My Go-To Vegan Salad Dressing: Balsamic Tahini-Dijon

 I found this recipe somewhere along my so-far 4-year journey into plant-based living. In September of 2020, a friend recommended a Documentary to me: The Game Changers. Immediately after watching it, I went completely Vegan. Since then, I have upgraded to a Whole-Foods, Plant-Based lifestyle, and studying nutrition has been my biggest "hobby." My favorite resource is nutritionfacts.org - a free non-profit website founded by Dr. Michael Gregor, who was the technical advisor for the documentary.

Anyway, I can't claim credit for this recipe, but over the years I have upsized it because I use this dressing on all my salads, plus other things, like sweet potatoes. Did you know that it is highly recommended to have a bit of vinegar each day? Not just apple cider vinegar as has been a meme in recent years, but ANY vinegar. It's the acetate ion that our bodies need, so any vinegar will do, even distilled white vinegar, also known as photographic fixer.

Now the recipe just fills a mayonnaise jar to the top. My latest addition is ground black cumin, but I'm still experimenting with the quantity. You only need 1/4 of a tablespoon per day to see the health benefits (the research shows), so today when I made a batch, I determined that its mass is a little over 900 grams, so I added 9 x 1/4 tablespoons (I use about 100 g of dressing a day) or 1 1/2 tablespoons.

Here's the upsized recipe:

1 1/2     cups    Balsamic Vinegar of Modena;

1           cup      Tahini (I use Barron's, from Amazon);

3/4        cup      Dijon Mustard (I use a store brand);

1/2        cup      Maple Syrup;

4           tsp       Nutritional Yeast;

2           tsp       Dried Basil Leaves;

2           tsp       Dried Oregano

Just pour the ingredients into the mayonnaise jar and shake. I have used it right away, but I can't help feeling that the dried herbs should be allowed to rehydrate for awhile. Maybe that happens so quickly that I've never consumed it with the herbs still dry.

Video and 3D Update

If you read some of my first posts, you'll know that I was interested in my home-movie archive as a possible augmentation to my own memory. Well, I have begun to digitize those videos and to edit them into viewable clips. In fact, I've begun offering this as a service in my own local area. I call it "Brian's Digital Boutique." You can find my info page at bit.ly/BDBmain. [NOTE: This service has been discontinued]
I've been using FOSS tools such as KDEnlive and Natron to do my video work.
In parallel to this activity, I've been doing some work in 3D. I've been exploring Structure-From-Motion software which transforms a series of photographs of an object or a place into a 3D model. This could be a shortcut for someone who wants to reverse engineer a mechanical part or to make a new copy of a broken item. Additionally, I've gotten some time in on Solidworks, a commercial 3D design and drafting (and analysis, and...) suite. I'm taking a class in this software, which allows me to own a student license. But as soon as the class is over, so will be my access to this powerful program. I've only just begun to look for alternatives, and so far I have only looked at OpenSCAD. This program looks powerful but has an entirely different user interface. Instead of sketching in 2D and then extruding into the third dimension (for example), in OpenSCAD you define your object using a programming language. This is far different so it will take some getting used to. And so far I have no idea how assemblies are created; whether there is an equivalent to "mates." Mates are instructions to the software that tell it how two parts relate to each other in space. It's so powerful. Just the other day I was amazing myself by building a ball-bearing from the ground up, with balls and races that were mated to each other. The balls could roll around in the races, and the whole thing could be turned just like in the real world. Can this be done in OpenSCAD? So far, I am totally ignorant.
I can't believe it's been over a year since my last post. How is anyone to take an interest unless they can expect regular posts? Sheesh.
Maybe I'll try to do a regular Weekend Update.
That's it for now.
-Brian

Transportation Thoughts

As I was driving to Solvang today, I was thinking of some of the impact that autonomous vehicles are likely to make. I think they will be a huge game-changer, and my hope is that they may help to undo the tremendous damage that automobiles have done to our society, environment and culture.
For one thing, I think that car ownership will fade away. Not at first. At first, the manufacturers will be trying to sell autonomous vehicles to everyone who has a car already, as the next step in car ownership. But eventually people will begin to realize that these robots (that's what they are) will be so efficient at getting to where they are needed, that the wait time for one to appear at your door will be measurable in seconds. Uber and Lyft already show us a model of the convenience that an app-linked transportation appliance can be. If you remove the last inefficiency -- the driver -- then the response time becomes close to nothing.
Transportation of goods and materials will also be made much more efficient. Transportation vehicles will be able to be active around the clock. The roads won't have to be as smooth either, both because the vehicles won't care how smooth the ride is, and because of active shock absorption. Air travel will disappear eventually for a number of reasons, primary among them the lack of portable fuels, but also because autonomous vehicles will be able to travel at rates far exceeding what human drivers can accomplish. The extra cost of air travel for a few saved hours won't be worth it, especially if you are traveling in what is effectively an office/lounge/suite.
But how will we power these vehicles? I think that there may be a very large solar power infrastructure that develops. Certainly the roadways will be lined with solar panels. They may even be covered overhead by panels. Getting the energy to the vehicles may be as simple as using conductive pick-offs like electric rail systems do. Or, the solar electricity could be used to crack water into hydrogen and oxygen to create portable fuels. Hmmm. Maybe air travel could use these same fuels after all; who knows? The electric pick-off systems might only be used on long highway stretches, while for urban and rural use, the vehicles would switch over to portable fuels.
Without so much car ownership, the cars that do exist will be in more constant use. Parking lots will be less and less desirable.  Won't that be nice? Maybe our society won't have to be built so much around the needs of these machines as they are for cars today. Maybe there could be more walkable plazas, social meeting places, outdoor entertainment venues, parks and nice places to be.
It will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

Another Change of Heart

OK, so I took a four-year detour. I seriously bought into the idea that industrial civilization is doomed, and that we all had better learn some basic survival skills so that we can, basically...survive. Well, I'm not a young guy these days, and I find that if I do much more than basic work in the garden, I seriously hurt myself. Yeah, I'm trying to get much more physically fit, and I've made lots of progress there (50 pounds lost, maybe 50 more to go?). But there are hard limits. So, you won't see me hefting bales of hay anytime soon, I'm afraid.

This year I was too disheartened to even do much in the vegetable garden. My Permaculture aspirations were going nowhere. I was in a tailspin of misdirection and disappointment. My house, while now being paid off, is still a tax burden, and it needs constant maintenance to not fall down. Luckily, the roof is in good shape, except for the patio roof. That area needs attention, because the next rainy season -- if we get one -- will likely make things a lot worse.

My wife has serious health problems with her ankles and now her knees. Arthritis. So I'm her caretaker, and that takes up much of my day.

So, why am I writing anything now at all? Well, I am coming out of my blue funk, having finally rediscovered an old interest that I think I can nurture into a new vocation, and I read an inspiring piece of fiction that made me somewhat optimistic for the future, and wanting to learn and create again. Yippee!

If anyone is interested, the fictional work is Walkaway, by Cory Doctorow, and, as always, he offers the book FOR FREE on his website, http://www.craphound.com. I bought the book used, so poor Cory didn't see any revenue from that sale. But in the spirit of what Cory stands for in regard to copyright and the ability to share something you buy, I passed my copy on to a young person who I think will get something out of it, based on some of his comments about life and the future. Hopefully I'm not being too vague.

I have decided to resurrect my lifelong interest in Photography and Video Production, and open a little boutique video transfer service in my local area. I will compete with the mass service people based on price points, pickup and delivery service, and extended services, such as curating, organizing titling and packaging customers' years of video onto an easy to access external hard drive. I also do video editing, so if a customer needs a video collage, I can take the best of what they
have, and make an emotive memory for them.

But what do I think is really going to happen to industrial civilization? Look at who is in the White House! Look at the hurricane that just threw Puerto Rico into a collapse situation of its own! Won't
we be following right along in a few years' time? Maybe. But I've been waiting for several years for the big stock market crash, the shuttering of the Walmarts, the halt of all food deliveries, and the rise of gangs of ravenous, hungry mobs. I can't just focus on gloom and doom all the time anymore. There will be disasters, sure, but not all at once. And I can't just sit and wait to die in one.

I have other interests that I want to follow, too. There are a few bits of robotic machinery that I would like to build, and that I think I CAN build, if I can finally clear out a lot of the excess STUFF I have
that's in my way. My wife and I have accumulated a lot of clutter that needs to be cleared out so that we can access the useful things we have. Nowadays, we can't find anything, so we have to buy stuff that we know we already have. That's not very smart!

So, that's where I stand today. Hopefully, I'll have a lot more for you
soon.

My Old Vision of the Future

A while back, I was awakened to the predicament humanity is in, due to our use over about 200 years of fossil fuels that took millions of years to produce, and the likelihood that a) we are running out of this stuff and b) our use of it is destabilizing the climate. But before that, I wrote a somewhat optimistic "background" piece about what would be happening in the year 2019. Here it is:

Background
Year: 2019:

Simple, trainable (at the level of about a dog) appliances are beginning to be seen in society. Robotic cars are appearing on the road, and with their advanced performance, they are being accepted hungrily by society. Initiatives are beginning to be proposed that would allocate special lanes to these augmented vehicles. Some have even proposed that human drivers be banished from the roads, but most feel that's not necessary. Instead, safety devices have been developed that take control of the vehicle if the human driver attempts to make a dangerous move, falls asleep or becomes impaired.
Without the need to support a human driver, bus and taxi travel has become so inexpensive that most people - especially city dwellers - don't need to actually own a vehicle. Autonomous vehicles swarm like bees, with an empty one at your door in just a minute or two.

People are starting to realize that they will no longer be needed in jobs that consist of repetitive hand-eye coordination operations, like driving, assembling products, or even cooking. All new commercial trucks are robotic, and retrofit kits are selling wildly.
Scientists and Engineers - those who think and solve problems for a living - realize that their livelihoods are threatened too. Not nearly as quickly as laborers, but quickly enough. Many of these scientists speak of intelligence augmentation, the integration of computer interfaces directly into their heads. Along with this is a growing excitement that the heralded singularity - the birth of general artificial intelligence - is actually going to happen.
Grandiose plans for solving the world's problems: warfare, hunger, environmental conditions, are giving way to small, distributed solutions involving robotic distribution, ubiquitous automated surveillance, and open systems architecture for forming public policy.

Religious fundamentalism has begun to die off as access to information from all over the world has been able to spread, due to the development of instant human language translation. All phones have translation capability, and a real babelfish - the device conceived by Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe author Douglas Adams, that one inserts into his one's ear to hear any language translated to one's own - are on the market. Because language is no longer the barrier it was, any opinion can be shared among the world's population, and people are beginning to realize how much they have in common, even as they nurture their own unique cultures.

Appreciation of human performance has branched into two groups: performers including athletes, dancers and artists whose bodies have not been modified, and those whose bodies incorporate the latest biomechanical technology. The International Olympic Committee has advanced stringent screening policies to assure that only unmodified athletes can participate, but outside of the Olympics, there are a dazzling variety of world records being set in endurance, strength, speed and agility.

Against this technological background, humans still do what humans have always done: fall in love, get married, raise families, and work to improve their lives. They also enjoy unprecedented entertainment choices: besides participating as athletes or performers, anyone can participate in vividly realistic and elaborate alternative realities. Computer communication devices are everywhere, so where's nowhere that you cannot be tied into the world network. Wearing binocular display glasses that incorporate tiny cameras into them, your personal reality can be modified to include elements of fantasy, or to exclude visual clutter. The cameras intercept the scene in front of you; the computer adds, subtracts or modifies the image, then the displays present it to your eyes.

The cyborg label that used to attend anyone who wore complicated cybernetic eyewear is diminishing. The optical systems that sit in front of the wearer's eyes in a modern eye display are transparent, allowing others to make eye contact with the wearer.

For some people - a rising number actually - it is not sufficient to modify reality from outside the body. Drugs and now even electronic devices can enable the fine-tuning of emotional states. This technology is so far only able to effect gross changes, such as cheering you up, or preventing hunger or cravings of various kinds. Your thoughts themselves are still a dark secret. At least they are this year....

In a world of perfect connection, you can never be lost, but you cannot easily hide either, at least, not from the legal authorities. For everyone else, you can enter a "not available - do not contact" mode, with customizable lists of keep-outs and emergency break ins. No one outside the people you specify will be able to contact you. Many people have adopted strict off-the-clock times, and it's a matter of much discussion in etiquette circles. Excessive "absence" is seen as rude, so there's some care to be taken with your settings.

Interest in personal privacy has blossomed, in backlash to the excessive abandonment of privacy by many individuals in the early years of the century.
Increasingly, each year seems separate from the last by huge tides of change. The world is constantly dishing up surprise after surprise, with pleasant surprises finally beginning to outnumber unpleasant ones. After a decade and a half of unpredictable weather, failing economies, refugee crises, drowning cities, earthquakes and disease outbreaks, things seem to be settling into a calmer pattern.

The disparity between the intellectually gifted and those who are not is diminishing. Even without a hardware interface to the brain, computers are just so damn helpful. Long gone are the days when you had to learn all about computers to use one. These days, if you can state your problem, the computer can find the help you need.
Everyone is wondering whether there will be a giant employment crash, but so far it hasn't happened. When the financial system was overhauled a few years back, it was decided that there would be a human dividend: Every man, woman and child would be entitled to basic support, simply due to their membership in the human race, which collectively built the tools to get everyone here. This was a trickle-down effect on a massive scale, that took no time to catch on, but was a daring proposal at the time. Anyone who wanted more than this basic support - which, incidentally included food, shelter, unlimited access to information/communication and health care - could take on any sort of occupation that he desired. Reward systems were standardized, and rewarded not only those occupations that contributed to the economic system, but that contributed to the overall well-being of humanity. Many chose to relocate from their advanced societies in the west, to areas where people needed the most help.

Everyone knows that AI is just around the corner. Progress in both the top-down reverse engineering of animal and human brains and bottom-up development of machine intelligence algorithms has been a phenomenon. Today, the concern of many is that artificial intelligences will be unknowable, and this is almost certain. These intelligences will be unknowable by someone who isn't also augmented, incorporating a bit of AI into themselves. However, these AIs will be able to know us, and will be able to interact with us on our terms, even as they devote only a percent or two of their intellect to doing so. It is predicted that by 2025, a real general AI will appear, and that will be the “knee” in the curve of accelerating change; the inflection point or singularity beyond which all bets are off.

Kids entering college a decade ago had no guarantees that what they were studying in school would be at all useful in earning a living when they finished. Usually that was true, but the universities knew that the specific subject matter wasn't what was really being taught, beyond standardizing students in a set of common skills.. The thing that was being taught was how to acquire knowledge as needed, to incorporate it into one's intellect, and to use it do develop further knowledge. As the saying goes, "You don't really understand a thing until you can explain it to someone else."

That's where I left off. I couldn't think of a way of summarizing the darn thing, and after my "awakening", it didn't seem to matter.
It's interesting how I brush off the "unpredictable weather, failing economies" etc. with words that indicate that this was an aberration instead of a new normality.
I wonder how far along the path to the future we will get before we just can't, anymore. I have basically lost interest in this future, and instead, I'm finding new ways of living a much less complex, fragile existence. I plan on writing much more about it right here.

Peak Everything, the Crashing Economy, and the Future

I have had my eyes opened by recent events. I had thought all I had to do was sit back and keep myself and my family alive and healthy until the Singularity, when pretty much every possibility would open; even the potential for immortality.
Now I find that "future history" and the fate of civilization is a race between MANY downward - pushing factors: peak oil, high government debt, climate change and financial uncertainty, and the hope that there will be technological fixes for humanity's problems. I'm no longer optimistic that our society will be saved by new energy technologies and the coming RBN (robotic, bio, nano) technology boom.

SO, I am investigating what I can do at home to make it more likely that I and my family survive the breakdown of easy access to food, shelter, transportation and security, and become a little bit (or a lot) more self-sufficient.

I'm learning, as quickly as I can, how to grow food. I'm studying grey water manuals, getting my hand tools in order, and deciding what to do with my vehicles. Should I get rid of the ones with computer chips inside, and just rely on the old Chevy pickup?

If anyone reads this, and wants to know where I started, just do a search on Dmitry Orlov. Find his book, "Reinventing Collapse". Watch the talk he gave at the Long now Foundation, or any of the other interviews. Get busy!

Plans Goals Dreams

I have a dream / goal of building up a fully capable workshop / laboratory from scratch using recycled materials and utilizing the best engineering and scientific principles to make it truly capable. I'd like to document the process as I go, perhaps making videos and writeups for my website. I'd like to go from nothing but dirt and rocks, a few recycled materials and some energy input, all the way to bio- or nanotechnology.

I recently bought some books on the topic of building a metalworking shop by casting the components in a charcoal foundry, and using hand tools to finish it and put it together. At stages of the development process, the lathe, in particular, assists in its own creation. The series of books is a set of seven small paperbacks by the late Dave Gingery on making shop equipment using a homemade charcoal foundry. It looks great. I have done some blacksmithing in the past; I made a forge from an old hibachi grill. I'm gonna do the same sort of thing again.

In addition to metalworking, I'm interested in building all parts, including electronics, to achieve a degree of self-replication, similar to the goals of the Fab lab project at MIT.

One other thing I'd like to test is how hot a hotspot I can create using low tech but large-area reflectors and the sun's rays. If this became useful, I could maybe use a big collector as a heat source for a furnace. Maybe I could melt small amounts of glass or metal.

Amazing Science Archive

As someone who is interested in science, and science experiments, labwork and demonstrations, I am pleased to find that Popular Science magazine has placed their articles into a searchable archive.
One of my favorite authors of these articles is Kenneth M. Swezey. He used to set up the experiments, get volunteers to perform them, take photos and write it all up in the many articles he authored over the years. He also collected these articles into several books: "After Dinner Science," "Science Magic," and "Chemistry Magic." I happen to own these three books; I've had them since I was a young kid, and they're among my most prized possessions. Now this same information is available to people who don't own the books (they're long out of print, but still covered by Copyright). Check out the archive, and start searching for cool things like "spinthariscope," "X-rays," "Chlorine," "Magnesiun," and whatever else you seek.
http://www.popsci.com/archive-viewer

Our Soylent Green Future?

I find it both fascinating and appalling when I go out onto the Web and read about what this century has in store for us: On one hand, we face increasing climate chaos, possible drought or hurricanes, the rising probability of a massive earthquake in California, the end of cheap energy and along with it affordable food. We hear dire predictions of the mess that consumer culture will make of the planet as it spreads to developing nations. What if everyone in China DOES want to drive a car? What if the banks fail? What if my retirement savings disappears? Oh, and don't forget the global pandemic threat! Bird flu, swine flu, dog or cat flu - it's just a matter of time before a really nasty bug appears, and circles the globe before we can do anything to stop it.
On the other hand, technological progress on many fronts continues to accelerate. Nanotechnology, a mastery over matter, and the ability to program molecules at will, is getting ever greater traction in labs around the globe, and despite the hype of its early days may deliver, in the areas of medicine and energy, quite soon. Even artificial intelligence, whose painfully slow development caused a generation of disappointment, is finally beginning to appear - in your cell phone! A world of highly-efficient solar energy farms, or solar satellites beaming energy to receiving antennas on the ground; super-medicine that can repair the damages of the aging process as easily as swallowing a capsule of nanobots; unlimited, healthful food, synthesized on the spot from an unending stream of component molecules, using templates based on the world's finest organic ingredients and culinary practices.
Will my retirement years look like something out of Soylent Green? Or will I simply not retire, but find fulfilling work that is not driven by the need to make a buck, but to serve humanity, while learning and creating, following my own unending and ever-changing interests? Will I finally learn to play the piano?
Should I be getting involved in a local "transition plan" that seeks to avoid financial and human catastrophe in my local area? Should I plant a vegetable garden? Should I abandon the house I live in, and move into an RV? Should I head to the countryside, where at least the farmers' markets may still have food? And what about my kids? Should the two I have in college continue to pursue their degrees, or will their education be rendered useless by technological or social change? What is the prudent course?
I'm trying to formulate one for myself and my family. Starting with the extrememly short-term, and working outward to a rest-of-my-life planning process, I'm trying to cover my bases.
First, the home disaster kit, with food and water for three or more days for my family. Then I'll put together a bug-out kit, which is something like a set of camping supplies, again with plenty of food and water, that we can take with us if we have to get out of town. This might be needed if (when) the "big one" hits, and our neighborhoods go up in flames, fueled by large quantities of natural gas escaping from the gas mains.
I'm also thinking of dropping off simple one-sheet disaster planning leaflets around my neighborhood, to try to get others to prepare. I don't want to be the only one with food and water, surrounded by several hundred families who don't!
I'm starting to take these steps toward Hacking the Future!

Science Tee

stroboptics shop
Hey, I made this shirt and offer it for sale at Cafe Press. You should get one now!

Update: This listing has long-since disappeared from Cafe Press. The price was so high that I couldn't afford to buy one.

Personal Portable 3D Printer

Personal Portable 3D Printer
A new 3D printer is coming onto the market. Apparently it's a breeze to operate, and only costs $1500.

If we couple this technology with vision technology that allows you to import physical objects into the software - scanning technology, if you will - then we have a system that can reproduce objects.

Imagine the carnival novelty: get a 3D portrait in thermoplastic. Remember those vacuum form machines at fairs? They'd manufacture a novelty idem for you in real time, using automated machinery. This would do that one a step better, by allowing you to create from physical input. Of course, you could still print out novelty items: License plate frames, eyeglass frames, toys, models and so on.

Manna not From Heaven

Manna is the name of a management program that debuted on May 17, 2010, according to this fictionalization from Marshall Brain.
Manna debuts in a fast food restaurant. All the employees wear wireless headsets, and Manna resides on a PC under the former manager's desk. Manna replaced the manager and his assistants. All day long, Manna issues voice commands through the headsets, and the wearer performs the tasks, then says, "ok." Each task is simple, like, "Walk toward the trash receptacle. Open the cabinet. Remove the trash bin." and so on.
Manna saves Burger-G $250 million in its first year. Soon, all businesses that can, are running Manna. Manna organizes the workers at a superstore so that they never even see each other. All to boost productivity.
Thus, these minimum wage earners become the eyes, ears, and hands of the robotic future.

http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm

Science Carnival

I volunteered to be the chair for the PTA's math and science night. Since last year's Art Festival was so successful when it was done on a Saturday, we moved our math and science night to a Saturday too.
My motivation for volunteering was that I really dig this hands-on science stuff. I even have a website devoted to it but I really don't seem to make enough time to do much of it these days. Well, this sort of forces my hand!
I have a long list of activities I am busily getting ready. Part of the work involves digging equipment out from storage, and refurbishing it. For example, I have a Van de Graaf generator that I bought on Ebay several years ago. When I first used it, it worked great. Scarily great, in fact. But the rubber belt soon self destructed, and the thing has been sitting in its box ever since.
So, not being able to track down a manufacturer for the machine, I am making a belt. My first attempt wasn't that good: I pieced a belt together from several strips of latex rubber. But the machine kept discharging every time one of the joints went across the rollers. So now I am attempting to make a new belt from a bicycle inner tube. At least this belt will only have one joint. I'll report on how it works, as well as updating the progress on all the other activities I have planned, including the solar marshmallow roaster.

atnmbl: The Autonomobile is Coming

I've been wondering for a long time why the GMs and Chryslers of the world are so clueless about roboticizing our vehicles. Are they just stupid? Or are they locked into an irrelevant mindset, unable to think outside the box-on-wheels?

I think it's too late for the Big Auto industry. But there is plenty of opportunity for creative designers and engineers, to integrate new technology to create something that the public really wants, and that can improve the quality of life for all of us.

An example is this: atnmbl.

It's an encouraging design exercise for an automonous vehicle. The designers started by completely revisiting the driving experience. Think of all the things you can't do while driving: reading, sleeping, cooking a meal, enjoying a cocktail, playing a video game, logging onto Facebook, and much more.
Their conclusion was this: during driving, your entire life goes on
hold.
Then they started asking, what SHOULD the driving experience be like? Their conclusion was that not having to drive would be the biggest improvement of the experience.
Once they determined that driverless driving was a design goal, they researched the state of technology. Programs like DARPA's Grand Challenge have shown that, with GPS, machine vision and the latest sensor suites, the task of driving CAN be handled automatically. The proof-of-concept has been done, the earliest (very expensive) prototypes have been built and tested, and now it's just up to Moore's Law to make it affordable.
So, given that driverless vehicles are both desirable and possible, what would one actually look like?
Design firm Mike and Maaike (pronounced MYY-kuh) reached the conclusion that an automous vehicle would look more like a dwelling than a teardrop, or an insect, or a crouching tiger. They came up with a vehicle they call atnmbl, short for Autonomobile. The atnmbl has panoramic windows, an entertainment center, and a wide, comfy couch suitable for up to seven passengers.


The atnmbl not only focuses on efficiency of task, it redefines that task. If you aren't having to put your life on hold to drive, then speeding dangerously to your destination is not important. Acceleration and top speed requirements are reduced, because they just aren't important anymore.
What's important is that you are free to go about your business while you travel. You don't even have to worry about parking; the atnmbl can drop you off at your destination, and go park itself. Or, it can go take someone else somewhere. This eliminates the biggest waste that cars represent: vast parking lots filled with cars that are used twice a day.
If you own your atnmbl, you can offer it for hire at a price that is automatically negotiated for you. Or, you can just hire one by TXTing or calling from your cellphone.
Some models might be equipped with a microwave, so you can warm your breakfast on the way to work. Some might be equipped with a self-cleaning bath/shower, so you can drag yourself from bed directly to your commute. Or you could hire a long-distance sleeper model in the evening, spend a few hours enjoying the entertainment, retire for bed, get up and shower in the morning, and step out at your destination fresh and ready to go.
Some people will simply SEND an atnmbl to pick up their groceries for them; without drivers, and being completely solar-powered, it will be cheap to do so. Your children will be able to travel in perfect safety without you, because there's a reliable driver built into the vehicle.

Some features:

• fully electric powered plus solar assist
• driverless navigation via GPS, Lidar, radar, accelerometers
• wrap-around seating for 7
• voice recognition and remote for real-time control/ input
• large display for info, searches, browsing, communication
• open-source software with downloadable apps for carpool and car-share
through social networking, pre-loaded trips, city tours, virtual
drivers, etc.
• live trip info on mini display
• electric door, standing height entryway
• electronically tinted windows
• all wheel drive with motors in each wheel
• very few mechanical parts (drive by wire)
• bar

DIY 3D Printing Uses low cost materials

Mark Ganter, Duane Storti and Ben Utela, from the University of Washington Department of Mechanical Engineering in Seattle, Washington, have developed a low-cost replacement for the materials their 3D printers use. AND, they've published their recipes.
Now materials costs drop from as high as $30 a pound to mere pennies. The result is that the UW has been able to open its rapid-prototyping shop to a wider variety of projects.
What's the new material? Powdered clay, mixed with sugar, maltodextrin or sometimes PVA. The fabjects are fired in a kiln just like any ceramic material.
Check out the recipe if you've built or are considering building a 3D printer.

Hacking YOUR Future

You click in the areas you want to work, such as "People" "People and Data" "Ideas" etc. and it helps find the appropriate career for you.
It says I'm supposed to be a snail farmer, or maybe an earthworm or (stretching it,) frog farmer. Wow! It really picked up on those hidden desires!
Here's the link: http://www.act.org/wwm/index.html

A Robotic Book Scanner

In Vernor Vinge's "Rainbow's End" a corporation is rapidly scanning the contents of the Ted Geisel library at UCSD using innovative technology: The machines grind the books up, chopping them into tiny bits, and vacuums up this book dust. Each tiny book particle is photographed as it is disposed of, and all of the images taken by the system are later stitched back together by powerful vision software.

The video above shows us an alternative to such destructive techniques. The robot turns the pages itself and GENTLY scans two pages at a time.

I think the librarians would favor this approach much better!

Doing Face Art with RoboRealm

This video is one of what I'm calling "Face Art". My webcam is taking a view of me and my surroundings and then RoboRealm - a video processing program designed as a vision platform for robotics - is performing a bunch of transformations to the video. Things like motion detection, frame averaging, histogram processing, mirroring, and so on.

It's fun, and not difficult to set up.

Sorry, no sound. I have some ideas for that, but can't get to it right now.

El Arbol de la Plaza

Sony BMG disabled embedding, because they want their artists to struggle in obscurity, I guess.

But here's a link to the video. I encourage you to watch it!
VIDEO @ YOUTUBE




Wow, what is that?

It's really scary. So surreal. Those airplanes in the sky - and that clown - really freak me out!
But for some reason, I really like it.

--UPDATE--
The artist is Vicentico, from Argentina.
The song is, as the post title says, "El Arbol de la Plaza".
Here are the lyrics:

El árbol de la plaza del barrio viejo no crece más
Se ha quedado quietito todo pelado por qué será
La tierra está tan seca en cualquier momento se va a quebrar
Pareciera que el cielo se fue olvidando cómo llorar

Hay que llamar a la tormenta a ver si llueve
Para salvar al arbolito que se muere

Si es que está en nuestras manos traer las nubes y hacer llover
Y vuelvan a la vida todas las hojas que hay por crecer
Bailen toda la noche que acá tocamos hasta amanecer
Que siento el aguacero venir llegando a calmar la sed

Hay que llamar a la tormenta a ver si llueve
Para salvar al arbolito que se muere

Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Si el agua moja la plaza
La muerte se vuelve a su casa
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Que si no se lloran las penas
Se convierten en condena
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve

El árbol de la plaza del barrio viejo no crece más
Se ha quedado quietito todo pelado por qué será
La tierra está tan seca en cualquier momento se va a quebrar
Pareciera que el cielo se fue olvidando cómo llorar

Hay que llamar a la tormenta a ver si llueve
Para salvar al arbolito que se muere

Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Si el agua moja la plaza
La muerte se vuelve a su casa
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Si no se lloran las penas
Se convierten en condena
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve

Y si después de la lluvia sale la luna
Y la tierra iluminada
Abra un sendero para seguir
Andemos como soldados por el camino que el árbol vuelve a vivir
Que el árbol vuelve a vivir

Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Que el agua moje la plaza
Así la muerte se atrasa
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Que si no se lloran las penas
Se convierten en condena
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Que baile la gente que baile en la plaza
Así la muerte se atrasa
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Ahora ya siento llegar la tormenta
Así que la banda apriete con fuerza
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve
Que baile la gente que baile en la plaza
Así la muerte se atrasa
Llueve, llueve y nadie se mueve.


You can visit Vicentico's website on MySpace.

Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene

Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene from pro on Vimeo.
Scientists at the University of Washington are pushing the boundaries of what can be done with video by computers. They can use a series of still images taken of the same scene a video was taken, and extract some of the superior qualities of the still images to enhance the video. Lighting, resolution, texture and camera movement can all be enhanced.

Other things the software can be used for include the ability to edit a few frames of video to remove unpleasant objects, and have the computer propagate those edits through the whole video. Examples shown include removing a "no parking" sign from the foreground of a flower shop, and removing an unsightly scar from a tree.
These researchers are making progress toward what I'm looking for: the ability of a computer to watch my videos for me, and create an artificial reality populated with the people and places in those videos.

Watch the video to get an idea of all the capabilities that these researchers are working on.