World’s Fastest Supercomputer… Is In China
October 28th, 2010Via: Nvidia Press Release:
Tianhe-1A, a new supercomputer revealed today at HPC 2010 China, has set a new performance record of 2.507 petaflops, as measured by the LINPACK benchmark, making it the fastest system in China and in the world today.
…
Tianhe-1A was designed by the National University of Defense Technology (NUDT) in China. The system is housed at National Supercomputer Center in Tianjin and is already fully operational.
The Disturbing Actroid-F Robot
October 28th, 2010Via: Plastic Pals:
AIST opened the doors of their lab for a couple of days (October 14th ~ 15th) to show off their robotics development and middleware. On display was the Actroid-F, developed by Kokoro Co. Ltd. and ATR. The operator’s facial expressions and head movements are tracked and replicated by the robot. The android is being positioned as an observer in hospitals to gauge patient reactions. However, despite the advances made in the last few years such as reducing the cost by a third by eliminating redundant actuators, it can’t escape the uncanny valley. The jerky head movements are particularly unnerving, but not to worry; its legs don’t actually work, so it can’t get up and chase you.
Woman Kills Baby Because He Cried While She Played Farmville (A Game on Facebook)
October 28th, 2010Via: Florida Times Union:
A Jacksonville mother charged with shaking her baby to death has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
Alexandra V. Tobias, 22, was arrested after the January death of 3-month-old Dylan Lee Edmondson. She told investigators she became angry because the baby was crying while she was playing a computer game called Farmville on the Facebook social-networking website.
Tobias entered her plea Wednesday before Circuit Judge Adrian G. Soud. A second-degree murder charge is punishable by up to life in prison.
Related:
Woman Neglected Children, Let Dogs Die of Starvation As She Played Video Game
Baby Dies as Parents Raise Virtual Child Online
Congressional Staffers as Stock Pickers
October 27th, 2010The point is that LOTS of people who aren’t corporate insiders know the news before the market does. They buy before the news comes out. This happens every day.
—Insider Crimes, Funny Money and Options Rackets
Via: Wall Street Journal:
The Journal analysis showed that an aide to a Republican member of the Senate Banking Committee bought Bank of America Corp. stock before results of last year’s government stress tests eased investor concerns about the health of the banking industry. A top aide to the House Speaker profited by trading shares of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae in a brokerage account with her husband two days before the government authorized emergency funding for the companies. Another aide to Republican lawmakers interested in energy issues, among other things, profited by trading in several renewable-energy firms.
The aides identified by the Journal say they didn’t profit by making trades based on any information gathered in the halls of Congress. Even if they had done so, it would be legal, because insider-trading laws don’t apply to Congress.
A few lawmakers proposed a bill that would prevent members and employees of Congress from trading securities based on nonpublic information they obtain. The legislation has languished since 2006.
“Congressional staff are often privy to inside information, and an unscrupulous person could profit off that knowledge,” says Vincent Morris, a spokesman for Rep. Louise Slaughter (D., N.Y.), a leading backer of the “Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act,” or STOCK Act. “The public should be outraged there is no law specifically banning this.”
When the bill was introduced nearly five years ago, just 14 other lawmakers endorsed it. The current version of the bill has fared worse: Only nine lawmakers support it. There is no companion legislation in the Senate.
Related: They Made a Killing: The Use of Knowledge of Covert Operations in the Stock Market
Humiliate, Strip, Threaten: UK Military Interrogation Manuals Discovered
October 27th, 2010Via: Guardian:
The British military has been training interrogators in techniques that include threats, sensory deprivation and enforced nakedness in an apparent breach of the Geneva conventions, the Guardian has discovered.
Training materials drawn up secretly in recent years tell interrogators they should aim to provoke humiliation, insecurity, disorientation, exhaustion, anxiety and fear in the prisoners they are questioning, and suggest ways in which this can be achieved.
Large Number of 9/11 Reference Videos Going Up on YouTube
October 27th, 2010Update: New Video of Building 7 Demolition
I’m not absolutely sure that this hasn’t been out all along, but I’ve lost track of how many 9/11 documentaries I’ve seen, and I don’t recall ever seeing this clip.
Wow.
Along with this one:
—End Update—
I think that these are from the NIST dump the happened recently. A YouTube user must have downloaded the torrent and is adding hundreds of the clips:
http://www.youtube.com/user/911Crasting
I just had a brief look and I found a few scenes that I’d definitely never seen before.
Janitors With Ph.D.s
October 27th, 2010Via: AlterNet:
For politicians, boosting college graduation rates has always been a fairly uncontroversial goal to support. The Obama administration is doing so, rather relentlessly, through a number of initiatives designed to better prepare students for college and support them once they get there.
The assumptions are 1) that students who graduate from college have increased potential for economic mobility, and 2) the more students who earn college degrees, the more our economy will grow. But are either of those assumptions still true, in light of our new economic reality? Or are we wasting money investing in a sector that’s producing thousands of janitors with Ph.D.s?
One thing’s for sure: our higher education system has produced thousands of janitors with Ph.D.s or other professional degrees — about 5,057 of them, in fact, plus more than 8,000 waiters and waitresses. When you look at all college degrees, there are more than 317,000 over-educated Americans serving us our meals, more than 80,000 shaking our martinis and some 62,000 mowing our lawns.
In all, about 17 million people in this country have completed college only to end up working jobs that require a skill level below that of a bachelors degree, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Research Credit: ltcolonelnemo
Cryptogon Readers Sign Up for Hosting with BlueHost
October 27th, 2010Thanks to the owners of streetsick.com and 202elmstreet.com for signing up for hosting with BlueHost. Cryptogon received $180.
Introduction to Permaculture Design DVD
October 27th, 2010Via: Permaculture Research Institute of Australia:
Based on the 72-hour Permaculture Design Certificate Course as devised by Bill Mollison, join Geoff Lawton as he takes you into the world of Permaculture Design and introduces you to a new way of looking at the world. Learn how to apply your design skills by observing, analyzing and harmonizing with the patterns of Nature. Discover the theory and then see the examples in action in this unique DVD. Essential information for anyone interested in learning more about Permaculture and how they can apply it in their daily lives to create sustainable abundance.
Related:
PERMACULTURE: A Designers’ Manual by Bill Mollison
Introduction to Permaculture by Bill Mollison
Glaxo to Pay $750 Million in Adulterated Drugs Case
October 27th, 2010Via: Reuters:
GlaxoSmithKline Plc has agreed to pay $750 million and plead guilty to manufacturing and distributing adulterated drugs from a now closed plant in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday.
