Not content with owning (or providing the means to run) 76% of the known universe, Google is still pushing full steam ahead to revolutionise our online screwing-around experience.

Two exciting projects they're working on right now:

1. Google WaveA sort of ramped-up version of an email client, incorporating all the real-time elements of an ( Read more... )

I originally posted Oil Get My Coat as a response to an argument on an internet message board about what caused the oil price spike in 2008. By the time subsequent events proved me correct, the owner of the board (who also happened to be the person with whom I was debating) had banned me, which - if nothing else - shows a remarkable prescience. I ( Read more... )

"...a dreary, desolate and, indeed, quite abject and distressing one; what we might call, by way of eminence, the dismal science."
  -Thomas Carlyle, 1849

The point of learning economics is to better understand the processes that underlie the distribution of goods and services - markets, interest rates, inflation, exchange rates, supply and demand ( Read more... )

Has everyone taken leave of his senses? Is everyone gone crazy? What the hell is this aura/chakra bullshit?


( Read more... )

I have a poster on my fridge of dinosaurs. It's mainly there to annoy Christians who think that the world is 6,000 years old. This poster from National Geographic illustrates the state of the world 180 million years ago, when the continents were all wrong. There's a little picture at the bottom of the poster of the state of the place back then:


( Read more... )

A continuing series of things you really should know.

Should people drink at least eight glasses of water a day?

No. It's bullshit.

The advice to drink at least eight glasses of water a day can be found throughout the popular press. One origin may be a 1945 recommendation that stated:

A suitable allowance of water for adults is 2.5 litres ( Read more... )

This is one of the most intelligent analyses of the oil situation that I have seen so far. It has something that most other analyses don't have: long-term perspective. It's a bit of a read, but it's worth it. I guarantee you'll learn something.

( the article... )

This is from Wikichan. Ask yourself does any of it sound familiar:

Camwhore Syndrome is a slang terminology for Histrionic Personality Disorder slightly mixed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. These issues usually spawn from defined needs in the camwhore, such as the lack of male influence, the lack of authoritative control, or generally ( Read more... )

Proof of my first point, in "Abortion" below, in case common sense wasn't enough:
Women are just as likely to get an abortion in countries where it is outlawed as they are in countries where it is legal, according to research published today ( Read more... )

I find it intellectually offensive that anyone would believe in the power of prayer to do anything. You should find it offensive too ( Read more... )