John Deere was born on this day in 1804. He industrialized agriculture.
And on a personal note, my mother, who died in 1990, would have been ninety today.
Category Archives: Technology and Society
Gerry O’Neill
Today would have been his eighty-fifth birthday. Many of his dreams may have been unrealistic, in retrospect (they were based on the assumption that the Shuttle really would reduce the cost of space access, among other things), but he inspired, and reinspired a generation jaded by the letdown of Apollo.
On a related note, Alexis Madrigal has an interesting bit of space (and California) history, over at the Atlantic.
A New Twist On Nigerian Spam
I just got this one: “I am Special Agent,Fred Jones and am in Nigeria as an FBI delegate that has been delegated to investigate this fraudsters who are in the business of swindling Foreigners that came for transaction in Nigeria . Please be informed that during my investigation I got to find out that there is a huge sum that has been assigned in your name.Regard FRED JONES”
This one is real for sure.
The Glass Of Tomorrow
Still no flying cars, but this latest video from Corning is sure twenty-first century. Interesting that they have a British narrator for an American company.
Why Star Wars And SF Don’t Actually Suck
Brian Preston rebuts Kathy Shaidle.
Why Star Wars Sux
Dear Thunderbird
Why is that lately I’ve been having to rummage through my spam folder to find valuable emails, from people I actually know? #BayesianFilterFail
The Florida Pythons
Wow, this has really become an ecological disaster:
In areas where the pythons have established themselves, marsh rabbits and foxes can no longer be found. Sightings of raccoons are down 99.3%, opossums 98.9% and white-tailed deer 94.1%, according to a paper out Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“What if the stock market had declined that much? Think of the adjectives you’d use for that,” says Gordon Rodda, an invasive-species specialist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) who published research in 2008 showing that Burmese pythons could conceivably expand across the southern portion of the United States.
“Pythons are wreaking havoc on one of America’s most beautiful, treasured and naturally bountiful ecosystems,” says USGS Director Marcia McNutt.
I remember when we drove down to Flamingo, on Florida Bay, the only place in the world (I think) where alligators and crocodiles coexist, and seeing a family of raccoons on a hike.
At least they’re not endangered species. If they can figure out some way to exterminate the snakes, they could be repopulated in the Everglades from other regions. I suspect that the solution may be some kind of engineered tasty poison that only affects Burmese pythons, but we probably aren’t that far along in the tech yet.
NASA’s Technology Priorities
The National Research Council has come out with a list of sixteen. Does anyone else see something conspicuous by its absence? Hint: it’s necessary for orbital refueling.
[Late afternoon update]
Here’s the full report.
[Bumped]
The Peak Oil Myth
Will the fracking boom finally put a stake through its heart?
Of course not. Malthusians are never stopped by reality. They just pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and go unmerrily on their way.