| The Ig Nobel Prizes This year's Ig Nobel awards were presented at Harvard University, around the same time as those Swedish prizes were announced. The awards are given to individuals whose achievements "cannot or should not be reproduced." The literature award, for example, went to an Australian woman whose book "Living on Light" asserts that although most folks eat food, they don't really need to. The psychology award went to two academic researchers for their groundbreaking piece, "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments." This is great stuff -- don't miss the archive. |
| Life: The Best Magazine Photos of the Year The Alfred Eisenstaedt Awards honor magazine photography in several categories, including fashion, news, travel, architecture, and cover of the year. All of this year's winners are jaw-droppers, but our favorite has to be Annie Leibowitz's interpretation of Da Vinci's "The Last Supper," featuring the cast of the Sopranos. Other standouts include Stuart Macfarlane's shot of Welsh rugby player Garin Jenkins getting gouged in the eye during a match against Argentina, and a Max Aguilera-Hellweg picture of a fetal surgery procedure. But, they're all great. See for yourself. |
| AOLiza Kevin Fox has already been barraged with hits after Harper's Magazine excerpted a transcript from his painfully funny web site, but why not share the love? The ELIZA program was developed in the mid-Sixties to "simulate a Rogerian psychoanalyst by taking excerpts from the subject's comments and posing questions back to the subject." Mr. Fox cleverly attached the conversational robot to an AOL Instant Messenger address that receives lots of random hits -- and posted the resulting exchanges right here. Some folks have unknowingly chatted with this program for over an hour! Enjoy. We certainly did. |
| Napoleon Tyrant. Hero. Revolutionary. Military genius. Brilliant politician. Short French guy with an incredible Napoleon complex. There's a lot you can say about Napoleon Bonaparte. On November 8, PBS Television will premiere a new show about the man whose presence on the battelfield, acording to the Duke of Wellington, was "equal to forty thousand men in the balance." Here is the accompanying web site, complete with timelines, biographical sketches, classroom materials, local showtimes, and an interactive battlefield simulator. PBS does it again. |
| In Focus Tagline: "A photojournalist chronicles his journey through kidney failure." Here is a story that puts a human face on a problem that currently affects approximately three million people nationwide. Follow John Martin's photographic tale from diagnosis to dialysis to transplant and recovery; pictures and text together make for a powerful experience. John's father donated a kidney when it was clear John needed one. The sequence of photos taken in the hospital as the two prepare for their respective operations is particularly moving. Also included on the site: links and resources about kidney failure, organ transplants, and related matters. |
| Film-Philosophy Warning -- this is a text-intensive forum that is completely devoid of gross-out Flash cartoons, garage band MP3s, or prancing vermin. But you will find loads of lively, informed commentary about the relationship between ideas and movies. Recent discussion topics include the use of film and video in the Blair Witch Project, new Taiwanese cinema, and Fisher Price's classic PIXL-2000 camera. While the academic jargon can be a little off-putting at times (e.g. "There is not and never has been a primordial experience which can serve as ground for a phenomenological account of sociality"), there are plenty of straight-talking threads to enjoy. |
| Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine A timely resource from the United Nations. Visit the site to "access information on important issues related to Palestine and the United Nations, as well as information regarding the work and official documents of the Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations." Also learn about the Palestinian Liberation Organization and the Palestinian National Authority, read documents from the Middle East Peace Process, and peruse an archive of U.N. resolutions relating to the region. |
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