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OK, smart guy, so how SHOULD the VSE be done?
2007-05-30 23:48:00
In response to my last post, Paul Spudis wrote in the comments (emphasis mine):The whole NASA v. private sector argument seems more theological than technical to me. But I'll just make one point: NASA (or more properly the federal government) has legitimate interests in space (including on the Moon) and I believe it is entirely appropriate for them to be striving in that direction. Moreover, as you correctly note, they are not likely to be dismantled at any time in the near future, so as they are already spending $16 billion per year, they might as well spend it on developing systems and technologies useful for the long-range settlement of space.For some, the NASA vs. the private sector argument might be more theological than technical; for me however, it is philosophical, historical, and technical. Philosophical, in that there simply is no constitutional basis for NASA to exist at all - Thomas Jefferson would have violently opposed such an agency, and indeed a great many of the c...
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Why do space at all?
2007-05-30 05:09:00
Space Politics provides a summary of Paul Spudis's speech (the whole presentation is here) at the ISDC:He also described the Ares program as "having all the disadvantages of a shuttle-derived system but none of the advantages"; he prefers a Shuttle-C or similar approach. The biggest problem? "NASA still doesn't really understand what its mission is," he said, creating "catalogs" of rationales rather than a single unified explanation. "I always thought that if you couldn't state your mission in a single sentence, you probably don't know what it is." His suggestion: "We're going to the Moon to learn how to live and work on another world. It's that simple."My question is, why? Why do we need to learn how to live and work on another world? Why should the Moon be that other world? Why do it the way that NASA has chosen to do it? And why should NASA be the ones to do it?I shall attempt to answer my own questions below, in reverse order.Why should NASA be the ones to do it?NASA h...
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Information Overload
2007-05-20 19:23:00
I haven't posted anything on this blog in a little while, and as is usually the case when that happens I have been working on something big.When I first started reading blogs, I would just keep links to them in my Favorites list, and read them from the start of my list to the finish. Of course, I kept adding more and more blogs, and pretty soon I just couldn't keep up with all of them, and couldn't afford to spend time loading a blog that hadn't been updated. Then I found Bloglines, which allowed me to bundle all my reading into one page, displaying only updated material. And that was a good solution, for a while - but as I kept adding more and more feeds, I once again ran into a problem. There was just simply too much to read. If I didn't visit Bloglines every day, and spend at least an hour, then I would find that the new blog posts and news stories just kept piling up, and piling up, and piling up; if I took a couple of days off from the computer there would be thousand...
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bye bye sitemeter
2007-05-15 06:04:00
I had noticed recently a strange URL showing up in the status bar when I tried viewing this blog, from specificclick.net, a few weeks ago. It would show up during the loading of the page, and I knew for a fact that such a URL was not in my blog template anywhere. I didn't know what it was all about until I read this:It?s so sad for me to hear that SiteMeter , a well-known web stats providers, is pushing specificclick tracking and advertising cookies on to visitors of sites using their service.Well I happen to think that a stunt like that is total BS. Sitemeter wants to put cookies on the computer of everyone who visits my blog? Well to heck with that noise. I'm giving Sitemeter the heave-ho, and using Statcounter instead.I cannot for the life of me figure out why Sitemeter would shoot themselves in the foot like this. Not only are people going to drop them like a hot potato, they have probably irrevocably destroyed their brand name as well. This is basically going to complet...

An Idea Whose Time Has Come
2007-05-12 16:06:00
Single combat is an old tradition, going back thousands of years. In ancient times, when two armies were prepared for battle, sometimes only one man from each army would fight, thus sparing the lives of the remainder of the armies. In the last several hundred years, single combat has become formalized and stylized, giving us such sports as boxing and fencing, and games such as chess or checkers. The demands of each of these disciplines are very different, but they all share in common the idea of a formal, stylized ritual battle between single combatants.So, what happens when you start combining these into a single competition? You get ... Chess Boxing! I'm not kidding:The basic idea in chessboxing is to combine the #1 thinking sport and the #1 fighting sport into a hybrid that demands the most of its competitors ? both mentally and physically.In a chessboxing fight two opponents play alternating rounds of chess and boxing. The contest starts with a round of chess, followed by ...
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Precisely dating a star? not so fast
2007-05-12 12:52:00
Centauri Dreams reports on the highly-precise (three significant figures) measure of the age of a star. Something doesn't quite add up in the method used to date the star, though. Elements heavier than Iron cannot be formed through the regular fusion mechanism of a star; it requires more energy for the fusion to take place than is released by the fusion, so the only place these elements can form is in a type II supernova. So, the elements Uranium, Thorium, Europium, Osmium, and Iridium cannot have formed within HE 1523-0901, and instead must have formed in a nearby precursor star and then been incorporated by HE 1523-0901 sometime after the precursor star went supernova. To then use the ratios of those elements as a measure of the age of the star, by treating HE 1523-0901 as if it was a lump of rock undergoing normal radioactive decay processes, is simply not valid - the ratios of those elements originally produced in the supernova is unknown, so their present-day ratios are no...
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This is HUGE
2007-05-11 01:25:00
I mean, really really huge. Wikipedia might have over a million articles, but there's a new site that will dwarf it in size. I'm talking about the Encyclopedia of Life, a website that will have (by the time it is fully completed some ten years from now) around three hundred million pages, with in-depth information about each of the known 1.8 million species on the planet. Information will be presented according to the self-selected knowledge level of the user, ranging from novice (for the grade-school student) to expert (for serious researchers working on PhD theses, for instance). And the best part is that you can contribute to the site, adding your own knowledge to this enormous encyclopedia.As the Encyclopedia of Life grows, one will be able to search for any species, either by its common name or its Latin designation, or filter a search, say North America/coastal/birds. This promises to be a wonderful resource for generations to come.
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OK, I'm back
2007-05-10 19:24:00
I know I've been pretty silent these last couple of weeks. For a few days there my internet was out, and then I've spent the last week or so refurbishing the Space Feeds site. I'm quite a bit happier with the look of that site now, although I expect I shall be tweaking it a bit more over the next few days. Go ahead, check it out.I expect that I shall be blogging more now, hopefully every day or so.
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We Have A Winner
2007-05-02 19:57:00
The Great Science Fiction Movie Poll is now over. Thanks to all who voted. The overall winner is certainly a popular movie, and although it isn't my first choice, it is definitely one of my favorites. And the winner is....[drumroll]Star Wars (Episode IV: a New Hope)Now, if you have been living in a cave for the last 30 years and haven't yet seen this movie (how are you on the internet, if that's the case?), then you should probably go down to the video store and rent it. If you don't feel like sitting through the whole movie, then you can click here to see Star Wars in 30 seconds, reenacted by bunnies.
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WAY cool
2007-04-29 04:30:00
As one can guess from the title of this blog, I'm kinda into robots. And, as a kid I was fascinated with dinosaurs, as I am sure is true of most kids. So, when you combine the two ideas and have giant robot dinosaurs, well then you've really got my attention.
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Itokawa in 3D
2007-04-28 00:27:00
The Hayabusa team has released this video showing asteroid Itokawa in 3D. Break out the red/blue glasses and enjoy.Hayabusa has just recently started the two-year journey back to earth. When it lands in the Australian desert, we'll get to see if the sample collection was successful.

first Carnival of Space
2007-04-26 20:53:00
The first Carnival of Space is up at WhyHomeschool.
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If I Was Made Of Lego
2007-04-25 05:41:00
Have you ever wondered what you would look like if you were rendered as a Lego figurine? No? Well, neither had I, until I saw this site. There, you can mix and match various Lego pieces, various colors, and so on, and see what you would look like as a Lego dude. That's me, on the right.OK, so I'm not actually on some moon, and they say that the camera adds ten pounds, and I don't have that little circular thing on the top of my head... but it is pretty close.
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There Can Be Only One
2007-04-24 04:14:00
Well, here we are, finally down to only two movies remaining in the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll. I have to say, last week's results surprised the heck out of me, as I thought for certain that 2001 would have beaten Logan's Run. However, Logan's Run managed to squeak by 2001 by a single vote, and it now faces Star Wars in the finals.This is it, the poll closes at 2300 GMT on April 30th. Tell your friends! Final Round - Great Science Fiction Movie Pollpick your favorite Logan's RunStar Wars (Episode IV - A New Hope) Current Results
More About: Here , Only , There

fallacies
2007-04-21 14:09:00
The Virginia Tech killing spree has brought the usual suspects out of the woodwork. And, I have seen a lot of fallacies put forward the last few days which need debunking.1. guns are badYes, a gun was used by some wackjob to commit a whole bunch of murders in a very short span of time. But no, guns are not in and of themselves bad. Cho was bad evil. The specific tool used is irrelevant. Guns don't kill people - people who point guns at other people and pull the trigger kill people.2. "the worst mass murder in US history..."Bull. There were three incidents that happened within the last 15 years that were worse. One of them resulted in the deaths of 79 people due to a fire. Another resulted in the deaths of 168 people due to an explosion of a bomb made of diesel fuel and fertilizer. And the worst mass murder in US history, resulting in the deaths of 2973 people, was caused by 19 people with box cutters. Don't trivialize their deaths.3. "our children aren't safe in their s...
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four years
2007-04-18 04:47:00
Today is the fourth anniversary of the this blog. Over the last couple of days you've probably noticed some changes - most notably, that row of navigation buttons above, where Day by Day used to be. Don't worry, I haven't gotten rid of Day by Day, I just moved it down with the rest of the comics.I'm always looking to make this blog more fun, constantly experimenting with the template. Seeing as how it is the start of the fifth year that I've been doing this, I figured I'd do something special. If you click on the Arcade button above, you'll see that I have added three classic arcade games to the blog: Pacman, Asteroids, and Tetris. (Man oh man, the amount of quarters I went through as a kid playing these games...) I've also updated the Sudoku game, and added another puzzle (Flood It!) at the bottom of the page. And although it still needs some work, I have managed to improve the chess game rather a lot. All in all, I'm fairly satisfied with the changes (which all wo...
More About: Four , Years , Year , Ears

The Great Science Fiction Movie Poll - Semifinals
2007-04-17 03:05:00
Update, April 23: We're into the final round of voting.We started out back on March 25th with 132 movies. Voting in the week following pared that number down to the top 32 movies by April 1st, then down to 8 movies on April 9th. Well, now we're down to the semifinal round, only four movies remain, the winners from last week's voting. You can vote once in each of the two semifinal polls (you have to click Submit separately for each poll), and voting closes on Monday, April 23rd at 2300 GMT. Be sure to pass the word around.Last week I had the top eight movies in the quarter finals. The head-to-head matchups were based on the previous week's voting, with the top movie going against the 8th-place movie, 4 vs 5, 3 vs 6, and 2 vs 7. This week the winner of the 1 vs 8 matchup goes against the winner of 4 vs 5, and the winner of 3 vs 6 goes against the winner of 2 vs 7.So, the first semifinal brings us one movie that totally blew away its competition last week, against another mov...
More About: Science , Movie , Fiction , Great , Science Fiction

Just a Reminder...
2007-04-16 14:25:00
Today is the last day for voting in the quarterfinals of the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll. If you haven't voted yet, you really ought to. Voting closes at 2300GMT. Tell your friends!
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parking on a dime
2007-04-16 13:49:00
Literally. The Pico robot is possibly the smallest self-contained robot in the world. Yes, there are smaller robots, but none that are fully mobile and have all their control circuitry, power supply, and sensors on-board. The whole thing fits into a cube half an inch (12.5mm) on a side. Probably the best part about this robot (which moves at a blazing fast top speed of 15 centimeters per second - see if you can move 12 times your body length in one second) is that it wasn't built by some big government lab or by some big university. It was built by just one guy working on his own.Okay, so it doesn't do the whole "edge of table" thing well, but still, it is controlling itself, changing its direction if it bumps into things. Pretty darn cool, if you ask me.
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Cosmos
2007-04-13 00:50:00
I was searching around on Google Video today, and stumbled upon a real gem. Cosmo s Studios has posted ten parts of a 13-part series, Carl Sagan's COSMOS: A Personal Voyage. So, if you've got ten hours to spare, then kick back, pop some popcorn and enjoy.promo: Episodes:Part 2: One Voice in the Cosmic FuguePart 3: Harmony of the WorldsPart 4: Heaven and HellPart 6: Travelers' TalesPart 7: The Backbone of NightPart 8: Travel in Space and TimePart 9: The Lives of the StarsPart 10: The Edge of ForeverPart 12: Encyclopedia GalacticaPart 13: Who Speaks For Earth?
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javascript chess for your sidebar
2007-04-10 15:13:00
A few days ago I added a chess program at the bottom of my sidebar, based on the JavaScript Chess With CPU Opponent program available here. That program had a few bugs, which I managed to straighten out, and didn't allow for the threefold repetition rule or the 50 move rule. I had toyed with making the program more capable, adding multiple levels of difficulty, but play at those levels simply became too slow. So, I just added the threefold repetition rule and 50 move rule. If you want to add the javascript chess with CPU opponent game to your blog sidebar, simply download the code from one of the links below (right click and Save As) and follow the included instructions.There are two versions of the code available. The first version is verbose, with a bunch of documentation and proper indentation, and the second version is much more compact, for a file size of about half that of the verbose version (at the expense of readability). If you want to tinker with the program to imp...
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The Great Science Fiction Movie Poll - Quarterfinals
2007-04-09 17:13:00
Update, April 23: We're into the final round of voting.Thanks to all who voted in last week's elimination round. The field of movies started at 132, was whittled down to 32 by the poll voters, and now has been pared down again - only eight movies remain. So, this week starts the quarterfinals round of the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll. You get to vote a total of four times, once in each of the four polls below. You have to hit Submit on each poll separately for your vote to count. I was a little late getting to this last night, so instead of next Sunday the voting closes next Monday, April 16, at 5pmMDT (2300GMT). The semifinals start next Monday, and the finals will start on April 23. Then on April 30th, the winner of the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll will be announced, with much fanfare and rejoicing. OK, no fanfare. And the rejoicing is up to you. Anyhow, let's get started; here's the quarterfinals. Quarterfinal A - SciFi moviespick your favorite2001: A Space...

What NASA should be doing, but isn't
2007-04-05 00:47:00
The Orbital Express program - sponsored by DARPA and launched by an Air Force Atlas V rocket a few weeks ago - is testing out several new technologies in autonomous satellite operations. The tests are being done with two satellites, called ASTRO (Autonomous Space Transfer and Robotic Orbiter) and NextSat, which are currently docked. Among technologies to be tested are multiple dockings and undockings, several propellant transfer tests, and multiple transfers of batteries and computers from one satellite to the other using a robotic arm mounted on ASTRO. This is exactly the sort of thing that NASA should be doing - testing out new technologies that expand opportunities in space - but aren't doing due to budgetary constraints (such as having to maintain a huge workforce to service the Shuttles, and keeping that same workforce employed while the Ares series of vehicles is developed).On-orbit inspection via robotic arm mounted on ASTRO(click on images for larger versions)ASTRONextSa...
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Asteroids!
2007-04-03 21:37:00
More here, here, here, and here.
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Great Science Fiction Movie Poll part 2: the poll strikes back
2007-04-02 05:15:00
Update, April 23: We're into the final round of voting.Well, the first round of voting in the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll is now over. Thank you to the hundreds of people who voted. And now, it is time for round 2 of the voting. This week's poll is similar to last week's, in that you can select multiple movies from the list below. This week's list is the top 32 movies - as voted by Robot Guy readers - out of last week's list of 132 movies. You may select up to 8 movies from this list. The poll closes in one week, on Sunday April 8 at 2300GMT (5pm MDT). Of this list, only the top 8 movies will make it to the next round. You can only vote once on this poll, so if you have your heart set on a particular movie making it to next week's voting, tell your friends so they can vote too. Starting next week there will be a playoff format, movie vs. movie duels.Update: Trumped! SFX magazine has conducted a poll similar to this one, and just released their results. Their s...
More About: Science Fiction

revelling in my geekdom
2007-03-31 14:57:00
I am forever updating the template for this blog: adding something here, removing something there, making big changes every so often, all in the name of making this page fun and easy on the eyes.A few days ago I decided I wanted to add more games. I've had a sudoku game just above the cartoons at the bottom of the page for ages, and that was fine, but I wanted more. So, I searched around a bit and found Peeptin by Flooble. I put it at the bottom of the sidebar. You've probably played this game before, with a set of jumbled up tiles numbered 1 to 15 in a 4x4 grid, which you need to slide around to put back in order.And that was fine, as far as that went. But, I wanted another game, something a little more challenging than Peeptin. So, I went looking for a javascript chess program that I could put in the sidebar. And, I found a fairly decent one, here.This is where my geekiness comes in. I took the original program and shrunk down the images of the board and pieces so tha...

State of the Armadillo
2007-03-28 20:36:00
Armadillo Aerospace has posted this video on their website, which they presented at the Space Access '07 conference this past weekend. I uploaded it to YouTube for all to see.
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the Great Science Fiction Movie Poll
2007-03-26 01:15:00
Update, April 23: We're into the final round of voting.Update, April 1: Voting is now closed on this first round. Go here for the second round of voting.Update: After I posted this, I realized that the format was unwieldy. It was a big hassle to vote in 16 separate polls to come up with favorite movies. Furthermore, there were some really tough choices to be made between some of the movies in several of the individual polls in this first round of voting. So, I have reworked the poll. Now, instead of picking one movie out of a group of 8, you just put a checkmark beside the titles of up to 25 of your favorite science fiction movies, and only have to hit the Submit button once. The new poll closes at 5pm MDT on Sunday, April 1st (2300 GMT). Sorry to those few people who took the time to vote in my unwieldy first attempt at this poll. The scores have all been reset, and you can all vote again.I kept on thinking of great science fiction movies that I should have put in the li...
More About: Science , Movie , Fiction , Great , Science Fiction

Favorite Science Fiction Movies
2007-03-22 14:28:00
In honor of the 25th anniversary this year of Blade Runner, Science dude is taking suggestions for a list of the greatest science fiction films ever made. I emailed him my suggestions, and then had several "oh, yeah, that one!" moments afterwards. Here is my (revised) list of my top 25 favorite science fiction movies:25. Enemy Mine. Lou Gossett Jr. makes a great lizard.24. Outland. Sean Connery rocks as a space marshal, the only law on a mining facility on Jupiter's moon Io.23. Innerspace. A fun take on Isaac Asimov's Fantastic Voyage, starring Dennis Quaid and a seemingly-possessed Martin Short.22. Silent Running. Bruce Dern saves the last of the trees in a space ship.21. Dark Star. Teaching phenomenology to a bomb.20. Tron. Hacker is scanned into a virtual existence inside a computer, forced to fight the eeeevil Master Control Program. Very cool special effects, and still entertaining.19. Planet of the Apes. "Get your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" The nove...
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the Goracle
2007-03-22 05:55:00
Dean Barnett skewers Al Gore:Has there ever been a man who so desperately hungered for greatness who was so thoroughly suffused with mediocrity? ... The G o racle will not brook any news that might conflict with this chosen role or any sign that disaster is less than imminent. For if there is no immediate and enormous crisis, who needs a Global Savior? And if he can?t be president, and he can?t save the world, what good is a Goracle?
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