How Old Do I Look?
When I was in my fifties, I used to tell people I was sixty; the sought-after response was something along the lines of how good I looked for my age. This cheap trick has lost its thrill, and now I’d prefer not to know how old people think I am. For those who still care […]
The Revenge of the Anti-Drunks
We humans tend to oversimplify things; ergo there are only two kinds of people. The nerds embrace technology, and the Luddites oppose it. We are certain we understand the distinction, but we are wrong. The appellation nerd is so entwined with our culture that it is nearly impossible to pin down the exact origin or […]
A Boy and His Atom
It takes a truly tech-savvy scientist to understand the awesome technology at play in your computer’s disk drive. For everyone else, there is one basic fact that remains clear. Since each generation of disk drives holds more information, whatever is representing that information must be getting smaller. IBM started making disk drives for computers in […]
Mystery Meat
During my son’s freshman year at Colorado State University, I had several occasions to visit him and eat in the dorm cafeteria. Among the various foodie temptations were a carvery, a pizza counter, a burger grill and both sushi and salad bars. As for desserts… don’t get me started. Things have changed since my first […]
Bend Me, Shape Me
“Bend me, shape me Anyway you want me Long as you love me It’s all right Bend me, shape me Anyway you want me You got the power to turn on the light”* I’ll give you the compressed version of this for now since I don’t have the bandwidth for more. If you are still […]
Group Hugs
“Can we all get along?” This famous line (often misquoted) was poignantly spoken by Rodney King. He was appealing for calm after the verdict in his police brutality trial that triggered the ’92 Los Angeles riot, a rampage that cost the city over $2 billion dollars. If you think anyone listened, just Google “Ferguson, Missouri.” […]
Taking Pictures
There are certain elements of technology that have saved my butt in tense situations. Example: We are at some sort of family gathering/vacation/dinner/graduation/party /wedding/ etc. when my wife turns to me and says, “You brought the camera, right?” A “yes” answer would, at the very least, postpone a dirty look until the film was taken […]
Innovative Intersections
It is often said that innovation occurs at the intersection of seemingly unrelated ideas. As an example, consider urine and origami. A recent paper in the Journal of Materials Chemistry A titled “Urine-Activated Origami Microbial Fuel Cells to Signal Proof of Life” by researchers at UWE Bristol has the details. The problem statement would seem […]
Zipperbot
Marvel Comics currently has 10 characters with names beginning in “Z”, but Zipperbot is not one of them. The ability to automatically unzip might pass for a super-power in some settings but that was not what the team at MIT had in mind. In a world where robots can put out fires, respond to disasters, […]
Apple’s Grasp of the Obvious
The U.S. Patent system is founded on an elegantly simple process for encouraging innovation. You come up with a unique idea that is not obvious to someone who is familiar with the subject area. You describe it in sufficient detail that others can duplicate it. In return for doing so in writing, the government will […]
