Link round-up
Mar. 15th, 2007 09:16 amIt's way time for a link round-up.
PacWind make a Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine that appears solid to birds even at higher rotation speeds - too bad it's a little too large for domestic urban use...
These felt bags made from factory wool waste unzip entirely to fold flat. Pretty!
Eco-Village in Craik, Saskatchewan. I'll be watching this to see how it turns out.
Falk Sleeping Bag - possibly a good addition to emergency kit?
The Internet is for Meta-Analysis, by
gnimmel. I really, really want to see this as a poster.
Research finds music training 'tunes' human auditory system; I'm really glad that they're showing support for my profession, but I question the quality of the research. Maybe people who have good auditory wossname are more likely to have continued with music lessons for more than two years? Bah.
Simuze appears to be some sort of creative-commons music site. There goes the Mammoth Project. Only, it's in Dutch, and I don't see an 'English' button anywhere. I guess that's okay for something in beta...
Depressed mothers can still be good moms. Again, I don't like the way the science is being presented here; it seems to have a lot more to do with knowledge and experience than depression, and really to make the research valid they'd have to compare depressed and normal mothers both from some sort of starting point and after undergoing the same training. I'm not saying that some training can't help some people, or that depressed mothers can't be good moms - just that they've not set up a control, and the study appears to be about education in those who are, incidentally, depressed, rather than comparing skills of depressed to 'normal' (whatever that is) mothers. The title is pretty misleading.
How to build your own ECG machine. Brilliant. See also OpenEEG.
Thumb drives get bigger and bigger. I wonder about the applications for tiny computers... I know there are mp3 players out there that have significant storage and can act as USB hosts for cameras and other devices. I'm wondering about things that are basically terminals with net access and so on, running off of a USB drive you plug in.
Bayonet fitting 2W lightbulbs, each as bright as a 25W incandescent. Still cheaper on eBay, I suspect... but it's nice to see these actually entering the market here. They make very nice little work lights, and a few of them light up a room quite happily. They also last aaaaages.
Little old granny puts up fight to be able to use cannabis for pain relief.
Interview with Rosamond Naylor on Global Food Security. Complex stuff, and important.
Why so important? Well, if you thought the world was crowded now...World population to hit 9.2 billion by 2050.
Physical and psychological torture has similar impact. Poor grammar aside, I've been saying this for years as regards abuse.
Top 5 Things that should be taught in every school - this is rather US-centric, but the basic concepts are quite valid. I guess I did alright - "communication skills" sounds an awful lot like English class to me, although learning French as a second language probably helped a lot. We had health classes too. Thing is, I know my parents taught me at least some of that stuff, or tried to... why is it the responsibility of the school to teach these things? I mean, I agree it makes good sense to educate citizens to not be crap, but all of these things are also beneficial to the actual student. What should be the job of parents, and what of schools?
It's worth telling you again about the Geek Scrapheap Challenge II, Saturday 24th March. I posted about this way back in February and then didn't say anything for a while - oops! But, um, please come.
Photography by
lynnyn. Some of this makes me pretty nostalgic for God's Country...
Sack Patsy - I admit I haven't read all the details, but Dr Crippen advertised it so it must be good, right? Um.
Right. Now I don't have to use a scroll button to get through all my tabs...
PacWind make a Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine that appears solid to birds even at higher rotation speeds - too bad it's a little too large for domestic urban use...
These felt bags made from factory wool waste unzip entirely to fold flat. Pretty!
Eco-Village in Craik, Saskatchewan. I'll be watching this to see how it turns out.
Falk Sleeping Bag - possibly a good addition to emergency kit?
The Internet is for Meta-Analysis, by
Research finds music training 'tunes' human auditory system; I'm really glad that they're showing support for my profession, but I question the quality of the research. Maybe people who have good auditory wossname are more likely to have continued with music lessons for more than two years? Bah.
Simuze appears to be some sort of creative-commons music site. There goes the Mammoth Project. Only, it's in Dutch, and I don't see an 'English' button anywhere. I guess that's okay for something in beta...
Depressed mothers can still be good moms. Again, I don't like the way the science is being presented here; it seems to have a lot more to do with knowledge and experience than depression, and really to make the research valid they'd have to compare depressed and normal mothers both from some sort of starting point and after undergoing the same training. I'm not saying that some training can't help some people, or that depressed mothers can't be good moms - just that they've not set up a control, and the study appears to be about education in those who are, incidentally, depressed, rather than comparing skills of depressed to 'normal' (whatever that is) mothers. The title is pretty misleading.
How to build your own ECG machine. Brilliant. See also OpenEEG.
Thumb drives get bigger and bigger. I wonder about the applications for tiny computers... I know there are mp3 players out there that have significant storage and can act as USB hosts for cameras and other devices. I'm wondering about things that are basically terminals with net access and so on, running off of a USB drive you plug in.
Bayonet fitting 2W lightbulbs, each as bright as a 25W incandescent. Still cheaper on eBay, I suspect... but it's nice to see these actually entering the market here. They make very nice little work lights, and a few of them light up a room quite happily. They also last aaaaages.
Little old granny puts up fight to be able to use cannabis for pain relief.
Interview with Rosamond Naylor on Global Food Security. Complex stuff, and important.
Why so important? Well, if you thought the world was crowded now...World population to hit 9.2 billion by 2050.
Physical and psychological torture has similar impact. Poor grammar aside, I've been saying this for years as regards abuse.
Top 5 Things that should be taught in every school - this is rather US-centric, but the basic concepts are quite valid. I guess I did alright - "communication skills" sounds an awful lot like English class to me, although learning French as a second language probably helped a lot. We had health classes too. Thing is, I know my parents taught me at least some of that stuff, or tried to... why is it the responsibility of the school to teach these things? I mean, I agree it makes good sense to educate citizens to not be crap, but all of these things are also beneficial to the actual student. What should be the job of parents, and what of schools?
It's worth telling you again about the Geek Scrapheap Challenge II, Saturday 24th March. I posted about this way back in February and then didn't say anything for a while - oops! But, um, please come.
Photography by
Sack Patsy - I admit I haven't read all the details, but Dr Crippen advertised it so it must be good, right? Um.
Right. Now I don't have to use a scroll button to get through all my tabs...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:31 am (UTC)If you're extremely lucky (ie if I get my arse in gear tomorrow), there will be a pair of slippers for you.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 09:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:02 am (UTC)I have DSL (http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/) on my USB drive, along with QEmu so it can either boot on a machine that can boot from USB, or run in the emulator on Windows. I've only been experimenting with it though.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:27 am (UTC)Because there isn't a "minimum ability to care for and educate a child" standard for allowing people to breed. (Put more charitably, one can't teach something if they don't know it themselves.)
no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 05:45 pm (UTC)Personally, I learnt essentially nothing (apart from exam technique) in most subjects in school until sixth form, because it was all stuff I knew already from intelligent and engaged parents and my own independent reading. That doesn't mean schools don't need to bother teaching reading and rudimentary history and a smattering of science and world religions and so on. I don't entirely agree with the article, because it's too business and marketing focused for my tastes. But I think it is useful to question whether personal finance and time management might be more worthwhile than a detailed knowledge of the terms of the treaties after WW1.
Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing cooking and what used to be called home ec compulsory on all school curricula. That perhaps falls slightly below reading as an essential life skill but not a long way behind. Of course parents should teach their children these things, and a great many others, but if the parents can't or won't, the future adults still need the skills.
Thanks...
Date: 2007-03-15 08:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-15 10:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-16 09:38 am (UTC)