This week, we’re looking at controversies over connectivity, both online and in the physical world. University of Ottawa law professor Michael Geist walks us through the arguments over net neutrality. And we’ll speak to researcher Rob van Kranenburg about his book The Internet of Things: A critique of ambient technology and the all-seeing network of RFID.
A fellow graduate student in my thesis lab at Washington University in St. Louis once told me about a fraternity brother of his who had a ball pit in his room at the frat house. I believe this LEGO creation from eldeeem is a metaphor for how creepy and gross that would be.
*Hat tip to Tromas at The Brothers Brick
This week, Science for The People is exploring genetics, neuroscience, and psychology, to find out what makes every person – and personality – unique. They’ll talk to science writer Jennifer Ouelette about her newest book “Me, Myself and Why: Searching for the Science of Self.” And science writer Ed Yong takes a critical look at the hype surrounding the hormone oxytocin.
Considering that we just added our ninth member of The Finch & Pea this week, and that we are ostensibly an online science pub, and that six of our staff are ostensibly female, we thought it would be fitting to commemorate this week with a lovely illustration by my favorite comic artist, Sydney Padua. Sydney has a fondness for historical documents and has currently been working through the Britain’s 1881 Census of Women’s Occupations. The data not only show that a woman’s place has never just been in the home, but that 12,709 British women in 1881 were employed as “Inn or Hotel Keeper, Publican” – a tradition we are proud to keep alive, if only virtually.
I was reminded while singing my daughter a “lullaby” that this employment is also referenced in the classic drinking song The Wild Rover:
I went to an alehouse I used to frequent,
And told the landlady my money was spent.
I asked her for credit. She answered me, “Nay.”
Saying, “Custom like yours I could have any day.”
I’m pretty sure we had one of these around the house when I was young.
In the same way that a sea otter’s pelt looks better on the sea otter, I think the Nauga is prettier than the chair.
*Hat tip to Rusty Blazenhoff of Laughing Squid.
The Finch and Pea 