I'm currently reading Bruce Feiler's newest book "America's Prophet," but it has nothing to do with my choice for today's song. Aesop Rock's just been in my head. I'll be posting about Feiler's book soon, though. Enjoy:
Monday, February 15, 2010
Star Wars is Alive and Well
Somewhere, Ronald Reagan is smiling. In the last several days, two different groups of scientists announced that they were able to shoot down something speeding through the air with a laser.
Let me repeat that: human beings can now shoot things out of the sky with lasers.
On February 12th, Boeing announced that it had successfully shot down a ballistic missile during a firing range test of its new airborne laser system. The Cold War is over, but apparently that doesn't mean we've collectively stopped thinking about the danger of long-range missiles. How this will affect the way we talk with or about Iran and North Korea remains to be seen, but I imagine our Iranian policies will be mostly unchanged.
Iran doesn't have nuclear weapons yet, and both Israel and the United States have had other anti-ballistic missile defense systems for quite some time. The United States seems to be more concerned with preventing Iran and North Korea from selling their technology to other hostile governments or militant groups, and these new systems do nothing to prevent that. However, these defenses drain a good deal of power from the threat of a nuclear attack, which makes saber-rattling from both countries even less intimidating than it already is.
On a different note, scientists working with the Intellectual Ventures Lab released video of a new system they've developed to fight malaria by frying mosquitoes in flight. The system is so sensitive that it detects the wing speed of things that pass in front of it, and fries only the female mosquitoes as they go by. This lessens (or possibly eliminates) the threat of diseases carried by mosquitoes, since only the females bite. Below is the video release by IV Lab, shot at 6,000 frames per second.
Let me repeat that: human beings can now shoot things out of the sky with lasers.
On February 12th, Boeing announced that it had successfully shot down a ballistic missile during a firing range test of its new airborne laser system. The Cold War is over, but apparently that doesn't mean we've collectively stopped thinking about the danger of long-range missiles. How this will affect the way we talk with or about Iran and North Korea remains to be seen, but I imagine our Iranian policies will be mostly unchanged.
Iran doesn't have nuclear weapons yet, and both Israel and the United States have had other anti-ballistic missile defense systems for quite some time. The United States seems to be more concerned with preventing Iran and North Korea from selling their technology to other hostile governments or militant groups, and these new systems do nothing to prevent that. However, these defenses drain a good deal of power from the threat of a nuclear attack, which makes saber-rattling from both countries even less intimidating than it already is.
On a different note, scientists working with the Intellectual Ventures Lab released video of a new system they've developed to fight malaria by frying mosquitoes in flight. The system is so sensitive that it detects the wing speed of things that pass in front of it, and fries only the female mosquitoes as they go by. This lessens (or possibly eliminates) the threat of diseases carried by mosquitoes, since only the females bite. Below is the video release by IV Lab, shot at 6,000 frames per second.
Take-Down of the Day
Plenty of notable personalities used the storms that recently hit the mid-Atlantic to bolster their claims that climate change is a hoax or, at the very least, an exaggeration. Given that the scientific community was still trying to get its bearings after Climate-gate, it was the perfect time to pounce
Unfortunately for these skeptics, Fred Pearce at the Guardian has been helping to clarify what actually happened with Climate-gate. His piece exposes (again?) many global warming detractors as the intellectual slobs we suspected they are.
Unfortunately for these skeptics, Fred Pearce at the Guardian has been helping to clarify what actually happened with Climate-gate. His piece exposes (again?) many global warming detractors as the intellectual slobs we suspected they are.
If There's One Thing I've Learned...
...it's that politics is exhausting. It takes a certain level of stamina to follow the details of multiple stories as complex as health care reform, the daily grind of Congress, or the Obama administration's fluctuating feelings on where to try terror suspects for their crimes. The internet has made it extremely easy to find other people's analyses, but finding raw information and synthesizing it to create meaningful posts on a regular basis is something I just haven't gotten the grip of yet. Duties and desires exist outside of the blogosphere, and I'm still trying to find the proper balance between the things I need to do and the things I'd like to get better at.
In short, my apologies for going on an unexpected hiatus for a whole week.
My goals for this blog have changed since it began several months ago. Originally, it was a way for me to organize my thoughts about current events while trying to train myself to write in a professional way on a more regular basis. Now I find that this blog is more of a cathartic thing, allowing me to release energy built up over the course of a day or week as I follow the news. There are a lot of things I'd like to be an expert on: Congressional procedures, political prospects for 2010 and 2012, the Torture Memos, the Arab-Israeli conflict... the list goes on and on.
Over the course of the coming months, my schedule will become increasingly busy, and my time to sift through the hundreds of stories brought to me by Google Reader will diminish further. When I do write, however, I hope to do so as an expert about the topic, even if that means I don't have something posted the day an event takes place. I'm not a newspaper, and blogs suffer when the writers try to be things they are not.
My golden rule--never get too personal!--will still stand, but I (and as a consequence, my blog) will benefit from not forcing myself to write about dreary, serious things all the time. Thus far, I have been quite passionate about the topics this blog has addressed, and I will continue to be attached to them, but I hope to inject my personal interests into more of my posts from now on.
I hope everyone continues to read and enjoy The Baltimore Soloist as I try to retool my writing habits. And, as always, please pass this site on to your friends and family if you feel I deserve it.
In short, my apologies for going on an unexpected hiatus for a whole week.
My goals for this blog have changed since it began several months ago. Originally, it was a way for me to organize my thoughts about current events while trying to train myself to write in a professional way on a more regular basis. Now I find that this blog is more of a cathartic thing, allowing me to release energy built up over the course of a day or week as I follow the news. There are a lot of things I'd like to be an expert on: Congressional procedures, political prospects for 2010 and 2012, the Torture Memos, the Arab-Israeli conflict... the list goes on and on.
Over the course of the coming months, my schedule will become increasingly busy, and my time to sift through the hundreds of stories brought to me by Google Reader will diminish further. When I do write, however, I hope to do so as an expert about the topic, even if that means I don't have something posted the day an event takes place. I'm not a newspaper, and blogs suffer when the writers try to be things they are not.
My golden rule--never get too personal!--will still stand, but I (and as a consequence, my blog) will benefit from not forcing myself to write about dreary, serious things all the time. Thus far, I have been quite passionate about the topics this blog has addressed, and I will continue to be attached to them, but I hope to inject my personal interests into more of my posts from now on.
I hope everyone continues to read and enjoy The Baltimore Soloist as I try to retool my writing habits. And, as always, please pass this site on to your friends and family if you feel I deserve it.
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