23 March 2010

Tidbits, miscellaneous and bits and bobs

Ok, let's clear out the tabs on my browser ;

A host of mummies, a forest of secrets : "In the middle of a terrifying desert north of Tibet, Chinese archaeologists have excavated an extraordinary cemetery. Its inhabitants died almost 4,000 years ago, yet their bodies have been well preserved by the dry air."

The trouble with trusting complex science : Another round of of talking about trusting science, specifically this time about climate change. I'm quite baffled that anyone can read the article and then at the bottom shout about conspiracies, it's all bogus and lies. There's only one side of this silly debate that's got any evidence to back up their claim. Can you guess which one?

Morality, with limits : "The question: What can Darwin teach us about morality?" A heck of a lot, but not Darwin himself but more to the point the 250 years of science that has progressed since. Speaking of misrepresenting Darwin, how about the worst science journalism of the year? Personally I think it's funny the media and the general population has such a crazy-bad knowledge of what Darwin actually wrote. Maybe they should read the darn thing before venture into hyperbole? 

Sam Harris at TED : Science can answer moral questions : As a follow-up to the previous link I had to post this talk by Sam Harris that should be considered very, very seriously. Religion does not have monopoly over the notion of moral behavior, and often, you can say it's the opposite (referring, for example, to the current disgusting scandal within the Catholic Church, the worst crimes, the most abhorring behavior done by self-proclaimed holy people, and then the systematic cover-up of the same. Shocking stuff!)

Spin classification : Unless you're a physicist geek, this is both over your head, and terribly boring. You have been warned.

Distributed Publications : Finally, a more techie geeky look at distributed publications, using RDF / triplets (or any graph-ish model). Jeni always talks about great stuff.

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