December 2, 2012
INTJ (introversion, intuition, thinking, judgment) is an abbreviation used in the publications of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) to refer to one of the sixteen personality types. INTJs are one of the rarest of the sixteen personality types, and account for about 1–4% of the population.
The MBTI assessment was developed from the work of prominent psychiatrist Carl G. Jung in his book ‘Psychological Types.’ Jung proposed a psychological typology based on the theories of cognitive functions that he developed through his clinical observations. From Jung’s work, others developed psychological typologies. Continue reading →
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December 2, 2012
Internet Killed Television is a web series which documents the lives of Charles Trippy, his wife Alli and their dogs Zoey and Marley. The show consists of episodes averaging around one to twenty minutes that are filmed, edited, and then aired every day onto YouTube by mid-afternoon Eastern Standard Time. The series was originally planned to last for only one year; however, after the success of the first season, the couple have decided to continue.
The YouTube series has now reached its fourth year and every year, so far, they have reached out to their audience, the CTFxC(ers) to create a montage featuring the main events that had occurred that year. Continue reading →
Posted in Art, Humor, Technology |
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December 2, 2012
First published in 1948 by gynecologist Dr. Arnold Kegel, a pelvic floor exercise, more commonly called a Kegel [key-guhl] exercise, consists of repeatedly contracting and relaxing the muscles that form part of the pelvic floor, now sometimes colloquially referred to as the ‘Kegel muscles.’
Exercises are usually done to reduce urinary incontinence after childbirth, and reduce premature ejaculatory occurrences in men, as well as to increase the size and intensity of erections. The aim of Kegel exercises is to improve muscle tone by strengthening the pubococcygeus (PC muscle) of the pelvic floor. Continue reading →
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November 30, 2012
The moka pot, also known as a stove top espresso machine, is a coffee maker which produces coffee by passing hot water pressurized by steam through ground coffee. It was first patented by inventor Luigi De Ponti for Alfonso Bialetti in 1933. Bialetti Industrie continues to produce the same model under the name ‘Moka Express.’
The moka pot is most commonly used in Europe and in Latin America. It has become an iconic design, displayed in modern industrial art and design museums. Continue reading →
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November 30, 2012
David Rees (b. 1972) is a cartoonist and humorist whose best-known work combines bland clip art with outrageous ‘trash talk’ to incongruous effect. The comic strips have achieved wide popularity and some controversy.
Rees grew up in Chapel Hill, North Carolina and was an avid reader of ‘Rex Morgan, M.D.’ comics. He is a graduate of Oberlin College, and drew comics for the school’s newspaper. His office-cubicle humor is partly inspired by his experience working in a basement for Citicorp; he was later a part time fact-checker for ‘Maxim’ magazine and ‘Martha Stewart Weddings’ magazine, until he was laid off. Rees’s best-known and most controversial comic is ‘Get Your War On.’ Continue reading →
Posted in Humor, Language, Money |
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November 30, 2012
Heisenbug is a whimsical computer programming jargon term for a software bug (glitch) that seems to disappear or alter its behavior when one attempts to study it.
The term is a pun on the name of Werner Heisenberg, the physicist who first asserted the observer effect of quantum mechanics, which states that the act of observing a system inevitably alters its state. Continue reading →
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November 30, 2012
‘Rapture of the Nerds’ is a derisive term for the technological singularity (a theorized future period of superhuman intelligence). Some critics assert that no computer or machine will ever achieve human intelligence, while others hold that the definition of intelligence is irrelevant if the net result is the same.
Cognitive scientist Steven Pinker stated in 2008, ‘There is not the slightest reason to believe in a coming singularity. The fact that you can visualize a future in your imagination is not evidence that it is likely or even possible. Look at domed cities, jet-pack commuting, underwater cities, mile-high buildings, and nuclear-powered automobiles—all staples of futuristic fantasies when I was a child that have never arrived. Sheer processing power is not a pixie dust that magically solves all your problems.’
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November 30, 2012
The South Butt, LLC was a clothing and accessories company founded in 2007 by Jimmy Winkelmann, a then 16-year-old student at Chaminade College Preparatory School. The company dissolved in 2011.
Winkelmann claimed the company was a parody of the The North Face, an American outdoor product company. Continue reading →
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November 29, 2012
The tragedy of the anticommons is a type of coordination breakdown, in which a single resource has numerous rightsholders who prevent others from using it, frustrating what would be a socially desirable outcome. It is a mirror-image of the older concept of tragedy of the commons, in which numerous rightsholders’ combined use exceeds the capacity of a resource and depletes or destroys it.
The concept covers a range of coordination failures including patent thickets, submarine patents, and nail houses. Overcoming these breakdowns can be difficult, but there are assorted means, including eminent domain, laches, patent pools, or other licensing organizations. Continue reading →
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November 29, 2012
In economics, the tragedy of the commons is the depletion of a shared resource by individuals, acting independently and rationally according to each one’s self-interest, despite their understanding that depleting the common resource is contrary to their long-term best interests.
In 1968, ecologist Garrett Hardin explored this social dilemma in ‘The Tragedy of the Commons,’ published in the journal ‘Science.’ Central to Hardin’s article is an example (first sketched in an 1833 pamphlet by William Forster Lloyd) involving medieval land tenure in Europe, of herders sharing a common parcel of land, on which they are each entitled to let their cows graze. Continue reading →
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November 29, 2012
A detection dog or sniffer dog is a dog that is trained to and works at using its senses (almost always the sense of smell) to detect substances such as explosives, illegal drugs, or blood. Hunting dogs that search for game and search dogs that search for missing humans are generally not considered detection dogs.
There is some overlap, as in the case of human remains detection dogs (sometimes called cadaver dogs), trained to detect human remains. They are also used for drug raids to find where the drugs are. In the state of California, dogs are trained to detect the Quagga Mussel on boats at public boat ramps, as it is a invasive species. Continue reading →
Posted in Drugs, Politics, War |
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November 29, 2012
Cyborg anthropology is the discipline that studies the interaction between humanity and technology from an anthropological perspective. The topic originated as a sub-focus group within the American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting in 1993. The sub-group was very closely related to two other academic disciplines, STS (Science, technology and society) and the Society for the Social Studies of Science.
Historian and feminist Donna Haraway’s 1985 ‘Cyborg Manifesto’ could be considered the founding document of cyborg anthropology by first exploring the philosophical and sociological ramifications of the term. More recently, Amber Case has been responsible for setting up the Cyborg Anthropology Wiki.
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