BlogOfTheMoon

It's worrying how little that some otherwise intelligent people know about science. Another portion of the Theory of Relativity has been confirmed recently and one of the physicists who confirmed it (Erricos Pavlis) was interviewed on the Today programme on Radio 4. It was actually embarrasing listening to the interview. Today presenters are intelligent, well-informed people, but this fellow (whose name I didn't catch – he's certainly not one of the regulars) was clearly struggling to keep up. After a clear and concise explanation of the effect, Pavlis seemed taken aback but rallied well when asked to explain what spacetime was! And after that, the presenter took refuge in the "wasn't Einstein clever" routine. Cringeworthy. Another reason why science needs to be better taught at school.

Introducing the BioNav™, "a truly extraordinary piece of technology, comprising millions of moving parts packed into a tactile leather-effect case". :-)

I'm finding it worrying that the US has been able to to order two servers hosting various Indymedia sites hosted in the UK to be taken down, especially since no reason has yet been given as to why, although the latest statements indicate that they acted on bahalf of the Swiss and Italian authorities. In any case, the way that the orders were carried out, with no information being given to the victims, is incredibly dodgy.

That's about it really. Looks like SpaceShip One has won the X-Prize. Woo, and indeed, hoo :-)

So the USAF is taking unto themselves the right to attack neutral, commercial and third party satellites. This is deeply worrying, not that that's anything new: Bush's entire policy post-September 11 has been pretty much the same thing. I really hope that he gets ejected this November (not that I'm naïve enough to think that even if Kerry got in [not that he has a great chance] that he'd do an awful lot about it).

Just some random things that I thought were quite cool. First, (via the IgNobel Awards) is the idea of the US outsourcing prayers to India. Frankly, I have no idea what that's about, but it seemed quite cool. Also from the IgNobel Awards is the story of an Australian who patented the wheel (this story is a few years old, but I don't remember it from the time). Next is the good news that Sony Japan is to stop using copy-protected CDs, which can only be good for consumers. I just hope that other parts of the company (and others) follow suit soon. Finally, a postive story about patenting: Microsoft's patent on the FAT filesystem has been overturned.