Yesterday around 14.30 a big quake hit the Sendai area in Japan, followed by a tsunami and a contiguous stream of additional shocks. I immediately contacted friends in Tokyo and they are all fine. Transportation in Tokyo is interrupted, and so is communication. I don’t know any more details. I just have news from a [...]
Some time ago, I proposed the foundation of a Question and Answer site for Academia. Now, the Academia StackExchange has reached commitment phase, meaning that the proposal aggregated a consistent number of people who may have an interest in it, and further aggregation of active participant is sought after. You may report your interest in [...]
February 25, 2011 – 12:45 am
Nothing says relax better than a peaceful evening in front of a steamy cup of chamomile. Since thousands of years, humanity uses it as a natural remedy for a large amount of ailments, most notably hypertension, sleeplessness and to ease a flu-dominated night, like in my case recently. Moved by curiosity, I took some time [...]
February 22, 2011 – 12:55 am
I recently bought this 240 Gigabytes of awesomeness, conveniently packed into a 2.5″ SATA box. It’s an Other World Computing Mercury Extreme Solid State Hard Drive. It has no moving parts, it consumes less battery, and it’s fast. Damn fast. This thing is so fast it opens applications before you lift your finger from the [...]
February 7, 2011 – 3:03 pm
As you probably recall, some time ago I proposed to associate scientific dissemination and research to a symbol. I chose this symbol to be the tulip, and I planted some bulbs. As winter will turn into spring soon, they start peeking out of the cold soil Satisfying! This year, I decided to donate my royalties [...]
January 26, 2011 – 6:00 pm
I love the movie reviews made by RedLetterMedia. They are irreverent and to the point, and they are not only a real pleasure to watch, but also an interesting insight in how movie critics is performed. My favorite review is from Star Wars – Episode 1 – the Phantom Menace. While I agree with the [...]
January 10, 2011 – 12:25 am
It’s always a pleasing experience to change someone’s point of view by introducing him a new, simple concept. When this someone is a friend, the pleasure is even greater. A few days ago I had a conversation with a friend, about how to deal with the uncertainties of life, in particular about employment, marriage and [...]
December 21, 2010 – 8:19 pm
I happened to read this very interesting article from The Economist with title “The disposable academic – Why doing a PhD is often a waste of time“. The article details in accurate terms the current condition of post-MasterDegree formation and professional development in the field of academic research. I invite you to read it, and [...]
December 17, 2010 – 4:04 pm
This is the coolest application I’ve ever seen. It does text recognition of the movie feed coming from the iPhone, then translates the text to another language on the fly (currently, Spanish to English and vice-versa) and renders the translated version on the movie itself, with proper coloring. The effect is so beautiful to be [...]
December 4, 2010 – 1:54 am
As you probably heard in the news, two days ago everyone was ablaze for a mysterious announcement from NASA. Speculation started on how the new discovery would “impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.” Someone found a habitable planet? Found a message with Seti@HOME? Discovered the primordial soup composition? The buzz resonated and amplified at [...]