Beasts of bone and steel

via iO9

Check out this gallery of awesome art pieces that combine mammal skeletons with steam-punk-esque machinations by Ron Bell.

Bell’s series “Osteomechanics” and “Crania Mechanica,” integrate animal bones into imagined machinery. With the heavy use of brass and electrical prongs, they have a steampunk feel, but Bell’s core inspiration comes from 18th Century scientist Luigi Galvani, who experimented with delivering an electrical spark to animal muscles. The sculptures are supposed to evoke a sense of mystery, leaving the viewer to wonder at the era and person that gave rise to these strange little machines, and what scientific problem they were meant to solve.

What does the internet think of you?

via Christie @ OOAN

The internet gives you a right to narcissism. And now you can enjoy that narcissism in a new colourful way with Personas.

This MIT gadget scours the internet for your digital imprint and classifies your record into a bunch of coloured bars corresponding to different categories (e.g. politics, arts, sports – even stuff like aggression and illegal).

Definitely worth checking out. And as Christie notes, it will change each time you run the program.

I ran the simulation three times. I did not use my real name, the program cannot distinguish people with the same name – and there are much more prominent internet Michael Zimmers.

Most of the presence for zayzayem comes from Wikipedia (particularly spats and screeds). Not sure where all the sports is coming from (perhaps early days on SparkNotes).  I think the third one represents me best.

Your online identity is important. Potential employers (and dates) screen you through Google and Facebook – so there are definitely certain things you don’t want to inadvertantly place up there. This can be a useful tool in seeing what is out there on you. But it is also only a matter of time that they will be using it to check up on you.

Insert Psyschedelic Tortoise Fantasy Sequence … here

Was afraid of going over my internet cap this week, so played around with GIMP to distract myself (okay, maybe I could have turned off the computer…)

This is a mash of several photos I’ve taken this year.

I’m Fungry

Day 661, originally uploaded by evaxebra. (all rights reserved)

Mmmmm… Kittens.

Look closer

Nikon has the results from its 2008 “Small World” Photomicrography competition.

People’s choice Chicken Embryo does simply amaze.

But I’m going to pick on these two pictures. They are very interesting, and also hard to guess. Can you work out what they are?

I was kidnapped by lesbians from outer space

Knitting on the dark side

via William the Coroner

Next Gaming in Evolution – part 2

First two parter on It’s Alive!!

For some background on our topic: Science in the new Spore Computer game visit: Spore Official Site, Carl Zimmer: Gaming Evolves, Joan Bushwell’s Chimpanzee Refuge and/or the first part of this post.

I’m going to be rather brash and provide some constructive criticism on a game that I haven’t played yet, and isn’t even released in Australia yet…

The user-driven nature of Spore is going to be very hard to remove in a gaming market. A game isn’t a game if a user isn’t able to meddle with it. Even Sim-Earth, which allowed you to tweak planetary climate conditions, still allows some lee-way towards IDiots. Hell, IDiots even use computer evolution simulations by proper evolutionary biologists as *proof* of ID. So I’m not going to suggest too many improvements on that aspect, aside from perhaps a version that allows attributes to be generated in a more random fashion than spending points in a shop. I don’t think this would float in the market though, modern gamers are very much used to be able to get what they want.

To combat the games “one dimensional march”, perhaps mods or sequels that introduce “end-game” style content for the pre-intelligence mini-games in the greater Spore game.

For the beast-stage game, the user could try and make their creature survive in wake of another creature holotype achieving sentience. I think this could have a capacity to have some environmental messages in there. The user would be charged in ensuring their species does not go extinct. This could be achieved in several ways:

• the high road – adaptation – adjusting to threats such as hunting (build up defense like – venoms, quills, mimicry of predators), habitat destruction (adapt to extreme habitats or adjust to city life), and pollution (avoid eating plastic bags, drinking polluted streams) – standard time-based victory
• the middle road – domestication – either by becoming tasty, cute or just generally useful enough that the sentients will actively try not to wipe you out. Be careful though, the balance between being domesticated and being hunted to extinction may be very tricky to reach. Case study: The Aurochs.
• the low road – nature fighting back – why let yourself be hunted to death, having sentience doesn’t necessarily mean they have to be top of the food chain – I think this would prove a popular victory path – standard winning by ensuring the other guys (in this case the human equivalents) are wiped out

For the tadpole-stage game. I was intrigued by the NYTimes comment amount the small sea-critter being eaten by leviathans out in the depths, forcing it to go onto land. Why not allow your creature to become the leviathan. Again conservation could be brought in by drawing from the fate of whales, sharks and other ocean dwellers.

The ocean depths being analogous to space in terms of a Final Frontier would really open up opportunities for some very exotic environment and alternative creature animations.

Further discussion below the fold…

Taking the piss out of alchemy

One of the last posts of mine (actually the alleged “last post“) on the old blog was about the virtue of alchemy as predecessor to modern investigative science.

While alchemy’s main basis in Hermetic mythology and the ability to transmute metals into gold may have been grounded in woo – much of the foundation for chemistry – physical and organic was laid down by alchemists.

The AIRchives has an interesting art based portrayal of one of these science-based areas of alchemical expertise – extraction of phosphorous – from urine.

Now you know what’s in all those scientists beakers…

One Horned Jesus

The overlord of the godless interwebs has returned from his pilgrimage to the isle of beasts…

It’s definitely nice to have Pharyngula back on tap. Some of the intermission posts by PZ’s students have been interested. I would definitely like to see Danio writing things (possibly on his own site) on a more regular basis.

The break from PZ did allow me to appreciate some of scienceblogs other writers though – which was definitely a good thing.

For those of you under a rock PZ is the heavyweight of science blogging, capable of crashing polls and servers like no other man. Capable of stirring up controversies that can shake wikipedia and bring the Catholic League to its knees.

Today we have him to thank for this simply wonderful story:

An art gallery in the UK is causing outrage amongst local Christians. The current display includes a plaster figure of Jesus – with a stiffy (pics thx to the sun)

Other culture icons like Mickey Mouse are included in the display. I think this is probably a little more distressing for kiddies than old JC. I mean JC was a thirty year old guy, presumeably he at least suffered from the occasional morning glory. Mickey is purely a children’s entertainment icon, like Ken, he isn’t even meant to have junk down there, let alone working plumbing.

Ice Candy

Magestic

Made from death and crap.

Story Snopes. Image AAD

Banners ahoy!

How cool is my custom banner up above.

Along with half-assedly updating my “about” page, I’ve also provided the appropriate attributions to the kind flickr users who have contributed to my nice banner.

The banner collage combines my own photographs with some Flickr Creative Commons 2.0 photos of creatures I have some fascination with.

Take a little time and try and see if you know what every animal is.

Naked kids aren’t sex objects

I don’t think it’s radical concept, is it?

I’m really finding it hard to understand it when morally outraged people are calling art with naked children “provocative”. Then in the same breath these people (*cough* Kevin Rudd *cough*) are saying we need to let children be children.

If we were letting kids be kids, we wouldn’t be too fussed that they were naked now would we. Either they are kids or sex objects, they can’t be both.

Art Monthly Magazine has decided to launch an issue containing multiple naked children artworks in protest over the recent media-generated hysteria over the Bill Henson exhibition sparked by the ghastly victimisation of victims organisation Bravehearts.

AMM receives public arts funding so is going to be in some serious hot water over this. NSW Premier Morris Iemma has already attacked the magazine. Cheapening the protest to a “cheap, sick stunt at the expense of a young child” to boost their sales. Whether it will actual result in anything tangible being brought against the publishing group has yet to be seen.