28 Days Later

Why February gets the shaft.
By Melonyce McAfee
Posted Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2007, at 6:51 PM ET

The shortest month of the year seems to have gone by in a flash. Why does February have only 28 days?

It's the Romans' fault. Our modern calendar is loosely based on their old, confusing one. Though records on the Roman calendar are sparse and sketchy, legend has it that Romulus, the first king of Rome, devised a 10-month lunar calendar that began at the spring equinox in March and ended with December. It is unclear whether there were any official months between December and March, but it's likely they were left off because the wintertime wasn't important for the harvest.

The second king of Rome, Numa Pompilius, decided to make the calendar more accurate by syncing it up with the actual lunar year—which is about 354 days long. Numa tacked on two months—January and February—after December to account for the new days.

The new months each had 28 days. But that didn't sit well with Numa because even numbers were considered bad luck at the time. So, he added a day on to January, giving the year an odd-numbered 355 days. No one knows why February was left with 28 and remained an unlucky month. It may be related to the fact that Romans honored the dead and performed rites of purification in February. (The word februare means "to purify" in the dialect of the ancient Sabine tribe.)

The 355-day calendar couldn't stay in sync with the seasons because it didn't account for the amount of time it took for the Earth to orbit the sun. So, an extra "intercalary" month of 27 days was inserted after February 23 every couple of years or so to even things out. The pontiffs who were in charge of calendar upkeep didn't always add the extra month on schedule. (Some officials took advantage of the system to extend their time in office, for example.)

In around 45 B.C., Julius Caesar commissioned an expert to put aside the lunar origins of the Roman calendar and make it sun-based, like the Egyptian one. Caesar added 10 days to the calendar year and an extra day in February every four years. (The leap-year day was inserted after the 23rd, the same time as the old intercalary month.) Now, the year averaged out to 365.25 days, very close to the actual average length of a year: 365.2425 days (and even that varies).

Some have speculated that Caesar added a day to February when he reformed the calendar—making it 29 days long. The story goes that when the Senate renamed the month of Sextilis to honor the emperor Augustus, that day was subtracted from February and added to August in order to make it equal in number to July—the month named for Caesar. But this theory is now believed to be bunk; it's likely that Julius never even added a day to February.

New News Blogger

Alright, because I've become somewhat obsessed with the weird news on Fark, I've noticed I've been sharing more and more of those stories on my home blogger page (this one). That's all about to change!! I've started a new page of weird, amazing, crazy, cool, and/or informative news that I find interesting. That means I won't be filling up this page every day with informational news, so it might be blank more often, but feel free to check out the News & Views page... have fun.

WTF!! Phantom Sequel

Is a Phantom Sequel in the Works?

By Andrew Gans
and Kenneth Jones
20 Feb 2007

The on-again, off-again sequel to Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera seems to be in the on-again mode.

In his Feb. 16 blog, the award-winning composer writes, "I can confirm what I told the studio audience whilst on the set of 'You're The One That I Want' last week in the U.S., that I am considering writing a sequel to Phantom of the Opera based on an idea presented to me over a decade ago. I will be returning to the U.K. shortly and hopefully have a blog for you, but let's just say, I am full of ideas!"

Lloyd Webber had previously written "The Heart Is Slow to Learn," a song for a Phantom sequel. That song was unveiled to the public at the televised London concert celebrating Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday. Kiri Te Kanawa performed the ballad. The composer later dropped the idea of the sequel and chose to collaborate on the musical The Beautiful Game.

The winner of seven 1988 Tony Awards, including Best Musical, The Phantom of the Opera became the longest-running show in Broadway history on Jan. 9, 2006. It surpassed Cats' record-holding run of 7,485 performances. The musical at the Majestic Theatre recently celebrated its 19th birthday on Broadway Jan. 26.

The musical, based on the Gaston Leroux novel, has music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and is directed by Harold Prince. Lyrics are by Charles Hart (with additional lyrics by Richard Stilgoe) and the book is by Richard Stilgoe and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Rambo goes for another tour!

SLY Stallone is making his new Rambo film without blockbuster action scenes for the hero.

The 60-year-old star hopes his fourth movie featuring the Vietnam veteran will follow the success of Rocky Balboa.

Sly said: “It’ll be Rambo reaching old age and dealing with that and a new threat.

“He won’t be outrunning helicopters and dropping napalm. It’s more of an emotional journey.”

Filming on John Rambo is due to begin later this year.

Uses for Ear Hair

Saturday, February 17, 2007
Ear-hair powered space-suits

NASA is investigating the use of a protein found in human ear-hair as a means of powering space suits. The protein converts motion into electrical energy -- and if it's augmented with an electricity-conducting microbe, it could form self-healing, semi-living "skins" that convert Martian wind and even the jogging and walking of astronauts into juice.

They are focusing on a protein called prestin, which is found in the outer hair cells of the human ear. In the cell membranes of these cells, prestin converts electrical voltage into motion, elongating and contracting the cell. This movement amplifies sound in the ear.

However, prestin can also work in reverse, producing electrical charges in response to mechanical stresses, such as tiny vibrations. Each protein is only capable of making nanowatts of electricity, but Matthew Silver and Kranthi Vistakula, both of IntAct Labs, believe that many proteins used together may be able to power small devices or help charge a battery...

But eventually, they say networks of the proteins could form 'power skins' to coat spacesuits, so that the astronauts' natural movement would be able to generate power for their equipment. The skins could also wrap around buildings on the Red Planet, where gusts of wind would activate prestin.

Which Disney Princess Do You Relate Best To?
Snow White YOU ARE SNOW WHITE!!!!
Take The Quiz Now!	Quizzes by myYearbook.com

Anniversary!!!

Today is Chris and I's 1 Year Anniversary!!!

US Navy uses Dolphins with Freaking Lasers!!!

Navy May Deploy Anti-Terrorism Dolphins

By THOMAS WATKINS
Associated Press Writer
SAN DIEGO (AP) -- Dozens of dolphins and sea lions trained to detect and apprehend waterborne attackers could be sent to patrol a military base in Washington state, the Navy said Monday. In a notice published in this week's Federal Register, the Navy said it needs to bolster security at Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, on the Puget Sound close to Seattle.
The base is home to submarines, ships and laboratories and is potentially vulnerable to attack by terrorist swimmers and scuba divers, the notice states.
Several options are under consideration, but the preferred plan would be to send as many as 30 California sea lions and Atlantic Bottlenose dolphins from the Navy's Marine Mammal Program, based in San Diego.
"These animals have the capabilities for what needs to be done for this particular mission," said Tom LaPuzza, a spokesman for the Marine Mammal Program.
LaPuzza said that because of their astonishing sonar abilities, dolphins are excellent at patrolling for swimmers and divers. When a Navy dolphin detects a person in the water, it drops a beacon. This tells a human interception team where to find the suspicious swimmer.
Dolphins also are trained to detect underwater mines; they were sent to do this in the Iraqi harbor of Umm Qasr in 2003. The last time the animals were used operationally in San Diego was in 1996, when they patrolled the bay during the Republican National Convention.
Sea lions can carry in their mouths special cuffs attached to long ropes. If the animal finds a rogue swimmer, it can clamp the cuff around the person's leg. The individual can then be reeled in for questioning.
The Navy is seeking public comment for an environmental impact statement on the proposal.
The Navy wanted to deploy marine animals to the Northwest in 1989, LaPuzza said, but a federal judge sided with animal-rights activists concerned about the effects of cooler water, as well as how the creatures would affect the environment. Water in the Puget Sound is about 10 degrees cooler than in San Diego Harbor, which has an average temperature of about 58 degrees, LaPuzza said.
Since then, the Navy has taken the dolphins and sea lions to cold-water places like Alaska and Scandinavia to see how they cope.
"They did very well," LaPuzza said. If the animals are sent to Washington, the dolphins would be housed in heated enclosures and would patrol the bay only for periods of about two hours.
Stephanie Boyles, a marine biologist and spokeswoman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, said that sea mammals do not provide a reliable defense system, and that they should not be kept in small enclosures.
"We believe the United States' citizens deserve the very best defense possible, and this just isn't it," Boyles said, adding that dolphins are easily distracted once in open water. "They don't understand the consequences of what will happen if they don't carry out the mission."
Dolphins can live as long as 30 years. LaPuzza said the Navy occasionally gives its retired animals to marine parks but generally keeps them until they die of old age.
The Navy has been training marine mammals since the 1960s and keeps about 100 dolphins and sea lions. Most are in San Diego, but about 20 are deployed at Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, Ga.
The Navy hopes eventually to downsize its marine mammal program and replace the animals with machines.
"But the technology just isn't there yet," LaPuzza said. "The value of the marine mammals is we've been doing this for 35 years, and we've ironed out all the kinks."

Car Trash

A car crash in West Yarmouth led police to the discovery of a filthy car filled to the brim with trash and rubbish.

According to police, there was so much trash inside 53-year-old Ann Biglan's Ford Focus, it completely filled the inside from the floor to the ceiling front and back.

The copious amounts of trash apparently caused the crash. Biglan told police several old coffee cups and pieces of trash fell onto the gas and brake pedal, which caused her to lose control while backing out of a parking space near the West Yarmouth Post Office.

Police said the trash that fell on the pedal caused the Focus to pick up speed, drive over a curb, across Route 28, hit a Ford Explorer and back over a sidewalk. Biglan's car finally came to a rest after crashing into a flowerpot in the parking lot of the West Yarmouth Mobil gas station.

No one was injured during the crash. Bigan is charged with impeded operation of a motor vehicle, negligent operation of a motor vehicle, failure to use care in backing, operating with a rejected safety inspection sticker.

The Holy Grail of Geek Lists

Star Trek Meets the Holy Grail!!!...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnCvpJwKKpw

Which brings us to....

Fifteen geek movies to see before you die!!!!

• Brazil
• The Matrix
• The Fifth Element
• Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan
• Star Trek: The Voyage Home
• Serenity
• Dark City
• 12 Monkeys
• Shaun of the Dead
• Darkman
• Army of Darkness
• War Games
• Monty Python & the Holy Grail
• Office Space
• Repo Man

From the count (10 of 15) it logically seems that I'll be dead sooner than I thought. What's your count?

11 Most Important Philisophical Questions (& Why)

1. “The unexamined life is not worth living” – Socrates (470-399 BCE)

Socrates’ [wiki] belief that we must reflect upon the life we live was partly inspired by the famous phrase inscribed at the shrine of the oracle at Delphi, “Know thyself.” The key to finding value in the prophecies of the oracle was self-knowledge, not a decoder ring.

Socrates felt so passionately about the value of self-examination that he closely examined not only his own beliefs and values but those of others as well. More precisely, through his relentless questioning, he forced people to examine their own beliefs. He saw the citizens of his beloved Athens sleepwalking through life, living only for money, power, and fame, so he became famous trying to help them.

2. “Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily” – William of Ockham (1285 - 1349?)

Commonly known as Ockham’s razor, the idea here is that in judging among competing philosophical or scientific theories, all other things being equal, we should prefer the simplest theory. Scientists currently speak of four forces in the universe: gravity, the electromagnetic force, the strong nuclear force, and the weak nuclear force. Ockham [wiki] would certainly nod approvingly at the ongoing attempt to formulate a grand unified theory, a single force that encompasses all four.

The ultimate irony of Ockham’s razor may be that some have used it to prove God is unnecessary to the explanation of the universe, an idea Ockham the Franciscan priest would reject.

3. “The life of man [is] solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” – Thomas Hobbes (1588 – 1679)

Referring to the original state of nature, a hypothetical past before civilization, Hobbes [wiki] saw no reason to be nostalgic.

Whereas Rousseau said, “Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains,” Hobbes believed we find ourselves living a savage, impossible life without education and the protection of the state. Human nature is bad: we’ll prey on one another in the most vicious ways. No doubt the state imposes on our liberty in an overwhelming way. Yet Hobbes’ claim was that these very chains were absolutely crucial in protecting us from one another.

4. “I think therefore I am” – René Descartes (1596 – 1650)

Descartes [wiki] began his philosophy by doubting everything in order to figure out what he could know with absolute certainty. Although he could be wrong about what he was thinking, that he was thinking was undeniable. Upon the recognition that “I think,” Descartes concluded that “I am.”

On the heels of believing in himself, Descartes asked, What am I? His answer: a thinking thing (res cogitans) as opposed to a physical thing extended in three-dimensional space (res extensa). So, based on this line, Descartes knew he existed, though he wasn’t sure if he had a body. It’s a philosophical cliff-hanger; you’ll have to read Meditations to find out how it ends.

5. “To be is to be perceived (Esse est percipi).” Or, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” – Bishop George Berkeley (1685 – 1753)

As an idealist, Berkeley [wiki] believed that nothing is real but minds and their ideas. Ideas do not exist independently of minds. Through a complicated and flawed line of reasoning he concluded that “to be is to be perceived.” Something exists only if someone has the idea of it.

Though he never put the question in the exact words of the famous quotation, Berkeley would say that if a tree fell in the forest and there was no one (not even a squirrel) there to hear it, not only would it not make a sound, but there would be no tree.

The good news is, according to Berkeley, that the mind of God always perceives everything. So the tree will always make a sound, and there’s no need to worry about blipping out of existence if you fall asleep in a room by yourself.

6. “We live in the best of all possible worlds.” – Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646 – 1716)

Voltaire’s famous novel Candide satirizes this optimistic view. And looking around you right now you may wonder how anyone could actually believe it. But Leibniz [wiki] believed that before creation God contemplated every possible way the universe could be and chose to create the one in which we live because it’s the best.

The principle of sufficient reason holds that for everything, there must be sufficient reason why it exists. And according to Leibniz the only sufficient reason for the world we live in is that God created it as the best possible universe. God could have created a universe in which no one ever did wrong, in which there was no human evil, but that would require humans to be deprived of the gift of free wills and thus would not be the best possible world.

7. “The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk.” G.W.F. Hegel (1770 – 1831)

Similar to “vision is 20/20 in hindsight,” Hegel’s [wiki] poetic insight says that philosophers are impotent. Only after the end of an age can philosophers realize what it was about. And by then it’s too late to change things. It wasn’t until the time of Immanuel Kant (1724 - 1804) that the true nature of the Enlightenment was understood, and Kant did nothing to change the Enlightenment; he just consciously perpetuated it.

Marx (1818 – 1883) found Hegel’s apt description to be indicative of the problem with philosophy and responded, “the philosophers have only interpreted the world differently, what matters is to change it.”

8. “Who is also aware of the tremendous risk involved in faith – when he nevertheless makes the leap of faith – this [is] subjectivity … at its height.” – Søren Kierkegaard (1813 – 1855)

In a memorable scene from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indy deduced that the final step across his treacherous path was a leap of faith. And so it is in Kierkegaard’s [wiki] theory of stages of life.

The final stage, the religious stage, requires passionate, subjective belief rather than objective proof, in the paradoxical and the absurd. So, what’s the absurd? That which Christianity asks us to accept as true, that God became man born of a virgin, suffered, died and was resurrected.

Abraham was the ultimate “knight of faith” according to Kierkegaard. Without doubt there is no faith, and so in a state of “fear and trembling” Abraham was willing to break the universal moral law against murder by agreeing to kill his own son, Isaac. God rewarded Abraham’s faith by providing a ram in place of Isaac for the sacrifice. Faith has its rewards, but it isn’t rational. It’s beyond reason. As Blaise Pascal said, “The heart has its reason which reason does not know.”

9. “God is dead.” – Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 – 1900)

Well, you might not hear this one in a graduation speech, but you’ll probably hear it in college. Actually, Nietzsche [wiki] never issued this famous proclamation in his own voice but rather put the words in the mouth of a character he called the madman and later in the mouth of another character, Zarathustra.

Nevertheless, Nietzsche endorsed the words. “God is dead” is often mistaken as a statement of atheism. It is not, though Nietzsche himself was an atheist. “Dead” is metaphorical in this context, meaning belief in the God of Christianity is worn out, past its prime, and on the decline. God is lost as the center of life and the source of values. Nietzsche’s madman noted that himself came too soon. No doubt Nietzsche, too, thought he was ahead of his time in heralding this news.

10. “There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.” – Albert Camus (1913 – 1960)

Camus’ [wiki] solution to the philosophical problem was to recognize and embrace life’s absurdity. Suicide, though, remains an option if the absurdity becomes too much. Indeed Camus’ own death in a car crash was ambiguous. Was it an accident or suicide?

For Camus, the absurd hero is Sisyphus, a man from Greek mythology who is condemned by the gods for eternity to roll up a stone up a hill only to have it fall back again as it reaches the top. For Camus, Sisyphus typified all human beings: we must find a meaning in a world that is unresponsive or even hostile to us. Sisyphus, Camus believed, affirms life, choosing to go back down the hill and push the rock again each time. Camus wrote: “The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s
heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”

11. “One cannot step twice in the same river.” – Heraclitus (ca. 540 – ca. 480 BCE)

Heraclitus definitely isn’t alone here. His message was that reality is constantly changing it’s an ongoing process rather than a fixed and stable product. Buddhism shares a similar metaphysical view with the idea of annica, the claim that all reality is fleeting and impermanent.

In modern times Henri Bergson (1859 – 1941) described time as a process that is experienced. An hour waiting in line is different from an hour at play. Today contemporary physics lends credence to process philosophy with the realization that even apparently stable objects, like marble statues, are actually buzzing bunches of electrons and other subatomic particles deep down.

Bonus: Fake Your Way Through a Conversation (with Correct Pronunciation!)

If you fumble with a philosopher’s name, nothing you say afterward will sound credible. So, learn to pronounce these names correctly, then start worrying about their ideas.

(George) Berkeley is properly pronounced like Charles Barkley (bark-lee). This name is commonly mispronounced “burk-lee” like Berkeley, California, which, ironically, is named after George Berkeley.

(Friedrich) Nietzsche is commonly mispronounced as “nee-chee.” The correct pronunciation is “nee-ch-ya” and rhymes with “pleased ta meetchya.” “Pleased ta meetchya, Neechya.” Say it!

Lao-tzu (born ca. 604 BCE) is spelled several different ways in English transliteration from the Chinese. But no matter how you spell it, the proper way to pronounce it is “lau” (sounds like “ouch”)-“dsuh”. The stress goes on the first syllable.

(Charles Sanders) Pierce (1839 – 1914) is commonly mispronounced as “peer-s.” The correct pronunciation is “purse,” which is somewhat funny because Pierce rarely had a penny in his purse. Oddly, Pierce took his middle name, Sanders, as an anglicized form of Santiago, or “St. James,” in honor of a fellow pragmatist, William James (1842 – 1910), who helped him out financially.

(Ludwig) Wittgenstein (1889 – 1951) is a name that demands authentic German pronunciation, and there are plenty of ways to slaughter it. Here’s one that embodies all of them, “wit-jen-steen.” The correct pronunciation is “vit” (rhymes with bit)-“ghen” (rhymes with ken)-“shtine.” The first name is pronounced “lude-vig.” If you think it’s hard to pronounce his name, try reading his Tractatus.

Super Bowl XLI

The Colt's won. It was a very exciting game of super bowl firsts. Sorry Bears.

Bond, Tom Hanks

Press play, you'll enjoy this. I promise.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wOcQr-2-pE