YouTube link.

The Antikythera Mechanism has been featured a number of times on Neatorama, including a working model created in 2008.  This year a fully functional replica has been created using Lego materials.  Since gears with 19, 47, 127, and 223 teeth were not publicly available, a complex differential shaft had to be fashioned.

Two Nature videos about the original Antikythera Mechanism are available at The Guardian.

YouTube link.

Professors and students at Budapest's ELTE-MTA Theoretical Linguistics Programme celebrate the 20th anniversary of their department with a cover of "We Are The World."

There comes a time
When we heed a certain call,
When linguists must come together as one.
There are people speaking,
They bind and c-command;
It's grammar, the greatest gift of all.

We can't go on
Pretending day by day
That we know our language works in the brain.
We are all a part of
God's linguist family,
And the truth, you know, grammar's all we need.

The full lyrics are available in the YouTube pulldown box.  Via Language Log, where there is some relevant commentary.

Worldwide lightning strikes for the six month period May-Oct 2010 have been compiled into a database and plotted on maps.  Embedded above is the distribution of lightning in the United States; the deep purple color represents 32 ground strikes within a 20-km grid.

A map of worldwide lightning distribution is available at the Accu-Weather link.

Link, via.

This is a one-of-a-kind penny, resulting from a production error at the U.S. mint in Denver.  It was struck in bronze rather than the zinc-coated steel normally used during the WWII era. About 20 such errors are known from the Philadelphia and San Francisco mints, but this is the only one known from the Denver mint.

The anonymous collector who formerly owned the coin “donated it to a charitable organization so they could sell it with all of the proceeds going to the charity,” according to Andy Skrabalak of Angel Dee’s Coins and Collectibles in Woodbridge, Virginia who acted as agent on behalf of the former owner.

The new owner is an anonymous businessman who plans to exhibit the penny at various venues around the country.

Link.

YouTube link.

A recent post about a newscaster's gaffe prompted me to seek out this classic clip.  It was first posted on YouTube almost five years ago, but is worth viewing as an example of the importance of punctuation - specifically, that a period should signify a full stop.

The text as it was written for the newscaster:

“Good evening, I’m Ken Bastida; Dana is off tonight.

He was murdered and set on fire while celebrating his birthday. The body of Jimmy Frezshi was found by firefighters on Monroe Street…"

The result as it was read off the teleprompter:

“Good evening, I’m Ken Bastida. Dana is off tonight; he was murdered and set on fire while celebrating his birthday.

The body of Jimmy Frezshi was found by firefighters on Monroe Street…"

YouTube link.

This steeplechase features children riding Shetland ponies.

Since its inception this yearly series of races, which culminates at Olympia, has raised hundreds of thousands of pounds for charity. This year the chosen charity is Great Ormond Street Hospital.  Between 50 and 60 jockeys and ponies have travelled the length and breadth of the country during the season all hoping to be the lucky 10 who make it to the prestigious Olympia week.

Re the thrown rider, the announcer's comment seems to be "These young children - they do bounce, they do bounce."

http://www.olympiahorseshow.com/programme02/, via Metafilter.

Topical creams and gels containing hormones may produce side effects in other family members.

All it takes is frequent skin-to-skin contact with an arm, shoulder or leg that’s been slathered with a product containing estrogen, progesterone or testosterone.

The symptoms of secondary exposure can be alarming. Young children of either gender may develop enlarged genitals and start sprouting pubic hair and breasts. Dogs and cats that lick estrogen cream off an owner’s skin may act as if they are in heat, even if they are spayed...

Dr. Metzger has seen cases such as a baby whose genitals were enlarged because a grandpa on testosterone cream wasn’t in the habit of washing his hands before changing the child’s diapers...

Topically-applied medications are thought to pose fewer risks for primary users than oral medications, so their use has markedly increased.

Link.  Another article on this subject at the New York Times.

Although it looks like a fantasy instrument that might have been designed to accompany vacuum cleaners in a Gerard Hoffnung music festival, the serpent is a bona fide wind instrument, with a pedigree dating back over four centuries.

The Serpent is an ancient musical wind instrument, related to the modern Tuba, Euphonium, and Baritone (see Pictures). It is blown with a cup shaped mouthpiece which is very similar to that of a trombone or Euphonium/Baritone. Played softly, it has a firm yet mellow tone color, or timbre. At medium volume, it produces a robust sound which seems to be a cross between the tuba, the bassoon, and the French horn. When played loudly it can produce unpleasant noises reminiscent of large animals in distress...

Many observers are confused in their efforts to classify the Serpent. The use of wooden construction with finger holes does not mean that the Serpent is a woodwind instrument! Because the sound originates with the vibration of the player's lips in a cup mouthpiece, the Serpent is classified as a brass instrument...

The shape results from the need to bring the finger holes within reach of the player, on what is actually a rather large instrument.

Further (extensive) information is available at The Serpent Website.

Link.  Photo via Sublime Things.

The Apollo 11 astronauts left a variety of items on the moon.  In addition to the flag, the plaque, and the silicon disk with goodwill statements, they left the item shown above.  It is a small replica of an olive branch, described as "less than half a foot in length," a traditional symbol of peace.   The gesture was intended to serve as "a wish for peace for all mankind."

Photo:  Great Images in NASA, via Fresh Photons.

This "baby cage" was marketed for families living in tenements without easy access to outdoor spaces.

Suspended from the side of the building, the baby would have access to fresh air and sunlight through the cage's wire frame, and still have sufficient room to play with toys, according to a patent filed in 1922 by an Emma Read of Spokane, WA. The patent also notes that the cage could double as a place to sleep, with removable curtains working to prevent a draft.

There is an additional photo and further explanation at the Atlantic link.

Link, via.  Photo credit Getty Images.

"All Sorts of Sports," a never-published "lost" work by Theodore Geisel has been discovered and will be sold at auction this week.  Some will be surprised to discover that Geisel used assistants even in the earliest stages of creating and writing his books.

[The manuscript] consists of nineteen handwritten and drawn pages, the first seven of which are completely in the hand of Dr. Seuss. The remaining pages are mostly written by an assistant with corrections and doodles by Dr. Seuss, some taped on.

At the link are seven pages from the manuscript, and an example of the rough draft of the text:

"All Sorts of Sports. Shall I play checkers? golf? croquet? There are so many games there are to play. I could. / maybe.. / shall I.. There are so many many sorts. So many sorts of games + sports. What am I going to do today? There are so many games to play! I guess I won't... There are so many sports, let's see... I could bowl, jump hurdles, or water ski. I could blumf. Or blumf blumf blumf blumf blumf. Or blumf. Or blumf blumf blumf blumf blumf."

The manuscript is up for bids at Nate B. Sanders Auctions; the auction ends October 21, and the current bid is a bit over $21K.

Link, via Metafilter.

French physicists at the Université de Reims have studied the best way to pour champagne; their surprising discovery is that it should be poured into a tilted long-stemmed glass rather than into an upright one.  The goal is to retain as much dissolved carbon dioxide as possible in the decanted liquid:

In champagne and sparkling wine tasting, the concentration of dissolved CO₂ is a parameter of great importance since it directly impacts the four following sensory properties: (i) the frequency of bubble formation in the glass, (ii) the growth rate of rising bubbles, (iii) the mouth feel, i.e., the mechanical action of collapsing bubbles as well as the chemosensory excitation of nociceptors in the oral cavity (via the conversion of dissolved CO₂ to carbonic acid), (iv) and the nose of champagne, i.e., its so-called bouquet...

They used infrared thermography (left illustration) to document the escape of carbon dioxide from the glass, and measured the dissolved carbon dioxide in the champagne (right illustration) over time and at different temperatures.  The results are discussed in their  publication in the ACS Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, where there are detailed photographs of bubble formation and a mathematical analysis of the degassing process.

Link, via Physics Buzz.

YouTube link.

Those who have tried their hand at Sim City 3000 will be interested in this video of what is claimed to be the maximum size city possible.  "Magnasanti" has 6 million residents, and required three years to construct.  Vincent Ocasia, the creator, notes that while it is a maximal size city, it is not a utopian paradise:

Technically, no one is leaving or coming into the city. Population growth is stagnant. Sims don’t need to travel long distances, because their workplace is just within walking distance. In fact they do not even need to leave their own block... Suffocating air pollution, high unemployment, no fire stations, schools, or hospitals, a regimented lifestyle - this is the price that these sims pay for living in the city with the highest population. It’s a sick and twisted goal to strive towards. The ironic thing about it is the sims in Magnasanti tolerate it. They don’t rebel, or cause revolutions and social chaos. No one considers challenging the system by physical means since a hyper-efficient police state keeps them in line. They have all been successfully dumbed down, sickened with poor health, enslaved and mind-controlled just enough to keep this system going for thousands of years...

In the video at 6:39, you can see that the population precipitously dies off after age 60.   And, in case you were wondering, the creator says "I am not autistic, or a savant, nor suffer from OCD, or suffer from any other form of clinical mental disease or illness for that matter."

http://www.viceland.com/blogs/uk-games/2010/05/10/the-totalitarian-buddhist-who-beat-sim-city/.

The watch, retrieved from the wreckage of a warship that sank off the coast of Scotland in 1643, was a mass of corroded metal when brought to the surface, but computed tomography scans reveal the exquisite workmanship inside.

Any parts made of steel, including the watch's single hand as well as the studs and pins that originally held the mechanism together, have corroded away. But most of the components are brass, and in excellent condition... The top and bottom plates are held together by square-section Egyptian tapered pillars, first used around 1640. Other parts of the mechanism are engraved with a floral design. The clockface itself is marked in Roman numerals with what appears to be a fleur de lys on each half-hour, and an English rose in the centre.

At this link you can view a video "flythrough" of the serial CT images.

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/101011/full/news.2010.529.html.  Photo:  Trustees of National Museum of Scotland.

This video won the 2010 Vimeo award for "Best Experimental Film."  Creator Chris Beckman's explains:

Somewhere between a visual mixtape and a postmodern virtual travelogue, "oops" – a ten-minute art video composed entirely of appropriated YouTube videos, seamlessly stitched together via a motif of camera drops... This abstractly voyeuristic portrayal of an ever-filming generation (who won't let the transcendence of being in A Moment inhibit their document-everything impulse) presages a future where every moment of our existence, from the mundane to the sublime, is preserved and catalogued for all to see.

Vimeo link.  Vimeo award winners.