Sometimes it’s just a photo (Sunset on Boracay)
Be sure to check this photo by wili_hybrid out bigger.
Whales are people too
WIRED has an interesting article exploring the concept that Whales Might Be as Much Like People as Apes Are.
Chimpanzees, gorillas and bonobos possess self-awareness, feelings and high-level cognitive powers. According to a steadily gathering body of research, so do whales and dolphins.
In fact, their capacities could be even more ancient than our own, dating to an evolutionary explosion in brain size that took place millions of years before the last common ancestor of the great apes existed.
…Most findings come from bottlenose dolphins, killer whales, sperm whales and humpback whales — the species that scientists have painstakingly studied for a few decades, and now continue their work with improved gene sequencing and song analysis tools. In these four species, scientists see considerable social complexity and individual distinction. They talk of whales and dolphins in terms of cultures and societies, and say cetaceans possess qualities of personhood. They say the same is likely true of other species, who simply haven’t been studied yet.
“It’s only due to our lack of knowledge that humans remain this exclusive species,” said Shane Gero, a Dalhousie University marine biologist. “We’re getting a lot of long-term studies in cetaceans, hitting multiple generations, and we’re finally able to get at these questions.” Though there’s still more evidence for primate than cetacean personhood, Gero said accumulating research “will start tipping the scales.
The photo is Vancouver Aquarium – Beluga Whale “Making contact” by David Ohmer
Cutting through the Babel with Google Fusion Tables
Circle of Blue has an article about last week’s launch of Fusion Tables by Google. The new system allows users to upload and manage huge databases of information and access aggregated data through a common format
“The biggest potential is to build an ecosystem of data on the Web,” said Alon Halevy, the senior Google engineer who led the Fusion Tables development team. “This means making it easy for the people to upload, to merge data sets, to discuss the data, to create visualizations and then to take these visualizations and put them elsewhere on the Web so that there’s better data on the Web.”
…Fusion Tables, a breakthrough application of online research and communications capacities, goes beyond traditional database systems because it allows users to share and merge data in real time with other contributors wherever they work. It also allows users to apply visualizations, and discuss discrepancies of specific data points. Multiple users can cross-check and discuss individual rows, columns or even cells as easily as right-clicking on the spot.
Users can also display their data through a variety of visualizations: as a timeline, a graph or a map. The “fusion” of the data sets can link dissimilar information from the far corners of the Web to reveal patterns and trends that might be impossible to spot otherwise. This makes Fusion Tables a central hub for data collaboration, as anyone can publish and access files, which were formerly locked away in Excel spreadsheets, PDF reports, and hard-cover textbooks.
I know from scientist friends who I’ve talked with that one of the biggest barriers to collaboration is the fact that Lab A can’t communicate with Lab B … fortunately there’s Google to allow them to speak the same language. Check out the article for more and some created images and watch this interview with Halevy.
The photo is The Last Drop by lepiaf.geo and it’s part of her Water set (slideshow).
John Butler at Rothbury
A friend of mine introduced me to the mind-blowing guitarist John Butler.
He’s going to be at Rothbury in Michigan this summer. Speaking of Rothbury, we’re giving away a pair of tickets to Rothbury on Absolute Michigan. If you want to go, check it out!
XL
Youtube is going big with YouTube XL. It’s kind of annoying if you see a video that you want to share (like for example the Star Wars: The Old Republic game trailer), but it’s perfect for applications like those show above.
The photo is Confirmado: YouTube se ha hecho con el mercado de los bebés de 1 año con su XL by mmoroca
New iMac keyboard – tiny is huge?
I love Apple Computers for their ease of use, interface and design. All that love didn’t mean a whole lot when I unboxed a new iMac and saw this.
wtf??!!
You have a clean and open aesthetic in your OS and in your stores and then you jam some poor sap’s hands into a keyboard roughly exactly the size of an Apple laptop keyboard. I guess it helped reduce the overall price but seriously, wtf?
I think Ridley Scott needs to make another video…
I guess I do owe a note of thanks to the keyboard for leading me indirectly to that cool video from the 1983 Apple keynote by Steve Jobs.
The photo is by hyperscholar and I guess that to the caterpillar, the keyboard seemed massive.
Bliss from the Past
Farm Accident was definitely the highlight from this year- click through to check out the high quality version (and also this and this from Farm Accident). The video includes Bliss Festival highlights like Crazy Richard and probably me selling artwork somewhere…
Check out other faves from Bliss from the Past.
There’s a Red House over yonder
Dunno what to say except that I’m fixing to get my next couch from the Red House.
Abducted?
Sorry about the lack of posts … I’m out and about having fun though!
The Vintners of 2003
Here’s a great old poster that Traverse Magazine did of vintners from the Leelanau Peninsula & Old Mission Peninsula.
Here’s a slideshow of photos from the 2008 LPVA Sip & Savor … we’re doing a PJ Prize Giveaway this year.
