This remarkable picture was taken by Rob Bullen on Saturday February 26 from the UK, using an 8.5? telescope. I’ll note that’s relatively small as telescopes go! But the ISS is now over 100 meters long, and if it’s directly overhead (that is, the closest it can be to an observer on the ground) it appears large enough to easily look elongated in binoculars — in fact, it would be big enough to look elongated to someone with good eyesight and no aid at all*! Still, images like this are difficult to obtain even with a carefully guided telescope equipped with a video camera.
Oh — did I mention that Rob hand-guided his telescope for this shot?
[...]artist Michael Kalish went big, using 1,300 punching bags, 6.5 miles of stainless steel cable, and 2,500 pounds of aluminum pipe to construct a 22-foot-high installation that took three years to complete.
The idea for the project came to Kalish as he was falling asleep one night in 2008: an array of custom-made, teardrop-shaped speed bags suspended in midair that, from just one vantage point, align themselves like pixels into an image of Ali’s face.
Who do you think will still be famous in 10,000 years? People from history or now. Shakespeare? Socrates? Hawking?
In that case, I'll go with the major religious leaders (Jesus, Buddha, etc.), Einstein, Turing, Watson and Crick, Hitler, the major classical music composers, Adam Smith, and Neil Armstrong.[...]
My thinking is this. The major religions last for a long time and leave a real mark on history. Path-dependence is critical in that area.
Otherwise, an individual, to stay famous, will have to securely symbolize an entire area, and an area "with legs" at that. The theory of relativity still will be true and it may well become more important. The computer and DNA will not be irrelevant. Hitler will remain a stand-in symbol for pure evil; if he is topped we may not have a future at all. Beethoven and Mozart still will be splendid, but Shakespeare and other wordsmiths will require translation and thus will fade somewhat. The propensity to truck and barter will remain and Smith will keep his role as the symbol of economics.
In Yeskov's retelling, the wizard Gandalf is a war-monger intent on crushing the scientific and technological initiative of Mordor and its southern allies because science "destroys the harmony of the world and dries up the souls of men!" He's in cahoots with the elves, who aim to become "masters of the world," and turn Middle-earth into a "bad copy" of their magical homeland across the sea. Barad-dur, also known as the Dark Tower and Sauron's citadel, is, by contrast, described as "that amazing city of alchemists and poets, mechanics and astronomers, philosophers and physicians, the heart of the only civilization in Middle-earth to bet on rational knowledge and bravely pitch its barely adolescent technology against ancient magic."
Super easy to make. Took me about an hour even though I am clumsy as hell when it comes to working with wire. Depending on your choice of supplies it could have easily been finished in half the time. And while they don't sound perfect I was able to belt out a killer 'Ode to Joy' even if it was a bit out of tune.
Knight broke in to the Northwest home of Washington Post writer Marc Fisher in December, police said. He helped himself to a number of items, including two laptop computers, a new winter coat and about $400 in cash.
Before leaving the scene of the crime, he put on the winter coat and posed with the cash for a photo he took of himself. He then posted his “loot” photo on Fisher’s son’s Facebook page, the writer said.
The final winch set up involves an 2100 foot long rope that is spliced and will run all day long in a continual 1050 foot loop. The rope alone weighs 70+ pounds and the winch without the rope is close to 200 pounds.
The three different shafts and accompanying gears result in a final drive ratio of 30:1-4.5:1 so it is capable of pulling three adults up a 30 degree incline at comfortable slow speeds or a rather bumpy high speed.[...]
Note the mountain bike grip shift toward the top of the picture, which is our five speed throttle control. Also barely visible in this picture are the three pulleys that keep the line from jumping as the line makes 4 passes around the spool before heading back down the hill.
