Talking About Stuff, with Mike and Christiana

That's why I adopted this little fella..

adopt your own virtual pet!

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What's the concert?

This one:

Celtic Wonders Concert - Dervish

What's the gadget?

This one:

Griffin iTalk iPod Accessory

Why the 2-in-Review?

Well basically, it is the intersection of two different tracks. On the first, I like Celtic music, so when a good friend of mine asked if I wanted to go see Dervish at a nice outdoor concert, I said, sure, sounds like fun!

On the second track, I'm gearing up for Worldcon and one thing that I thought would be fun was making audio recordings of some of the more interesting panel discussions. I came across the Griffin iTalk, and it's pretty nifty. Fits right on top of the iPod, you can control it with the iPod menu, many gigabytes of recording space at your fingertips and it automatically synchs up with your computer.

But, I didn't know how well it would record sound in a public space, particularly with a crowd, when I'm some distance away from the speakers, so even though recording a concert is generally a no-no, I decided to test it out on Dervish.

So how'd it do? Pretty darn good! See for yourself! The quality isn't great, but considering this was an outdoor concert, I was surrounded by people and I was about 40 yards from the stage, I think this is pretty impressive.

(Right Click and Select "Save As" to download clips)
Dervish Clip 1 (1.21 MB) — A bouncy little jig
Dervish Clip 2 (3.69 MB) — The lead singer tells the story of the song she's about to sing, plus the beginning of the song.
Dervish Clip 3 (1.20 MB) — A fun sing-a-long type song.

Note: These clips do not include complete songs and I'm not going to post the whole concert recording. If you like their music, great! Go buy their CD's! I did. Of course, I bought mine at the concert, so I got these too!



So sum total? Great band, great gadget! I recommend both.

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Blind Teen Amazes With Video-Game Skills

I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but blind people playing video games have become a repeated theme here. Anyway, this one is pretty interesting.

Brice Mellen is a whiz at video games such as "Mortal Kombat."

In that regard, the 17-year-old isn't much different from so many others his age.

Except for one thing: He's blind.

And as he easily dispatched foes who took him on recently at a Lincoln gaming center, the affable and smiling Mellen remained humble.

"I can't say that I'm a superpro," he said, working the controller like an extension of his body. "I can be beat."

Those bold enough to challenge him weren't so lucky. One by one, while playing "Soul Caliber 2," their video characters were decapitated, eviscerated and gutted without mercy by Mellen's on-screen alter ego.

"I'm getting bored," Mellen said in jest as he won game after game.

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It might just turn out to be a good investment.

Sure was for this guy. These are amazing!!

(link found at Jerry Pournelle's Chaos Manor)
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Okay, here's the spot for everyone to discuss the details of what happens in HP book 6. There will be spoilers galore inside, so anyone who isn't finished reading it yet should take that under serious consideration before looking inside.

Dean's World has a great post and discussion going about the subject of Intelligent Design, and a petition that states the following:

"We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged."

There are a lot of great comments there, but here is a repost of a pretty long one that I posted there:

This is a subject that I have, over the years, spent a lot of time and mental energy on, believe it or not, on both sides of the issue. (warning, this is going to be long)

I did not grow up Christian, I was a lazy agnostic until high school. (By that, I mean my attitude was: "I don't know if there's a God, but I don't care enough to think about it very hard.")

I'd always liked science (still do), and to me, when I heard the arguments in favor of creationism, they seemed bizarre and nonsensical. In retrospect, I realize that my position then was based as much on faith as the creationist one. (Faith in what my teachers had told me, rather than, say, faith in the Bible.) I had not done my own research or subjected the matter to any critical thinking. I just took it for granted that what my science teachers had told me was true.

In my junior year of high school, I became a Christian, and I'll spare you all my testimonial here, (though I'm more than willing to share it with anyone who is interested,) but through my new church, I was exposed, for the first time, to some of the more sophisticated creation science arguments. (i.e. Ones not expressed by my 16-year-old classmates)

It was a revelation, not so much because I agreed with everything they said, but the very idea that one of the so-called scientific "truths" I had been taught actually could be wrong. I did a lot of research and spent the next few years feeling vaguely angry and betrayed by the scientific community.

I switched sides in the debate, though mostly I was defending creationists as not being ignorant and stupid rather than defending any specific version of creationism. You see, I was not altogether persuaded by creationism, but it seemed to me that they had a number of legitimate points and questions about evolution that, as far as I could tell, had never been satisfactorily answered.

In college, I majored in biochemical engineering, and had plenty of opportunity for debates on the subject, and frequently they would get heated.

Then, I reached a sort of epiphany. My belief in God does not depend on the answer to the evolution question. It was a huge relief. Suddenly, this problematic issue that had been giving me such mental anguish was now just an interesting puzzle.

The fact, (perhaps the only real one in this whole debate,) is that we will never know with 100% certainty how exactly life originated. Whether it was people created from dust, or self-replicating RNA that came down on an asteroid, or whatever, we will only ever be able to look at the after-effects, and speculate.

That is not to say that these speculations aren't useful. I think that the desire to learn as much as is possible about this world and the universe at large is the intersection between philosophy and science.

My own take is that a God-assisted process of evolution seems the most likely explanation. Note, by the way, that it is the "evolutionists" who won't let me into their club for that reason, not the ID folk.

In college, I did a lot of advanced study in this field, even an entire semester course devoted exclusively to the subject. The current "official" theory of evolution insists that it is based on random changes, constrained by a few rules imposed by natural selection. I was specifically told by my professor that you cannot believe in scientific evolution and God at the same time. According to him, they are mutually exclusive.

I think that's a load of bulls#!t, but the fact remains that a great many scientists feel that way, and they are the ones leading the charge against Intelligent Design.

The Intelligent Design movement has its own problems of course, not least of which is the presence of literalist creationists among their ranks. I'm not saying that the literal Genesis account couldn't have happened, only that it doesn't seem the most likely explanation to me, and also that I don't think seven literal 24-hour days are required for creation to be a miracle.

Still, for most people, the only possible intersection evolution has with their day-to-day lives is the debate regarding how to teach it in schools.

Frankly, I'm not that concerned with evolution being taught in schools. What really irritates the hell out of me is that, in most schools, it's being taught wrong!

I don't mean that they should be teaching ID alongside it, I mean that they are not even teaching the actual scientific theory properly!

As a few people have mentioned above, science classes today are not being taught science. They are being taught facts. "This is the way things are, and you should believe it because I said so."

I don't know how any of you were taught eveloution in school, but for me, it went basically like this.

"Life gradually evolved from simple life forms to complex ones because of 'survival of the fittest', and we know it because of X, Y, and Z"

Where X, Y, and Z would be examples of natural selection rather than evolution.

A couple of examples of misunderstandings continually perpetuated by bad science teachers:

Note: These are all based on actual scientific evolutionary theory, not ID or anything weird.

1. Natural Selection is NOT the same thing as "Survival of the fittest."

The problem with "fittest" is that it assumes a level playing field. A great many examples of natural selection have nothing to do with "fitness". Example: you've got two populations of squirrels or something, each on one side of a river. The squirrels on the left side have less food and so they have to compete harder to survive, thus over time, they get smarter and stronger, etc. than the squirrels on the right side of the river. "Survival of the fittest" would suggest that the smarter, stronger left-side squirrels would survive, because they are "more fit" than the right-side squirrels.

But then there's a forest fire on the left side of the river and all the left-side sqirrels are burned up, leaving only the dumber, weaker right-side squirrels. That's an example of natural selection, but not of survival of the fittest. Evolutionary theory states that natural selection that is the driving force, not "fitness."

2.Proportional changes in population is not the same thing as evolution.

When I was in school, one of the examples we were given to support evolution was the story of white moths and gray moths near an industrial city in England. The tree bark there was mostly white, so white moths had an advantage over the gray moths, because they were harder to see by their predators. As a result, the white moths were far more plentiful than the gray moths. But then, as the air got polluted by the factories, the white tree bark started turning gray. (Observe also how there is a buried environmentalist message in this story.) With the darker tree bark, the gray moths began to have an advantage over the white moths, and thus, they grew in numbers until they were plentiful, and the white moths were rare.

Now, that is evidence of natural selection, but it is not evidence of evolution in any respect. Think about it, at the beginning of the story, we have white moths and gray moths. At the end, white moths and gray moths. The only thing that changed is their proportions. (This is sometimes called micro-evolution.)

There is no question that natural selection occurs, because we can observe it, as with the above example. Now if this story had been merely used as an example of natural selection, that would have been one thing, but instead, that story was presented as proof that evolution had occurred! And it wasn't just my teacher, this was right out of my textbook.

So I'm not going to insist that creationism or ID be taught alongside evolution in schools, (though I don't see how anybody is hurt by a disclaimer like: "Some people think that life is too complicated to have arisen just through random changes, but we don't have any way to test that.")

What really gets to me though, is not the teaching of evolution, but rather when it's taught wrong.

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Got a couple today. The first isn't related to me in any way, but it's interesting.

Google maps has got the Moon!

Make sure you zoom in all the way!


Next up, a pair of odd internet connections that impact me personally.

Apparently, my review of Conan the Barbarian is the #1 link that comes up when you Google "Thusla Doom".

This last item I find simultaneously flattering and very disconcerting. I suppose this is the sort of thing that just happens when you become an original content provider, but... ew.

Apparently, someone has taken my Pool Rules cartoon, and reposted it on a site for Furry Hentai.

You'll forgive me, I hope, if I don't link to it here.

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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Okay, lets get something straight. There are a lot of people out there insisting that this isn't a remake of the 1971 Gene Wilder movie, but rather it is a re-adaptation of the original book, and as such should not be compared with the other film.

Hogwash, piffle and phooey to all that. Way more people have seen the other film than have read the book and given that they are both based on the same story with all the same characters, it's just stupid, in my opinion, to assert that you shouldn't compare the two.

So I'm going to feel free to compare the hell out of them, and anyone who doesn't like it can go find some other reviewer, a snooty one who thinks that trivial distinctions like that are legitimate film criticism. That said, this film does apparently go back to the source material as its basis, rather than remaking the 1971 film itself. So the geese with their golden eggs and the fizzy lifting drinks are gone, replaced by the book's original squirrels and the great glass elevator.

Apparently, even the lyrics to the Oompa Loompa songs are taken right from Roald Dahl's original book.

So, anyway, now that I've finished with that little burst of righteous indignation, how is the movie?

Really pretty good.

I have a couple of minor complaints, but on the whole I was enormously entertained.

Both of my complaints stem directly from comparisons with the other movie, thus my vigorous defense of that approach above, and both, frankly, are mixed anyway.

And really both relate to the songs. The slightly cheesy and repetitive oompa loompa songs from the other movie are gone and replaced with elaborately staged, exciting songs. Now, in principle, I like this, and I enjoyed them.

But basically, who ever did the sound mix screwed up royally, because you CAN'T FREAKING HEAR THE WORDS!

Or at least, I couldn't, and I was really trying. The music and the arrangements and the dancing and everything are really appealing, but I really would have liked to be able to tell what they were singing! Seriously, I feel like I got only one line in three. I wish there had been subtitles.

The other also relates to the songs, but is a little harder to put my finger on. Basically, the story is episodic in structure:

Chapter 1: Charlie is poor and the Wonka factory is mysterious.
Chapter 2: Golden Tickets
Chapter 3: Arrival at the factory
Chapter 4: Agustus Gloomp and the river of chocolate.

etc.

Yet, somehow this film doesn't seem to give enough weight to that structure, in particular as each of the horrible kids is dispatched in their respective ways. It always seems to be in a hurry to the next bit, and as such, I didn't feel as much of an emotionally satisfying climax to each episode.

I wanted the various fates of the bad kids to have a moment of acknowledgement from the film, something the previous version definitely had, but in this one, the kids are hardly out the door when it's "On with the tour!"

Okay, so enough with the bad stuff. Is there stuff to like in this version.

Absolutely.

Tim Burton is one of those filmmakers that really has his own distinctive vision. When you watch a Tim Burton film, you know you're watching a Tim Burton film. His films aren't always good exactly, but they are at least always interesting.

This one is good. Just the sheer visual look of the film is quite wonderful. All of the effects, the color, the direction, the sets, the costumes, etc, all just fantastic. (with the single exception of the "eatable" main factory floor, which I didn't find to be any real improvement over the original, which made it a little bit underwhelming, considering how good everything else is.)

All of the kids and their parents are great. Though they don't always have that much to do, there are loads of great facial expressions and interactions with their parents.

And of course, Johnny Depp. I had heard some people say that they didn't like his portrayal of Willy Wonka, and while they are certainly entitled to their opinion, I don't share it. I thought he was hilarious. From the absurdly funny anticlimax of his first appearance when the kids arrive at the factory, to his constant insistence that Mike Teavee is mumbling, to his inability to say the word "parents" without gagging, I just loved him. I've loved him in everything he's in lately, it feels like.

Let me be honest. His Willy Wonka is DEFINITELY weird. Not everyone will like him, but I did, so take that for whatever its worth.

So, final impressions?

I had a really good time with this film. Enormously entertaining.

Compared to the original film? Well, it's a little bit of a toss-up, merely because that version has become so iconic in pop-culture, it's a little hard to let some of that imagery and those original songs go. I would say the new version is more entertaining, but less endearing. Funnier, but not quite as lovable.

So, I heartily recommend it, but I doubt anybody will be tossing out their copies of the Gene Wilder version.

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Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Wow, did I ever plow through this one.

Picked it up at the local Barnes and Noble at about 12:30PM on Saturday and turned the last page at about 1AM last night.

Now, it isn't quite as long as Order of the Phoenix, but even still, I was fairly impressed. Harry Potter books have always been like that, very smooth, quick reads, but this one seemed a great deal more so.

It's very good.

In fact, based on a quick first reading, it might even have taken Goblet of Fire's place as my favorite book of the series.

It's going to be hard to get into why without spoilers, but I'm determined to avoid giving anything away. Believe me, you don't want any of this story spoiled for you.

Why is this one so good? Well a big part of it is that it feels as though it uses the history of the series in a very effective way, more so than the others. These characters have had 5+ years of dealing with each other now, and it shows. They know each other well, at the same time that each of them has grown and changed some. Plus, all the previous books give everything that happens in this one a great deal of context, that just provides a wonderful texture.

The plot, as always, is incredibly inventive and compelling. Furthermore, big things are happening this year. More so even than book 5. Voldemort's hand has been forced now, and he can no longer pretend he isn't back. As such, he's stepped up his plans and people are definitely noticing.

In fact, in a move that I'm quite sure isn't an accident, the book contains a strong mood of, lets face it: terror.

In Harry Potter's world, people are living in constant danger. They are being warned to take precautions by their government. Warned that anyone could be under the influence of the Imperious curse, and thus anyone must be scrutinized. We know that the Death Eaters are out there, but we don't know where or what exactly they're planning. Pretty much all you can do is to just try to be aware of your surroundings, and to try to keep living your life. Sound familiar to anyone?

So there's a real sense of fear behind everything in this book, which really ratchets up the tension. Also ratcheted up is the continued maturation of the characters. They're sixteen and seventeen now, and if they had started noticing the differences between boys and girls way back in book 4, in this one, they like those differences. There's nothing inherently sexual, but expect plenty of snogging.

JK Rowling has an excellent sense of character, and this again plays into what I was saying about the series history. We feel like we know these characters extremely well, and every interaction between them feels both believable and yet still surprising. It's really quite amazing. There are a number of times in this book where you feel the pleasant frustration of wanting to slap a character upside the head so that he or she will come to their senses, at the same time that you completely empathize with them.

Gosh, I'm running into trouble now. What else to say without giving anything away? The book has a dark tone to it, as I spoke briefly about already, but it's even darker than the last one, and goes some very scary and upsetting places indeed. Still, the humor and fun that we've come to expect from this series are still present in sufficient quantities that the darkness and seriousness do not overwhelm.

It's really quite a fantastic book. It's a given, of course, that anyone who's already a fan will want to read this one, so I'm not exactly going to be convincing anyone to read this one when they wouldn't have otherwise, but maybe, for those of you who haven't already picked it up, or those who are waiting for a family member or friend to read it first, just maybe I'll help the feeling of anticipation be all the more fun.

Anyway, I may discuss more of the story later when more people have read it and can discuss the details of the plot, but have no fear, there will be spoiler warnings.

Oh, and believe me, there is spoiler gold in this one.

Take this quiz and find out!

Apparently, my results are:

You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Now here's an odd sensation: Feeling that someone is hypocritical for calling someone else a hypocrit, while at the same time agreeing with them.

Current Drudge Report Headline:

Sen. McCain Stars in Boob Raunch Fest

Now, once you've recovered from that ludicrously stupid headline, take a look at the article.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. -- who once held hearings chastising Hollywood studios for producing R- rated films and marketing them to teens -- is now playing a part in one!

Opening this weekend, WEDDING CRASHERS, a movie packed with raunchy moments and bare-breasted beauties bedding down with the guys.

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McCain joked on Tuesday, "Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson and me - we're all pretty much starring roles." McCain said he couldn't resist a chance to appear in a Hollywood movie because "it impresses my kids."

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During his senate hearings on Hollywood, McCain lectured Hollywood executives for pushing R-rated films:

"Motion pictures have to ability to elevate and inspire us. To weave wonderful tales, and to record our history. Clearly though, such is not the case."

(Emphasis his)

Now this isn't the first time that I've observed Matt Drudge acting like a ridiculous hypocritical prude regarding the entertainment industry. This guy who spends most of his time pandering to his audience by digging up the most scandalous headlines he can find, including stories about two-headed frogs and the like, (often titled: "FREAK!") This is the guy who broke the Monica Lewinsky story for crying out loud, and now he wants to act like he's some paragon of moral virtue clucking his tongue at raunchy comedies?

This is exactly the sort of thing that has made me respect Drudge less and less as the years go by. To be sure, he was one of the first people to revolutionize the way news was handled online, but now, he's not doing anything different than any other jackass out there with a blog and knowledge of Google. (Note: I'm going to drive right on by any notion of irony here.) So basically, this sort of story is really the sort of thing that makes me visit his site less often, and even when I do, it's generally only due to morbid curiosity.

All of that said, he totally has a point about McCain.

Now, way back when he was running in the 2000 primaries, I liked him. He had this great war hero record and was refreshingly blunt and independent. He refused to just walk the party line and I liked that.

Over the years since then however, my respect for him has dwindled dramatically. It seems to me now that he's little more than a publicity hound, who'll say or do anything that will get him more face time. Of late, he's found that being one of the few Republicans willing to criticize the president gets him lots of media exposure. (This is not to say that people shouldn't criticize the president, only that I think his motives are selfish.)

A senator appearing in a Hollywood film is a pretty tacky thing to do regardless. But to appear in an R-rated sex comedy is even worse. And the fact that he has publically criticized those movies in the past just takes the whole thing to the point of absurdity.

So, I agree with Drudge that McCain's being a hypocrit by appearing in this movie, but I think Drudge is being a hypocrit for saying so.

As I said, an odd sensation.

Parkinson's Treatment Linked to Compulsive Gambling

They've discovered through a scientific study of certain Parkinson's drugs known as dopamine agonists that the treatments can, in some cases, trigger compulsive gambling behavior!

The human brain really is an amazing organ, and the influence chemicals can have on the way we think and feel is really pretty incredible. Don't believe it? Have a couple of beers and then think about it. Now with things like alcohol, for the most part, we have a pretty good understanding of its effects.

With all of these new medications, especially the ones specifically intended to affect the brain, the side effects can be a great deal more subtle. I know this first hand. (Note: I'll be posting a bit later with updates to some of the personal things I've been dealing with recently.)

Yet this one is especially surprising, as it suggests that certain compulsive behaviors can really be more biochemical than we even realized before. The good news about this, is that the people who were displaying this symptom can solve the problem by simply reducing their dosage. Furthermore, this sort of surprise finding could lead to advances in the way we understand and treat things like Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.

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Apparently some people do, because:

Gladiator Sequel Planned

Of course, Russell Crowe wouldn't be in it, since his character died at the end of Gladiator, but the character played by Djimon Hounsou looks likely to return.

I have mixed feelings about the sequel. I definitely think there's still room in the market for another gladiator-style film, but Russell Crowe was a huge part of what made the first film great. A sequel without him would have to be a very different film. Djimon Hounsou could be a good lead though. I certainly liked him in that, and he's been terrific in a number of other things as well, like "Amistad" and "In America."

That said, maybe that's a good thing. Maybe the inability to use the same protagonist would help them to not fall into the repetitive derivative traps that most sequels succumb to.

Of course, it all depends on the script and director as well. I doubt Ridley Scott will be on board, since I don't think he's ever made a sequel in his entire career.

UPDATE! Just checked, and Ridley Scott did do "Hannibal", which is a sequel. But not a sequel to one of his own films, which was really my larger point anyway.

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Wow, it was a lot of work, but I've finally put up the first part of my flash cartoon.

It's actually only the first half of what I had originally envisioned as the first episode, but it took so long that I decided I'd go ahead and put up what I've got.

So I've put the link over on the right side of the page beneath my profile. Check it out and let me know what you think!

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How about Airplanes?

http://www.jsonline.com/onwisconsin/movies/jun05/332493.asp

The American Film Institute has enshrined it as one of the top 10 comedies of all time. Stuff magazine listed one of its many one-liners - "Have you ever seen a grown man naked?" - as among the funniest movie lines ever. And Sports Illustrated has ranked the appearance by basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as one of the best film cameos by an athlete.

Though such accolades hint at how firmly a part of the cultural firmament the 1980 film has become, they are also relatively minor and arbitrary.

More satisfying recognition comes this week when Jewish Family Services, a non-profit social services group working in the Milwaukee area for more than 135 years, presents a 25th anniversary benefit celebration of the film. A reception and dinner will be held Wednesday at the Pfister Hotel and a red carpet screening will be held Thursday at the Pabst Theater. The event is in honor of the volunteer service and philanthropy of Louise Abrahams Yaffe and her son Jim Abrahams, who wrote and directed "Airplane!" with fellow Shorewood High School and University of Wisconsin-Madison graduates David and Jerry Zucker.

I'm sure that you've all heard about this by now, (if not, turn on a TV or the radio or something,) and though I'm not sure I have anything profound to say on the subject, I just felt that I had to say something.

Clearly, this is a terrible tragedy and I want to offer my sincerest sympathies and condolences not only to those who were directly affected by the explosions, but also to everyone living over there who has had the war on terror brought right to their doorstep, especially since the UK is a target mostly for being such a close and valuable ally to the United States in this fight.

While there are clearly some legitimate questions and concerns about the way the war on terror/Iraq is being fought, I think it needs to be reiterated that this sort of bombing is simply unacceptable.

Even the purported reasons, (that we've heard so far,) that this is retaliation for the fights in Afghanistan and Iraq are disingenuous, since 9-11 proves they hated us before that.

But the reason that groups like Al Queda hate us are frankly immaterial to my point.

Regardless of any beliefs or problems or complaints they have, the deliberate attempt to kill as many innocent civilians as possible can have no justification whatsoever.

This is not a case where we can give them what they want and they'll go away. Even if we were to give in to all their demands (which we would never do for a variety of reasons), that would simply demonstrate to them that their tactics are effective and they would just ask for more.

The issues in the Middle East are extremely difficult ones to address and there are no easy answers. But the one thing that is easy, is knowing that this sort of terrorism is never okay, no matter what the cause.

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You heard about the "Deep Impact" probe that collided with a comet over the weekend? Well, not everybody is happy with the mission's success.

Russian Astrologer Sues NASA over Comet

Marina Bai has sued the U.S. space agency, claiming the Deep Impact probe that punched a crater into the comet Tempel 1 late Sunday "ruins the natural balance of forces in the universe," the newspaper Izvestia reported Tuesday. A Moscow court has postponed hearings on the case until late July, the paper said.

Bai is seeking damages totaling 8.7 billion rubles ($300 million) - the approximate equivalent of the mission's cost - for her "moral sufferings," Izvestia said, citing her lawyer Alexander Molokhov. She earlier told the paper that the experiment would "deform her horoscope."

I wish her good fortune (Get it? Get it?), but I don't think the stars are in her favor. After all, when I tried to sue Tea Leoni for moral sufferings from the movie Deep Impact, I couldn't even get anyone to return my phone calls.

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To the extent that one can be simultaneously intrigued and alarmed, that's exactly how I feel about this:

Robot Hand Performs Remote Breast Exams

Life-saving breast examinations could soon be performed by a robotic hand that combines ultrasound with an artificial sense of touch.

The robotic breast examiner was devised by researchers at Michigan State University in the US. They say it will enable a medical specialist to examine women from a remote location, perhaps even from the other side of the world.

"Just because you’re located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan or even Botswana, it doesn’t mean you can’t have a sophisticated diagnostic or therapeutic procedure," says Carol Slomski, a surgeon at Michigan State University, who helped design the system.

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Check this out, then click on the links to view the image more carefully, and tell me that this graph doesn't make 100% perfect sense.

The rise in average global temperature over time is directly attributable to the declining world population of pirates.

And what's more, there's actually something we can do about it! So slap on that eyepatch, steal some booty and save the planet!

Found the link at Chaos Manor.

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