Interesting Thingies

It was not until the 14th century that scientists created the first sophisticated astronomical clocks. The Antikythera mechanism, with its precision gears bearing teeth about a millimeter long, is completely unlike anything else from the ancient world.  It seems that the device could be used to predict the positions of the sun, moon and planets on any specific day in the past or future. The maker of the machine would have had to calibrate it with the known positions of these bodies. A user could then simply turn a crank to the desired time frame to see astronomical predictions. The mechanism displayed positions, for instance, on a “zodiac dial” on the front of the mechanism, where the ecliptic was divided into a dozen 30-degree sections representing the constellations of the zodiac. 

The Design of Everyday Things is a best-selling book by cognitive scientist and usability engineer Donald Norman about how design serves as the communication between object and user, and how to optimize that conduit of communication in order to make the experience of using the object pleasurable.  One of the main premises of the book is that although people are often keen to blame themselves when objects appear to malfunction, it is not the fault of the user but rather the lack of intuitive guidance that should be present in the design. Norman uses case studies to describe the psychology behind what he deems good and bad design, and proposes design principles. The book spans several disciplines including behavioral psychology, ergonomics, and design practice. Read More ...

 Over the automotive industry’s 100+ year history, companies such as Ford, Chevrolet, and Mercedes-Benz have produced some truly iconic cars. Whether they’re designed for excitement, luxury, or just simple transportation, Visual Capitalist's Marcus Lu notes that these vehicles offer a set of features that make them highly desirable to consumers. The most successful models will undergo numerous revisions over time, sometimes sticking around for many decades. To learn more, this graphic from Alan’s Factory Outlet lists the 35 vehicles with the longest production runs of all time. Here are the top 10 below.  Read More ...

The Source Code i s   here . This not a joke. We can wonder about the license though. Maybe we should ask the walking product of this source:   Craig Venter   (update: not quite true, it is mostly someone else). The source can be viewed via a wonderful set of perl scripts called   ‘Ensembl’ . The human genome is about 3 gigabases long, which boils down to 750 megabytes. Depressingly enough, this is only 3.6 (update: used to be 2.8, apparently Firefox decreased in size, huh.) Mozilla browsers. DNA is not like C source but more like byte-compiled code for a virtual machine called ‘the nucleus’. It is very doubtful that there is a source to this byte compilation - what you see is all you get. Illustration of a DNA molecule. The language of DNA is digital, but not binary. Where binary encoding has 0 and 1 to work with (2 - hence the ‘bi’nary), DNA has 4 positions, T, C, G and A. Whereas a digital byte is mostly 8 binary digits, a DNA ‘byte’ (called a ‘codon’) has three d...

In Garfield Heights, Ohio sits one of the most toxic shopping centers constructed in the United States.  After nearly 2 years of construction, City View Center opened in 2006 as a power center, containing big-box stores such as Walmart, Giant Eagle, Circuit City, PetSmart, Jo-Ann Fabrics, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Bed Bath & Beyond, Office Max and Marshalls.  Issues arose due to the center being built atop a landfill. One tenant after another moved out over the years due to health concerns and structural issues, and the center was eventually abandoned.  So how exactly did all of this arise, and why was the center built here anyway? Read More ...

Convincing someone to change their mind is really the process of convincing them to change their tribe. If they abandon their beliefs, they run the risk of losing social ties. You can’t expect someone to change their mind if you take away their community too. You have to give them somewhere to go. Nobody wants their worldview torn apart if loneliness is the outcome. The way to change people’s minds is to become friends with them, to integrate them into your tribe, to bring them into your circle. Now, they can change their beliefs without the risk of being abandoned socially. The British philosopher Alain de Botton suggests that we simply share meals with those who disagree with us: “Sitting down at a table with a group of strangers has the incomparable and odd benefit of making it a little more difficult to hate them with impunity. Prejudice and ethnic strife feed off abstraction. However, the proximity required by a meal – something about handing dishes around, unfurling napkins at th...

A common sight at the entrance to Whittier is of people who missed the last crossing sleeping in their cars. Many residents own T-shirts that say "POW." Prisoner of Whittier, that is. The thing is, Whittierites never have to take the tunnel if they don't want to, even though the tiny southwest Alaska town is severed from the outside world in so many ways. It snows 22 feet a year here, more than 1,000 times the normal national average (OK, Boston this past winter doesn't count). Residents don't even have to leave the building they live in if they don't want to. That's because Whittier, including its hospital, school and city government, functions within one self-sufficient structure: a Cold War behemoth that seems better suited to a city like Newark (no offense to Jersey). The 14-story Begich Towers Incorporated, known around these parts simply as BTI, is probably the last thing you'd expect to see in an outpost as remote as this. It soars skyward, rude...