Ahh yes, a site, and a huge wikiTrail.
Graspr? I guess if you would like to grasp how to do something like build a house or cook a certain meal - via social video blogging. I’m not really big on teaching people how to do stuff, even though I should since I did get a Masters in Instructional Design. I guess I considering teaching more work than fun. At any rate, I’m thinking about putting together some tutorials on Reason and Ableton Live. You can look for them here. (I can’t wait to use the new Thor module in Reason!)
So on to the real business of things. I do haiku chats on tumblr. I don’t title them, I number them using roman numerals. This is where our story today begins. Roman numerals. I was just looking around about ordering stuff (you know how many I’s before X) and down at the bottom I saw two things that catch my attention. The first was LXX or the Septuagint (LXX=70) and the second thing I saw was pandigital numbers. I was more interested in some of the links from the Septuagint - being a biblical reference.
Basically a pandigital number is a number that contains all of the digits of a base counting system. So in base 10 1234567890 is a pandigital number. They don’t show cases for other base counting (like hexadecimal, base 16 - used with computers… commonly color references on the webernet).
The Septuagint refers to the 72 (rounded down to look nice as LXX ) scholars who translated the Hebrew old testament into Greek. In the third paragraph I checked out the links to two books not in the Protestant bible I’m used to, just to see what they’re about.
Maccabees is a set of books about a Jewish family that rebelled against the government around the first or second century BC (interesting note, this date is BC, not the usual BCE according to Wikipedia… more on that some other time). I looked briefly at the article on 1 Maccabees and the summary of the contents is very interesting. But also very interesting for me personally was the toolbar on the side that listed old testament books and what sects include them in their religious texts.
Ben Sira, the Book of Wisdom, Daniel, and Esther were other books that I briefly looked at. I was interested to read the histories of Ben Sira and the Book of Wisdom simply to see how they were used in the early church and the removed from the Canon later on. Esther was just some interesting history about Persia. But the Daniel article particularly intrigued me because of the NPOV. Granted biblical topics can be pretty touchy, but books of the bible typically have pretty good, solid sourcing referenced. I took a brief look at the talk page. Not much to see here as far as I’m concerned. Just some squabbling over dates. And their writing is probably overly wordy and not very interesting.
The End.
Some sci-fi must sees. Why? Just because some guy on the internet says they’re better than star wars. PFFT.
Interesting article in the uk publication Daily Mail about the physical boundaries given to children. I remember when I was eight I was not allowed to go past the Beans house. Somehow I managed to find woods to play in though.
A mom in Virginia gets time for hosting a sweet sixteen for her son and providing the booze. The funniest part of the article:
Eckert recently helped launch an awareness campaign in the county called Parents Who Host Lose the Most.
Thank-you babysitting socialist pigs!
War Profiteers: Business as usual.
Awesome entry from wired about a G.I.’s guide to Iraq in 1943 and the G.I.’s guide to Iraq presently. Definitely worth checking out.
A blog of -hilarious- bad spock drawings. via kottke
We should just set a distance from the sun and say, “If you’re past this point, you aren’t a planet.” I know pluto is crying right now. via kottke
From the MAD SCIENTIST files, a man is trying to send information back in time using quantum mechanics. Oh, how the logic of the space-time continuum makes me dizzy.
Ars Technica’s annual BYOC (Build your own computer) guide. GOD BOX GO!
and now for the instructable-icious edition. The first is for all you clue lovers out there. I give to you, the hidden bookcase door. (I don’t think there was an actual bookcase in the clue movie. I think they used a fake wall in the conservatory, a fireplace in the lounge(or study?), I think they used a cabinet or closet in the kitchen, and a painting somewhere else… but i digress). The circumstances for this project are pretty specific, but if I ever have a situation where this would be appropriate, you can count on me to build it. (or just think about building it.)
Next up on the DIY massacre are SLAP BRACELETS. That’s right those insane pieces of metal that they banned from elementary school because of rumors of slit wrists. Oh man, do I love/hate the 80’s. Also, dear brother, notice that the name of the article submitter is the name of one of your favorite 80’s songs.
And finally for the audiophile/yard sale addict in us all - the speaker/headset in an old phone receiver. a must for any dj or musician that’s bored with typical instruments… or just likes to goof around.
Next up is a great entry on Belorussian movie posters. I love Belarus. Nuff said.
A new translation of the bible! IN LEGOS! (Ok so not really a translation, but you know, whatever) Actually I think I saw this some time ago floating out there in space, but I just recently clicked through to it on some blog or another, so I thought I might share it with the crew. Now study up!
And from the factoid department comes the coldest place in north america. Along with a really spiffy picture of a guy and his frozen beard/companion
An instructable on a sphere speaker array. I’m adding this to my growing list of diy summer projects. I didn’t check out the research on this, rather, i’m intrigued by this project simply because of my girlfriend’s paper lamp room. A spherical speaker would go really well in there.
I forget where I stumbled on this, but here it is: a nautical map of internet communities. This reminds me of the software war map, but I forget where I saw that. Oh well, moving on.
Next up are a series of make goodies I found particularly interesting for various reasons. The first two are guitar hero hacks! I’ve always wanted to turn my old fender into a guitar hero controller. Chalk one more up to the diy project list. The second looks like a piece of software that turns your guitar hero controller into a sampler. I’ll have to combine that with some kind of midi hack for my reason/ableton setup.
The last make tidbit is a write up about the new WORLD OF WARCRAFT REWARDS VISA CARD. Oh holy crap. I’d get this but I don’t play anymore. Maybe if they came out with an LOTR card, and I actually got LOTR, and played LOTR. But I’m too busy playing Gears of War and Saints Row right now.
Stumbled onto this cool site that documents speed traps (apparently truckers call highway cops “bears”), new little factoid for me. Unfortunately I didn’t find it too useful for the Philly area mostly because if there is a trap listed they try and get you to buy some book or something first. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll just file this under “one of those great ideas that is ruined by commercialism.” But see for yourself.
Really neat artist site. Of particular interest were the dress tents. A visually fun stop on in the vast infinity of the internet.
Great question about light bulbs on MAKE. I’m not very well versed in most of the physics behind lighting electronics, and typically just ignore that little print on my bulbs and lamps. I assume, well, it’s ok because 1) someone sold it to me, it must be pretty OK and 2) I haven’t had a fire yet. The comments are the most helpful part of the post.
I don’t know who this bing guy is on cnn money, but this article was pretty funny. Find out what your dream bu77$1T job is.
I’ve never read freakonomics, but somehow I get their blog feed, presumably some sort of marketing scheme. At any rate, I came across this article today about an interesting poverty solution (I’m not convinced about the effectiveness of it) and a lamed reference to an abortion “victory.” I particularly like the comment about paying people to act middle class.
Nice write up on the new LOTR MMORPG from yahoo. Screen shots included. I am planning on getting into this game late summer. I can’t wait.
Interesting reddit post about a photo and caption from Katrina. Race plays a big role, but some of the agenda-ists are crying foul illegitimately. There is a snopes write up that seems to dispel the race card.
Interesting article and awesome pictures of plastered ant colonies.
