A Rube Goldberg pancake machine

If you’re of a certain age (an age even bigger than mine, but I read old stuff), you’ll know about the amazing and amusing inventions—most of them imaginary—of cartoonist Reuben Garrett Lucius “Rube” Goldberg (1883 – 1970).  Here’s one example of his imaginary devices: an alarm clock triggered by the arrival of the early bird catching a […]

What kind of computer does the Mars rover use?

Although we never talk about computers here, I’m absolutely sure that many readers are into them.  And even I was curious to know what kind of computer was onboard the Mars rover Curiosity.  Well, it turns out that, much to my delight (I’ve always been an Macintosh man), it’s an Apple “Airport Extreme”.  The description […]

Recognizing a cat

Elebenty gazillion readers sent me this story (with diverse links) over the last ten days.  Thanks to all of you, who are now too numerous to name. (See links at The New York Times, Wired Science, and the BBC, among others.) The interesting results are encoded in scientific language in the abstract of a yet-unpublished […]