I know, I know, I originally posted this video 18 months ago, but it has just been shown on BBC Prime, and I still think this is one of the best Dr Who episodes ever, certainly of the modern series. It is taken from the end of Series 2, Episode 10 (Love and Monsters), and I just love this little monologue section.

Ira and I were watching some more of QI (a BBC comedy quiz show) last night, when we heard that the founder (Edward de Bono) of ‘lateral thinking’ had made a very unusual suggestion to solve the Israeli/Palestinian conflict during a think tank session. To send out huge (presumably free) consignments of Marmite!
Apparently a Zinc deficiency can lead to you being more aggressive than you would otherwise be, so to try and minimize the violence in the Middle East, perhaps they should try sending out something high in zinc… In a similar vein, Dr. Alexander Mauskop suggests that having Botox for migraines may help relieve the symptoms! The idea is relatively simple, and has been tested out to a certain degree - if there is little to no tension around your head, migraine seem less likely to attack…

So, another week in American politics, another Democrat adviser resigns. Last time it was one of Barrack Obama’s, over labelling Hillary Clinton as a ‘monster’, this week it was one of Clinton’s (unpaid) senior advisers, for stating that “If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position”, referring to his candidacy for the presidential nomination.
Its seems to me that Samantha Power took the hit for Barrack in order to re-enforce the notion that Hillary is more of the same Washington politics with all that entails, whereas Geraldine Ferraro simply stated what a lot Hillary’s supporters probably believe, but were too afraid to voice out loud. Click on over to the BBC site for more details.

Technology that has previously been used to mark out minefields may have found a new use in life - keeping (some) sea life out of fishing nets. The BBC article describes how the animals that use sonar for navigation could be helped by making it obvious that the net involved some physical barrier; currently the nets do not bounce enough sonar back to the animal, and so can entangle, and slowly kill dolphins, porpoises, smaller whales etc.

Previously, battery powered devices were used to mark out mine fields, however these have obvious drawbacks when the battery runs out and needs replacing.

That’s a pretty impressive claim for a car, no? Well the BBC has a report on such vehicle. The premise is reasonably simple - filled a tank with compressed air, and then use that pressure to power the engine. It is more of a hybrid car TBH, as it can also use more traditional liquid based fuels to increase its range, and performance. Check out the video for a demonstration. Obviously it will need to pass safety tests, and I’d be particularly interested to find out how well the carbon fibre tank for storing the compressed air will survive side impacts etc., but that said, it certainly looks like a promising direction for the motor industry to be facing.

Before I forget, I came across the following pictures over at the BBC News website. Thought you might like to see them?

So, no great surprise that none of my friends got round to reading the previous posts yet, but I see most of them on messenger, so I’ll assume no one’s house or car got trashed by falling trees etc.

How are people? For those readers not in the UK, the south of the country is currently being hit by quite a bad serious of storms. Click on over here for a BBC report on it so far.

So, if you have a moment (and electricity and a working phone line ), leave a comment, let us know if your area was affected by the 80mph+ winds or the rain and resulting flood waters.

As you can see from that last photo Cheltenham’s famous race course was hit by the winds, with some of the temporary structures in place for the National Hunt damaged. Swansea was also effected, so if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go and phone around friends and family…

I bookmarked this article a while back, but forgot to write a post for it, apologies. Anyway, check the image below and then read on…

Tam Hanna does not like the fact that this year’s CeBit tradeshow (covered briefly on BBC World’s Click program) apparently discriminated journalists whose output was electronic, rather than the traditional ink and paper of newspapers & magazines. On first reading, I can see her point - why should a group of writers be seen as separate, perhaps even second class, simply because they publish online? Upon reading the comments there, however, I think a little more logic leaked into my thought process. If Tam had written about recent (sorry, but quoting events from 2000 seems a tad OTT) actual discrimination beyond the two words on the pass, I’d have been more disturbed. As it stands, it just seems like she was looking for link-bait?

Mission accomplished CeBit discrimination.

No longer really virtual at least… Before assuming I have had one too many vodkas (nope, tonight’s total = 0 !), head on over the BBC’s article here. Whilst it was an interesting read, when Mr Kurzweil made reference to being able to plot the future by looking at progress over the last 50 years, I can’t help remembering Moore’s law, which held that processing power would double every two years. However, over the last decade or so, industry has struggled to keep up with this ideal. I also remember scientists confidently predicting we would all have Jetson-like hover cars, and have residential homes on the moon by 2001… However long it may take, and assuming society does not create a backlash against technology literally becoming part of, or integral to our bodies, I think Mr Kurzweil’s predictions may come to pass eventually.