Thursday, May 12, 2011
San Francisco Model/labyrinth Made Out of 100,000 Toothpicks
Artsist Scott Weaver's, "Rolling Through The Bay", is a composite of various landmarks from around San Francisco,all created in astonishing detail usuing some 100,00
0 toothpicks. Oh, and it's also a ping pong ball labyrinth. It's certainly an amazing piece of art, and I am duly impressed.But what I always find most astonishing about works like this, is the truly unfathomable amount of free time, not to mention patience, some people apparently have. I can't even make the time to draw a picture anymore, and I don't have the patience to set up a hundred of... ANYTHING, much less a hundred thousand of those things.
-CAINE-Source:The Bold Italic VIA: Laughing Squid
Images and video by:The Tinkering Studio, The Exploratorium
Scott Weaver's Rolling through the Bay from Learning Studio on Vimeo.
Monday, May 9, 2011
Godless Geek Blog Year Zero, a Makeover, & a New tumblr
Today marks the first complete year of Godless Geek Blog, which isn't a particularly significant event by ANY standard, but it does make ME happy. So I decided to mark the occasion by giving the page a bit of a makeover, as you have likely noticed by now, and I also decided that it was about time I gave you another option for following the blog. So as of today, you can now follow Godless Geek Blog on tumblr at: godlessgeekblog.tumblr.com, where I'll be compiling not only posts from both here and Compendium, but also a variety of additional content straight from tumblr, as well as all of the other places where I can be found lurking on the web.So since it has been a year and all, and I don't often ask you for any special attention, I have a favor to ask. If you enjoy the blog, then please, just for today, share it with your friends. Post a link on your own blog, like it on Facebook, send out a tweet, or you could even just start following me on twitter @Godlessgeek_. Why, there's even a button for most of those things just sitting and waiting patiently for you to press it, right there underneath the "share The Godless Geek Blog" heading to your right. And if you do decide to help promote the blog somehow, let me know, and I'll gladly return the favor.
Lastly, I wanted to say thanks, not just for the sharing, but for your continued interest in the blog. Daily traffic continues to grow slowly but surely, as it has been doing since the day I started, and I genuinely appreciate you all making the effort to follow, and to read what I have to say. So weather you've been following for a while now, or you've just found your way here for the first time, know that your interest is greatly appreciated, and though posts may have gotten a bit sparse around here as of late, I've got a lot more stuff on the way.
Thanks again.
-CAINE-
Sunday, May 1, 2011
The Sixsense Academy
NOTE: I inadvertently posted an unfinished draft of this post last night, which I have since edited and corrected for errors, so if you stumble upon the previous version, that is why it exists.
What is the "Sixsense Academy" You say? And wouldn't "Sixth" sense be easier to pronounce and make more... um... sense?
Well the answer to your second question is clearly yes, though I suppose we can give them a pass and assume that they were attempting to avoid association with the crappy Shamalamadon movie. As to your first question, think of the Sixsense Academy or the, "International Academy of Spiritual Education", as Dumbledorf's castle, only for cons and the diluted. No really, the website claims the Liverpool academy is based in Leasowe castle, cute huh?
In reality, this is basically a troupe or traveling circus for psychics masquerading as an "educational organization" with no real physical hub anywhere; as far as I can tell from they're website, which seems deliberately vague and misleading on this point. Unless of course you think they might actually own a castle in Liverpool, a concert hall in Ireland, and a sanctuary in Spain. Ya, me neither. But the website does claim they have plans to "open Academies" in the south of England, as well as here in the US, and won't that be fun.
You'll also be pleased, but I suspect not particularly surprised, to learn that the Academy not only offers classes to student off all levels, but that you don't even need to be psychic to enroll. Way to keep that customer base open. But it's the tutors that really matter most to this whole deal, so let's look at them.
As you would expect, the list of available tutors on the site includes, psychic healers, mediums, life coaches, a "world renowned angel Channeler and soul expert" and a member of the MBE, the Most Excellent order of the British Empire, ya I don't really know what it means either. But for me, there are three tutors who really stand out from this crowd of seven.First, There's Nina Hall, who is apparently one of the UK's leading, "Aura photographer, Aura Imaging & WinAura Live Consultant's". Now, what makes her most special to me is the "winaura" thing. Cause when I saw that word I thought, "Winaura? What is that, some kind of windows program for reading auras?" Why YES! Yes it is- this will be getting it's own entry. Oh ya, and Nina does psychic surgery too, great.
Next, there's Nicky Whittaker ( no link, she apparently doesn't even rate a profile on the page) , who doesn't do anything particularly special that I know of, since she is listed on the site solely as a, "Spain tutor". Not a Spanish tutor, not a tutor in Spain, but a Spain tutor. You know, in case you need to brush up on your...um... Spain.
But most important by far is the whole reason I found the academy in the first place, Joe "the man who sees dead people" Power. listed on the academy web page as: "International TV, Award winning, Psychic Medium, Author & Teacher".I've written about Joe before, but in case you missed it; Joe is your standard run of the mill, "I see dead people" (oh the irony), kind of "psychic medium". His favorite pastimes include, pretending to talk to the dead, exploiting the grieving, humiliating himself on TV- with a little help from Derren Brown, and wasting the time of local authorities by claiming some special insight into murder investigations, and missing persons cases. He even managed to find some time just last year to falsely accuse members of the MSS of violent threats. Busy guy that Joe.
But hey, maybe some of the other folks are good at what they do.
Bottom line, while I freely admit that I am completely unfamiliar with most of the people on the list, and perhaps they all manage to fall into the, self-diluted believer category; Joe, in my humble non-liable opinion, does not. Joe knows exactly what he's doing, and it isn't talking to the dead. So weather you believe in any of what this so-called academy is selling or not, it seems fair to assume that any organization willing to include him on their list of trusted experts, not to mention a psychic surgeon who employs a scientifically baseless computer program in her act; knows exactly what they're doing too, and it isn't educating.
-CAINE-
Source:sixsenseacademy.com on Twitter: @SixSenseAcademy
Image credit (In order of appearance): The Sixsense Academy and Joe Power
You should also check out The Merseyside Skeptics' site for more of they're dealings with Joe.
Finally, I posted this the last time I wrote about Joe, but it's just too good not to share again. And really, everything you need to know about Joe is right here, in Derren Brown Investigates: "The Man Who Contacts The Dead(cold reading)".
Posted by Youtube user: ScepticaTV
Posted by Youtube user: ScepticaTV
Saturday, April 30, 2011
APOD: A Rose Made of Galaxies (Arp 273)
Image Credit: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)Text via the Hubble site:
This image of a pair of interacting galaxies called Arp 273 was released to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the launch of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The distorted shape of the larger of the two galaxies shows signs of tidal interactions with the smaller of the two. It is thought that the smaller galaxy has actually passed through the larger one.
Via:Phantasmagoria
Sex ED With Miss Lovecraft
"Late Bloomer", a short film from Craig MacNeil, written by, Clay McLeod Chapman
Posted by Youtube user: northlakefilms
I, am a pretty big fan of HP Lovecraft, shocking I know, but really, given the fact that Morbid Angel has been one of my top three favorite bands for the past 20 years or so, how could I not be? But I really wasn't sure that I'd enjoy a parody of Lovecraft's writing style, then I watched the video. Simply put, IT'S AMAZING!
It's dark and weird and funny, the writing style is a perfect parody, the delivery is awesome, and the ending is hilarious. Though I do have to admit that I couldn't help but think of DR. Orpheus from Venture brothers at certain points in the narration, but really, he's kind of Lovecraftian too, so that's ok. Bottom line, this is quite possibly one of the greatest things I have ever seen, and you should stop reading this now and watch it!
Also, let it be known that from this moment forward, I shall only be addressing the vagina using it's new proper name, Yog-Soggoth! which I'm certain is going to go over well with the ladies.
Enjoy!
-CAINE-
Source: toplessrobot.com
Friday, April 29, 2011
The LHC & Rumors of The Higgs Boson
Searching for the Higgs Boson, or "god particle", as it has been unfortunately dubbed by some, is one of the primary functions of the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC (Some of you may remember the LHC as the device that nuts everywhere warned could potentially destroy the earth by creating a black hole once it was powered up in 2008- that didn't happen BTW.). This massive particle accelerator, the largest ever built, smashes protons into one another at a speed of 99.99999 % the speed of light. These collisions result in the release of energy, which in turn, generates a variety of sub-atomic particles including, potentially, the Higgs Boson; which is a theoretical particle predicted by the standard model of particle physics that is believed to impart particles with mass.
So last week, when rumors began circulating that the LHC had potentially caught it's first glimpse of the Higgs, geeks everywhere were understandably excited.
The rumors began last Thursday after a memo authored by several physicists working on the project was leaked to the public, having been anonymously posted in the comments section of physicist Peter Woit’s blog, “Not Even Wrong.” While the memo itself has been confirmed as legitimate, officials from CERN, the organization which operates the LHC, were quick to point out that this was not an official release;
“It’s way, way too early to say if there’s anything in it or not,” said CERN spokesman James Gillies. “The vast majority of these notes get knocked down before they ever see the light of day.”
A member of the ATLAS team, the name given to one of the LHC's particle hunting experiments, also pointed out that results like these are fairly common place, and typically turn out to be the result of errors or biases upon further examination. Which seems both logical and likely, especially given that this isn't the first time that rumors of an accelerator having found evidence of the Higgs have made their way onto the web.
Though this newest set of rumors will likely turn out to be nothing, like most rumors started by anonymous posters on the Internet, there is always the potential that this could in fact be the confirmation of the Higgs Boson that physicists have been waiting for. It might even be an entirely new particle that no one's ever predicted, but it's far more likely it's just an anomaly.
“It’s way, way too early to say if there’s anything in it or not,” said CERN spokesman James Gillies. “The vast majority of these notes get knocked down before they ever see the light of day.”
A member of the ATLAS team, the name given to one of the LHC's particle hunting experiments, also pointed out that results like these are fairly common place, and typically turn out to be the result of errors or biases upon further examination. Which seems both logical and likely, especially given that this isn't the first time that rumors of an accelerator having found evidence of the Higgs have made their way onto the web.
Though this newest set of rumors will likely turn out to be nothing, like most rumors started by anonymous posters on the Internet, there is always the potential that this could in fact be the confirmation of the Higgs Boson that physicists have been waiting for. It might even be an entirely new particle that no one's ever predicted, but it's far more likely it's just an anomaly.
Source:Wired Science
Image Credit:cpepweb.org
For More about the world of particle physics, I encourage you to visit SciTechUK's channel on Youtube, to watch all 15 parts ( don't worry, most of them are less than 3 minutes) of the following program, on particle physics, "In Search of Giants", presented by Professor Brian Cox. You could also visit My Channel, where I have arranged them in order via a playlist.
Posted by Youtube user: SciTechUK
Posted by Youtube user: SciTechUK
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