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This blog: Random things I find, and amazing sights I see.
My interests span medical and scientific fascinations, computer coding (with some bias for Macs), education, and the strange and weird things people do. There could be any of that and more in here.
Me: I am Mark Whybird. I am notoriously poor at keeping in touch with even my closest friends and family, so please don't feel singled out.
- Email me. No really, do. Unless you're a spammer. If you are a spammer, instead I suggest you think for a moment about how your career choice condemns you to deal almost exclusively with morons.
Alternately, use the Ask Me Anything form!
Amazing NEW Periodic Table Song & Video!
If the Animaniacs and Science had a child, this would be it! Every element of the Periodic Table, sung, in order!
Success!
A 5-Cell, or Pentachoron, is a highly symmetrical four dimensional solid shape. Here you can see it projected into three (well, technically perspective-projected into two) dimensions, rotating about its “ZW” axis.
I find 4d *really* hard to get in intuitive grasp on, even when I get it at an intellectual level. Watching this thing rotate fascinates me.
(via thescienceofreality)
Great article on the balance between making digital things look like familiar things, and using the digital medium to the fullest.
“Our industry is in the throes of an aesthetic shift. At one end of the spectrum, there’s the stitched leather and wood of iOS; at the other, the stark, ascetic information-spaces of Windows Phone. It’s more than a change of fashion: I think it highlights our continuing struggle to understand how to design and build products.”
Beau Lotto: Optical illusions show how we see
One of the best TED talks I’ve seen in recent memory. Sit down and prepare to get a bit of a brain cramp as you are taken through a series of truly awesome optical illusions.
In the process, you will learn a bit about how we perceive the world. In a sense, these tricks show us how our eyes work, but more accurately it shows us how our brains make sense of all that visual information.
You begin with particular wavelengths of light, the purely physical thingness of things. You end with a perception of your surroundings, tricks and all. All the between bits are where the fun lives.
What IS an illusion???
(Source: youtube.com, via thescienceofreality)
This simple scene greets me each morning just before I arrive at work. These days, I actually consciously make myself look up from my iPhone or my book as I walk through it - there is something about this view coming into my brain that really lifts my mood and makes the day seen better.
The thing is, I have been walking through it for years, and it is only recently that I really looked up and drank it in!
I wonder what other beautiful things that make life better we miss every day by just not looking up to take them in?
Lets stop and smell the roses :)
I think this truck I was behind may be a transformer - and it doesn’t look very happy!
Redefining The Kilogram
Veritasium takes you through the history of the kilogram standard, a block of metal locked in a basement that defines the most important international standard that we have.
Unfortunately, the mass of the current standard is changing thanks to … well, something not entirely known. Atomic evaporation maybe? What is definitely true is that a new kg standard is needed.
The replacement candidate is a nearly perfect sphere of a single isotope of crystalized silicon. It is the world’s roundest object! If this sphere were the Earth, the highest mountain and the lowest valley would only be a few meters apart.
An awesome chemistry and physics lesson from Derek!
(via thescienceofreality)
via danorst:
Moon Rise Time Slice…. this is a collage of 11 photos taken over 27 minutes and 59 seconds
Gorgeous. Also photographic proof that the moon is not, in fact, larger near the horizon. That is merely an illusion.
What do they call that illusion? “The Moon Illusion” of course. ASAPScience did a really nice video about it.
(via astrofissionchips)
Anonymous asked: What are the questions people ask you ?
I have to say, the most common question so far has been “What are the questions people ask you ?”
Thanks for asking! :)
