Mild Doctor Who series 5 spoilers | Bad Astronomy

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MILD SPOILERS FOR THE NEW DOCTOR WHO. If you want to remain Whoally pure, then go away.

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I just got word that the new series of Doctor Who will start on BBC America here in the States on April 17. All I know about the UK premier is that it’ll be around Easter (I may know more next week). The BBC confirms that the first three episode titles will be The Eleventh Hour and The Beast Below, both by Steven Moffat, and Victory of the Daleks by Mark Gatiss. Guest stars include Alex Kingston (River Song is back!), Sophie Okonedo, and Tony Curran.

Yay!


Remainders – The Things We Didn’t Post: Wishful Thinking Edition [Remainders]

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In today's Remainders: wishful thinking. Nikon fans hope they've stumbled on a viral campaign for new cameras; magazine companies hope their slick new ads will keep you buying magazines; Google CEO Eric Schmidt gets pranked in 1986, and more.

Follow the Signs
Camera geeks are getting excited over some mysterious cards that have been showing up in their mailboxes. First I'll explain what's on the cards and then I'll explain what people are surmising, just because it'll be funnier that way. The first card was all black, with the number "8" on one side inside a burst of yellow, with the words "I am" on the back. The next day, a similar card with the number "7" was mailed out, with the words "I am fun" on the back. Now for the theories: yellow and black being Nikon's colors, people are thinking that this might be some sort of cloak and dagger lead up to the unveiling of Nikon's first micro four thirds camera, or perhaps NIkon's rumored EVIL line of gear. The could be reading into the cards a little too much, but when you extend the daily countdown it ends on March 8, the same day a Nikon press event is scheduled in the UK. At least this rumor has a definite expiration date. [Engadget]

Lifting Spirits
There's only one thing that's better than a cat elevator, and that's a cat elevator that is entirely operated by the cat itself. Though you have to wonder if this type of cat-tech retards the development of their natural abilities to leap from crazy heights and not be injured. Because if anything that's a super power we need to be cultivating, not discouraging. [Neatorama]

DoubtsCast
We'd love for a Mitsumi's new TV-enhancing miracle chip to be real, but we find it very hard to believe that any chip is improving LCD black levels as well as is shown in this photograph. The company claims they hope to commercialize the chip this year, but I wouldn't hold your breath—or hold on to your crappy LCD TV—waiting for it. [CrunchGear]

Punk'd
What was Eric Schmidt up to back in 1986, before he became the overlord of the internet-age empire we know today as Google? Getting pranked by his employees, of course. For April Fools Day '86, his Sun Microsystems underlings put a Volkswagen Beetle in his office, to which the bespectacled Schmidt probably responded by slapping his knee and snorting out a "Gee golly!" In any event, the video is a nice trip back to the mid-80s, a time before pranks were invariably cruel and back when the economy was so good that extra cars were always just kicking waiting to be disassembled and reassembled in someone's office. Ah, sweet nostalgia. [TechCrunch]

Light On Ideas
I love LEDs and I love cool furniture design, but this LED table sort of makes my blood boil. It costs $24,000. It shows just about zero imagination when it comes to implementing the lights. It has to be plugged in at all times. A waste of money, a waste of energy, a waste of LEDs! Did I mention it costs $24,000? Forget that noise, just make your own. [UberGizmo]

Pew Pew
A recent study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project revealed that more Americans get their news from the internet than from print media. No surprise there—if anything it's surprising it didn't happen sooner—and the internet is still behind national and local TV when it comes to how Americans stay up to date, so don't get too worried about the internet subsuming everything in it's path. Not yet anyway. Still, this is one step closer to the future we envision in which Gizmodo is the nation's primary source for all news, gadget and otherwise. (One surprising bit from the study: 21% of internet news-gatherers get their information from a single site. So, seriously, get ready for the Gizmodo News Network.) [Ars Technica]

Print Rules
Five huge print publishers—Time and Conde Nast among them—have banded together on a $90 million crusade to remind us why magazines rock so much and why we should shell out $3, $4, $5, $6 a month to buy them. "We surf the Internet. We swim in magazines," reads one of the campaign's ads that's going to run in ESPN The Magazine. Sure, whatever, we might be swimming in magazines, but the magazines themselves are drowning. Drowning so bad that they don't know which way is up and it seems like a good idea to throw tens of millions of dollars into a lame ad campaign. Drowning so bad that they think it's a good idea to try to put their customers' internet consumption and magazine consumption at odds when they could be working on models that combined the two and made everyone happy. Drowning so bad that they're trying to convince people that growing 11% over the last 12 years since Google came on the scene is some kind of great accomplishment. Just make sure the New Yorker looks really good on the iPad and we'll forget this campaign ever happened, OK? [WSJ]

Screen Shots Fired
Some fat-fingered Dell employee accidentally made a typo when entering a new Ubuntu netbook into the system, resulting in this price of $100,278. That's not what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is this particular type of fuck-up—the accidental astronomical price—and if we will find anything quite so amusing. I've heard some people say that the Aristocrats is the funniest joke ever told, but surely the accidental astronomical price is better. Knock knock. Who's there? A hundred thousand dollar. A hundred thousand dollar what? A hundred thousand dollar netbook from Dell. Oh that's good! OK, maybe that's going too far—I like a good goofy pricing error now and again—but the internet is treasure trove of typos. Maybe it's time for us to branch out. [CrunchGear]


Security Expert: Flash Is the Root of Browser Insecurity (Oh, and IE8 Isn’t So Bad!) [Security]

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You're probably relatively confident in your various machines' integrity against hackers. Repeat Pwn2Own hacking competition victor Charlie Miller would like you to know that you're wrong—especially if you have Flash.

In an interview with OneITSecurity, Miller picks off questions about hacking and security with just enough ease and nonchalance to make me queasy. Like, you know how Mac OS exploits are supposed to be tougher to root out than Windows exploits? Not quite! And they're both vulnerable:

Windows 7 is slightly more difficult because it has full ASLR (address space layout randomization) and a smaller attack surface (for example, no Java or Flash by default). Windows used to be much harder because it had full ASLR and DEP (data execution prevention). But recently, a talk at Black Hat DC showed how to get around these protections in a browser in Windows.

And obviously, Linux is fortress, right? Again:

No, Linux is no harder, in fact probably easier, although some of this is dependent on the particular flavor of Linux you're talking about. The organizers don't choose to use Linux because not that many people use it on the desktop. The other thing is, the vulnerabilities are in the browsers, and mostly, the same browsers that run on Linux, run on Windows.

And within a given operating system, surely you can ensure immunity from exploits by choosing a secure browser like Firefox. Surely. No? GUUUGHHH.

[The safest browser is] Chrome or IE8 on Windows 7 with no Flash installed. There probably isn't enough difference between the browsers to get worked up about. The main thing is not to install Flash!

So the guy who consistently prevails Pwn2Own, a competition where hackers demonstrate exploits for sport, says that Flash, which is installed on about 98% of computers on the internet, unifies all browsers in insecurity, and that IE8, an Internet Explorer browser, in case you're having trouble unfolding that acronym, now ranks among the safest in its category. The slightly better news is, despite inherent insecurities that he doesn't bother to elaborate on, mobile smartphone platforms are relatively secure as compared to their desktop counterparts. So there's that.

The full interview is definitely worth a read, even for the tech disinclined—it's a good reminder that you (and you!) can never completely avoid online security threats. So, stay on your toes, and look out for... something? [OneITSecurity via Crunchgear]


In desperate times, what works, wins

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When one of the worst natural disasters in history hit Haiti earlier this year I worried what sorts of  alternative medicine “help” the Haitians might have thrust upon them.  From around the world, health care workers with expertise in trauma and disaster relief offered their skills, realizing that anyone who came to Haiti must bring with them a lot of value—taking up valuable space, food, and water without providing significant benefit will hurt far more than help.

But others have used this disaster to benefit themselves and their own quasi-medical cults.   There have been many reports of the Church of Scientology’s faith healers walking around in yellow t-shirts trying to “assist” people’s nervous systems.  Homeopaths, the folks who sell water panaceas, have been offering to “help” as well.

Poor and less-industrialized countries are a target-rich environment for alternative medicine cults, but may conversely be a tough nut to crack.  Since many alternative medicines don’t require an industrial base, they can be made readily available anywhere.  Homeopathy is just water;  if a homeopath can simply provide a water remedy that contains fewer fecal coliforms than the local water, they can get away with quite a bit before people realize they’ve been duped.  In fact, unless a population has had exposure to real medicine, the altmed folks can fool people for a very long time. But hungry people can also be very pragmatic, and they know that eating grass will only give a false satiety.  The same may be true of medical help.

When face with an immediate threat to life and limb,  most people find out rather quickly the difference between real and fake medicine.  In rich countries such as the U.S., people have the luxury of indulging in alternative remedies.  We have good public sanitation and vaccination and so suffer more from diseases of excess rather than those of desperate poverty.  If you have access to food and clean water, so much that you even consume to excess, then you may have time to explore fake cures.  But when the feces hits the rotating blades…

From our friends to the north (and my email from Dr. Gorski) I learned about a naturopath’s struggle to provide help to Hatitians post-quake.  Canada seems to have a serious naturopath problem.  Naturopaths in Canada tried to co-opt the flu pandemic with a worse-than-misleading educational campaign, and have made in-roads into getting the same rights as real doctors (without the concomitant responsibilities—we real doctors have to have at least some evidence on our side).

So it was with no small amount of Schadenfreude that I read about a naturopath’s failure in Haiti (but also sadness for the Haitian people for being subjected to him).  Denis Marier, a naturopath practicing not far from me, took his altruistic impulse and a whole lot of fantasy and boarded a plane for Hispanola.  His particular medical fantasy seems to be centered around vitamin C.

I’m also trying something new this mission – intravenous vitamin C injections to assist with tissue and wound healing. I don’t have access to refrigeration, but should be able to keep the vitamin C, calcium, magnesium, selenium and zinc stable for a few days. I’ve brought enough from my clinic to give approximately 100 treatments of 5 grams of vitamin C plus support minerals.

Well, I’m sure that vitamin C will fix up those traumatic amputations just fine.  And with neonatal tetanus, it sure couldn’t hurt, right?

The elderly lady with the maggots in her sinus cavity from an earthquake injury went to surgery today – she’s expected to recover well. I’m hoping the IVC administered over the last several days, as well as the homeopathic (Pyrogenium) have contributed to her positive prognosis.

You can hope all you want, but unless devitalized tissue is debrided, no amount of magic water will help.   In an unsanitary environment like a disaster zone, any extra skin punctures simply add to the risk of infection, so rather than being simply useless, Mr. Marier’s medicines are likely to cause additional harm.  The Haitians seem none too impressed with Mr. Marier anyway:

Unfortuantely, as I’ve experienced on previous missions, the local community is arriving at a free “medical clinic” expecting medications, not homeopathic remedies to help with post-traumatic stress from the original disaster.

Those pesky Haitians!  Coming to a medical clinic expecting medical help!  You’d think centuries of crushing poverty would have sucked the hope out of them by now, but apparently they still expect medical clinics to practice medicine.  According to the Globe and Mail report:

After he saw two patients the lineup just melted away, he told me, frustrated, towards the end of his final day. Before he [Marier] left, he disposed of the leftover injectable Vitamin C he brought with him from Canada (it’s a new-ish remedy, apparently, to stimulate tissue healing) because he was worried that, in his absence, it would be used improperly. When I left him, he was also contemplating disposing of a huge load of traumeel, a homeopathic anti-inflammatory.

Yeah, let’s hope all that magic water doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.

I understand the altruistic impulse; it’s largely responsible for my decision to go into medicine.  But an altruistic impulse directed improperly can cause great harm.  Marier sounds like a nice guy who has his heart in the right place.  Maybe he and people like him can refocus his efforts on providing real help, such as raising cash for MSF or PIH, organizations with a track record of providing real help.


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Studies Supporting HHO Boosting

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Doug RH has claimed that a Livermore study demonstrates that HHO boosters work as claimed, showing improvements of as much as 65%, He further claims that my understanding of current HHO research is hopelessly rooted in century-old thinking. Maybes he's right. Thus this thread.

Having actually

Hydrofloors’ Swimming Pools Belong In the X-Men’s Danger Room [Swimming Pool]

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I don't know who has the pockets and the space to install Hydrofloors—mechanically operated tiles that sink into the ground slowly, revealing a swimming pool already full of water—but I want to meet them. Watch them in action:

According to the manufacturer, the system is "nearly invisible" and you can adjust the depth of the swimming pool to any depth just by using a control panel. I wonder if my downstairs neighbor will mind it if I install one. [Hydrofloors via Notcot]


Rumor: Apple Finally Sees the HDMI Light [Rumor]

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After years of Mini DVI and Mini DisplayPort, will Apple really give us HDMI? A bucketful of rumors from AppleInisider say HDMI is replacing DVI in the next Mac minis, and reveals a long lost audio/video Mini DisplayPort adapter.

The new Mac mini, according to AppleInsider, will ditch its old DVI port for HDMI, which'll sit next to the Mini DP port. The reason Apple's interested in HDMI is that it delivers audio along with video over a single port, unlike the current MiniDP spec. The catch, though, is that these new Mac minis use Nvidia's MCP89 chipset, meaning they'll likely be Core 2 Duo machines still—not yet getting the upgrade to Core i3/i5/i7.

In terms of other Macs, the audio/video problem still exists, so what Apple had cooked up to go with those Blu-ray players that never happened in the latest iMacs is a proprietary DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter that carried audio and video through a customized Mini DisplayPort. We might see this revised Mini DP port in the next MacBook revision though, and the adapter that goes with it.

The updated Mini DisplayPort with audio sounds like the most logical option for Apple, rather than backtracking to HDMI after purposely shunning it. Just give me one port that carries both audio and video—I don't care what you call it—and some way to plug it into another display or plug other stuff into the Mac, and I'll be happy. [AppleInsider]


NASA Management Changes – More To Follow

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NASA Announces Agency Center Management Changes

"Arthur E. "Gene" Goldman, who has been the director of Stennis since November 2008, has been named deputy director of Marshall. Patrick Scheuermann, the deputy director at Stennis will take over as the Stennis director. Stennis houses many of NASA's rocket propulsion test capabilities and applied science programs. Marshall's work includes propulsion systems, engineering, science, space operations and other work in support of NASA missions. As previously announced, Woodrow Whitlow, Jr., the Glenn center director, has been named the associate administrator for Mission Support at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Ray Lugo, the deputy director at Glenn, has been named acting director."

4-hp Compressor

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Please help me ,to make it run.......

I have single ohase 7kw genset, trying to start 4 hp single phase air compressor,when the swith on gen set overload and stop ....

thanx

Noktor ƒ0.95 HyperPrime Lens Gives Your Micro Four Thirds Camera Night Vision [Cameras]

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Sure, you could just sit tight and wait until mega ISO camera sensors give all of our cameras flawless night vision, but what if you have a Micro Four Thirds camera right now? Then this lens will do just fine.

Noktor's HyperPrime 50mm has something I've only seen one other time in a consumer lens: an aperture diameter larger than its focal length. In performance terms, this means that the lens lets in twice as much light as an already dead-fast ƒ1.4 lens, letting you crank down your camera's ISO settings to capture a cleaner picture. In photographic terms, this means that you'll only be able to focus on a paper-thin plane, giving your photos—assuming you're focusing on something close by—an extreme depth of field effect.

The lens ships in April for $750, but given the extraordinary aperture size, reasonably high price and relatively unknown manufacturer, and full manual operation—that's right, no auto focus—it's probably best for you Micro Four Thirdsers to wait until this thing proves its prowess. [Noktor via DPReview via Wired]


Putting “Ears” on a Microscope Lets Reseachers Listen to Bacteria | 80beats

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e-coli-bacteriaThe invention of the microscope allowed scientists to peer into the tiniest of cells. Now, imagine a device that can not just look into minute cells, but can also listen in on their activities.

A team of scientists is building a “micro-ear” that uses tiny beads and lasers to amplify and measure vibrations on a molecular scale. The team hopes the new device will become standard lab equipment soon, allowing scientists to listen to the movement of bacteria such as E. coli as well as microorganisms that cause diseases like sleeping sickness [The Daily Beast].

The micro-ear is based on an established technology that uses laser light to measure tiny forces. The “optical tweezers” work by suspending very small glass or plastic beads in a beam of laser light. Measuring the movement of these beads as they are jostled by tiny objects allows measurements of tiny forces that operate at molecular scales [BBC]. The optical tweezer is so sensitive, it can measure a piconewton force, which is a millionth of the force that a grain of salt exerts when resting on a tabletop [BBC]. But unlike the optical tweezer, where one single laser beam measures the forces exerted by tiny objects, the micro-ear would use a circle of bead-bearing laser beams to listen to the object in question.

Scientists say this circle of laser beams can pick up the motion caused by bacteria as they use their flagella to motor forward. That motion causes the ring of electrically-charged beads to wobble by different amounts, and all those wobbles are measured using a high speed camera. That output is then connected to a speaker, so that researchers can hear the bacteria’s vibrations. The device has already picked up Brownian motion, letting researchers listen to atoms and molecules sloshing about in a fluid. The new micro-ear could also help scientists understand how harmful bacteria move, and how drugs can be used to stop them in their tracks.

Join Discover Magazine on Facebook.

Related Content:
80beats: Dime-Sized Microscope Could Be a Boon for Developing World Health
80beats:Microscope-Cell Phone Combo Could Spot Disease in Developing World
80beats: New Nano-Scale Imaging Technique Takes Pictures of Viruses in 3-D
DISCOVER: World’s Tiniest Scale Can Weigh Individual Molecules

Image: iStockphoto


Robert McCall

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Famed space artist Robert McCall, 90, dies, Collectspace

"An artist whose visions of the past, present, and future of space exploration have graced U.S. postage stamps, NASA mission patches, and the walls of the Smithsonian, Robert McCall died on Friday of a heart attack in Scottsdale, Arizona. He was 90."

The late, great Robert McCall, Miles O'Brien

"When the congregation decided to add a small, chapel-in-the-round for smaller ceremonies a few years ago, they called upon this artistic pair in their midst to design the stained-glass windows. ... Not long after it was finished, and not long after the Challenger disaster, the widow of the commander of the doomed flight, June Scobee visited here. After gazing into the glass and reflecting, she told the McCall's she knew where her husband was. The McCalls' eyes glisten as they recount the story."

Challenger Center Mourns the Death of Space Artist Robert T. McCall, Challenger Center

"Bob's artistic talent and imagination helped us to create the concept and design for Challenger Center, and he remained a close friend and supporter. My heart goes out to his wife Louise and his entire family," said June Scobee Rodgers, Challenger Center's Founding Chairman. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made in McCall's honor to the Challenger Space Center of Arizona, 21170 North 83rd Ave, Peoria, AZ 85382, http://www.AZChallenger.org."

McCallStudios

Piping Jobs

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hello friends..m in final year (last semister)of chemical engg & have first class in aggregate..m also doing diploma course in "piping & materials".

I m looking 4 a job in pipng design field..cud any1 suggest me 4 d same..!!!!

Panasonic’s New Silicon Battery Technology Could Yield 30% Capacity Improvement [Batteries]

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Panasonic is going to be rolling out production of Li-ion batteries that use a silicon alloy anode soon, according to Nikkei. The result? A whopping 30% increase in capacity. Panasonic's not the only company working on the technology, but they're the first to yield any kind of spec detail.

The Si-alloy batteries are expected to retain at least 80% capacity even after 500 charge/recharge cycles, and will be available commercially starting in 2012. The first target: notebooks, although the bigger fish appears to be vehicles. Don't get to excited about the impact on electric cars, though: given the additional weight associated with Si-alloys, it'll be some time before we see one of these bad boys in a Volt. [Nikkei via Engadget]


Rumor: Foxconn Production Problems Mean Long Lines at iPad Launch [Rumor]

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An analyst is reporting that "an unspecified production problem at the iPad's manufacturer, Hon Hai Precision, will likely limit the launch region to the US and the number of units available to roughly 300K."

Analysts make poofy, speculative claims that we ignore all the time, but Canccord Adams' Peter Misek here is reporting that there is an actual "unspecified production problem" happening at Foxconn (the prettier name for Taiwanese manufacturer Hon Hai Precision) resulting in a "manufacturing bottleneck." Of course, it's possible he's still wrong, and a million iPads will flow freely later this month (ooo, is it March already?).

But a high-demand, low-supply launch wouldn't be the worst thing in the world either. It certainly wouldn't be unprecedented; Christ knows, Amazon and Nintendo that strategy milked it for years. [AppleInsider]


"I wouldn’t want to live forever even if given the choice."

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- "What you mean is that you want to signal that you're unselfish and virtuous to the point of self-sacrifice, but that if everyone around you was taking an anti-ageing pill, you'd take one too; you wouldn't pass it up and be the only wrinkly one. You also wouldn't kill yourself when you hit 78 in your futuristic young body, rather you'd look back with nostalgia on those mad days of youth when you thought that death was somehow good. By then you would have learned that you are running on corrupted hardware, and that a lot of your far-mode verbalizations are not really your true preferences. No offence meant - I had to go through this painful realization too."

From Robert Wiblin's Facebook.