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Archive October 1 - October 27

Friday, October 27
Comic Book Resourses shows us the final art for the Marvel Postage Stamps due next year. I'm glad to see they are all classic art.

Thursday, October 26

Assorted Items: Sara Goudarzi of LiveScience assures us that a stable population of vampires is a mathematical impossibility, which rules these scenarios right out.

New Scientist Space asks "What happens when you throw an elephant into a black hole?"

You can take a virtual tour through Popular Science's House of the Future.

Wednesday, October 25

BBC News introduces us to Humans version 2.0.

Tuesday, October 24

Recommended Readin': David Tenenbaum of Astrobiology discusses the radiation hazards of travelling to Mars, while David Shiga of New Scientist Space looks at the possibility of getting there inside of an asteroid.

Michael Cassutt tries to describe what it's like when an SF writer gets "in the zone" in his SciFi Weekly column.

Gary Wolf's cover piece in the new issue of Wired on The New Atheism is intriguing, as is Richard Dawkins essay on the current decay of enlightenment values.

Engadget introduces us to the nimble RB2000 gymnastbot.

Monday, October 23

Jeff Foust at The Space Review examines the struggles involved in climbing the steep learning curve to space.

LiveScience shows us video of a really small robot hand.

Moments of silence, please, for Jane Wyatt and Nelson de la Rosa.

Grow-A-Brain links to the useful American Society for Velociraptor Attack Prevention, who claim "velociraptor attack is the 3rd leading cause of death for men age 27-29."

Saturday, October 21

I missed this last week, but New Scientist Tech reports that a computer has been build using DNA as logic gates.

Thursday, October 19

The first line of this news story reads "A government agency named the final 89 contestants to compete in the 2007 Urban Challenge, an autonomous robot race through city traffic with a $2 million prize." (emphasis mine)

Nope. Nothing can possibly go wrong here.

The city has yet to be decided.

Queen guitarist Brian May apparently gave up a promising career as an astrophysicist to become a rock star. And now he's decided to go back.

And, for no good reason, here's a soccer-ball adorned We Are The Champions alarm clock.

Wednesday, October 18

Popular Science shows us how we may grow houses in the future.

Tuesday, October 17

The BBC reports that the human species may split in two.

Assorted Items: Reasonably Clever gives us the Lego Tarot.

From McSweeny's: Aquaman, King of the Seven Seas, has Fucking Had it With You, Man.

Scott McKeen of The Edmonton Journal informs us that in Geekworld, it's always Halloween.

While browsing the archives of the Canadian comedy site The Toque I found this funny bit about the Chia Spock, which pisses me off because now I want one.

And why was I unaware that there exists Klingon Bikers?

Monday, October 16

Space Stuff: Eric R. Hedman at The Space Review tells us what steps are needed to ensure NASA's future workforce, while Leonard David at Space.com previews this weekend's X Prize Cup competition.

Yet another robotics researcher has made an android duplicate of himself.

Posting may be a tad light this week. I'm frantically working on a collection of the Bad Day Studio Holiday Cards and want to wrap it up in the next few days. I'll update y'all with more details when I'm finished.

Friday, October 13

This is neat in a postmodern Age of Aquarius kinda way: A text and image-based "time capsule" will be digitized and beamed with a laser into space on Oct. 25 from the Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan, MX.

George Dvorsky links to Anders Sandberg's awesome warning signs for the future.

Thursday, October 12

Assorted Items: Lore Sjoberg of Wired looks at some of the expensive crap Trek fans buy.

Seth Shostak of Space.com tells us of the new SETI telescope array.

Engadget has some pictures from inside the Robot Museum in Japan, which opens today.

Wednesday, October 11

James Clasper of The New Statesman looks at the role of lawyers in space.

Steven Grant at Comic Book Resources explains how time is perceived in comic books.

Kurt Amacker at Cinescape tells us about one woman's crusade to get two graphic novels pulled from her library.

Tuesday, October 10

The always excellent Tales of Future Past now has a Shop section, with a selection of retro-sexy science fictiony goodness.

Geekpress links to this intriguing KurzweilAI.net piece on using the Moon as a backup drive for human civilization.

Meanwhile Physorg reports on more modest research into growing lettuce on the moon.

Monday, October 9

There's hope for the world: Last week the NY Times Home & Garden section ran a feature on the growth of the Secret Room industry.

Jason Berek-Lewis of Broken Frontier starts a multi-part column on the role that mentors play in comic books.

Let's start down the road to Halloween with Popular Science's tips on spooky homemade special effects.

Sunday, October 8

I'm back.

While I was gone, it was reported that the Pope may abolish the concept of Limbo.

No word on whether Limbo Dancing will be affected.

Wednesday, October 4

Kurt Amacker at Cinescape discusses the problems arising when comic characters get personality makovers, while Steven Grant of Comic Book Resources looks at the effects of character revamps.

The headline reads: "Musical robot composes, performs and teaches."

I'm off to South Carolina for a couple for my dad's service.

Tuesday, October 3

Here's my dad's obituary.

Thanks again to everyone who wrote in. It means a lot.

Dwayne Day at The Space Review looks at the parallel courses of spaceflight and SF TV.

Leonard David at Space.com previews next month's Space Elevator Games.

Monday, October 2

My father passed away this morning, after a moderately long bout with liver cancer.

I want to thank the lot of you who sent me emails of support over the last month or so. Details are still sketchy at this point, but I'll fill you in as I go.

Sunday, October 1

It is October.

The God of the Month is Odin. The All Father. AKA Wotan or Wednesday. I always prefer him in big wrathful dramatic mode

The Molecule of the Month is Chloroform.

Mark R. Leeper of SF Crowsnest has some thoughts on time travel.