Polyface Farm

 Just outside of Staunton, Virginia, Joel Salatin runs a farm that thrives without using chemical fertilizers, herbicides, hormones, or antibiotics. I've eaten his beef and chicken and I can tell you his product is outstanding. Here, from Wilson Quarterly, is a photo essay about life down on the Polyface Farm.

100 Year Old Photos of NYC

Here's a wonderful photo essay from The Daily Mail. These are 100 year old, never before seen photos of the greatest city in the world. I may be a Red Sox fan, but I love New York.

Fun Time - 10 Gorgeous Buildings Made From Books.

From Flavorpill, here is a photo essay of houses MADE from books.

SSI Plans Orbital Lab Module

Some 35 years ago Gerald K. O'Neill founded The Space Studies Institute to support research that would make it possible to create a permanent human presence in space. Recently the Princeton New Jersey headquarters were moved to the Mojave, California, where much of the activity of the new commercial space industry is centered. Last December, Gary Hudson, a long-time space entrepreneur, became president of SSI.

At the Space Access ’12 conference in Phoenix, Hudson will announced a bold new initiative for SSI. SSI plans to focus on one flagship project called G-Lab which is designed to answer one question: how much gravity is needed for the permanent human settlement of space?

0g is not good for your health. Bone and muscle loss are just two of the effects that would prevent humans from engaging in long term space exploration, but little is know about the range from 0-1g. The G-lab is designed to answer this question.

We The Tiny House People

Kirsten Dirksen's documentary film, "We The Tiny House People: Small Homes, Tiny Flats & Wee Shelters," was released a few days ago and she has posted it on youtube.  Here's the link and below is the video.

Travel Photo of the Week

Belize

Regenerative Medicine Repairs Mice From Head To Toe

Now this article from Nature.com illustrates the advances that have been made using stem cells to repair various organs in mice.

Three separate studies being done by the Tokyo University of Science, University College London and the University of California, San Francisco show that stem cells techniques can be used to restore sight, heal a damaged heart and regrow hair.

Can cloned organs be far behind?

30 Influential Shipping Container Homes

This is on the E-book site ISSUU. It is an E-book of the 30 most influential shipping container homes ever built. The title confirms it. Many of them are quite lovely. I am especially fond of what I see on pages 69-72.

HemLoft

Here's an amazing little slide show of a tree-house in Whistler, Canada. Here's the link.

 

Fun Time! There's Never Enough Bacon.

Ah, the fun loving Japanese. A Tokyo reporter took advantage of a Burger King promotion and ordered a Whopper with 1050 pieces of bacon. Before going to work on the burger, Mr. Sato once again began his primal ritual of psyching himself up, shouting: “This is what real hamburger lovers eat! 10 strips? 100 strips? Like that’s enough! A real man needs 1050 strips of bacon!”

Here's link to the original article.

The 25 Most Beautiful Public Libraries in the World

I love books and what better place to find them (except maybe a bookstore, a place that is rapidly disappearing) than a library? Here, courtesy of the culture website Flavorpill, are 25 of the worlds most beautiful libraries. Happy reading.

Stuttgart City Library, Stuttgart, Germany

"We The Tiny People" Small House Documentary

My fascination with tiny homes has led me to many places. On of my favorites is called Fair Companies. One of its founders, Kirsten Dirksen, has made many of the videos I have featured. Here is an 11 minute preview of her upcoming documentary film, "We The Tiny People." In it are many of the homes and builders, that I have profiled on Whole Ideas. The film will be out April 23, 2012.

Travel Photo of the Week

Mount Agung, Bali

I'd Like My City Printed Out, Please - In 3D

China's Forbidden City took some 15 years to construct and served both as China’s political center and home to its emperors from the palace's completion in 1420 to the end of the Qing Dynasty in 1912. Some six-hundred years after being finished, it seems that it is in need of repair, but instead of hiring stone masons and carpenters to do the job, China’s Palace Museum has contracted Loughborough University in the UK to restore select antiquities in the Forbidden City using 3D printing.

Here's a link to the article at 3D Printer Hub that talks about the work.

National Planetary Exploration Car Wash & Bake Sale

Yep, it's gotten to that. NASA budgets have been cut to a point where, just like our schools, we have to have car washes and bake sales to fund it.

So, on June 9th, across America, bake sales are being held to bring attention to the deep cuts made to our space exploration programs. Interested in participating? Here's a link to the website, National Planetary Exploration Car Wash & Bake Sale.

I hope they have good brownies.

Oscarson Townhouse

Here is a beautiful townhouse in Stockholm. 900 square feet of house and 400 square feet of outside space all in a lot 15' by 45'. Very well organized. Open and airy with plenty of light. The real trick is how they were about to get that much floor space into such a small footprint. This came from The Tiny Life blog.

Fun Time! 300 Step Rube Goldberg Machine

I love Rube Goldberg machines. A team of engineering students at Purdue University have built a Rube Goldberg-style machine that inflates and pops a balloon in 300 steps—a new world record!

Here's the vid.

Your Brain On Politics

I have long thought that political leanings are heavily influenced by genetic inheritance which has a lot to do with the structure and chemical makeup of any given brain. Now comes two articles and a book that details studies showing that my notion may be more than just a notion. I'm not going to discuss this at length today. I'm just going to point you to these items and let you make your own judgements

The book is by Chris Mooney and is entitled "The Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science--and Reality." He is also the author of a companion article "The Left and the Right: Physiology, Brain Structure and Function, and Attentional Differences."

The research article is entitled "Are Political Orientations Genetically Transmitted?" and is authored by John R. Alford of Rice University, Carolyn L. Funk of Virginia Commonwealth University and John R. Hibbing of the University of Nebraska.

I close with this thought: when I was young, the generally accepted definition of mental illness was the inabilty to accept reality. When and why have we strayed from this definition?

Family Lives in 168-sq. ft. House

Here's a vid from Anderson Cooper's youtube channel. After losing their business to the recession, Carl and Hari decided to make a drastic move, out of their 3-bedroom home and into what they call their "Tiny House."

Travel Photo of the Week

Amsterdam

I WANT MY FLYING CAR!!

Today, The Daily Beast has an overview of the history of flying cars, real and imagined. 16 pictures of the most coveted vehicle (next to a starship) that mankind has ever known.

My pick? The car from the animated series, "The Jetsons." Until that model is available, I'll pass.

How A Lifesize Starship Enterprise (Almost) Got Built

If you read this blog you know I am a Trek geek (nerd, whatever). I just found this story about how 20 years ago a lifesize Enterprise almost got built in Las Vegas.

It seems that downtown was languishing and the city was looking for a way to bring people back to downtown. The city had started a competition and while many project were considered, it came down to two finalists, "The Fremont Experience" and "The Starship Enterprise."

Enter Gary Goddard and his team of designers, Chuck Canciller, Greg Pro and Mac MacElrevey. They developed the project and got the approval of all involved and finally the city decided that the Enterprise project was a go. There was only one person left to convince: Paramount CEO Stanley Jaffe.

And this is what he said...

“You know, this is a major project. You’re going to put a full-scale Enterprise up in the heart of Las Vegas. And on one hand that sounds exciting. But on another hand, it might not be a great idea for us – for Paramount. I don’t want to be the guy that approved this and then it’s a flop and sitting out there in Vegas forever.”

Here's a link to the full article.

Oh, and thanks Mr. Jaffe for saving us from a flop like this.

Yes, this certainly wouldn't have been any fun now, would it?

What First Contact Would Really Mean

In this Wired article, anthropologist Kathryn Denning of York University in Toronto Canada, discusses what first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization would mean for us. Here are some great quotes...

"...many people hold outdated ideas regarding scenarios of contact. We have our iconic case studies, such as Columbus landing in the Americas or Cortez and the Aztecs. But most of those have been revamped with additional historical work in even just the last 30 or 40 years.

"So when I hear that standard model of Columbus or Cortez, frankly I want to roll my eyes. For example [Steven] Hawking says — interminably and repeatedly — that when Columbus showed up in the Americas, well, that didn’t turn out very well for the Native Americans. And therefore we should similarly be worried about trying to attract the attention of an alien civilization.

"The problem is that it tends to misrepresent Earth’s history. These stories get invoked in models of contact with an alien society, but it’s a biased retelling of Earth’s history and it’s usually not a very good one.

"The underlying narrative there is that it went poorly for the Native Americans because they were the inferior civilization. And, by extension, it would go poorly for us because the other party would be the superior civilization."

Fun Time! James Wojtal: Puppet Maker Extraordinaire

For today's Fun Time (and Easter) I am featuring the work of my friend James Wojtal (pronounced "Voy-tal") who is a master puppet builder and puppeteer.

You've seen his work with the Muppets, Sesame Street and Avenue Q. He's also done some very clever stuff for CollegeHumor and advertising clients.

Here's mini-gallery of some of his puppets and here's link to his website, A Puppet A Day.

He has a youtube channel that highlights his work and gives insight to the puppet building process. He also has an Etsy store. If you need a cool puppet, you now know where to go.

Bacteria Killing Flashlight.

Yeah, you read that correctly. Now, which meaning did I intend?

This is just out. In the Journal of Physics D, there was an article published a couple of days ago about a new plasma generating flashlight that kills surface bacteria. I'm not going to go into the science of here, but it seems that this $100, room temperature device is poised to revolutionize the medical field when it comes to controlling bacterial infections.

What with the problems with antibiotics these days, I'd say this invention is very timely.

iBrain

We're one step closer to being able to read each other's minds. NeuroVigil has developed an extremely portable EEG device that can be used on-the-go.  No need to be strapped down to a bed for this one. It comfortably fits on the head and can be wore at any time for convenient gathering of brain data.

As the website says, "The iBrain™ device, a cutting-edge, single-channel EEG recording tool that is easy to use, comfortable and portable allows for more efficient and user friendly EEG data collection.

The iBrain™ is a miniature electronics box attached to a light and flexible elastic head harness and electrodes that can effortlessly be applied to the head during sleep. The iBrain™ has a rechargeable battery that provides hours of continuous recording, a USB port for simplified data transfer and battery charging to a computer, and provides days of recording storage."

Oh boy. Next up: A convenient implantable chip that does the same thing. Borg collective, here we come!

Travel Photo of the Week

West Fjords of Iceland

Animoog

I've been using this wonderful iOS app for about four months and I have to tell you that it has completely changed the way I create synthesized sound. I sold thousands of dollars of hardware synthesizers and got the Animoog. Works with iPad 2 or 3 and iPohone/iPod touch 4 and better.

Here's a review and here's a link to the Apple Animoog page.  The best part? For the rest othe week Animoog for iPad is only $2.99 and for iPhone/iPod only $1.99.

Dominique’s Narrow Boat

Here's another great entry from Tiny House Blog. Dominique Brown is a freelance 3D and spacial designer who took a small canal boat and transformed it into a floating home. Excellent use of limited space (30' by 6'2"), big windows, built-in storage and elegant design.

Here's a link to her blog.

Microhouse

From their website:

"Microhouse is an award winning collaboration of, designers, builders, and clients who are passionate about the design of small houses and their communities. As a young flexible team we are energetic, resourceful, and creative. Our collaborative approach to design allows us to draw on a vast resource of knowledge that we apply to our projects both local and worldwide. This approach allows us to fully realize our clients' goals on a wide range of projects from large scale master plans to individual cottage designs."

Looks nice to me.