Mike Lynch, a private detective hired for an Italian documentary on Titor, suggests that Haber’s brother, John Rick Haber, is Titor. John Rick Haber is a computer scientist who would have known about the IBM 5100 and Unix 2038 problem, with a post office box application later linking John Rick Haber with the John Titor Foundation. Lynch believes John Rick Haber to have the computer knowledge and wit to perpetrate the Titor hoax.
i09: The Man Who Told the Internet He’d Come from the Future
“Even Ballard didn’t go as far as describing consumer riots over 2$ waffle makers at Wal-Mart” – Ashley Benigno
This most recent Thanksgiving weekend was violent even by Black Friday standards, including at least once incident of one shopper using pepper spray on fellow consumers. As Ashley points out, that’s a grimly Ballardian reality. This weekend I’ve come across some other WTF moments that seem like they were lifted directly from a Ballard novel:
South Korean Twin Towers Design
DJ crushed in bed in hotel room by taxi cab
Corporate executives gone wild chew threw restraints on airplane
These are fucked. Hyperreal baby masks for adults. The masks come in three models: disgusted baby, happy baby and cry baby. You can check out more photos and some videos as the site.
(Thanks Chris!)
When performing simple tasks like pushing elevator buttons or picking up a cup, the brain actually has a mini-debate as to which hand should do the jobs. Now magnetic stimulation will make sure the brain always chooses the left hand.
Researchers found they could influence the decision about what hand to use in simple tasks using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). The finding could have medical applications in assisting patients who have lost or damaged limbs. It may also suggest the possibility to manipulate other decisions using TMS.
Mad Science: You can switch from right-handed to left-handed through the power of magnets
(Thanks Bill!)
See also:
My wife’s said that insects are the food of the future. But some are embracing that future voluntarily already. San Francisco-based “chef and artist” Phil Ross is bringing insects and worms to fine diners in San Francisco and New York, with unexpected results.
You really want to go green? Try this. “I have my month’s meat growing in my office,” Mr. Ross said. “It’s taking up almost no space, it’s organically raised, it’s as fresh as I want it to be and the waste from it is garden compost.”
Mr. Ross first brought a group of San Franciscans together to chow down on cooked insects a year ago, and he was surprised when the guests started buzzing around him for raw samples. “I was like, ‘O.K., go for it,’ ” he said. “And then that just led to this very weird erotism moment when people were practically hugging each other while eating these live insects.” The spirit of the moment overflowed, leading, in a few cases, to groping and kissing in a corner.
“I wasn’t expecting that,” he said.
New York Times: Waiter, There’s Soup in My Bug
(via David Forbes)
Be sure to check out the slideshow.
The article, titled “The weirdest people in the world?”, appears in the current issue of the journal Brain and Behavioral Sciences. Dr. Henrich and co-authors Steven Heine and Ara Norenzayan argue that life-long members of societies that are Western, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic — people who are WEIRD — see the world in ways that are alien from the rest of the human family. The UBC trio have come to the controversial conclusion that, say, the Machiguenga are not psychological outliers among humanity. We are. […]
Others punish participants perceived as too altruistic in co-operation games, but very few in the English-speaking West would ever dream of penalizing the generous. Westerners tend to group objects based on resemblance (notebooks and magazines go together, for example) while Chinese test subjects prefer function (grouping, say, a notebook with a pencil). Privileged Westerners, uniquely, define themselves by their personal characteristics as opposed to their roles in society. […]
The paper argues that either many studies’ conclusions have to be retested on non-WEIRD cultural groups — a daunting proposition in terms of resources — or they must be understood to offer insight only into the minds of rich, educated Westerners.
National Post: Westerners vs. the World: We are the WEIRD ones
(via Josh)
Update: That link is dead, but here’s a PDF of the article
Also: Here’s a PDF of the paper.
Experts have now come to a consensus that the statue was made in the sixth century in North-western India, probably in the Swat Valley.
In some way or other then, and over two or perhaps three hundred years, this little Buddha made its way half way across Euro-Asia to end up on the mantelpiece of a Swedish burgher. Doubtless he sometimes called his wife over and they looked together, shaking their heads at the ‘caste-mark of gold’ on this strange doll’s forehead. […]
Presumably the object was traded down the Silk Road to the Black Sea and from there up the Baltic or just possibly from India to the Caspian and up the Volga to Moscow and from there to the ‘Viking Sea’? That it was found with objects from Egypt, Ireland and the Eastern Mediterranean is, any case, a reminder of just how far Scandinavian ‘traders’ – again Beachcombing is trying to be polite – travelled in the early Middle Ages.
Beach Comber: The Buddha in Viking Sweden
(Thanks Paul!)
Boing Boing’s David Pescovitz on The World as a Wunderkammer at TEDx SoMa.
My interview with Pesco is here.
The government of Espírito Santo, a state located in the southeast of Brazil, is experimenting with a new training routine for some of its military police officers. Instead of learning about new combat techniques, policemen are developing interpersonal relationship skills, emotional balance and discipline in a Zen Buddhist monastery, located 70km from the state capital, Vitória.
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