Hulleye Comes By!

Hans Blix in the Boston Review:

A year ago the international Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, which I chaired, presented its unanimous report, “Weapons of Terror,” to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. The report urged governments to wake up from what Annan has called their “sleepwalking” and revive arms control and disarmament. We often hear warnings that the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty—the global instrument through which states committed themselves against the acquisition of nuclear weapons and for nuclear disarmament—now risks collapse. The good news is that the world is not replete with would-be violators. The overwhelming commitment to the treaty remains tremendously valuable: Libya and Iraq were both found to be in violation and brought back into observance. In two other cases—North Korea and Iran—the world is actively seeking solutions. For now, at least, there appear to be no other problematic cases.

Still, the dangers are real, and the treaty is under strain.

More here.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect: “the phenomenon whereby people who have little knowledge systematically think that they know more than others who have much more knowledge”. “Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Meanwhile, people with true knowledge tended to underestimate their competence.

a clip from die hard 4 is online. john mclane is back ladies and germs.

Microsoft has agreed to make changes to Vista’s search utility after Google complained to the Justice Department that “Vista’s desktop search tool slowed down competing programs, including Google’s own free offering, and that it’s difficult for users to figure out how to turn off the Microsoft program.”

Microsoft initially dismissed the allegations, saying regulators had reviewed the program before Vista launched. However, Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel, said in an interview last week that the company was willing to make changes if necessary.

Tay al-Ard - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tay al-Ard (طی الارض or طيّ الارض or طیّ الارض - literally “folding up of the earth”) is the name for thaumaturgical teleportation in the Islamic religious and philosophical tradition.

Welcome to Mars express: only a three hour trip

if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our cur

Z machine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Z machine is the largest X-ray generator in the world and is designed to test materials in conditions of extreme temperature and pressure.

Kefitzat Haderech - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In Torah study and Jewish folklore, kefitzat haderech is the ability to jump instantaneously from one place to another or travel with unnatural speed.

Krasnikov Tube - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

create a space warp behind the space ship as it travels at near lightspeed, and then use the “tube” thus created for the return trip - interesting property for the return trip: it gets you back home shortly after you left, no matter how far you go.

Seafarer’s professions and ranks - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bridge (ship) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Binnacle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Spithead and Nore mutinies - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Naval officer ranks - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Admiralty law - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Royal Navy battleships - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The European Space Agency is looking for people who would like to go on a pretend trip to Mars — for about a year and a half.

The 520-day experiment involves a crew of six living in sealed modules at the Institute of Biomedical Problems in Moscow.

Promising a program “as close to a real Mars mission as possible,” the space agency plans to simulate a 250-day trip to Mars, 30 days to experience the planet and 240 days to make it back home.

Weightlessness and radiation are not included, but the simulated out-of-planet experience offers isolation, confinement, crowding, lack of privacy, high workload, boredom with available food, and limited communication with family, friends and mission control.

Still keen? You might be just what the agency needs if you are:

* Between ages 25 and 50.
* In good health.
* Highly motivated.
* Fluent in either English or Russian, preferably both.
* No taller than six-foot-one (185 cm).
* Experienced in medicine, biology, engineering and the like.
* A non-smoker with no addictions.
* Willing to be a medical and psychological test subject.
* A national and resident of a select list of countries — including Canada.

People with mental disorders, special diets, those considered too fat or too thin, or currently in jail need not apply.

Imagine that your child’s private school tuition bill of $20,000 is due and the only source you have for paying it is the sale of some of your stock holdings. Fortunately, you got in on the great Google godsend and purchased 100 shares at $200 each, for a total investment of $20,000, and the stock is now at $400 a share. Should you realize your net gain by selling half of your Google stock and paying off your bill? Or should you sell off that Ford stock you purchased ages ago for $40,000 at its current value of $20,000?

If you are like most people (myself included), you would sell your Google stock and hang on to your Ford stock in hopes of recovering your losses. This would be the wrong strategy. Why would you sell shares in a company whose stock is on the rise, and hang on to shares in a company whose stock is on the decline? The reason, in a phrase, is “loss aversion,” and the psychology behind it does not fit the model of Homo economicus, that figurative species of human characterized by unbounded rationality in decision making.

Keep reading at Scientific American.

So another book has been written about the army. Its the first study of the various profitable corporations that the Pakistan Army runs. The last I can see is that the book was banned and taken off the shelves, its launching ceremony was cancelled and all other hotels and auditoriums in Islamabad refused to allow the book launch because “the authorities” told them to. Please go out and buy the book. If you don’t wish to, you can download it here. The book was shared by the author to get her version of the truth to you, but please encourage her efforts. What is the scale of the corporate interests of the Pakistan Military? Is the Pakistan military the only one in the world that indulges in what author Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa calls “Milbus” - A “Military Business”? What are the implications of the military economy for Pakistan as a whole including its political and social costs?

so it seems a fellow named kenny irwin has a lot of time on his hands and has done a fantabulous job photoshopping and archiving some great scenes of the dovestar chronicles. they feature khan solo, commander nabibukhsh, admiral shahjahan, lieutenant kamilah, kickbots and the rest of the pakistani starfleet as they battle it out against the dovemaster with it’s evil COObeams.

via ismat.

This map shows all the star systems that lie within 12.5 light years of our Sun. Most of the stars are red dwarfs - stars with a tenth of the Sun’s mass and less than one hundredth the luminosity. Roughly eighty percent of all the stars in the universe are red dwarfs, and the nearest star - Proxima - is a typical example. click to make bigger

bob barker is finally retiring. the viewers are psychotic.

Bob says, “I thank you for inviting me into your homes for more than 50 years,” Barker said in the closing moments of the show, nearly drowned out by cheers from the audience. “”This is a very emotional time for me,” Barker said. “This is the first time since I was 21 years old that I didn’t have a show.” He declined to talk much about his immediate future, except to say, “I’m looking forward to being bored.”

Some fans traveled across country for his final taping.

“When we heard that this was Bob’s last show, we said we had to get out here,” said Ryan Gagney, 29, of Oakland, Maine.

paris hilton is officially out of jail after having served three days from a 45 day jail sentence. more proof that the justice system in LA sucks balls for celebrities and she will now officially be drunk behind a wheel within twelve hours again.

Update: apparently she was released because her medical problems were purely psychological and not physical. she was having a nervous breakdown and bouts of depression. no shit sherlock, that’s what jail is supposed to do. you’re supposed to not like it. that’s why it’s jail and not your local club med.

Paris was apparently suffering from severe panic attacks and depression, where she even became suicidal. Towards the end of her stay, Paris began, what others call, a nervous breakdown. Her psychiatrist was so concerned for her well being they did everything possible to get her to a place in which was comfortable for her and her health.

apparently people are pissed off too. LA County public officials are not happy about it. The president of the LA Sheriffs union says that this kind of treatment for celebrities is typical under the reign of Sheriff Lee Bacca.

“There appears to have been preferential treatment. This is not the first time that this has happened. Remember Mel Gibson. On any given day, a thousand female inmates are in custody. Why is one case, out of the blue, treated any different than them?”

And L.A. County Supervisor Don Knabe says:

“This incident with Paris Hilton is just the most recent that highlights the problems our criminal justice system has with making sure sentences stick, whether it is in a County jail or under electronic monitoring.”

Meanwhile, professional pain in the ass Al Sharpton had this to say:

“…this early release gives all of the appearances of economic and racial favoritism that is constantly cited by poor people and people of color. There are any number of cases of people who handle being incarcerated badly and even have health conditions that are not released. This act smacks of the double standards that many of us raise…”

The only good news is that Nicole Richie is set to face a judge soon about her DUI and maybe the backlash from Paris will cause everyone to go nuts and overreact with Nicole. They’ll all want to look like they’re tough, so they’ll just load Nicole into a little rocket and then shoot her directly into the sun.

The Large Hadron Collider is in trouble again. It will start work sometime in spring 2008, not November this year as planned. The delay has been blamed on an ‘accumulation of minor setbacks,’ and comes on top of a ‘design fault’ that saw breakdown of magnets supplied by the competing Fermilab. Yesterday Slate nicely rounded up increasingly loud rumors among physicists that Fermilab may already have seen the ‘holy grail of particle physics’ the LHC was build to find.

via /.

how’s this for a geeky game of the day. you’d enjoy it if you studied physics or engineering. i finished a couple of levels and then ran out of patience.

Serena Williams could kick your ass.

the apple iphone ads are out a few weeks before the june 29th release. i’m not waiting with any particular need for it. thought i’d link the ads nevertheless. my philosophy: never buy a first gen apple product. you’ll regret it.

how cool is this!

from Gaping Void.

 they love OS too

and so should you.

relativity on a whole new level.

it’s finally ending. i guess i’ll have to wait a year to find out if the cylons defeat humanity or not.

the humourous team down at top gear have gone ahead and listed the 100 sexiest cars of all time in their opinion.

Maserati has always maintained a romance about the name despite some shockingly poor cars, but once in a while it manages something really special.

Yes, the Duo-Select paddle operated gearbox might not work in fully automatic mode, but the Quattroporte is simply one of the most evocative four-door saloons anywhere in the world.

A Ferrari-sourced 4.2-litre V8 howls down the screams from the back seats as you make a large Italian four-seater flick through the twisties like one of its more exotic Cavallino cousins. And it seduces your eyes away from your brain. We love it.

an author tries to learn from the brother of one of the london bombers, how his brother ended up in the suicidal position he did.

What turned Mohammad Sidique Khan, a softly spoken youth worker, into the mastermind of 7/7? I spent months in a Leeds suburb getting to know Khan’s brother. A complex and disturbing story of the bomber’s radicalisation emerged.

Suicide bombing is not just a religious phenomenon. It is employed by many secular organisations, including the Kurdish PKK and the Marxist Tamil Tigers. In fact, until 2000, the Tamil Tigers had carried out more suicide attacks than all other groups put together. Over the years, the profiles of individual bombers have also varied, from young boys to, more recently, women. Ariel Merari, a Tel Aviv University psychologist, has profiled 50 suicide bombers and found that there were hardly any common factors. None were deranged or schizophrenic. Few had problems like depression. Merari concluded that the only factor linking all forms of suicide terrorism was the way bombers were recruited and trained. It is the psychology of the group, not the individual, that is key.

For my BBC research team, our first month in Leeds was a write-off because no one would talk. This silence was the first sign that Beeston’s Pakistani community might harbour the kind of cohesive group in which an “altruistic” mentality could flourish.

keep on reading from prospect magazine.

the ten principles of economics explained by yoram bauman. if you have ever had any issues learning these basic principles of economics, you’ll figure them out now as yoram breaks them down in ten easy steps.