True's beaked whale.jpg

Western spotted skunk

Hooded skunk

Yellow-throated Marten

Wolverine

Trump meme #1

January 10th, 2017

Meme: Trump learned discipline, respect, and hard work because his father sent him to a military academy.

Trump was such an insufferable a**hole, he failed out of his comfy private school and his dad sent him to a private military school. Because of this, Trump says “I always felt that I was in the military” and that he had “more training militarily than a lot of the guys that go into the military.”. Trump actually avoided service in Vietnam using 4 education deferments and then a Y-1 medical deferment for “heel spurs”. In college, Trump played football, tennis and squash. Trump has never held a job or done an honest day’s work in his life.

Links for January 2017

January 2nd, 2017

Repairing a Canon EF lens, photos

Rep. Meadows targets campus rape rule
The Republican Congress’s priority is eliminating rules to prevent rape on College campuses. The ‘Freedom Caucus’ is all about the freedom to rape. Republicans, the pro-rape party. Terrible headline–by quoting Rep. Meadows, it affirms his opinion of the rules.

what vichy france can teach us about the normalization of state violence by Aliza Luft
“…in August 1940, even before France and Germany embarked upon an official collaboration, the French Catholic episcopate formally endorsed the Vichy regime’s first anti-Semitic decree, the Statut des Juifs. Shortly thereafter, the State Council, Vichy’s highest judicial body, purged all Jews from public office. Simultaneously, more Catholics were ushered into government appointments than at any time since 1878.”


Leia Organa: A Critical Obituary by Malcolm Sheppard


Nixon’s Vietnam Treachery By JOHN A. FARRELL

To them all, Nixon insisted that he had not sabotaged Johnson’s 1968 peace initiative to bring the war in Vietnam to an early conclusion. “My God. I would never do anything to encourage” South Vietnam “not to come to the table,” Nixon told Johnson, in a conversation captured on the White House taping system.

Now we know Nixon lied. A newfound cache of notes left by H. R. Haldeman, his closest aide, shows that Nixon directed his campaign’s efforts to scuttle the peace talks, which he feared could give his opponent, Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, an edge in the 1968 election. On Oct. 22, 1968, he ordered Haldeman to “monkey wrench” the initiative.


Science Of Rain-x and Aquapel

Rain-X is more hydrophobic, but wears off. Aquapel (fluorine based) bind covalently but is not as hydophobic.

Leaving Conservatism Behind by Matthew Sitman

Everyday Authoritarianism is Boring and Tolerable by Tom Pepinsky


Spy Agencies Say: Yeah, Russia Did It

The US intelligence agencies’s report is out–Russia hacked the US election to get Trump elected. Republican response–we think Russia is great now! Love Putin, he’s so old man hunky! Remember the good old days, when Republicans preferred America to its long time enemies?

Good for the Heart, Good for the Brain. Despite a growing conviction among researchers that lifestyle choices matter, Americans still view Alzheimer’s as a predominantly inherited disease. by Joshua C. Kendall

10 Discworld Quotes You’ll Desperately Need for the Next Four Years

And, while it was regarded as pretty good evidence of criminality to be living in a slum, for some reason owning a whole street of them merely got you invited to the very best social occasions. – Feet of Clay

Commander Vimes didn’t like the phrase “The innocent have nothing to fear,” believing the innocent had everything to fear, mostly from the guilty but in the longer term even more from those who say things like “The innocent have nothing to fear.” – Snuff


A supplement maker tried to silence this Harvard doctor — and put academic freedom on trial

2017 Total Solar Eclipse

Dr. Martin Luther King’s Economics: Through Jobs, Freedom

Why Do Republicans Hate Obamacare? by Kevin Drum


Why large dogs live fast—and die young By Elizabeth Pennisi

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA—For most mammals, size matters: Large ones, such as elephants and whales, live far longer than small ones like rodents. But among dogs, that rule is reversed. Tiny Chihuahuas, for example, can live up to 15 years—8 years longer than their much larger cousins, Great Danes. Now, a team of undergraduates may be closer to figuring out why. The most likely culprit? More harmful oxygen free radicals in fast-growing, fuel-burning puppies.

In the adult dog cells, energy and free radical production was about equal in the two breed sizes. But in the puppy cells, that balance was off. Adult large and small dogs had about equal amounts of antioxidants, but the cells from large breed puppies had too many excess free radicals for the antioxidants to fight, the undergrads reported here last week at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. That’s likely because large breed puppies have fast metabolisms, growing faster and requiring more energy than smaller breeds, Winward says. Cell damage even at this young age can have long-lasting effects.

The results are preliminary, and there are other ideas about why dogs age the way they do. But if the findings hold up, it might be possible to extend large dogs’ lives with antioxidant supplements for puppies, Winward suggests. These antioxidants could help get rid of those young dogs’ extra free radicals before they do damage.

Antioxidants will not work to extend large dogs lifespans. Antioxidant supplements of many types have been tried in all types of animals with nearly all trials failing. I recall an antioxidant used as a preservative showed a positive effect in house flys where flight was measured as the flys aged. The flight muscles have a high oxygen demand.


2016 is hottest year, breaks records set in 2015, 2014, 2010, 2005!

Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes

An election fraud fake news masterpiece

How Purdue Pharma created the opioid addiction epidemic

Repealing the Affordable Care Act will kill more than 43,000 people annually


Blue Lives Matter by Albert Samaha

BuzzFeed News reviewed 62 incidents of video footage contradicting an officer’s statement in a police report or testimony. From traffic stops to fatal force, these cases reveal how cops are incentivized to lie — and why they get away with it.

Links for December 2016

December 1st, 2016

Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), new Secretary of HHS, is a member of a fringe medical organization. Anti-science Bircher / Ayn Randian nutters.
The Harlan Ellison Books Preservation Project, harlanellisonbooks.com
Lego machine with strain wave gearing
NASA Fractal branching ultra-dexterous robots (Bush robots), 1999
2016 National Popular Vote Tracker
Why Pat McCrory Lost and What It Means in Trump’s America
Republicans like Putin, 45% like/55% dislike Based on YouGov polling.
Bird photo booth
On Pizzagate and conservative delusion by Jim Wright
Report: Chicago cops ignored recommendation to fire officers after Laquan McDonald shooting

Beckman DB-G Grating Spectrophotometer teardown

November 26th, 2016

Beckman DB-G Grating Spectrophotometer, Cat NO. 1403.

Links: Grating Spectrophotometer DB GT (1961), University of Queensland Physics Museum

Bulbs:
E 871 (3 leads, HID, for UV)
GE 2331 (visible, 5.9V, 4.66A, 25W)

photomultiplier RCA IP28A, 69-04 (Anode supply: 1250V. Voltage between dynode No9 and anode: 250V. D-C anode current: 2.5ma. Ambient temperature: 75 Deg C. Package: 1-5/16″ D x overall length 3-11/16″ long. Seated height 3-1/8″ long. base: 11 pin plug-in with socket and 30″ cable. Note: Specification sheet available. Maybe replaced with 931A, average anode characteristics are the same.)

Photomultiplier board:
Vacuum tubes:
5654
12BH7A

Main board:
Adams and Westlake Mercury Wetted Contact Relay – MWSL-15093-1B
Vacuum tubes (all filaments lighted):
12BH7a
6973
6EM5
6AX5
85A2/0G3
12AX7

Links for Nov 2016

November 13th, 2016

The Skeptical Chymists — associated with a modern version of a 1920’s chem set for kids
Amateur chemistry discussion board
Estimated 1:20000 eggs in the US are contaminated with Salmonella enterica. The fraction varies as infection rises and falls in flocks, at times 1:10 eggs are contaminated. The majority of egg-laying flocks have Salmonella infections, but only a subset of chickens are infected, only some eggs get contaminated, and egg-washing reduces Salmonella in eggs. Still this works out to over 2e6 contaminated eggs / year in the US.
What Central Asia’s spectacular states can tell us about authoritarianism in America.
Autocracy: Rules for Survival by Masha Gessen
. Notes from a reporter in Putin’s Russia on what to expect.
Rants on 2016 US election
Global sea ice super anomaly Nov 2016
An Insider’s View: The Dark Rigidity of Fundamentalist Rural America By Forsetti’s Justice
Paul Ryan’s plan to eliminate Medicare
What you — yes, you — can do to save America from tyranny. Written by Timothy Snyder
The 14 Characteristics of Fascism by Lawrence Britt

Links for October 2016

October 5th, 2016

Harry Truman, 1952

I’ve seen it happen time after time. When the Democratic candidate allows himself to be put on the defensive and starts apologizing for the New Deal and the fair Deal, and says he really doesn’t believe in them, he is sure to lose. The people don’t want a phony Democrat. If it’s a choice between a genuine Republican, and a Republican in Democratic clothing, the people will choose the genuine article, every time; that is, they will take a Republican before they will a phony Democrat, and I don’t want any phony Democratic candidates in this campaign.

But when a Democratic candidate goes out and explains what the New Deal and fair Deal really are–when he stands up like a man and puts the issues before the people–then Democrats can win, even in places where they have never won before. It has been proven time and again.

We are getting a lot of suggestions to the effect that we ought to water down our platform and abandon parts of our program. These, my friends, are Trojan horse suggestions. I have been in politics for over 30 years, and I know what I am talking about, and I believe I know something about the business. One thing I am sure of: never, never throw away a winning program. This is so elementary that I suspect the people handing out this advice are not really well-wishers of the Democratic Party.


The Post’s Jane Ridley tells why she was staunchly anti-vax until she had a frightening wake-up call

How Trump Took Hate Groups Mainstream. The full story of his connection with far-right extremists. by Sarah Posner and David Neiwert

Profile of Chicago school system head Forrest Claypool–the guy who sold CTA fare system Ventra to a private company.

A Science Fiction Tasting Menu for the As Yet Uninitiated (not books I would pick, but some interesting comments)

Links for September 2016

September 5th, 2016

Collection of evidence Trump is a racist
Another collection of examples of Trump racism

Electroetching steel
MIT Nanomaker course (CD Spectrometer, PDMS Microfluidics, Photovoltaics)
Ross Greene approach to disciplining kids
Iraq War deaths: 405,000 (95% uncertainty interval 48,000–751,000) + 10% more due to emigrants

Links for August 2016

July 19th, 2016

Roland Fryer is wrong: There is racial bias in shootings by police
Hillary Clinton ‘scandals’ in perspective
Rundown of newer health fraud merchants

What is true is already so.
Owning up to it doesn’t make it worse.
Not being open about it doesn’t make it go away.
And because it’s true, it is what is there to be interacted with.
Anything untrue isn’t there to be lived.
People can stand what is true,
for they are already enduring it.
–Eugene Gendlin
1977 Time ‘Coming Ice Age’ cover is a hoax
Gary Johnson is Worse than Donald Trump (tax plan + party platform)
Libertarianism: Half-Baked Thought Experiment Cooked Up by Self-Entitled Pricks
Greenland sharks live to 400 years (272-512 yrs)
NGS sequencing machines, July 2016
NGS machine plot
Trump poll watcher voter intimidation effort runs afoul of 1982 court settlement banning RNC from voter intimidation (expires 2017 unless they get caught again)
How the Trumps Got Rich: The Trump fortune was built off theft — from workers, from the state, and from the commons. by Samuel Stein
the Primer movie explained , also youtube explanation

Links for July 2016

July 4th, 2016

Trump supporters profile in The New Yorker
Hillary Clinton Isn’t Getting Indicted. Here’s Why (ThinkProgress)
Low carb diets reduce insulin levels but do not increase metabolism rate

Links for June 2016

June 1st, 2016

Trump University was a scam. And so Trump is attacking the judge in two of the cases.
Illinois budget background
Similarities between Trump and Reagan: both disdainful of fasts, incurious, initially weakly supported by GOP establishment