Bill Angel

There is serious speculation that Donald Trump might pick Newt Gingrich as his running mate. See http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/12/politics/donald-trump-vice-presidential-search/ Donald Trump shouldn't get all the attention for suggesting goofy ideas in the context of a Presidential election. In 2012 Newt Gingrich suggested that someday the moon might become America's 51st state! See http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/01/27/gingrich_moon_base/

Koyaanisqatsi Movie Full Soundtrack - Phillip Glass (1982) https://youtu.be/t-t8w08QNJM

Superman by the Crash Test Dummies Two admirers of Superman photographed by me in Baltimore

The Sci Fi humorist Douglas Adams imagined that there is a restaurant at the end of the universe named Milliways. There could perhaps also be a hotel there named the Multiverse Envy Hotel. One could imagine Donald Trump visiting such a hotel, and attempting to argue with the infinite versions of himself in the other universes about whose universe was the largest. ;-)

Glycerine (or Glycerol) is a simple sugar alcohol compound. Is there some connection between this chemical compound and the lyrics of this song?

excerpted from chapter 53 of the book "Innocence" by Dean Koontz Dean Koontz's understanding of cosmology is a bit off. All the matter of the Universe is embedded in space which is currently expanding in all directions at a speed greater than the speed of light. But the matter in the universe is not expanding toward a void in the way that Koontz is visualizing it. It is the energy of space which drives the expansion and which carries the matter of the universe along with it, rather than the matter of the universe exploding into a void like the fragments of an exploded hand grenade.

An excellent book that I just finished reading is Instant: The Story of Polaroid by Christopher Bonanos http://www.polaroidland.net/the-book/ Edwin Land, the founder of Polaroid, was a role model for Steve Jobs, and the author develops a picture of Edwin Land that illustrates some of the similarities in how Land and Jobs ran their respective companies and promoted their products. The book isn't just about personalities however. The author makes an effort to explain to a general audience how the different systems for instant photography that Polaroid developed worked, as well as each of the systems' strengths and weaknesses.

One factor attributable to human error that may have contributed to causing the loss of this aircraft is the phenomena known as "spatial disorientation". This phenomena has been linked to the crashes of a number of commercial aircraft. Spatial disorientation can especially be a problem with flights at night over water, which was the situation with the Malaysian flight.IASS 08 SPACIAL DISORIENTATION.pdf

A good book to read this Memorial Day weekend is Armageddon, The Battle for Germany 1944-1945 by Max Hastings It presents a totally unromanticized depiction of combat, plus a good analysis of the stengths and weaknesses of the opposing armies and generals.

I'm currently reading ‘Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War’ by Robert M. Gates who served as Secretary of Defense for Bush and Obama. The author provides a very frank assessment of what he thinks of Congress, of which he has a very low opinion. He also has a low opinion of Joe Biden, but a high opinion of Hillary Clinton.

What I am reading (actually listening to) right now is the audio books version of the book "Quantum Man, Richard Feynman's Life in Science" by Lawrence Krauss, read by the author. Here is a humorous quote from the book: "He's another Dirac, only this time human." Eugene Wigner speaking of Richard Feynman. Eugene Wigner was talking about Feynman when he was young and at that time unknown to the scientific community. The book includes a serious discussion Feynman's scientific work. It is not just a collection of humorous anecdotes from his life. For that reason, listening to Lawrence Krauss just read it is a frustrating experience as there are no illustrations or photographs to ponder while listening to his narrative. I figured that since I had available just the audio book version from the library, the actual printed version of the book would be better and would contain photos and illustrations. Well it doesn't. The printed version has some simple drawings, few in number, and unfortunately no photographs.

What I am listening to right now is the audio books version of the book "Quantum Man, Richard Feynman's Life in Science" by Lawrence Krauss, read by the author. Here is a humorous quote from the book: "He [Feynman] is another Dirac, only this time human." Eugene Wigner speaking of Richard Feynman. Wigner was talking about Feynman when he was young and then unknown to the scientific community.

I think that cosmologists ponder that question a lot. One area of interest is termed the Anthropic principle. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle#Anthropic_coincidences I provided the link to the article's section covering Anthropic coincidences. The thrust of the argument is that if the physicial laws of the universe were different than they are, we would not exist to observe the universe and ask questions such as yours. But the physicial laws COULD be different, there could be an infinite number of universes in which the laws are slightly different, but conscious life doesn't exist in these alternate universes to ask these questions.

Your argument seems to be a case of what's termed "reductio ad absurdum" See http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum

A good book that I am currently reading: "The 4 Percent Universe" Subtitled: "Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality" by Richard Panek Published in 2011

Live cats always land on their feet. Dead cats don't. So if that cat belongs to Schrodinger it's unclear what the system will do if you put it inside of a box (while the cat is alive ) and then don't look at it.

I'm currently reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. Considerable criticism has been directed at the work over the novel's historical inaccuracies. In reading the book I came across this passage which, from a scientific standpoint, also seems to be fictional rather than based on scientific plausibility (Chapter 6): I guess that the idea here is that manta rays somehow use some phenomena based on quantum entanglement to navigate under water. It would be quite a shock if his idea turned out to be true. ;-)

Edward Snowden, Russia's Honored Guest?

The Catholic Church's Position on Same Sex Marriage

The Government has rejected the idea of creating a Trillion Dollar Coin. See: Treasury, Fed oppose using platinum coin to avoid debt ceiling It's a pity, because I had a neat idea for the design of the coin. How about a Trillion Dollar Coin with Alan Greenspan's Image On It? The reverse side of the coin would contain the following quote from Alan Greenspan: "The whole notion of a debt ceiling makes no sense"

David Bowie has a new song and video out, which brought to mind two other depictions of two headed individuals: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOyDTy9DtHQ Two Headed Accordian Player... Two Headed Infant (good and evil)

Here is a paper from a Creation Ministries website that is of interest because it appears to be a scientific critique of research in evolutionary biology.: Human chimp dna similarity re-evaluated The authors' conclusion is that "The humanchimp common ancestor paradigm is clearly based more on myth and propaganda than fact." Not so closely related after all.

One does get the impression that wealthy investors and corporate executives are more comfortable negotiating with the Communist Chinese than they are with the duly elected representatives of the American worker, be they the labor unions or the Democrats. Instead of calling in Joe Biden at the last moment to try to negotiate a deal with the Republicans, perhaps they should have called in Hu Jintao, the President of the People's Republic of China, whose portrait I had incorporated into my political image.

Consequences of going over the Fiscal Cliff? Think of it as "outsourcing" our Government to China

I don't know if this has been posted elsewhere at scienceforums.net. I did a search and couldn't find it. So I thought to post a link to it here: CERN Physicists Predict Cosmic Quantum Phase Shift to Coincide with End of Mayan Calendar