Charles Vance Millar had quite a sense of humour:

Charles Vance Millar was a prominent lawyer who practiced in Toronto from 1881 until his death in 1926. He went to his grave a bachelor, and due to some interesting investments (Charlie liked the longshots), this irascible 73-year-old left a considerable estate.

Millar was both a student of human nature and possessed of a perverse sense of fun. His best jokes turned on others’ greed and love of money, and his pet theory was that every man had his price – the trick was to figure out what it was. (One of his favorite pranks was to leave $1 bills on the sidewalk, then watch the expressions of passersby as they furtively pocketed them.) His last will and testament exemplified his unusual sense of humor and put to the test his notions about every man having his price. Given Millar’s obvious familiarity with the law, he had to have known what the execution of his will would do to the judicial system he’d long been part of – indeed, that was probably the motivation behind his wacky stipulations. Millar’s death afforded him one last chance to tweak the beard of the legal system, and he took it. [...]

[Via MetaFilter]

Wade Davis related an astonishing story of resourcefulness in a recent talk he gave at the Long Now Foundation. The gist of his story (which I gather he’s related in quite a few talks over the years) is summed up in this Reddit post:

During the 1950s Canadian government forced the Inuit into settlements. A family from Arctic Bay told me this fantastic story of their grandfather who refused to go. The family, fearful for his life, took away all of his tools and all of his implements, thinking that would force him into the settlement. But instead, he just slipped out of an igloo on a cold Arctic night, pulled down his caribou and sealskin trousers, and defecated into his hand. As the feces began to freeze, he shaped it into the form of an implement. And when the blade started to take shape, he put a spray of saliva along the leading edge to sharpen it. That’s when what they call the “shit knife” took form. He used it to butcher a dog. Skinned the dog with it. Improvised a sled with the dog’s rib cage, and then, using the skin, he harnessed up an adjacent living dog. He put the shit knife in his belt and disappeared into the night.’

Some posters to the Reddit comment thread are sceptical, suggesting that an icy shit knife would melt when it encountered the warm innards of a freshly-killed dog. I’m sure it wouldn’t last long, but:

1. Nobody said that the knife was unscathed at the end of the episode. There may well have been some deterioration, just not enough to render it useless;
2. In very cold weather, I can readily believe that that shit would freeze really hard;
3. If the shit knife was reasonably sharp it might not have to last very long. I don’t imagine that an experienced Inuit hunter, well used to skinning animals, would take too long to skin a dog.

Besides, if the story isn’t true it damn well should be.

Ty Mattson has created a range of simple yet stylish posters for Lost. I like the first poster best, but that may just be because John Locke is far and away my favourite character.

At any rate, as of late in season 3 he is.

As I predicted, having started watching the last third of season 3 again I’ve ended up buying the season 4 box set. I realise that I’m still lagging way behind everyone who has been watching the show on TV all this time, but I’m hoping that by the time I make it to the end of season 4, the season 5 box set might be available at a reasonable price.¹

[Via Qwghlm]

1. Or I’ll have turned into a rabid Lost fan, desperate enough to buy season 5 – and possibly even season 6 – whatever the price. Time will tell. ^

Being mugged is one thing. Being mugged and failing to notice that you’ve been stabbed is something else entirely:

Mugging victim Julia Popova calmly went home after being robbed on her way home from work – without realising she had a six inch knife stuck into her neck.

Yes, they do have a photo. And yes, it’s as bad as you think it is.

[Via GromBlog]

Has the Hubble Space Telescope really captured a picture of two asteroids colliding, or is that a Centauri cruiser lurking out there in the asteroid belt?

Seriously, though: that’s one hell of a photo Hubble took. What were the chances of catching that shot?

[Via James Nicoll]

My City vs. Your City uses data from Last.fm to illustrate differences in musical taste between different cities.

The trouble is, your city needs to have a critical mass of Last.fm users if the comparisons are to be of any use. Look at the current figures for Newcastle versus Leeds: the ranking of artists for Newcastle is just about meaningless, since one or two more plays would shift most of the top 10 artists several places (or, no doubt, elevate some of the artists outside the top 10.) Still, that’s my fault for living in an area where there apparently aren’t many Last.fm users. The basic concept is neat.

The one suggestion I’d make – at least for cities where there’s a big enough user base to make the rankings a tad more representative – would be to display at least the top 25 artists, the better to reveal genuine regional variations once you get past the current half dozen or so acts who are being pushed hard because they have an album out or are on tour.¹

[Via MetaFilter]

1. I suppose this is less of an issue for comparisons between cities on different continents: even Lady Gaga can’t be touring on two continents at the same time. Can she? ^

Meet the iron-plated Snail:

Also called the “scaly-foot gastropod”, Crysomallon squamiferum was discovered back in 1999, over two miles below the central Indian Ocean, deep within hydrothermal vent fields. Fluids in these vents are high in sulfides and metals, which the snail incorporates into its shell. The gastropod’s shell has three layers: a highly calcified inner layer, a thick organic middle layer, and an outer layer that is fused with granular iron sulfide. It is unlike any other known natural or synthetically engineered armor.

[Via collision detection]

Pretty!

I’m not sure that Moff’s Law qualifies as a ‘law’, since it’s more of a lengthy, impassioned rant than a nugget of wisdom, distilled into a pithy statement.

It’s still worth a read, though:

Of all the varieties of irritating comment out there, the absolute most annoying has to be “Why can’t you just watch the movie for what it is??? Why can’t you just enjoy it? Why do you have to analyze it???”

If you have posted such a comment, or if you are about to post such a comment, here or anywhere else, let me just advise you: Shut up. Shut the fuck up. Shut your goddamn fucking mouth. SHUT. UP.

First of all, when we analyze art, when we look for deeper meaning in it, we are enjoying it for what it is. Because that is one of the things about art, be it highbrow, lowbrow, mainstream, or avant-garde: Some sort of thought went into its making – even if the thought was, “I’m going to do this as thoughtlessly as possible”! – and as a result, some sort of thought can be gotten from its reception. That is why, among other things, artists (including, for instance, James Cameron) really like to talk about their work.

Now, that doesn’t mean you have to think about a work of art. I don’t know anyone who thinks every work they encounter ought to only be enjoyed through conscious, active analysis – or if I do, they’re pretty annoying themselves. And I know many people who prefer not to think about much of what they consume, and with them I have no argument. I also have no argument with people who disagree with another person’s thoughts about a work of art. That should go without saying. Finally, this should also go without saying, but since it apparently doesn’t: Believe me, the person who is annoying you so much by thinking about the art? They have already considered your revolutionary “just enjoy it” strategy, because it is not actually revolutionary at all. It is the default state for most of humanity.

So when you go out of your way to suggest that people should be thinking less – that not using one’s capacity for reason is an admirable position to take, and one that should be actively advocated – you are not saying anything particularly intelligent. And unless you live on a parallel version of Earth where too many people are thinking too deeply and critically about the world around them and what’s going on in their own heads, you’re not helping anything; on the contrary, you’re acting as an advocate for entropy.

And most annoyingly of all, you’re contributing to the fucking conversation yourselves when you make your stupid, stupid comments. You are basically saying, “I think people shouldn’t think so much and share their thoughts, that’s my thought that I have to share.” If you really think people should just enjoy the movie without thinking about it, then why the fuck did you (1) click on the post in the first place, and (2) bother to leave a comment? If it bugs you so much, GO WATCH A GODDAMN FUNNY CAT VIDEO.

Not that there’s anything wrong with funny cat videos, mind…

[Via Feeling Listless miniblog]

Ross Anderson on how the banks and credit card companies have pulled a fast one by pushing customers to use the 3D Secure system to ‘protect’ their online purchases:

Online transactions with credit cards or debit cards are increasingly verified using the 3D Secure system, which is branded as “Verified by VISA” and “MasterCard SecureCode”. This is now the most widely-used single sign-on scheme ever, with over 200 million cardholders registered. It’s getting hard to shop online without being forced to use it. In a paper I’m presenting today at Financial Cryptography, Steven Murdoch and I analyse 3D Secure. From the engineering point of view, it does just about everything wrong, and it’s becoming a fat target for phishing. So why did it succeed in the marketplace? [...]

Surprisingly enough, it’s got very little to do with security and a great deal to do with shifting liability for losses onto customers.

[Via Bruce Schneier]

Something to catch up with on the BBC iPlayer.¹ Between the Ears: The Chekhov Challenge – The Sound of a Breaking String:

One of the most enigmatic stage directions in all drama appears in Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard: ‘A distant sound is heard. It appears to come from the sky and is the sound of a breaking string. It dies away sadly.’ Between the Ears focuses on the many attempts to produce this sound, ranging from musical saws to gun-shots. Guests include Paul Arditti, who mixed industrial, musical and bird sounds for the production by Sam Mendes, and musician Leafcutter John, who accepts Radio 3’s own Chekhov Challenge, recording his experiments to find a resonant breaking string sound for the 21st century.

[Via TV Today]

1. With apologies to non-UK readers. ^

In anticipation of the final season of Lost, Anna Pickard decided it was long past time for her to acquaint herself with the show. Here’s what she learnt in episode 1:

1. There are very good reasons one should never stand in from of a moving jet engine. It sucks.
2. If your best way of identifying yourself to other people is by popping out a couple of lines of squeaky falsetto, you might want to start considering the benefits of anonimity.
3. If the amateur stitching your wound is threatening to vomit in the gash, do not seek to reassure them by telling them a story about someones guts pouring onto the floor. It is not wise.
4. If your beach holiday brochure promises untouched beaches and exotic far-off peacefulness, always ALWAYS check the small print for monsters.
5. Hot jack, Doctor of Medicine, likes his booze.
6. Charlie, inadvisable male soprano of Manchester, appears to like his smack.
7. So far then, I think there are eleven recognisable characters, though there were more random screamers who may soon turn into beloved friends, and probably will: I recognised many of them from the articles I’ve tried not to read over the years.

I’ve only seen up to about three-quarters of the way through season 3. I saw the first two seasons on terrestrial TV, then swore off the show when Sky bought the exclusive UK rights only to pick up the season 3 DVD box some time well after its release. I stopped working my way through the episodes quite some time ago, when I got distracted by the need to keep up with some show that was in its first run on terrestrial TV. Once I had some time in my TV-viewing schedule again, I was acutely aware that if I did start watching Lost again I’d end up wanting to watch season 4 right afterward. At that time, the season 4 box set was still (IMHO) quite expensive, and with a full DVR I really couldn’t justify the expense¹ so I let it lie.

We’ll see if following these belated episode reviews rekindles my enthusiasm for picking up season 4.

[Via Anil Dash]

1. I still can’t, quite. ^

If you were the Duke of Milan’s Human Resources manager, would you recommend hiring this guy?

9. Where the operation of bombardment might fail, I would contrive catapults, mangonels, trabocchi, and other machines of marvellous efficacy and not in common use. And in short, according to the variety of cases, I can contrive various and endless means of offense and defense.

10. In times of peace I believe I can give perfect satisfaction and to the equal of any other in architecture and the composition of buildings public and private; and in guiding water from one place to another.

[Via kottke.org]

xkcd’s Spirit is too sweet for words.