The Tikkimann

mothernaturenetwork: Google and NASA to share quantum...

Fri, 17 May 2013 15:00:53 -0400

Google and NASA to share quantum computer

Google has already developed quantum machine algorithms that will makes searches on mobile devices more energy-efficient.

So, Rob Ford, Mayor of Toronto, May be Smoking Crack...

Fri, 17 May 2013 13:21:49 -0400

A reporter from Gawker and two reporters from the Toronto Star have allegedly seen a video of what appears to be Mayor of Toronto Rob Ford smoking crack. Their stories differ somewhat, but not in the essentials—he smokes and inhales from a pipe containing a white-looking substance.

That’s a very bad look. Crack Cocaine is not a good drug to be taking while running the finances of one of the world’s largest cities. The Toronto Star article even implies that this might be why he was kicked out of the Garrison Ball earlier this year, when the Toronto Star began suggesting he had a problem with alcohol; perhaps he was under the influence of some stronger stuff.

The video hasn’t been posted, and The Toronto Star has been more critical of Rob Ford than most, but Gawker, to my knowledge, only even covers Rob Ford occasionally—they’re more interested in American politics. Why would writers from two different publications independently tell the same lie, with different details? If Ford has any wiggle room here, it’s probably in the possibility that the video is false somehow—that it was staged with an actor that looked like him, or that he’s actually smoking a different substance. Even that looks uncertain, however.

Here are the articles: http://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2013/05/16/toronto_mayor_rob_ford_in_crack_cocaine_video_scandal.html

http://gawker.com/for-sale-a-video-of-toronto-mayor-rob-ford-smoking-cra-507736569

Also, Gawker has announced plans to raise money to buy the film and post it: http://gawker.com/we-are-raising-200-000-to-buy-and-publish-the-rob-ford-508230073

Get Over It!

Tue, 14 May 2013 18:00:45 -0400

pbh3:

I can think of a few instances where saying “Get over it” wouldn’t be very well received. Mainly when someone has just been diagnosed with a fatal ailment.

Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is the largest known vortex in the...

Tue, 14 May 2013 15:01:01 -0400

Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is the largest known vortex in the Solar System. It’s big enough to engulf several Earths as shown in this artist’s rendition. — Michael Carroll

pleatedjeans: eatmorebikes

Mon, 13 May 2013 15:00:55 -0400

pleatedjeans:

eatmorebikes

ucresearch: Happy Mother’s Day! Here’s a great photo of...

Sun, 12 May 2013 23:44:22 -0400

ucresearch:

Happy Mother’s Day!

Here’s a great photo of UCLA’s Anna Fisher: the first mother in space.

Yeah, wall! Don’t let non-sentience stand in the way of...

Sun, 12 May 2013 23:32:30 -0400

Yeah, wall! Don’t let non-sentience stand in the way of your dreams!

the-absolute-funniest-posts: sur-demon: ohmelissaoh: dead....

Sun, 12 May 2013 15:00:52 -0400

the-absolute-funniest-posts:

sur-demon:

ohmelissaoh:

dead. literally, dead.

ahahahahaaha

This post has been featured on a 1000notes.com blog.

"If you speak in an angry way about what has happened to our people and what is happening to our..."

Sun, 12 May 2013 01:14:40 -0400

“

If you speak in an angry way about what has happened to our people and what is happening to our people, what does he call it? Emotionalism. Pick up on that. Here the man has got a rope around his neck and because he screams, you know, the cracker that’s putting the rope around his neck accuses him of being emotional. You’re supposed to have the rope around your neck and holler politely, you know. You’re supposed to watch your diction, not shout and wake other people up— this is how you’re supposed to holler. You’re supposed to be respectable and responsible when you holler against what they’re doing to you. And you’ve got a lot of Afro-Americans who fall for that. They say, “No, you can’t do it like that, you’ve got to be responsible, you’ve got to be respectable.” And you’ll always be a slave as long as you’re trying to be responsible and respectable in the eyesight of your master; you’ll remain a slave. When you’re in the eyesight of your master, you’ve got to let him know you’re irresponsible and you’ll blow his irresponsible head off.

And again you’ve got another trap that he maneuvers you into. If you begin to talk about what he did to you, he’ll say that’s hate, you’re teaching hate. Pick up on that. He won’t say he didn’t do it, because he can’t. But he’ll accuse you of teaching hate just because you begin to spell out what he did to you. Which is an intellectual trap—because he knows we don’t want to be accused of hate.

And the average Black American who has been real brain-washed, he never wants to be accused of being emotional. Watch them, watch the real bourgeois Black Americans. He never wants to show any sign of emotion. He won’t even tap his feet. You can have some of that real soul music, and he’ll sit there, you know, like it doesn’t move him.

And then you go a step farther, they get you again on this violence. They have another trap wherein they make it look criminal if any of us, who has a rope around his neck or one is being put around his neck—if you do anything to stop the man from putting that rope around your neck, that’s violence. And again this bourgeois Negro, who’s trying to be polite and respectable and all, he never wants to be identified with violence. So he lets them do anything to him, and he sits there submitting to it nonviolently, just so he can keep his image of responsibility. He dies with a responsible image, he dies with a polite image, but he dies. The man who is irresponsible and impolite, he keeps his life. That responsible Negro, he’ll die every day, but if the irresponsible one dies he takes some of those with him who were trying to make him die.

”

- Malcolm X

The traps of racism.

Source: http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/malconafamhist.html

(via disciplesofmalcolm)

Some interesting logical traps used by the prejudiced. Of course, the condemnations of a “responsible negro” are only truly warranted in a culture where the oppressed aren’t being listened to—where people who make some of the problematic arguments Malcolm X cites and people like them outnumber the rest. When it’s not possible for a “responsible Negro” to change the system from within, the methods Malcolm X supposed are necessary. And maybe that’s true. In either case, Martin Luther King Jr. did a pretty good job of nonviolent reform.

It’s Mother’s day, so treat your mother right.

Sun, 12 May 2013 00:44:16 -0400

It’s Mother’s day, so treat your mother right.

ohbrandles: aubrey plaza. She has nice eyes.

Fri, 10 May 2013 18:00:43 -0400

ohbrandles:

aubrey plaza.

She has nice eyes.

the-absolute-funniest-posts: This post has been featured on...

Fri, 10 May 2013 15:01:00 -0400

the-absolute-funniest-posts:

This post has been featured on a 1000notes.com blog.

child-of-clay: im-electric-sympathy: i made sum pancakes oh...

Thu, 09 May 2013 21:00:32 -0400

child-of-clay:

im-electric-sympathy:

i made sum pancakes

oh my god are you shitting me

ikenbot: Robots and Donuts Eric Joyner has made a name for...

Thu, 09 May 2013 18:01:22 -0400

ikenbot:

Robots and Donuts

Eric Joyner has made a name for himself over the past few years with his signature Robot and Donuts series of paintings.

In his works, he depicts retro robots exploring and participating in a variety of activities… but somewhere in the painting donuts are incorporated. So, why Robots and Donuts? In his interview with Electix, Eric says:

“Upon deciding to become a gallery artist, I had to make some rules, or guidelines. They were as follows: 1 – I will only paint things I like, 2 – The subject(s) had to be something that I could paint for 30 years, and 3 – That people like it. Donuts & robots together make no sense. I find this interesting.”

This is hilarious. Also, I might be crazy but I DON’T SEE A DONUT IN THE SURFING ONE. Eh, whatever— maybe he didn’t have both in all of them.

bluntasaurus-sex: muthafuk: Pawel Kuczynski these are...

Thu, 09 May 2013 15:01:02 -0400

bluntasaurus-sex:

muthafuk:

Pawel Kuczynski

these are beautiful.

Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Explains Why He Hates Fat Chicks | Elite Daily

Thu, 09 May 2013 01:21:24 -0400

Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Explains Why He Hates Fat Chicks | Elite Daily:

Anyone who’s been to Abercrombie & Fitch in the last few years has probably noticed that they don’t carry XL or XXL sizes of women’s clothing because they don’t want overweight women wearing their brand.

Hmm, I could never be so hip as to exclude plus-size women—especially when the presence of bulked-up men forces you to make a gender distinction. (If it does, in fact, force you to make a gender distinction…there are bulked-up women, too, right?)

It’s a neat idea, and if they think that having a sexy, discriminatory brand identity helps them cater to the attitudes of cool people/people who want to feel cool by buying clothes, that’s their right as a business. However, it’s worth noting that they’re catering to people’s irrational impulses, which might actually move some product, but also brings you closer towards having an irrational business model. Under normal circumstances, you should be selling clothes to anyone who wants to put clothes on their body. It would be fascinating if people so shallowly subscribe to the “cool”of good-looking salespeople and customers that Abercrombie and Fitch actually turned a profit on this move, and things like the human desire to be in the “in” crowd, a natural magnetism towards good-looking people influenced customers to buy more clothes than the fact of not catering to a major audience (XXL women) hindered them. It’s possible, and the fact that I’m talking about the company suggests that a marketer somewhere is doing something right, but it would be…sad, somehow.

koxix: where is the fucking warning that says “this is...

Wed, 08 May 2013 18:00:53 -0400

koxix:

where is the fucking warning that says “this is irreversible”

I wouldn’t go that far. It’s a (literal) pain to pry those things apart with your nails, though.

The First 3D-Printed Gun Has Been Fired

Wed, 08 May 2013 15:01:05 -0400

The First 3D-Printed Gun Has Been Fired:

Video has been released of the first 3D-printed gun being fired and the creator states he is planning on releasing the blueprints for the gun for free next week. This gun, known as the Liberator, is stirring up quite a bit of tension in the gun rights…

Welcome to the future everyone. Very shortly, you will be able to print out a gun from the comfort, safety and (most importantly) privacy of your own home. As 3D printers become more and more common, this technology could fuel social movements and rebellions, democratizing the power of a gun for all people, while presumably more and better guns become printable.Or, y’know, it becomes some niche product that no one really uses because only people who have cutting-edge technology and a deep understanding of internet use will find it. I can’t imagine that this won’t have a significant effect on our world, though. I just hope any ensuing social changes are more peaceful than when the printing press was developed. (I’m looking at you, Martin Luther. Those poor Anabaptists in Munster…)

"The difference between science and philosophy is that the scientist learns more and more about less..."

Thu, 02 May 2013 18:01:06 -0400

“The difference between science and philosophy is that the scientist learns more and more about less and less until she knows everything about nothing, whereas a philosopher learns less and less about more and more until he knows nothing about everything.”

- Dorion Sagan on science and philosophy (via explore-blog)

AHHHH, ACCURATE SUMMARY! Although really, philosophers learn a little about things like logic and how to break down arguments, which they can apply everywhere. They learn that there is much to know in this world that they will not be possible to learn it all in their lifetime, and they learn how little it is they really know, but their mere awareness of this helps them see the world better than others. I think, anyway.

"In the 1950s, the researchers William Dement and Nathaniel Kleitman discovered that we sleep in..."

Thu, 02 May 2013 16:57:04 -0400

“In the 1950s, the researchers William Dement and Nathaniel Kleitman discovered that we sleep in cycles of roughly 90 minutes, moving from light to deep sleep and back out again. They named this pattern the Basic-Rest Activity Cycle or BRAC. A decade later, Professor Kleitman discovered that this cycle recapitulates itself during our waking lives. The difference is that during the day we move from a state of alertness progressively into physiological fatigue approximately every 90 minutes. Our bodies regularly tell us to take a break, but we often override these signals and instead stoke ourselves up with caffeine, sugar and our own emergency reserves — the stress hormones adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol. Working in 90-minute intervals turns out to be a prescription for maximizing productivity. Professor K. Anders Ericsson and his colleagues at Florida State University have studied elite performers, including musicians, athletes, actors and chess players. In each of these fields, Dr. Ericsson found that the best performers typically practice in uninterrupted sessions that last no more than 90 minutes. They begin in the morning, take a break between sessions, and rarely work for more than four and a half hours in any given day.”

- The counterintuitive psychology of productivity. Pair with the science of productivity, animated. (via explore-blog)