Clipmarks | balthazarus's clips

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: The company has already launched a scent-producing store signage system, piloted a mobile fragrance communication system and premiered smell-enhanced movies in Japanese theaters. With the i-Aroma, a more personal olfactory experience is on the way for volunteers lucky enough to be involved in the trial

Clip Source: www.gizmag.com

Fragrance

the next internet phenomenon

Japanese telecommunications company NTT Com is currently seeking volunteers to test a pungent bit of kit which produces different smells at the request of programs downloaded from the Internet. There will be two separate trials of the i-Aroma conducted from mid-July to the end of August. One course will send out smells matching "the rhythm of daily life" while the other will release odors based on an ancient astrological system. Sadly though, only those living in Japan can take part.

The i-Aroma is loaded with 6 base oils and attached to a PC via USB cable. The volunteer connects the PC to the Internet and special courses designed by astrologist Ryuji Kagami or aroma therapist Kaoru Sasak will determine what scents are mixed by the device and released into the air. A remote control on the i-Aroma can be used to dispense stored, favorite smells when not connected to a PC.

be able to produce fragrant blends in response to special instructions

Tags: internet, sense, scent

God or Darwin? some statistics...

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 14:58:25 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: though i used the same headline as the article, i do not agree to it. Evolution is not equal to religion and they are merely two different perspectives of the same reality. Each one portrays a different worldview, a different world, a different view. the direction in religion is one of preservation, maintaining the existing order as it , whilst in evolution the dynamics are in constant motion of exploring new orders which by nature are transitory.

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

God or Darwin? The world in evolution beliefs

Find out where on earth only 8% of people believe in evolution

The British Council has asked, with the help of Ipsos MORI, over ten thousand adults across ten countries from China to the USA, just what they think of evolution.

The results show that the majority of adults surveyed have heard of
Charles Darwin and know at least a little about his theory of
evolution. But they also show that there are significant minorities of people who either want nothing to do with evolution - and think it should either not be taught in schools or alongside creationism.

Beliefs in evolution

Countries

Heard of Darwin

Agree the scientific evidence for evolution exists

Think it is possible to believe in a God and evolution simultaneously

Argentina 86 44 62 China 90 55 39 Egypt 38 8 45 Great Britain 91 51 54 India 62 38 85 Mexico 91 52 65 Russia 93 39 54 South Africa 27 8 54 Spain 72 39 46 USA 84 33 53

Tags: evolution, darwin, religion

Subliminal Messages Motivation

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:22:38 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: Going now for a coffee...

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Subliminal Messages Motivate People To Actually Do Things They Already Wanted To Do

To get people to behave in a certain way, the idea for such behaviour must first be planted in their minds. Once the idea has been planted in your mind (so-called ‘priming') then either a lack of something (deprivation) or a positive association with a certain action can ensure that you are actually motivated to carry out that action

results of the experiments showed that motivation for carrying out certain actions (such as drinking) occurs when the action matches an existing deprivation or has a positive association

These two motivational states both independently indicate that carrying out a certain action is worth striving for

motivational worth; if an object is relevant for attaining your goals then you will perceive it to be bigger than it actually is. In one of Veltkamp's experiments, glasses of water were estimated to be bigger, if the participants had not had a drink for some time

Tags: psychology

Ethiopian Multiplication

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 16:04:46 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: Cool

Clip Source: threesixty360.wordpress.com

Ethiopian Multiplication

This method of multiplication is also called Egyptian Multiplication (because it was done in Egypt) and Russian Peasant Multiplication (although the Peasant part might be intended as a bit of a pejorative).

Here’s the basic idea: Suppose you want to multiply two numbers like 14 and 12. You could use your fingers, of course, but here’s another way:

Start with the two numbers on top. Halve one, ignoring any remainders or fractions, and double the other, stopping when you get to 1.

14 & 12

7 & 24

3 & 48 [See how I ignored the fact that halving 7 leaves 1 left over?]

1 & 96 <— Stop here.

Now look at the numbers on the right. Some are across from an even number: in this case, 12 is across from the original 14. Ignore those, and add the rest. So we’ll add 24, 48, and 96, which were across from odd numbers, and get 168. And that’s the product! Isn’t that cool?

Clip Source: www.scientificblogging.com

It’s cool, because it’s binary

essentially how computers do multiplication internally

Tags: mathematics

Mediastorm

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 12:11:54 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: Each photograph represents a different project and a different story...

Clip Source: mediastorm.org

Driftless: Stories from Iowa

economy have pushed the youth of rural communities to migrate to the metropolises of America

Intended Consequences

During the 1994 genocide, Rwandan women were subjected to massive sexual violence, perpetrated by members of the infamous Hutu militia groups known as the Interahamwe. Among the survivors, those who are most isolated are the women who have borne children as a result of being raped. Their families have rejected both them and their children, compounding their already unimaginable emotional distress

Common Ground

Rape of a Nation

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is home to the deadliest war in the world today

45,000 people die each month in the Congo. Most deaths are due to easily preventable and curable conditions

The Ninth Floor

The Marlboro Marine

Love in the First Person

Evidence of My Existence

Finding the Way Home: Two Years After Katrina

Ivory Wars: Last Stand in Zakouma

Black Market

wildlife trade is the third largest illegal trade in the world

Tags: photography, society

Those unsure of own ideas more resistant to views of others

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:15:42 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: It sounds obvious almost, but one should doubt his mind and when saying doubt i mean asking yourself what do i feel, see... and why do i see feel this? can i feel, see otherwise?

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

People Sometimes Seek The Truth, But Most Prefer Like-minded Views

Clip Source: news.illinois.edu

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

included data from 91 studies involving nearly 8,000 participants

The researchers found that people are about twice as likely to select information that supports their own point of view (67 percent) as to consider an opposing idea (33 percent). Certain individuals, those with close-minded personalities, are even more reluctant to expose themselves to differing perspectives, Albarracín said. They will opt for the information that corresponds to their views nearly 75 percent of the time.

Clip Source: news.illinois.edu

People are also more likely to expose themselves to opposing ideas when it is useful to them in some way

If you’re going to buy a house and you really like the house, you’re still going to have it inspected

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Perhaps more surprisingly, people who have little confidence in their own beliefs are less likely to expose themselves to contrary views than people who are very confident in their own ideas

more resistant to new points

political, religious

Tags: psychology

This is the rhythm of the heart..

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 08:52:32 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: "investigators did find subconscious reflex autonomous responses. Almost every musical crescendo induced progressive skin vasoconstriction along with increases in blood pressure and heart rate.

Correlations between cardiovascular variables and music profile were particularly evident during the aria "Nessun dorma," which is characterized by 3 progressively stronger crescendos. "We found that there were a lot of correspondences, particularly during the part of the musical track that has those crescendos," said Dr. Bernardi.

Conversely, during the slower or silent phases, there was progressive skin vasodilation and reductions in heart rate and blood pressure, indicating progressive relaxation."

Clip Source: www.medscape.com

Cardiac Rhythms Synchronize With Music

Music, particularly pieces that contain crescendos or gradual increases in volume, elicits synchronized cardiovascular and respiratory responses in young people that are similar in both musicians and nonmusicians

"We know now that music can affect the cardiovascular system, and if we understand how this works, then we can use it,"

Researchers tracked the cardiovascular and respiratory profile of 24 healthy subjects aged 24 to 26 years old, of whom 12 were experienced choristers and 12 were age- and sex-matched controls with no musical training.

Hooked up to an electrocardiogram (ECG) and with their eyes closed, the subjects listened to various pieces of music with headphones

Beethoven's Ninth Symphony

Verdi's Nabucco

Verdi's La Traviata

selected these pieces because they contain several changes in music dynamics — for example, crescendos, decrescendos, pianos, and fortes

To measure conscious emotional arousal, subjects were asked to rate the intensity

Tags: music, heart

Sea level rise: it goes up and up...

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 12:43:01 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus

Clip Source: www.newscientist.com

Sea level rise: It's worse than we thought

As more and more ice slides into the ocean, sea levels are rising faster and faster – but just how high will they get?

Clip Source: www.newscientist.com

the fate of the planet's ice, from relatively small ice caps in places like the Canadian Arctic, the Andes and the Himalayas, to the immense ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica, will largely determine the speed and extent of sea level rise

The oceans are already rising. Global average sea level rose about 17 centimetres in the 20th century, and the rate of rise is increasing. The biggest uncertainty for those trying to predict future changes is how humanity will behave. Will we start to curb our emissions of greenhouse gases sometime soon, or will we continue to pump ever more into the atmosphere?

According to one recent estimate, the continued loss of this ice will add another 10 to 20 centimetres to sea level by 2100

The second biggest contributor has been thermal expansion of the oceans

Clip Source: www.newscientist.com

Tags: ecology, sea;

What if Lincoln Had Used Twitter :-?

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 14:32:47 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus

Clip Source: www.time.com

history is a funny thing. Take the Pilgrims, for example. Not only do they look ridiculous — (hat buckles? really?) — but you can make fun of them without fear of accidentally offending someone. This is the brilliance of the website historicaltweets.com.

has re-imagined famous moments throughout history as Twittered by the people who experienced them

Odysseus: "Back home! Who r all these random dudes?"

Lou Gehrig: "Found a penny on the sidewalk! I'm the luckiest man on the face of this earth."

Al Capone: April 15 AGAIN?!?!

Buzz Aldrin: @NeilArmstrong: you go first

James Joyce: 140 characters? A sentence of such fractured length would have barely begun to scratch at the surface of man's vain, insignificant —
James Joyce: Damn.

Claude Monet: I feel like I've seen this haystack before...

Monica Lewinsky: Note to self: drop off dry-cleaning

Henry VIII: Women. Can't live with 'em, can't live wi—ooooh.

Lassie: Idiot child fell down the mine shaft again. That makes 3 times in one week.

Clip Source: historicaltweets.com

Tags: twitter, funny, history

Head Scarf Emerges as Indonesia Political Symbol

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:25:21 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: Golkar Party officials rejected accusations by the president’s party that they were trying to exploit Islam for politics; they also denied having anything to do with the recent distribution of leaflets that stated, falsely, that Boediono’s wife was not Muslim, but Roman Catholic.
The fundamentalists are trying to force women to wear the jilbab as an act of submission, and had already done so in various municipalities across the Indonesian archipelago in recent years, Ms. Neng said. For the progressives, she said, wearing the jilbab was an expression of a woman’s right.

“For women in Indonesia, whether they want to wear the jilbab or not is their choice,” said Ms. Neng, who started wearing one five years ago. “It shouldn’t be political.”

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Head Scarf Emerges as Indonesia Political Symbol

JAKARTA, Indonesia — The three parties competing in Indonesia’s presidential election next week have plastered this city with campaign billboards and posters depicting, predictably, their presidential and vice presidential choices looking self-confident.

But one party, Golkar, has also put up posters of the candidates’ wives next to their husbands, posing demurely and wearing Muslim head scarves known here as jilbabs. The wives recently went on a jilbab shopping spree in one of Jakarta’s largest markets, and published a book together titled “Devout Wives of Future Leaders.”

Most polls suggest that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono of the Democratic Party will be re-elected

after running a smooth campaign based on his economic policies and a popular anticorruption drive. Despite television debates, the personality-driven campaigns have focused little on differences over policies or ideas, except regarding the wearing of the jilbab

Tags: politics, religion, women

Understanding does not diminish Awe

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 09:52:50 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: "The religious experience is, at best, a stunted variety of this feeling. Awe without understanding, or at least the desire for understanding, degenerates into mysticism: viewing a mystery not as a challenge to be solved, but something to be worshipped for its own sake. Mysticism states that ignorance is a desirable condition, a state we should glory in. This attitude only keeps us frightened and ignorant, and worst of all, robs us of the deeper and more genuine awe that comes with comprehension. I say, let us explore. There may be problems too high or too deep for us, mysteries we cannot penetrate - but so far, we haven't found any, and if there are any, they will not need to be protected from our investigations."

Clip Source: www.daylightatheism.org

Moving Beyond Awe

The nineteenth-century German theologian Rudolf Otto, in his book The Idea of the Holy, popularized the term "numinous", an adjective describing the sense of mystery and wonder that purportedly stems from the presence of a deity. According to Otto, the sense of the numinous had two main characteristics: the mysterium tremendum, the sense of fear and trembling that comes from the presence of that which is wholly other, and the mysterium fascinas, the sense of fascination and curiosity that such an experience evokes.

Otto's theology concisely sums up the categories of religious experience. But the problem with his conception of the numinous is that it lacks one very important quality - understanding.

For Otto, as for many theists, the numinous is not something we should seek to comprehend.

there is no mention of penetrating the mystery

pulling back the curtain of our ignorance

what humanity has been doing throughout its history: piercing the mysteries that surround us

Tags: atheism, religion, understanding, awe

A Moved Mover

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:38:09 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: An interesting account that names and refute all arguments favoring a godly existence of any sort.
...
As David Hume wrote over 200 years ago in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion,
"What peculiar privilege has this little agitation of the brain which we call thought,
that we must thus make it the model of the whole universe?"

Clip Source: www.ebonmusings.org

Unmoved Mover

God is not a being that exists by mere definition (as the ontological argument unsuccessfully tries to establish); nor is God a mere mental state, with no existence independent of people's minds (at least, not according to most theists); nor is God's existence a necessary proposition to make sense of the world (as the presuppositional argument tries and fails to claim). Therefore, we can safely conclude that God's existence is not a properly basic belief, but rather an empirical proposition about the external world; it can only be properly supported by evidence, not mere assertion

it may surprise them to learn that all the most commonly heard arguments for God's existence have been around in one form or another literally for centuries

all of them were refuted soon after they were first proposed

The Ontological Argument

The Cosmological Argument

The Design Argument

The Moral Argument

The Presuppositional Argument

Other Arguments

Tags: atheism

Mind-Controlled Wheelchair

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:41:55 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: Impressive.
Another example to the ever increasing in availability that technology enables.

Clip Source: www.informationweek.com

Toyota Develops Mind-Controlled Wheelchair

researchers in Japan have built a brain/machine interface (BMI) that has been demonstrated to control a wheelchair using a person's thoughts

The system enables a person to make a wheelchair turn left or right to move forward simply by thinking the commands. The response time is in 125 milliseconds

The BTCC's system uses several sensors placed over the areas of the brain that control motion to measure electrical activity in the region. The electical impulses triggered by the rider thinking of turning or moving the wheelchair are picked up and analyzed by an onboard laptop that passes the commands on to the wheelchair.

The system has an emergency stop that can be activated by the user puffing his cheeks.

The BMI adjusts itself over time to the characteristics of each driver's brainwaves. If a person dedicates three hours a day to using the system, the BMI can reach 95% accuracy in a week, researchers said.

to be applied to other types of brain waves

Tags: technology, brain, computer

Atlas Obscura

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:44:29 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus

Clip Source: atlasobscura.com

About the Atlas Obscura

Welcome to the Atlas Obscura, a compendium of this age's wonders, curiosities, and esoterica. The Atlas Obscura is a collaborative project with the goal of cataloging all of the singular, eccentric, bizarre, fantastical, and strange out-of-the-way places that get left out of traditional travel guidebooks and are ignored by the average tourist. If you're looking for miniature cities, glass flowers, books bound in human skin, gigantic flaming holes in the ground, phallological museums, bone churches, balancing pagodas, or homes built entirely out of paper, the Atlas Obscura is where you'll find them.

The Atlas Obscura depends on our community of far-flung explorers

Anyone and everyone is welcome and encouraged to nominate places for inclusion, and to edit content already in the Atlas

Clip Source: atlasobscura.com

Carnivorous plants, medieval aphrodisiacs, and the largest original wood structure glass conservatory in the western hemisphere

Museum of Bad Art

Torre Argentina - Roman Cat Sanctuary

Tags: travel, community

Clipmarks | balthazarus's clips

21st-Century Slaves

21st-Century Slaves : A HIDDEN INDIA (1)

i-Aroma

God or Darwin? some statistics...

God or Darwin? The world in evolution beliefs

Beliefs in evolution

Subliminal Messages Motivation

Subliminal Messages Motivate People To Actually Do Things They Already Wanted To Do

Ethiopian Multiplication

Ethiopian Multiplication

Mediastorm

Those unsure of own ideas more resistant to views of others

People Sometimes Seek The Truth, But Most Prefer Like-minded Views

This is the rhythm of the heart..

Cardiac Rhythms Synchronize With Music

Sea level rise: it goes up and up...

What if Lincoln Had Used Twitter :-?

Head Scarf Emerges as Indonesia Political Symbol

Understanding does not diminish Awe

A Moved Mover

Mind-Controlled Wheelchair

Toyota Develops Mind-Controlled Wheelchair

Atlas Obscura

About the Atlas Obscura

Museum of Bad Art

Torre Argentina - Roman Cat Sanctuary

21st-Century Slaves

: A HIDDEN INDIA (1)