As noted in the Obama- and Hillary-Protect series, their Secret Service candidate-protective agents hold their hands at waist height, particularly in crowds, but also when standing guard. Presumably this allows quick action against hands of attackers or to draw weapons. Do other protective and/or law enforcement officers use this hand positioning?
The Buckminster Fuller Institute:
The word Dymaxion combines three of Fuller's favorite terms: dynamic, maximum and tension. He applied it widely to a number of his inventions including the Dymaxion Air-Ocean World Map. His map received a patent for displaying the world's geographical data on one surface without distorting the relative shapes and sizes and without any breaks in any of the continental contours. This map is presented as a unique six feet by twelve feet silkscreen print on canvas and as a 50 inch x 72 inch edition on paper. During his lifetime, Fuller lectured tirelessly. Excerpts from 42 hours of his audiotapes, titled Everything I Know, will provide ambient sound for the exhibition.
This exhibition at Sebastian + Barquet is concurrent with the major retrospective, Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe, on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art from June 26 - September 21, 2008.
"With 812 body parts, 55 characters, 927 photos"
There's a Recloose loose aboot this hoose
MOFRESH (the filmmakers)
Megatrends author John Naisbitt shares some thoughts on the future, information and change.
I'm in accord with the idea that there is a lot of hype around the concept of constant change. As far as I see it, we still eat food, drink water and breathe air and until you walk through my living room wall, I'll assume the laws of physics are still in place. That along with everything else shows that despite dramatic changes in certain aspects of this reality being fairly constant, the basics are still the same. I visualize it as a yin and yang-like relationship between the static and dynamic.
I think these points are relevant to the recent Singularity, aka the Rapture of the Nerds, (see also) kerfuffle. I agree with the Transhumanists in the sense that technological advances could, especially in the case of artificial intelligence, spiral off into something barely recognizable or cognizable. The thing is, if any technology were to outspan its utility, and it would if something like the Singularity were to occur, I think we'd be more inclined to bottle it up or shut it off completely. If you turn your stereo up so loud that the sound is distorted and the speakers are about to blow, you cut back a bit and find the right volume. If some wise-guy tries to sell you some new advanced speakers that could handle the power but would blow your eardrums out, break your windows and piss off your neighbors, what use is that?
If the Singularity is useless to us on a basic keep-the-trains- running-on-time sort of way then we'll make cool games with it or, more likely, the military will try to find some way to weaponize it. If we can't do that, we'll cast it away. We'll still need air and water and food and power and sex and to go to the bathroom. I just don't buy into the idea that we'll lamely stand by while some uber-intelligence flies off the charts and decides humans are obsolete. Remember, we control the breakers and if they take that control away, we'll blow the shit out of the power plant.
So what can we take away from all this? Well, if you strip away the eyebright and ooh-wow of the technological hype machine, you'll find that an overwhelming majority of the human beings on this planet are faced with the same basic problems and survival challenges, just within changing scales and contexts and hopefully with diminishing suffering and inconvenience and increasing efficiency and ease, though that might be a bit too optimistic at this crossroads.
It would be to their, and our, advantage if futurists moved from the realm of science fiction more into the world of non-fiction.
via MediaFuturist
Police kill man in standoff over FEMA trailer
Man, I knew that guy. We weren't good friends, but I worked with him for a while.
It's always a bit of a shock to see a name you know in a story like this.
Kinda sad, too. When I knew him, he was a little crazy in a normal within-the-boundaries sort of way, but I never imagined this.
This isn't the first time this has happened to me. One time I saw a roommate's face on the front page of the Times-Picayune, wanted by the FBI under a different name. Talk about a shocker.
There are others. One that happened in high school borders on the paranormal, but I'll save that for another time.
via The Consant Seige
Potheads rejoice! Drugs that encourage the growth of new neurons in the brain are now headed for clinical trials; There are six places where it's really bad to be a woman; Sir Charles Shults found obvious changes in the Phoenix images; and the UAV Sniper Drone is an unmanned flying gun. (via)
On a good day I watch about 30-50 music videos. This one keeps tugging on me.
sonnyj.co.uk
SonnyJTV
hat tip: notes from somewhere bizarre
I got a good laugh out of this.
For those of you not into sports, this series of ads plays on the spontaneous camaraderie amongst strangers that can emerge around particularly meaningful or emotional moments during a sporting event. From my experience, you can find yourself dancing in the arms of a complete stranger, sometimes one that might normally require a wide berth.
As an interesting aside, there is a seeming release of endorphins when one raises their arms up in cheer. Try it sometime, I'm not kidding. You'll feel a surge of joy move from your arms throughout your body. A good yell helps. Do it with 50,000+ screaming drunks and the euphoria is tangible. There is a mass consciousness component to sporting events that any aficionado of the mind would find instructive to examine and experience. It's similar to, but distinctly different from the arena concert experience. (Anecdotally, many athletes and musicians have reported that they can feel this wave of ecstasy when they are on the field or onstage. I think many most of them are addicted to it.)
via Gems Sty
A car collides into cyclists participating in a race in Mexico's northern border city of Matamoros, Sunday, June 1, 2008. At least one person was killed and 14 injured when a driver slammed into a bicycle race. (AP Photo/Jose Fidelino Vera Hernandez)
Car plows into bike race in Mexico, 1 dead
via Nothing To Do With Arbroath
image: BBC
via Delicious Ghost
Many of you might have seen the BBC/NOVA documentary The Family That Walks on All Fours that aired in 2006. The film profiles the five siblings of a Turkish family with a condition known as Unertan syndrome. This affliction is not only associated with quadrupedality, but also manifests imperfect articulation of speech, mental retardation, and defects in the cerebellum, a part of the brain involved in motor control.
Now, according to Turkish scientists, genetic mutations have been found in four unrelated families (including the above mentioned Ulas family) that are responsible for a protein which is known to be critical to the proper functioning of the cerebellum during development. This finding might put a dent the hypothesis that there is a single gene associated with bipedalism yet might help confirm that there was a genetic component to the transition from quadrupedalism. I'm not really sure how this will bear out in relation to Uner Tan's "backward evolution" hypothesis.
PhysOrg:Although the families lived in isolated villages 200-300 km apart and reported no ancestral relationships, the scientists expected to find a single genetic mutation implicated in the condition. They were surprised to find that this was not the case.
"We carried out genome-wide screening on these families", said Professor Ozcelik, "and found regions of DNA that were shared by all those family members who walk on all fours. However, we were surprised to find that genes on three different chromosomes are responsible for the condition in four different families.
Here's a snippet from the NOVA documentary:
Passionate Productions - The Family That Walks on All Fours
BBC News - Family may provide evolution clue
Times Online - Life on four legs
Careful, it'll grow on you.
Bostich
Fussible
Bostich+Fussible
Nortec Collective
NSFW
I know, it's wrong on so many levels...
DhyanChohan
Les Mystères Ufologiques
via Posthuman Blues
I'm not a big fan of milk anymore, it turns my guts and I'm not so sure how healthy it is to drink it, but I love this video. Regardless of dietary preferences, it's a great piece of viral advertising.
I was kinda disappointed that this wasn't a real band.
For the curious, White Gold is a rock star who was given a guitar full of milk by an angel. He's really stoked about the whole thing.
Paid for by the California Milk Processor Board, the objective of these videos is to sell more milk and get kids off soda. I think they outdid themselves.
One thing struck me: it seems that the musical stylings are more appropriate to the youth of the early to mid-seventies than to those of the now. This was like hearing Basketball Jones back in the sixth grade. But hey, if kids are digging this kind of music, I'm all for it. It would be a big step up from the crap I'm hearing on the radio.
I don't know. Maybe the fact that I like it is proof that kids will hate it and that it's really an out-of-touch effort doomed to failure and obscurity.
White Gold's YouTube
White Gold is White Gold
via Wired Science
Rumor has it that they sold the gear and closed the doors over at engrish.com.
from szechuan-vultures.com
via Danwei
No acid until you've cleaned your room!
If you would like to read a little more about our vertically-challenged breakdancer...
via linkbunnies.org
Whenever I go through my Sunday Excursions folder, a loose theme often presents itself. No such luck this week. We're all over the place.
First, we'll try to start off on sound footing with some grooming advice from Joel and the bots:
Man, I miss that show. In 1994 I was injured in a car accident and spent most of six months on my back. MST3K saved my sanity.
mst3kinfo.com
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My stepmother lives in Vermont and is a fine and accomplished artist. Lately, she's been creating sculpture with wood. Her primary tool is a chainsaw. She weighs all of 110 pounds and handles that saw like it was a toothbrush. She has some nice metalwork, too.
LooSeeArt
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Some links:
150 Things You Didn’t Know About The Human World
Don't know how accurate these are, but they're fun anyway.
via The Presurfer
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Colin Wilson World
An appreciation of Colin Wilson - philosopher, critic and novelist.
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Real Military Flix
The world's largest on-line military film and video site.
via Cryptome
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Gene Ween's photography
via linkfilter.net
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Gerry Canavan:
The SITE intelligence group, which monitors terrorist Web sites, recently had a big find: images from a terrorist simulation of Washington, D.C. destroyed by a nuclear bomb.
Turns out the image was from Fallout 3.
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This made the rounds a while back, but some of you might not have seen Animator vs. Animation. Clever and revised.
thanks, Dad
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This is funny:
WWII history as an internet game
via LedgerGermane
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Wedding of the Vampires
Mia Mäkilä - Lowbrow and Horror Art
via MINDFVCK
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John Cage - 4' 33"
This is one of the best interpretations I've heard and unlike other video versions, there's a welcome lack of some dweeb trying to explain it all to you. Sorry about the missing second. I guess it was cut off.
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Be seeing you.
