From the Bad Astronomer, with the comment:
Some people might consider this a sin, but hey: I’m no angle.
… and if you don’t get it, this might help. Or you could try searching on it; secant you shall find.
Sine of the times
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Monthly Archives: October 2011
A woman of renaissance Italy
Salad Bowl
Once on Iron Chef America one of the chefs was using an electric drill. Alton Brown commented that he loves to see stuff from the hardware store in the kitchen. I don’t think he has seen this yet :-)>
New measurements and what they mean
Noted planetary astronomer Mike Brown wrote:
One of the nice things about science is that no matter what you do, eventually, someone is likely to come along and make the same measurement more precisely than you did, and you will get to learn whether you were right or whether you screwed something up. When you screw up, you do so in a very public manner. Everyone knows. You don’t look so good. It’s best to not screw up.
Monday Night Irish Class, October 24, 2011
Irish Class, October 24, 2011
Rang Gaeilge, an 24ú lá Mí Dheireadh Fómhair 2011
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Will was out, so we joined Mary’s class for the
evening. Mary was also out at another class for the first 45-50 minutes. This was prearranged, and
JS and I had been asked to run the class in her absence. I was a little scared of this, but it actually was
OK.
Found in the Citadel of Tiryns
An Ivory Rod with a Cuneiform Inscription. Abstract [I added a few web links]:
The subject of this contribution is the fragment of an ivory rod with six cuneiform signs
that was found in 2002. The rod came to light in a destruction layer dating to LH III B
Final within a workshop for skilled crafting inside Building XI which is situated in the
northernmost part of the Lower Citadel of Tiryns. The inscription is interpreted as the
first example of an Ugaritic text found outside of the Levant. The text is written from
left to right combining Akkadian logographic numerical signs and at least one letter
of the regular Ugaritic alphabet. After discussing different possibilities concerning the
object’s function. an interpretation as a «tally stick» is proposed. i. e. a mnemonic device
to document numbers. quantities or possibly a message, that was used by Levantine or
Cypriote specialists for skilled crafting who were working in Building XI on behalf of
the palace. The find assemblage in Building XI serves as a reminder that it would be
highly misleading to regard oriental objects like the ivory rod with cuneiform signs or
wall brackets appearing in a Mycenaean harbor town such as Tiryns as mere «exotica».
Instead. contextual analysis demonstrates that the Users were well aware of the special
significance attached to such objects in the east and employed them in accordance with
practices of Near Eastern or Cypriote origin, thus signaling their cultural affiliations.
From Explorator
From the Antarctic crime beat….
‘Criminal’ penguin caught on film.
As you can see, the perp has this down to a routine.
From Skepchick.
What is a magazine?
…. An iPad that does not work:
From Cosmic Variance
Another look at the OPERA experiment
Following up on Not so fast, folks…..
Game Over for Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos?: Another experiment looking at the same neutrino beam shows results that cannot be reconciled with FTL neutrinos.
Monday Night Irish Class, October 17, 2011
Irish Class, October 17, 2011
Rang Gaeilge, an 17ú lá Mí Dheireadh Fómhair 2011
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From Hilbert Space to Dilbert Space, and beyond 