A diagram from the 1969 study, A Dynamical Explanation of the Falling Cat Phenomenon, by Kane and Scher of Stanford University. Apparently one of the very few scientific papers on cat physics.
Kane and Scher neither lifted nor dropped a single cat. Instead, they created a mathematical abstraction of a cat: two imaginary cylinder-like chunks, joined at a single point so the parts could (as with a feline spine) bend, but not twist. When they used a computer to plot the theoretical bendings of this theoretical falling chunky-cat, the motions resembled what they saw in old photographs of an actual falling cat. They conclude that their theory “explains the phenomenon under consideration”.
Michael Eisen found a good example of algorithmic pricing on Amazon which resulted in two booksellers pricing a book on fly genetics at almost $24 million (via yewknee).
On the day we discovered the million dollar prices, the copy offered by bordeebook was 1.270589 times the price of the copy offered by profnath. And now the bordeebook copy was 1.270589 times profnath again. So clearly at least one of the sellers was setting their price algorithmically in response to changes in the other’s price. I continued to watch carefully and the full pattern emerged.
Once a day profnath set their price to be 0.9983 times bordeebook’s price. The prices would remain close for several hours, until bordeebook “noticed†profnath’s change and elevated their price to 1.270589 times profnath’s higher price. The pattern continued perfectly for the next week.
I’m waiting for the algorithmic pricing that messes up in the other direction and nets me a Gutenberg bible for pocket change.
Walls of fat removed from London’s sewers.
Enough fat to fill nine double-decker buses is being removed from sewers under London’s Leicester Square. A team of “flushers” equipped with full breathing apparatus has been drafted in with shovels to dig out an estimated 1,000 tonnes of putrid fat.
Pleasant.
Update: Just in-case you wanted to see some video footage of the fat removal.
How to make brownies, Pentagon style. The 26 page specification, also known as MIL-C-44072C, is available for your perusal.
British police consulted a warlock in regards to mysterious horse mane braiding. Honestly, I don’t know what’s weirder: seemingly random horse braiding, or the fact that the police consulted a warlock.
Hipsters repaint bike lanes. This made me laugh, it had to have been fun to write.
Scantily clad hipster cyclists attracted to the Brooklyn neighborhood made it difficult, the Hasids said, to obey religious laws forbidding them from staring at members of the opposite sex in various states of undress.
A Hamburger Today presents their guide to hamburger and cheeseburger styles. In other news, there were records set for the world’s largest cheeseburger, as well as the greatest number of simultaneous heart-attacks in one location.
The Soviet Digital Electronics Museum is pure gold for the gadget junkie.
What to do when the person you want to marry is allergic to grilled cheese. Euphemisms galore.
Flood shuts Canada’s national archives. The article states that the building has had 116 environmental incidents since 1988. Could just be me, but it seems like a stupid place to be storing important documents.
