Departures..

By | May 23, 2013

Tonight was my last meeting as an Executive Senator with GPSS.. I’ve got mixed feelings. On the one hand, it’ll be good to have my Wednesday nights back, but on the other, I always find it a little anticlimactic and sad to move on from any organization I’ve been a part of. In the case… Read More »

3D High Frame Rate film

By | January 9, 2013

Well, that was interesting. I just saw The Hobbit in 3D High Frame Rate. Ignoring the plot, design, acting and so on for a moment, I was struck by the 3D response I got. Normally, I have monoscopic vision due to my extremely far-sighted left eye, so seeing something recognizably 3D was really surprising. It… Read More »

Paralympics 2012

By | September 8, 2012

I’m far more inspired by these photos from the Paralympics than I was by anything I saw from the Olympics. There’s something much more moving about athletes overcoming physical adversity to even participate let alone win their events. Some highlights: high jump with only one leg table tennis with irregularly formed hands archery with feet… Read More »

RSS feed error

By | September 7, 2012

Urgh. Just noticed the RSS feed URLs for this blog were wrong, and have been for at least 2 years. A copy and paste error when building the current site theme.

Avon Reserve

By | September 3, 2012

There was a short opinion piece in the Press the other day about plans for the Avon River as Christchurch rebuilds. Read it here. The plan they’re talking about is broadly that espoused by the Avon-Otakoro Network, and envisions rejuvenating the damaged lands along the river (where much of the heaviest quake damaged land is)… Read More »

Anatomy class

By | September 3, 2012

Tomorrow morning, I start the Anatomy and Embryology class that all medical and dental students here at the University of Washington take. I’m neither, but since my PhD dissertation work centers around teaching anatomy, I’m taking it. Anatomy is typically taught using a combination of methods: lectures, living anatomy, and dissection. Of these, dissection is… Read More »

Musical nonsense phrases

By | August 29, 2012

Last month saw PSY’s ‘Gangnam Style’ video break big online. If you’ve not seen it, you should. The music’s catchy, and they clearly had far too much fun making the music video. Go on, watch it. After a few days’ trouble keeping it out of my head, I took a look into some of his… Read More »

Augmented Reality films

By | August 23, 2012

Recently, via the IEET, I’ve come across two excellent films exploring the possible impact of augmented reality on our lives. There are positives, but also negatives. The first, Sight, is only 8 minutes long, and focuses on a guy using AR apps to help him date. All goes well, until, well, I’ll let you watch… Read More »

Prosthetic Athletics

By | August 21, 2012

I’m more than a little impressed by the audacity of Philippe Croizon. Despite having had his arms and legs amputated, he’s successfully swum the English Channel, the Straits of Gibraltar, a chunk of the Red Sea, and is now swimming Bering Strait. To do this, he swims freestyle, with flipper-like leg prosthetics attached to the… Read More »

Markets inside the organization

By | August 12, 2012

There’s a double standard in the rhetoric around markets that’s always intrigued me: Free markets are the best way to organize society Central planning and command leadership is the best way to organize large organizations such as corporations and government The first claim is regularly heard in political discourse, while the second is rarely made… Read More »