "Holy Crap! Science!" is polyethylene glycols (PEGs).

Quotes shamelessly pasted in from Wikipedia:
"PEGs are prepared by polymerization of ethylene oxide and are commercially available over a wide range of molecular weights from 300 g/mol to 10,000,000 g/mol ( Read more... )

euziere called me up and told me that Google had just released its brand new, built-from-scratch web browser, Google Chrome! My first response was "but... but... we already have Firefox! Couldn't they have just contributed to Mozilla?" After looking at their site I see a few things that get them back on my good side ( Read more... )

I don't know if adaptive spam filtering will turn out to be the best technology for the job, but technologically it's very astute. For most of us spam is an everyday annoyance, but if the report from the Pew Internet and American Life project is to be believed, a lot of older or less computer-savvy folks find it offensive or even distressing ( ( Read more... )

It's finally here! It's finally here! I've been waiting most of a decade for commercial applications of e-paper -- it's a paper-thin and -light substance that uses electrical impulses to turn ink-pixels on and off. Unlike LCD screens, it uses reflected light, meaning that the power usage is way way lower, and it gets easier to read in bright light ( Read more... )

4GB flash drives are now under $30. I'm seriously considering getting one so that I can carry Wikipedia with me wherever I go.

They put a computer in a shoeThe new Addidas_1 shoe has a microprocessor that gathers information on the load and balance on the sole, and uses tiny motors to adjust the rigidity and shock absorption in different parts of the shoe. Part of me is really impressed, and part of me is disturbed at this latest oversold-overpriced-overtechnologized trend ( Read more... )