Ned Gulley’s Blog. Resident buzzwords: synthetic biology, ambient displays, swarm robotics, wise crowds.
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 31st, 2005
I need a new web host. My current one, Interland is not good. They are sloppy about a good many things, but the worst is that I am regularly unable to edit my blog because of some sort of CGI budget that I’m topping out. I get a message that says (effectively) “Can’t help you [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 29th, 2005
My nephew Ben (I hosted his high school salutatory address on this site) has graduated college and moved to China for a while to teach English in Guangdong province. He has already been asked to be a model for commercials. Without being absolutely certain, I believe this is the first time Ben has been asked [...]
Posted in Biology on Aug 24th, 2005
Why is molecular biology so different from engineering?
Engineers build things using well-understood systems, the details of which, while sometimes complex, were originally specified and documented by other engineers. Molecular biologists, on the other hand, are uncovering the bizarre workings of an almost impossibly remote alien world hidden from all but the most obsessively persistent [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 23rd, 2005
I came across Luca Zappa’s clever button maker by way of some del.icio.us popularity list somewhere. I was going to dismiss it quickly, but then I thought: maybe I’ll try to make just one. Once you start playing around with it, it’s hard to stop. This is a nice little tool for making those ubiquitous [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 19th, 2005
In a recent issue of New Scientist magazine, I came across a book review by religious chronicler Karen Armstrong about a book on Creationism by Michael Ruse. In her review, Armstrong does a remarkably compact job of summing up much of the religious vertigo we face in modern times. Here’s a long quote from her [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 16th, 2005
Lots of everyday phenomena puzzle most of us. How do radio waves magically transmit voices through the air? Where does bellybutton lint come from? Who buys the head cheese at the grocery store? But we don’t have time to waste contemplating mysteries like these, and besides, some physicist somewhere understands it all. Why bother?
Only [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 12th, 2005
This is much more complicated than it seems at first. Give it a try. Go to this site and follow these instructions:
When viewing the video, try to count the total number of times that the people wearing white pass the basketball. Do not count the passes made by the people wearing black.
You can learn more [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 11th, 2005
If you haven’t already downloaded Google Earth, perhaps you’re better off avoiding it. Although it’s free and incredibly entertaining, it will cause you to lose dozens and dozens of potentially productive hours of your life. The coverage of most of the U.S. is very good, and surprising chunks of the rest of the world have [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 5th, 2005
How much is a good idea worth?
Sabeer Bhatia, one of the founders of Hotmail, was so convinced that free web-based email was the best idea ever ever that he became terrified he might blurt it out to a passerby before he could incorporate. He later sold his business to Microsoft for $400 million, so [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 4th, 2005
One of my good friends from high school I knew mostly because of home room. Home room at Paisley High School was a strictly alphabetized affair, and my friend Jon’s last name came right after mine. Similarly, some of the most interesting things I ever learned in an encyclopedia came from the article just before [...]
