If Jurassic Park Were In Different Geological Eras – YouTube tags: dinosaur video humor weekly Disney Parks Ban Selfie Sticks “Disneyland and Walt Disney World have officially banned selfie sticks inside the parks. In a statement to the press, a Disney spokesperson cited safety concerns as one of the reasons for the ban. “ tags: weekly selfie sticks ban disney Vampire squid – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia “Vampyroteuthis infernalis, lit. “vampire squid of Hell”” tags: weekly vampire squid latin biology This is your brain on unread emails: does the information age stop us thinking straight? Corballis’s book is, perhaps fittingly, a meandering exploration of why it is not always good to be on-task or “mindful” – although, if it has one overall message, it is this: “nature designed us to dream, to escape the channels that confine us”. This is a comforting reminder that, whatever the impact of technology on our brains, it is not predetermined. Our frustratingly large capacity for distraction is also an innate source of freedom. tags: weekly information thinking Jim Stingl – A typical welcome sign? That won’t fly ” A sign painted in letters 6 feet tall tells people arriving here by air: “WELCOME TO CLEVELAND.” “There’s not a real purpose for having this here except madness” tags: weekly because New York Times falls for […]

Tool use in crocodylians: crocodiles and alligators use sticks as lures to attract waterbirds | Tetrapod Zoology, Scientific American Blog Network “As described by Dinets et al. (2013), Mugger crocodiles Crocodylus palustris in India and American alligators Alligator mississippiensis in the USA have both been observed to lie, partially submerged, beneath egret and heron colonies with sticks balanced across their snouts. Birds approach to collect the sticks for use in nest building and… well, let’s just say that it doesn’t end well for the birds. If the crocodylians really are using the sticks as bait to attract their bird prey, this is tool use, since the sticks are objects that are being employed for a specific function.” tags: animal crocodile tools tool science adaptation weekly How meaning comes to technology: PCR at 30 | Jean-Baptiste Gouyon | Science | theguardian.com “More than a technique, PCR is a concept, that enables molecular biologists to think in new ways of their object of study, DNA, to ask genes new questions. Opening the way to new experiments, it literally frees the imagination. Some even use PCR machines as fridges. After all a thermocycler is nothing but an intelligent heating and cooling block. It can be set on 4ºC for 48 hours, to conserve the result of an experiment over the week-end. ” How meaning […]

Hong Kong anti-litter campaign swipes DNA from trash, uses it to create mugshots of suspected litterers – Boing Boing “The agency tapped Parabon NanoLabs to do DNA testing on bits of trash found on the street, such as coffee cups and cigarette butts. The company then used Snapshot DNA phenotyping to produce a sketch of each litterer’s face based on the DNA sample found on the trash.” tags: weekly dna litter ad science Student Course Evaluations Get An ‘F’ : NPR Ed : NPR Not in agreement with the ‘taskmaster’ element but I have similar concerns about teaching evaluations. “Michele Pellizzari, an economics professor at the University of Geneva in Switzerland, has a more serious claim: that course evaluations may in fact measure, and thus motivate, the opposite of good teaching.” “Show me your stuff,” Stark says. “Syllabi, handouts, exams, video recordings of class, samples of students’ work. Let me know how your students do when they graduate. That seems like a much more holistic appraisal than simply asking students what they think.” tags: student evaluations teaching weekly How to pronounce hexadecimal | Bzarg The beautiful madness that is the Internet. h/t Christopher If you know me at all, you will know that I love this very much. http://t.co/wiUax42UPF tags: #fav weekly internet culture hexadecimal language The Las Vegas Strip […]