blacksundae

The Laboratory of Intelligent Systems (LIS) directed by Prof. Dario Floreano focuses on the development of robotic systems and artificial intelligence methods inspired by biological principles of self-organization. Currently, we address three interconnected research areas: flying robots, artificial evolution and social systems.

Link! Be sure to check out their projects page (which I would link to directly, but they’re using frames…. Tsk! Tsk!). Via this post on Current.

Barack Obama has raised heaps ‘n gobs of money, he’s ahead in the polls, it’s a new day, the sun is shining, birdies are chirping, maidens are dancing in the meadow…

Right?

Wrong. It’s not over. We should still send money to the Obama campaign. I’ve outlined my reasons here. See if you disagree.

“When you have Optimus Prime AND Master Chief cheering from the Superdome, is there really any doubt which team is superior?” - io9

This is not a scam. This is for real. This is the exciting reality of today’s time-travel pills. If you still have doubts, just look at our mailing address:

Online Time Travel Pharmacy
Dakota Territory Box #4
Western American Frontier
00015

We pick up our mail in the 1800s.
NOW THAT SPELLS “PROOF” IN ANY ERA OF TIME!

Link! Via Futurismic.

This AskMe question, and the resulting thread, make me feel so much better about myself:

As far as I am aware, I am a mentally healthy, well-adjusted, and sane person with no disorders. But I have a strange, fairly innocuous quirk which seems beyond my control and I’m curious about it…

When I think of / remember something embarrassing from my life, I compulsively make some kind of noise. It seems to happen unconsciously, before my censor can catch it and stop myself (it even happens when I am in a quiet or inappropriate place).

It’s not especially loud, in fact it’s often under my breath. The sound is usually just a quiet grunt, or a word/syllable or two. If I remember an embarrassing conversation, I tend to blurt out a random word of the conversation (as in, I’m replaying the dialogue in my head but then all the sudden one of the words pops out of my mouth). If it happens while I’m reading, I tend to blurt out one or two of the words that happen to be under my eyes at the moment.

It usually only happens when I’m remembering something palpably embarrassing or humiliating from my life — not for mild everyday kind of stuff. (Again, I had a fairly happy childhood and have nothing particularly traumatic in my past — I don’t think my embarrassing memories are any worse than the average joe’s)

So what is this, do I have some kind of low-grade tourette’s syndrome? Is there a name for this phenomenon? Does it happen to others or is it unique to me?

I do this all the time, and I’m very self-conscious about it. Based on the responses in the thread, I’m not alone at all! Read it!

Holy shit! Starship Troopers 3 is coming to a video rental place near you, and from the looks of this trailer it sports some of the tone of the Verhoeven’s original. I found number two sorely lacking in satire and graphic violence.

Man… to think I used to enjoy “Win Ben Stein’s Money.” Now Mr. Stein says things like this:

When we just saw that man, I think it was Mr. [PZ] Myers, talking about how great scientists were, I was thinking to myself the last time any of my relatives saw scientists telling them what to do they were telling them to go to the showers to get gassed.

And this:

Love of God and compassion and empathy leads you to a very glorious place, and science leads you to killing people.

The upshot of this cartoonishly anti-intellectual bullshit is that it makes it even harder for Intelligent Design proponents to pretend that their snake oil is genuine science, seeing as how the Discovery Institute has hitched itself to Stein’s Expelled bandwagon. Link!

Holy shit! Filmmaker/madman, Paul Verhoeven, director of RoboCop and Starship Troopers (and, yes, Showgirls), wants to make a movie about Jesus!

Here are a couple details about Verhoeven’s take, which sounds like the Anti- to Mel Gibson’s Christ. One of his conclusions deals with the fact that Jesus was probably the son of Mary and a Roman soldier who raped her during the Jewish uprising in Galilee. Verhoeven also claims that Christ was not betrayed by Judas Iscariot.

Link!

Atheists are moving up in the world! Unlike a few years ago, we aren’t the worst people in the world! Those would be the Scientologists!

I think what really makes this adorable video is the audience that is revealed at the end. Also, these seem to be two very posh kitties. In addition to a theremin, they appear to have a penthouse, a hammock and a little throne. Some cats have all the luck. [via Laughing Squid]