Quote of the Day [11.25.08]

“The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. The Spacing Guild and its Navigators, whom the spice has mutated over four thousand years, use the orange spice gas, which gives them the ability to fold space; that is, to travel to any part of the known universe without moving.”

Princess Irulan (Virginia Madsen), Dune

Quote of the Day [8.26.08]

"That which is in locomotion must arrive at the half-way stage before it
arrives at the goal."Aristotle restating one of Zeno's paradoxes

Quote of the Day [8.15.08]

“I don’t care about what anything was DESIGNED to do, I care about what it CAN do.”

Gene Kranz (Ed Harris), “Apollo 13”

Quote of the Day [7.23.08]

“Your scientists have yet to discover how neural networks create self-consciousness, let alone how the human brain processes two-dimensional retinal images into the three-dimensional phenomenon known as perception. Yet you somehow brazenly declare that seeing is believing!”

Man in Black (Jesse ‘the Body’ Ventura), The X-Files, “Jose Chung’s From Outerspace”

Quote of the Day [7.02.08]

“Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty — a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture.”

Bertrand Russell

Comet

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This is one hell of a picture. That’s the Comet McNaught that is very visible to the naked eye. I wish we could see it, but I fear that the light pollution here obscures it.

Winter Solstice

Today, err tonight rather, is the longest night of the year. They call this winter solstice. From this day forward it will be nothing but brightening days and shorter nights. Imagine, spring is almost here!

I do not like spring. It is my least favorite season. Even the cold of winter beats it out. I like it less because of the fact the days are lengthening. As spring approaches, the quality of light during the day is brighter, but unlike the quality of light in the autumn, spring’s is more happier. I do not like this brightness. I like the gloom of the autumn and the dark of winter. I would rather have it with not much light at all.

Also, around this time lots of holidays are centered around the longest night. It is such a coincedence that Christmas falls around the time of the winter solstice. As if the early christians adopted a pagan holiday for such a purpose. Hmm. What does yule stand for again? How about the chunnuka, festival of light? What a coincidence that it is a celebration of light in darkness! Weird that lots of cultures celebrate this day.