Things I am interested in…

On “the continuing controversy over online file sharing”, and non-scarce resources:

•  Piracy Is Progressive Taxation by Tim O’Rielly.
•  Giving It Away and Ebooks: Neither E, Nor Books by Cory Doctorow.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out.  It looks to me like the entertainment and media companies are getting pretty worried, but they do punch above their weight with the legislative bodies in the good old US of A.

(will take over the world)

 Not really going to happen any time soon.

 However, to see an intersting video of a modular robot that can convert from a snake to a hoop to a spider and back again, go here.

Well it’s always good to have one’s horizons expanded…

Here are two sites I have come accross recently that connect quite well with my own personal set of interests.  To expand on this – I am a doctor, currently training in the speciality of psychiatry.  Both of these websites have a connection with psychiatry, though I have to say in my opinion most things do.

 So, without further ado:

• an anti-aging blog
• another blog, intriguingly titled “Neurophilosophy“

(excuse the pun!)

 Just heard on a podcast I was listening to while walking to work (Scientific American Science Talk) that the fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has finished this week.

 Here are some interesting factoids from this:

• Internationally, scientists are 90% certain that the increase in mean global temperature of 0.75 degrees centigrade since recording began during the Industrial Revolution (1850) is due to human activities, as is the ongoing rise in temperature
• Eleven out of twelve of the most recent summers have been the warmest on record (again, since 1850)
• The global atmospheric concentration of CO2 has increased from a pre-industrial average of 280 parts per million (ppm) to the most recent measurement of 379 ppm in 2005
• The rate of increase of atmospheric CO2 has been larger in 1995-2005 (1.9 ppm per year) than it has been in the 145 years preceding (1.4 ppm per year on average)
• If all human CO2 production were to freeze at current levels tomorrow, the mean global temperature would rise about another 0.5 degrees by the end of the century
• If things continue in the worst possible way, with unabated greenhouse gas production, then scientists are predicting a further rise in mean global temperature of about 4 degrees by the end of this century
• If that is the case (i.e., worst case scenario) then two to four billion people will face water shortages by the end of the century, and a further 170 million person’s homes will be under water due to the 0.4m seea level rise

According to the podcast, this is a very conservative report – it had to be so that all of the governments involved would agree to its publication.

 I personally think this is food for thought…

There is a nice photo of my partner Jen holding my niece Katherine, that will go here as soon as I track it down…