Read this great essay by Todd Seavey “On fictional universes and the fans who rationalize them.” (Via The Volokh Conspiracy.) In my case, I admit, it strikes close to home.
My Tolkien bio makes VOYA Honor List!
Hey, this is cool: I just got a letter informing me my children’s biography of J.R.R. Tolkien, J.R.R. Tolkien: Master of Imaginary Worlds, published by Enslow Publishers, has been named to the VOYA (Voice of Youth Advocates) 10th annual Nonfiction Honor List. VOYA is a library magazine aimed at the librarians who serve young adults. …
Well, that’s fast…
I just barely turned in the manuscript, and lo and behold, what do I find on Amazon today but… I’m so glad I got the thing done last week…
The art of science
Check out the outstanding images in this online gallery of works from the First Annual Art of Science Competition at Princeton University.
Prions on the move
For the first time, scientists have watched transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, the infectious prion proteins that cause brain-wasting diseases like so-called Mad Cow Disease, invade and move within brain cells. In fact, they’ve got movies.
Helpful hints for mad scientists and other megalomaniacs
Live Science has compiled a helpful list of the Top 10 Ways to Destroy Earth.
Children develop cynicism at an early age
That’s what this study says. Yeah, right.
"God’s own medicine" turns 200
This past Saturday, physicians and academics from around the world gathered in Germany to mark the bicentennial of a medical breakthrough considered as important as the discovery of ether, X-rays and blood types–although the man who made that breakthrough is far from being a household name. Freidrich Wilhelm Adam Serturner was a 20-year-old pharmacist’s assistant …
First manmade craft about to enter interstellar space
That’s the good news. The bad news is that it was launched in 1977, and it’s taken it almost three decades to get there, so it won’t be dropping by other solar systems for a while yet. I’m talking, of course, about Voyager 1.
Download your brain by 2050?
The most amazing thing about this story? Not that we might be able to download the contents of our brains into computers by 2050, but that the author failed to reference Robert J. Sawyer‘s new book Mindscan, which is about exactly that kind of thing, in exactly that kind of timeframe. But, of course, he’s …
Earth-grown Martian plants
NASA-funded scientists are experimenting with genetically engineering plants that could grow on Mars. And “Designer Plants on Mars” is my science fiction headline of the day…so far, anyway.
2020 is closer than you think…
…and it has robots in it.
My latest live walk and vlog
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