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In the South Seas there is a cargo cult of people. During the war they saw airplanes with lots of good materials, and they want the same thing to happen now. So they've arranged to make things like runways, to put fires along the sides of the runways, to make a wooden hut for a man to sit in, with two wooden pieces on his head to headphones and bars of bamboo sticking out like antennas--he's the controller--and they wait for the airplanes to land. They're doing everything right. The form is perfect. It looks exactly the way it looked before. But it doesn't work. No airplanes land. Excerpt from Cargo Cult Science by Richard Feynman
posted by pieoverdone at 7:15 PM PST - 49 comments

A Senate bill to overhaul federal bankruptcy laws, a top priority of retailers, auto lenders and banks, cleared a key hurdle Tuesday afternoon. Sixty-nine senators -- nine more than needed -- voted for "cloture," a procedural move that limits debate. Republican leaders hope to push the bill to a final vote by the end of the week. Earlier, the Senate turned back a controversial, abortion-related amendment that has scuttled previous efforts to pass bankruptcy legislation. The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 was first introduced in 1998 as The Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act.
posted by airguitar at 7:09 PM PST - 63 comments

Build an Igloo. Snow f**king sucks.
posted by jeremias at 6:59 PM PST - 12 comments

The Unspoken Language of the Office. Not to be confused with the BBC or NBC television programs. How to get back to reading MetaFilter as quickly as possible. [via lifehacker]
posted by FlamingBore at 6:59 PM PST - 11 comments

Vader Boosts Morale [via golublog]
posted by kliuless at 6:46 PM PST - 16 comments

Stonecipher Out At Boeing. While it may seem Harry Stonecipher, the Savior of Boeing, quit over an affair, is that all there is to it?
posted by nj_subgenius at 6:26 PM PST - 6 comments

This is a very odd way to find out about a volcanic eruption. Shame it is sunset, and the webcam isn't showing much.
posted by eriko at 6:24 PM PST - 9 comments

The 2005 Flashforward Finalists for the San Francisco conference have been announced. Loads of cutting-edge Flash fun for a snowed-in evening. Vote for your favorites.
posted by ChasFile at 5:39 PM PST - 6 comments

Maine is an exciting place for children.
posted by Mayor Curley at 3:33 PM PST - 24 comments

Raise a herd of bizarre neon sheep things. AND BUILD A SPACESHIP!! Mean guys try to make them work in jewel mines and you need to defend them. I think it's about Marxism or something. [More incredible BBC games here.]
posted by Kleptophoria! at 3:16 PM PST - 6 comments

"We pledge to fight ‘blue-sky thinking’ wheresoever we find it!"
Clouds can be strange looking, majestic, colourful, freaky, ominous or electric to name but a few.
Perhaps you’d like to go cloud ’surfing’ in a glider along a 600 mile cloud formation that appears in Queensland (film links/explanation) later in the year?
Or would you rather view your clouds from satellite?
You can otherwise study cloud formations at your leisure if you want.

There’s a million more sites around of course – first link via.
posted by peacay at 3:08 PM PST - 14 comments

Drawn! is Johnny Martz's new baby... and I'm pretty excited, as I love looking at illustrator's work but I'm just not motivated enough to go out and find it myself. Hopefully he'll include Adam Rex, our own Claire Robertson, and Kyle Cummings in up-coming posts.
posted by silusGROK at 2:53 PM PST - 6 comments

SexID Some researchers say that men can have 'women's brains' and that women can think more like men. Find out more about 'brain sex' differences by taking the Sex ID test, a groundbreaking experiment designed by a team of top psychologists:
posted by srboisvert at 2:26 PM PST - 81 comments

Todd Solondz + Childrens Television Workshop [Flash; Not Safe For Anyone]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 2:25 PM PST - 18 comments

A new poll finds that the American public would significantly alter the Bush administration’s recently proposed federal budget. Presented a breakdown of the major areas of the proposed discretionary budget and given the opportunity to redistribute it, respondents made major changes. The most dramatic changes were deep cuts in defense spending, a significant reallocation toward deficit reduction, and increases in spending on education, job training, reducing reliance on oil, and veterans. These changes were favored by both Republicans and Democrats, though the changes were generally greater for Democrats.
What America Gets Right (pdf) via The Gadflyer
posted by y2karl at 12:53 PM PST - 49 comments

Yikes! The strange case of the homosexual necrophiliac duck pushed out the boundaries of knowledge in a rather improbable way when it was recorded by Dutch researcher Kees Moeliker.
posted by Shanachie at 11:24 AM PST - 17 comments

“The problem is not to make political films but to make films politically.”
In "Tout Va Bien", just released on Criterion DVD, four years after May '68 Jean-Luc Godard and Jean-Pierre Gorin examine the wreckage: fading workers' empowerment (page with sound), media fatuity, capitalist sprawl, global imperialist mayhem, interpersonal disconnections. "Tout Va Bien" is the story of a strike at a factory as witnessed by an American reporter (Jane Fonda) and her has-been New Wave film director husband (Yves Montand). Included on the DVD is also Letter to Jane (1972), a short film in which Godard and Gorin spend an hour examining the semiotics of a single, hypnotizing photograph of Fonda as she shares feelings with a Vietnamese villager. More inside.
posted by matteo at 11:13 AM PST - 18 comments

“Martin Meyer shoots what remains. The material of everyday life and death on the street. A dead pigeon, cat, rodent, squirrel. Accidents of everyday expression. A plastic doll fallen in a cake, her nose white with frosting. Jesus Christ's senior picture hanging from the rear view mirror. The fallen and the raised. Religious paraphernalia. Nationalistic displays. Epithets in aerosol. A dashboard hero pirouette. There's a story being told here.” And his Flash virtual tour of Brooklyn is amazing, too. [Probably safe for work, but definitely includes some disturbing imagery. YMMV]
posted by Man O' Straw at 11:07 AM PST - 7 comments

Pinball an historic American art form. Although early versions were boring by today’s standards, modern machines are a marvelous blend of sophisticated software and ingenious hardware. Pinball is often associated with gambling, and has always had a bad reputation. The industry has been in decline since Pong and Pac-man conspired to take over the arcade. With fewer and fewer machines available for the public to play, enthusiasts have started collecting and repairing the machines for home use. Some people take it to extremes.

The great pinball makers of the glory days are gone: Williams now makes slot machines, Gottlieb is long gone, and Bally was folded into Williams in the mid-90’s. Only one company is still making pinball machines: Stern Pinball, Inc. If you have an old favorite, find it in the Internet Pinball Database. For the sake of completeness, Mefites have talked about pinball before.
posted by cosmicbandito at 10:28 AM PST - 57 comments

If your European ancestors survived the Bubonic Plague 700 years ago, they very likely may have also passed on to you a mutation of the CCR5 gene -- called delta 32. This may not sound exciting, but delta 32 is a powerful mistake. HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, attacks the human immune system, infecting the white blood cells sent to destroy it. The delta 32 mutation, however, effectively blocks the crucial gateway into human cells the virus needs. In fact, possessing delta 32 could save your life, and the lives of your children.
posted by lola at 9:36 AM PST - 47 comments

KA-BOOM! I know Duke was based on him, but i was expecting...oh i dont know...a little nicer?
posted by ShawnString at 9:28 AM PST - 99 comments

Living Jewels: amazing photographs of beetles. [via]
posted by monju_bosatsu at 9:22 AM PST - 17 comments

Russian prosecutors have apparently decided not to take any action against Allofmp3.com (previously discussed here) , a Russian website which offers copyrighted mp3's for sale. The Moscow prosecutors reason is that Russian copyright laws only apply to physical media such as CD's tapes etc., not to digital media. If this decision is upeld, will it open the floodgates for others to start openly selling copyrighted material?
posted by bap98189 at 8:57 AM PST - 25 comments

Information for Disabled Travelers Travel may be a basic human right, but it's one that some find harder to exercise; from getting past clueless immigration officials to dealing with a constipated service dog on a cruise ship, tourism presents special challenges to the physically disabled. Fortunately, there's a wealth of information online, including accessibility info for Eurostar trains and specific airlines (the latter courtesy of The Society for Accessible Travel and Hospitality), and first-hand accessibility reports from Global Access, Access-Able Travel Source, Rebecca's Travels, The World On Wheels and The Gimp On The Go.
posted by yankeefog at 8:49 AM PST - 2 comments

If you are going to SXSW next week, you might want to download the 2005 Showcasing Artist BitTorrent file that CitizenPod has put together. It features over 750 high-quality songs; over 2 GBs worth of tracks from bands playing the festival. [via OneLouder]
posted by Quartermass at 7:23 AM PST - 10 comments

Punk Rock Scrapbook. J Neo Marvin carried an instamatic camera to a lot of gigs way back when, and he has posted them on his band's website. The Clash, X, The Ramones and more.
posted by planetkyoto at 7:05 AM PST - 19 comments

The Cathode Ray Tube Site Electronic glassware: history and physical equipment.
posted by carter at 7:02 AM PST - 4 comments

101 Zen Stories.
posted by sciurus at 6:17 AM PST - 28 comments

Favela Faces. The stories of four people in Rio's favelas.
posted by plep at 5:17 AM PST - 3 comments