Get Cynical

Its just a matter of time before somebody puts together an entire computer using LEGOs.

A few people have designed boolean logic devices using LEGO pneumatics and gone on to develop fundamental computer devices such as full-adders and flip-flops. These have been discussed greatly on LUGNET. I had suspected that there would be a large number of logic devices using mechanic principals, but a search for mechanical logic devices didn’t get many hits.

(via Monkeyfilter)

An interesting story about “secret numbers.”

If you’ve ever ventured outside the shortwave broadcast and ham radio bands and tuned around the areas allotted to so-called “fixed” stations you may have heard voices reading out long lists of numbers in either four or five digit groups. These transmissions are generally called “numbers stations” and appear in a variety of languages. Transmissions in Spanish are heard most often in the United States but, in Europe, German, English and French, as well as a variety of Slavic languages are the most commonly heard.

Update:

You can download and listen to some of these in mp3 format here.
(Thanks Mikhail)

What you see pictured above is a Chrysler Air Raid Siren, the most powerful siren in the world. It’s the size of a car, measuring near 12-feet in length and standing more than 6-feet tall. It also weighs twice as much as today’s typical car. This gigantic siren is powered by an 180-HP Chrysler Industrial V-8 HEMI® gasoline engine. The super-duty engine directly drives a three-stage compressor that blows 2,610 cubic feet of air a minute, at nearly 7 PSI, into a giant siren rotor. The compressed air screams through the chopper and out through six giant horns with an exit velocity of 400 miles per hour. The result is an incredibly loud 138 dB sound (measured 100 feet from the siren). The loudness of this siren is unmatched by any other warning device ever sold, ever. It’s also considerably louder than the largest steam whistle or horn. As if that were not dramatic enough, the whole unit, engine and all, slowly rotates one and one-half times a minute on its iron turntable base.

This is pretty funny, and accurate.

The Active Belt uses GPS and a series of vibrating motors in the belt to guide you to a location. I am not really sure why you couldn’t just use a handheld GPS unit instead.
(via Eyebeam reBlog)

A gallery of anti-bush posters. I guess they were supposed to be put up during the RNC. Some very cool posters.

Even slashdot has gone political.

Here is a site with some basic background information about Chechnya.

Last week I posted a link to watermelon carvings. I guess that people will carve just about anything because this site has pictures of different carvings of fruits and vegetables such as the carrots pictured above.
(via Metafilter)

One of my favorite websites. Heavens-Above really is great if you are stargazing and happen to see a satellite pass overhead. You can go to this site and find out exactly what you were looking at.

If you’re interested in satellites or astronomy, you’ve come to the right place! Our aim is to provide you with all the information you need to observe satellites such as the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle, spectacular events such as the dazzlingly bright flares from Iridium satellites as well as a wealth of other spaceflight and astronomical information.