Raindrops, UFOs, and Old Science Lab Computers: Lux Recommends #281
Welcome to Lux Recommends #281, this week’s edition of what we at Lux are reading and thinking about (want to receive this by email? Sign up here).
Articles
Old-school computing: when your lab PC is ancient: “Maintaining outdated PCs can be a matter of necessity — and a labour of love.” — Sam
Click to drop a raindrop anywhere in the contiguous United States and watch where it ends up — Adam G
I’m a Physicist Who Searches for Aliens. U.F.O.s Don’t Impress Me — friend of Lux Jeff Cooper
How Do We Quantify the Elusive Concept of Wasted Time? “Byron Reese and Scott Hoffman on Our Endless Fascination with the Way We Spend Our Days” — Sam
Ocean Creatures Mysteriously Swim in Circles, And Scientists Don’t Know Why — Adam K
Clouds of Unknowing: Edward Quin’s Historical Atlas (1830) — Sam
When Pollution Drives Evolution: “Some species of fish developed the ability to thrive in Newark Bay’s toxic waters, demonstrating nature’s power to rebound.” — Zack
Morphing pasta and beyond — Sam
Books
Lucifer’s Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle: “The gigantic comet had slammed into Earth, forging earthquakes a thousand times too powerful to measure on the Richter scale, tidal waves thousands of feet high. Cities were turned into oceans; oceans turned into steam. It was the beginning of a new Ice Age and the end of civilization. But for the terrified men and women chance had saved, it was also the dawn of a new struggle for survival — a struggle more dangerous and challenging than any they had ever known…” — Sam
Videos
SIGGRAPH 2021: Technical Papers Preview — Josh
Removing bees from an umbrella — Josh
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