Thursday, February 28, 2013

Kitchen Science for Kids


Having some fun teaching my daughter some scientific principles in the kitchen, we discussed solutions and solutes, viscosity, and density. We put together a list of materials and she made guesses as to which would be soluble in other materials. Only one gave her pause, whether sugar would dissolve into lemon juice, yet she was proven correct once she completed the experiment. Not bad for a seven year old. 




Monday, February 18, 2013

The Economics of Time Travel


Watching the sci-fi movie Looper, I find myself analyzing it from multiple perspectives, so needless to say I will have to watch it again soon. I enjoyed the film, along with the level at which it addressed the science involved in time travel; enough to attract viewers with a new twist, but not so much that it overwhelms the audience in it's complexity. This is good because it makes the film a fun ride without feeling like you've just prepared for a quiz. 


In a future in which government has given way to corruption and violence, "loopers" are assasins, with their targets being delivered from a future in which time travel is prohibited by law. As with government prohibition, the typical effect is that the market moves into the black, ignoring the law entirely. 


The guns are also varied and unique themselves, with much creativity on the part of the production crew. 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276104/

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Corn, corn, and more corn

Drinking a Manzanita soda with a Starlite vodka from texas, I can't help but laugh at the fact that, by Michelle Obama's new food standards, my spiked soda is now a vegetable. The Apple-flavored pop is corn-sweetened with high fructose corn syrup and the vodka is yellow corn and wheat distilled seven times. 

Rock out with the government intervention...