Amazing security attack

From Bruce Schneier's blog: Monitoring keyboard radiation

Methane Clathrates

Yet another frightening aspect of global warming.

What an idiot

From today's NY times article. 
 

As is often the case when stocks fall steeply, the market is starting to entice some investors, many of whom say they have never seen prices so low, to buy. Among them is Mr. Grantham, the GMO chairman.

After years of warning that stocks were unreasonably overpriced, he said he now believed they were below their fair value and had been slowly acquiring holdings in blue-chip companies.

“It’s a very nerve-racking time to be a value investor,” Mr. Grantham said. “You put a little bit into the market, and the next day you think, ‘What an idiot, what an idiot.’ ”

After hearing Warren Buffet and Jeremy Siegel say "buy now", I thought, who am I to disagree with those guys?  At least Mr. Grantham can made me smile.

Voting machines II

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/22/votes

Why oh why can't we have a better voting infrastructure?

Voting machines I

OK, this is a little better than nothing.  It is still pathetic.  Instead of congratulating themselves on a test of 10 machines, they should start to take this seriously and require paper trails and random post
election audits.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08296/921755-470.stm

Two kinds of genius

A great article from Malcolm Gladwell.

Reye Syndrome

I didn't know that you aren't suppose to take aspirin if you are younger than 19. 

Richard's Paradox

Interesting pseudo-paradox.

Calibrate your battery

I think it should be more well known that you need to calibrate your laptop battery.  I saw today that the capacity is down to %89.  Calibrating is simply a matter of totally discharging the battery, then turning it off for a few hours, then rebooting.  

Don't update to Aquamacs 1.5

If you use fullscreen mode on multiple monitors, Aquamacs 1.5 is broken.  The second monitor won't go to full screen.  Luckily, you can still download 1.4 from the historical releases page.

Palin workflow

Mia Farrow in Darfur

Mia Farrow has posted, in addition to her blog has posted a slideshow of her
time in a Darfur refugee camp.  This is one of the fascinating images.

Camel spiders

Nicholas Kristof wrote that the two scariest animals in nature are polar bears and camel spiders.  I'd never heard of camel spiders, so I looked them up.  Yep...  no exaggeration.  If you're brave, try camelspiders.net.  I'm not including a picture.  You'll see why.

space(s)?

I corrected a sentence in a book a friend is writing:

"... for various kinds of real and complex vector space ..."

I said this should be

"... for various kinds of real and complex vector spaces .."

Interestingly, he pointed out that it is a British/American English difference.

Ian Hibell

Here is a inspiring story about Ian Hibell,  who made his way all over the world on a bike. He was recently killed, after making his way the equivalent of 6 times around the equator, by some Greek jackass racing around Athens.