Jonathan Frei's Blog

"A person who exists only for the sake of his loved one is not an independent entity, but a spiritual..."

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 07:30:06 -0500

“A person who exists only for the sake of his loved one is not an independent entity, but a spiritual parasite. The love of a parasite is worth nothing.”

- Ayn Rand via Letters of Note, where you can read the full letter with this quote in context.

Jacob Sutton’s L.E.D. Snowboarder (by...

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 07:00:06 -0500

Jacob Sutton’s L.E.D. Snowboarder (by tb303meets606).

Fashion photographer and filmmaker Jacob Sutton swaps the studio for the slopes of Tignes in the Rhône-Alpes region of south-eastern France, with a luminous after hours short starring Artec pro snowboarder William Hughes. The electrifying film sees Hughes light up the snow-covered French hills in a bespoke L.E.D.-enveloped suit courtesy of designer and electronics whizz John Spatcher.

There's a place to go if you're paranoid

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 06:30:06 -0500

I’m not paranoid on the web (yet), but if I were I’m happy to know there’s a place to go. DuckDuckGo, the anonymous web browser, has an illustrated guide called Google tracks you. We don’t that explains their philosophy of the web.

DuckDuckGo has also published a guide to Escape your search engine Filter Bubble! which is helpful to understanding how your search history eventually filters web results to fit your world view.

If you’re curious to know what Google knows about you, you can view your Google web history.

Awesome. Flavorwire’s compilations of The 20 Most...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 07:30:06 -0500

Awesome. Flavorwire’s compilations of The 20 Most Beautiful Bookstores in the World makes me wonder at what I’m missing having switched most of my reading to a kindle and computer screen.

Breaking an addiction to Equasy or banning it entirely

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

Jeff Stier of Reason Magazine, in his essay Modern-Day Prohibition, shared the story of psychopharmacologist David Nutt, who didn’t think Ecstasy and LSD should be categorized among the most dangerous drugs. Instead of backing down to critics and detractors, he wrote a satirical article, analyzing another addiction.

He analyzed “an addiction called ‘Equasy’ that kills ten people a year, causes brain damage and has been linked to the early onset of Parkinson’s disease.” Nut added that Equasy “releases endorphins, can create dependence and is responsible for over 100 road traffic accidents every year.” Had Nutt not revealed that Equasy was simply the time-honored sport of horseback riding, activists certainly would have rushed to introduce a ban. Nutt pointed out that since Equasy causes acute harm to one out of 350 riders, it is far riskier than Ecstasy, for which the fraction is one out of 10,000.

The point in all of this is that prohibitions and bans are more based on the perception of risk, rather than statistics. Stier continues:

It is hard to miss the similarities between current prohibition campaigns and their historical predecessors. The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union’s “stated desire was to ‘reform, so far as possible, by religious, ethical, and scientific means the drinking classes.’ ” Likewise today, says Snowdon, self-righteous activists and their allies in government do not seek to improve public health by following the dictates of science but rather use pseudoscientific arguments and “subtle deceit” to advance laws that dictate how we live.

School Kills Creativity - Ken Robinson (by...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 06:30:06 -0500

School Kills Creativity - Ken Robinson (by koekskesberg).

There’s also his TED Talk version.

via xkcd: Kerning

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 07:30:06 -0500

via xkcd: Kerning

THE COMPOSITES

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

THE COMPOSITES:

The Composites is a very strange website where Brian Joseph Davis inputs descriptions of literary characters into law enforcement composite sketch software.

Obviously, I’m not condoning piracy, but it’s clear...

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0500

Obviously, I’m not condoning piracy, but it’s clear from this image that it’s not just about saving money. People are willing to pay if you offer them what they want, but if there is a large burden or inconvenience in going through legitimate avenues, they will look elsewhere.

“Cigarettes are like squirrels. They’re not...

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 07:30:05 -0500

“Cigarettes are like squirrels. They’re not dangerous until you put one in your mouth and light it on fire.” [via celluloidblonde]

This is what life was like before Google fixed it. (via...

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

This is what life was like before Google fixed it.

(via Shoebox » Chuck & Beans)

"Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities;..."

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0500

“Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.”

- Mark Twain in Following the Equator

via Brain Pickings

"The value of goals is not in the future they describe, but the change in perception of reality they..."

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 07:30:06 -0500

“The value of goals is not in the future they describe, but the change in perception of reality they foster. What we focus on changes what we notice. Our brain filters information, seeing one thing in a situation instead of something else, based on what we identify with, what we have our attention on, what we’re looking for—more or less consciously.”

- David Allen, Productive Living

Follow the TV References Pleatedjeans put together this video...

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

Follow the TV References

Pleatedjeans put together this video chain of TV shows referencing other TV shows.

The clips are from come from Saturday Night Live, 30 Rock, Community, South Park, Hannah Montana, Law and Order, Beavis and Butthead, Full House, The Simpsons, Scrubs, Gilmore Girls, The Office, Entourage, Arrested Development, Family Guy, The Fresh Prince, Saved by the Bell, Married With Children, Friends, …and back to Saturday Night Live

Marry a happy person. (via Dilbert comic strip for 02/10/2012...

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 06:30:05 -0500

Marry a happy person.

(via Dilbert comic strip for 02/10/2012 from the official Dilbert comic strips archive.)

Art History Through Sci Fi-Colored Glasses

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 07:30:05 -0500

Art History Through Sci Fi-Colored Glasses

"If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go with a group."

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

“If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go with a group.”

- - African proverb

Wordpharmacy is a concrete poetical work, which playfully...

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 06:30:06 -0500

Wordpharmacy is a concrete poetical work, which playfully equates the structure of language with pharmaceutical products. It consists of ten medicine boxes, each representing one of the ten word-groups. Each box contains a leaflet that functions as an instructional poem, guiding the reader’s ingestion of the given word group.

(via Wordpharmacy Family)

I don’t know if anyone I know will get this. (via...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 07:30:05 -0500

I don’t know if anyone I know will get this.

(via ThinkGeek :: ~/ Sweet ~/ Welcome Mat)

Under the Microscope #6 by CambridgeUniversity Cancer cells get...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 07:00:05 -0500

Under the Microscope #6 by CambridgeUniversity

Cancer cells get attacked by a killer T cell in this video by University of Cambridge researchers.

Cytotoxic T cells are very precise and efficient killers. They are able to destroy infected or cancerous cells, without destroying healthy cells surrounding them.