links for 2009-01-05

With links galore.

"The Penrose interpretation of quantum mechanics...

...states that the mass of a system affects the system's ability to maintain quantum coherence. This is the basis for some theories of quantum gravity. Above the Planck mass, which is ~1E-8kg, a system can no longer maintain coherence for any measureable time, due to the onset of gravitational interactions."

"It shouldn't take much effort to realize how absurd it is to believe in prophecy, let alone prophecy made by a civilization that couldn't foresee its own collapse. Nevertheless, the idea has gotten a lot of traction and will even be the focus of a disaster movie due out this year, 'directed' by Roland Emmerich."

"Of course we came up with more than one [potential blog name], before settling on our perfect choice. But what was imperfect for us might fit you just fine. So, offered up free of charge, here are some of the names we were bandying around, plus some extras I came up with since."

"In Windows 7 the transformation is complete: The Windows taskbar now operates pretty much exactly like the Mac OS' dock. "

I can't wait to find out how Mike Kozlowski will spin this as a brilliant move.

"A terrible thing happened recently. You might have missed it.
AOL Hometown, which itself was actually a combination of a bunch of previously acquired websites, shut down. It shut down on October 31 of this year."

"Who has controlled the Middle East over the course of history? Pretty much everyone. Egyptians, Turks, Jews, Romans, Arabs, Persians, Europeans...the list goes on."

"Earn a Ph.D. in astronomy and move to France. Tweaks to the official clock are announced by the Earth Orientation Center, a Paris-based subunit of the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service. "