HIV is a smart virus, but it would be smarter if it made all its victims horny. Rabies has it right. The infected animal becomes aggressive so that the rabies virus has a better chance of getting inside more bodies and thus extend its collective lifespan. HIV ought to tinker with the mind a bit…
There was a time, years ago, when I feared many of my meals were poisoned. My consolation was that the mere thought of suspecting poison in the food would neutralize it, make it safe for consumption. Well, I ought to have suspected poison in every dish then, just to be safe, right? There must have…
When you’ve got some pebbles, in an arbitrary arrangement, between the sole of your shoe and the sidewalk, and there is no contact between your sole and the sidewalk, then your weight is distributed roughly equally to all pebbles and from them to the ground. The fewer the number of pebbles under your sole, the…
When profs erase what they’ve written on the board to make room for a next example, do they feel loss? It’s a bit like having a day’s worth of office work burned up before your eyes by a lighter-wielding devil, only on a smaller scale. What have you to show for yourself? Nothing, it’s all…
We are faced with certain social quirks unique to this technology saturated age. One being: receipt of an email from someone who says yes thanks for the interest and promises they’ll try to give you what you want/find what you’re looking for. To this you could reply in kind immediately with a thanks hope to…
So while in class last Wednesday, the seat in front of me was empty, and this prompted the thought that if I could split my brain in two and have my other half occupying the chair in front, I could get more out of the lecture. I took it further and imagined splitting myself into…
One way gangs could help themselves is to have one or more of their members working for law enforcement. It would be a new take on the undercover operative. To be done correctly demands some time because the proper credentials would be necessary (proof of high school diploma, officers training, etc.) but the benefits would…
It’s sometimes practical to make a distinction between something natural and something man-made, but such a distinction is also a bit ludicrous. Most people could come to a consensus that humans are natural, and from there it would only take one person to put forth the argument that since we are natural, everything we do/make…
Once, while tripping, I was trapped for a short time in a thought trail about sound. I reasoned that every sound had a physical explanation. So that, for example, the sound heard when busting a wooden pencil apart resulted from the breaking of bonds/particles that made up the wood and lead. It was then that…
I have a subscription to The Guardian Weekly, a very fine publication from the U.K. I read each issue cover to cover but am terribly behind schedule. I’m currently reading week Aug 26 – Sept 1 2005. Furthermore, in a matter of days, I remember far less than half of what I’ve read. Still, I…