Somewhere to plonk clippings from articles I've read while commuting and thought "ooh!" "eek!" or simply "nicely written!" - the following from today's travels fit the bill nicely...
The idea for an eternal clock that would continue to keep time even after the universe ceased to exist has intrigued physicists. However, no one has figured out how one might be built, until now.
Researchers have now proposed an experimental design for a "space-time crystal" that would be able to keep time forever. This four-dimensional crystal would be similar to conventional 3D crystals, which are structures, like snowflakes and diamonds, whose atoms are arranged in repeating patterns. Whereas a diamond has a periodic structure in three dimensions, the space-time crystal would be periodic in time as well as space.
- from this article at Scientific American.
[...] It is, of course, possible that pollsters are all collaborating in an effort to re-elect Barack Obama, just as it is possible that pollsters are all members of the Order of the Knights Templar who are conspiring to effect the return of the Emperor Barbarossa and reinstate the Holy Roman Empire. These, like 50 quadrillion other possibilities, cannot be entirely ruled out; but my lifetime contains only about 2.5 billion seconds, which means that out of all possible cases of the universe, I have already spent too much time thinking about these ones.
- from this post on The Economist's Democracy In America blog
Get a book-size (or paperback-size)d sketchbook. Write your name and date on an early page and maybe think of a name for it — and if you want, write the book’s name there at the front. Make it into your little painful pal. The pain goes away slowly page by page. Fill it up and do another one. It can be hard to get started. Don’t flunk yourself before you get the ball rolling.
[...] You can make all kinds of rules for your art making, but for starting in a sketchbook, you need to jump in and get over the intimidation part — by messing up a few pages, ripping them out if need be. Waste all the pages you want by drawing a tic tac toe schematic or something, painting them black, just doodle. Every drawing will make you a little better. Every little attempt is a step in the direction of drawing becoming a part of your life.
- from Gary Panter's drawing tips at unbored.net
The problem is not that Spain is a "young democracy": young democracies can be vigorous, culturally revolutionary, fun places to be.
No, the problem is that, as Spanish people gaze at TV images of metre-long truncheons being wielded against passers-by in a Metro station, the discourse tends to head straight to where, for 30 years, they have avoided it heading.
[...] When the reference point for the Catalans' alleged "non-nationalism" becomes their preparedness to fight for Nazi Germany and General Franco, you know the "pact of silence" is not really working.
Spain has the power to explode in a way that Greece does not.
- from this post by Paul Mason, BBC
Articles read offline on Byline and Pocket, post written on BlogPress.
