11 SEP 2014 by TGAW
Tom Hanks on Typewriters
What I really, truly miss is the physical trail that typing usually gives you. Typing on an actual typewriter on paper is only a softer version of chiseling words into stone. 1 
notes
notesTom Hanks recently created an app that mimics typing on a typewriter. While talking about his app, one thought stuck out to me.
24 JAN 2014 by ideonexus
Stones are Chaos
The difference between a piece of stone and an atom is that an atom is highly organised, whereas the stone is not. The atom is a pattern, and the molecule is a pattern, and the crystal is a pattem; but the stone, although it is made up of these pattems, is just a mere confusion. It's only when life appears that you begin to get organisation on a larger scale. Life takes the atoms and molecules and crystals; but, instead of making a mess of them like the stone, it combines them into new and mo...
1 Despite being made up of atoms, molecules, and crystals, which are organization.
23 OCT 2013 by ideonexus
Proof that Objects Fall at the Same Rate
Salv.
But, even without further experiment, it is possible to prove clearly, by means of a short and conclusive argument, that a heavier body does not move more rapidly than a lighter one provided both bodies are of the same material and in short such as those mentioned by Aristotle. But tell me, Simplicio, whether you admit that each falling body acquires a definite speed fixed by nature, a velocity which cannot be increased or diminished except by the use of force [violenza] or resistance.... 1 notes
notesGalileo's proof is based completely on a thought-experiment, no observation necessary.
27 AUG 2012 by ideonexus
Laws of Motion
LAW I.
Every body perseveres in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed thereon.
Projectiles persevere in their motions, so far as they are not retarded by the resistance of the air, or impelled downwards by the force of gravity. A top, whose parts by their cohesion are perpetually drawn aside from rectilinear motions, does not cease its rotation, otherwise than as it is retarded by the air. The greater bodies... 1 notes
notesThe original source of these laws from Newton.
18 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
A Watch Implies a Watchmaker Argument
In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there, I might possibly answer, that, for any thing I knew to the contrary, it had lain there for ever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to shew the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be enquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think of the answer which I had before given, that, for any thing I knew, the watc...Folksonomies: creationism
Folksonomies: creationism
1 notes
notesEarly example of it from 1802.
08 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Empirical Reality is All Probability in Mathematics
The stone that Dr. Johnson once kicked to demonstrate the reality of matter has become dissipated in a diffuse distribution of mathematical probabilities. The ladder that Descartes, Galileo, Newton, and Leibniz erected in order to scale the heavens rests upon a continually shifting, unstable foundation. 1 notes
notesA response to Johnson kicking a stone to prove reality.
28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Tools Forever Changed Man's Relationship to Nature
[T]he moment man first picked up a stone or a branch to use as a tool, he altered irrevocably the balance between him and his environment. From this point on, the way in which the world around him changed was different. It was no longer regular or predictable. New objects appeared that were not recognizable as a mutation of something that existed before, and as each one merged it altered the environment not for one season, but for ever. Folksonomies: technology tool use
Folksonomies: technology tool use
1 The tools could change the environment in unpredictable ways.
09 FEB 2011 by ideonexus
The Unfeeling Space of the Internet Makes Us Prize Physic...
Before the Internet, I made more trips to the library and more phone calls. I read more books and my point of view was narrower and less informed. I walked more, biked more, hiked more, and played more. I made love more often.
[...]
How has the Internet changed my thinking? The more I’ve loved and known it, the clearer the contrast, the more intense the tension between a physical life and a virtual life. The Internet stole my body, now a lifeless form hunched in front of a glowing scree... 1 notes
notesStone notes that the Internet has caused her to enjoy the physical world less often, but more intensely when she does surround herself with it. The key being intention to be in one or the other at a particular time.
