― Friedrich Nietzsche
10/30/2011
10/29/2011
TERRORISM AND MORALITY Understanding the Language of Terror
"In its modern form, therefore, the language of terrorism has become the rhetorical servant of
Read the whole ESSAY here.
'via Blog this'
the established order, wherever it might be, and however heinous its own activities are.
Talking of ‘terrorism’ in this way flattens the world of international relations, removing all the
subtle peaks and valleys that make up the real life of nations, and reducing the diplomatic map
to a dull, lifeless plain on which are arrayed the huge army of sovereign nations on one side
(the ‘counter-terrorists’) and those who seek change - for whatever reason - on the other (‘theterrorists’). It is obvious that this is a crassly ahistorical account of the world, ignoring how
the various governments and regimes that deploy the language of terrorism in this way
themselves secured power: there is a Cromwell, a Washington, a Mandela or a Mugabe
behind most of today’s political power structures. It is in the inconsistency of its approach to
the use of force for political ends that the language of terrorism most exposes itself to moral
disapprobation."
Read the whole ESSAY here.
'via Blog this'
10/19/2011
New Gunsight Improves Marksmanship With Intuitive Aim, Says UAB Vision Scientist on Vimeo
New Gunsight Improves Marksmanship With Intuitive Aim, Says UAB Vision Scientist on Vimeo:
This is some interesting science behind the sight picture. I have used a Steyr M9A1, and found those sights to be intuitively simple and effective over and above your average stock pistol sights. Like to see where this sort of research goes.
'via Blog this'
This is some interesting science behind the sight picture. I have used a Steyr M9A1, and found those sights to be intuitively simple and effective over and above your average stock pistol sights. Like to see where this sort of research goes.
'via Blog this'
10/18/2011
National Center for Supercomputing applications of health sciences?
Why not devote say $12-20 billion USD to the creation and sustainment of a national supercomputing agency/facility whose primary task is to create/outsource/maintain/supply researchers and scientist with super computing resources for the exploration of diseases with special emphasis on protein folding/prion based pathologies?
I know there is already a national center, but it's focus is not primarily on health sciences.
I know there is already a national center, but it's focus is not primarily on health sciences.
9/20/2011
9/19/2011
"The weapon is still in alignment..."
lol
Make Ready with Bill Rogers: Reactive Pistol Shooting
It's Funny because it's well done...but it's also the camera angels...
Make Ready with Bill Rogers: Reactive Pistol Shooting
It's Funny because it's well done...but it's also the camera angels...
9/18/2011
Artificial blood vessels made on a 3D printer
Artificial blood vessels...
Artificial blood vessels made on a 3D printer may soon be used for transplants of lab-created organs.
Until now, the stumbling block in tissue engineering has been supplying artificial tissue with nutrients that have to arrive via capillary vessels.
A team at the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany has solved that problem using 3D printing and a technique called multiphoton polymerisation.
The findings will be shown at the Biotechnica Fair in Germany in October.
Out of thousands of patients in desperate need of an organ transplant there are inevitably some who do not get it in time.
In Germany, for instance, more than 11,000 people have been put on an organ transplant waiting list in 2011 alone.
To make sure more patients receive these life-saving surgeries, researchers in tissue engineering all over the globe have been working on creating artificial tissue and even entire organs in the lab.
But for a lab-made organ to function, it needs to be equipped with artificial blood vessels - tiny and extremely complex tubes that our organs naturally possess, used to carry nutrients.
Numerous attempts have been made to create synthetic capillaries, and the latest one by the German team seems to be especially promising.
"The individual techniques are already functioning and they are presently working in the test phase; the prototype for the combined system is being built," said Dr Gunter Tovar, who heads the BioRap project at Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology IGB in Stuttgart.
Elastic biomaterials
3D printing technology has been increasingly used in numerous industries, ranging from creating clothes, architectural models and even chocolate treats.
But this time, Dr Tovar's team had a much more challenging printing mission.
To print something as small and complex as a blood vessel, the scientists combined the 3D printing technology with two-photon polymerisation - shining intense laser beams onto the material to stimulate the molecules in a very small focus point.
The material then becomes an elastic solid, allowing the researchers to create highly precise and elastic structures that would be able to interact with a human body's natural tissue.
So that the synthetic tubes do not get rejected by the living organism, their walls are coated with modified biomolecules.
Such biomolecules are also present in the composition of the "inks" used for the blood vessel printer, combined with synthetic polymers.
"We are establishing a basis for applying rapid prototyping to elastic and organic biomaterials," said Dr Tovar.
"The vascular systems illustrate very dramatically what opportunities this technology has to offer, but that's definitely not the only thing possible."
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