Friday November 07, 2008 Links for 7th November 2008
- Hummingbird Hawk Moth
Yesterday afternoon, I went over to the Sun Labs building and listened to a talk by John McCarthy on Convergent Evolution and how it might be applicable to us communicating with aliens in the future.
John's prime example of convergent evolution was the Hummingbird Hawk-moth which has evolved to have many of the same biological traits as the hummingbird, even though it's an entirely different type of animal.
The other thing I found fascinating was Lincos, a language that has been specifically created for cosmic intercourse. This was written by Dr. Hans Freudenthal in 1960, and his book is long out of print (and is expensive to get hold of). I did find a critique from 16 years ago, that helps explain some of the concepts.
- Blueberry Scones from Cook's Illustrated
A couple weeks ago all the folks from the group I'm in, were in town from various parts of the world for the week. One of them had a copy of a Cook's Illustrated magazine with her. It had an interesting recipe for the best blueberry scones. This week I borrowed a copy of that magazine from our local library, and last night we made the scones. I'm not sure they are the best blueberry scones I've ever tasted, but they are the best ones we've ever made.
- WhiteBoard PONG
What to do if your meeting gets really boring. The only way one of those players is going to lose is if they suddenly have a narcoleptic fit (maybe induced by playing this game).
( Nov 07 2008, 08:50:00 AM PST ) [Listen] Permalink
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