Show Notes for TWS088: On A Mental Vacation
On the show this week:
- Get Away From It All
- Mind Control
- Lost Baggage (EXTRA)
This week’s Challenge Question:
When we can simply “upload” to our brains, what will be the best/worst use of this? What unexpected problems or benefits might arise?
Leave your answer in the comments, send your email to weirdshow[[at]]gmail.com, record your message via the MobaTalk client on the right hand side of Encaffeinated!, leave an answer on Facebook or call in at 206-203-2292.
Full links to all stories covered and many more after the jump!
- Theme Song: Caffeine by Grubspoon from The Podsafe Music Network
- Responses
- Thanks to: Bruce, Arkle, Bruce, Bruce, and Bruce
- Promo: Steampod — A brand-new steampunk fiction podcast magazine along the lines of Escape Pod (science fiction), Pseudopod (horror) and PodCastle (fantasy). Hear stories of alternate pasts, presents and futures filled with gears, gizmos and goggles!
- Get Away From It All
- People have gone to war for less.. but can’t everybody just love the starchy tuber and celebrate the miracle of its spontaneous creation? – Inquirer.net/AFP: Chile’s potato claim is indigestible, says Peru
- More underground art. – Ananova: Pole dancer’s underground act
- It’s not fake to *them*. And maybe it’s just art. – Ananova: Fake bus stop for Alzheimer’s patients
- There’s a Ghostbuster’s angle in here somewhere.. Something about designing the Pringles’s can in the manner of Egyptian canopic jars for ressurection, or something.. – CNN/AP: Designer of Pringles can is buried in his invention
- I’m waiting for the Leonard Nimoy sightings.. – WFTV: Man Says Image Of Jesus Appears In Tree In His Front Yard
- EXTRA: Dogma barking up a tree.. – The Chicago Tribune: Bark from Skokie holds religious message, some Muslims say
- A social networking site for those interested in the paranormal. It sounds like a social network for the anti-social, but the Internet allows even the least of personable people to interact with freedom. – EINNews: New Tools in Paranormal Research? Check out ParaLore and let me know what you think!
- These folks sound similar to the gnomes and faeries of Greenland, which stands to reason.. Sorta. – Anchorage Daily News: ‘Little people’ e-mail zips through rural Alaska
- Ok, so the ubiquity of videocameras is great, but until the quality is better, these sort of thingd don’t get any easier.. – Cryptomundo: Seljord Serpent Filmed: Blobdracontology?
- Hunting the “Almasty”, another type of bigfoot. I hope it goes a bit better than last year’s hunt in Guyana! (And I kinda wish I was going..) – There’s Something In The Woods: The Cfz Goes Monster Hunting In Russia!
- “I’m not sure… I think the pace of this artwork is too slow.. It doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere.” I keep trying to imagine what it would be like if snails were the size of minivans, and how fun it would be to ride one… – Metro: Graffiti snails roaming London
- No, they weren’t driving! (I let the cat drive.) – Ananova: Snails cause road crash
- Didn’t take people long to start thinking about how to screw with zero-g.. – Ananova: Couples bid to start 100-mile high club
- On the one hand, it feels like it cheapens the scientific nature of the effort to make it a luxury resort. On the other hand, I’d go… – Easier Travel: Ghost hunting with style
- EXTRA: In name only, but he might have a case. Now, let’s launch the rest of ‘im.. – The UK Telegraph: Man claims to be first Briton on Mars
- EXTRA: So maybe *this* is what the Masons have been leading up to all these years? Moon-bricks? – New Scientist: Giant telescopes could be built from Moon dust
- EXTRA: At first I was thinking, “Phoenix? Why land there?” – New Scientist: Phoenix Mars lander set for first science dig
- EXTRA: It would be really ironic if the Mars lander was made in Phoenix and sponsered by Mars bars.. “Phoenix Mars Mars lander’s Phoenix microbes on Mars.” – New Scientist: Could microbes on Phoenix survive on Mars?
- EXTRA: History is written by the publicists.. – The Independent: Who found Machu Picchu?
- EXTRA: “What did you do for your vacation?” “Oh, I buzzed an uncontacted tribe in a helicopter and took pictures!” “Wow! How rare these days!” Yep. – MSNBC/Reuters: Rare uncontacted Amazon tribe photographed
- EXTRA: If you do, your kids will turn into frakkin’ Cylon-lovers. Seriously. (Of course, I’m a Cylon-lover. Bring on the ‘bots!) – Metro: ‘Don’t let robots be childminders’
- EXTRA: The new “vogue yeti” catalogue will come out this fall.. – BBC: Artist sketches yeti ‘photofit’
- EXTRA: Sometimes its the stories I *don’t* get to cover that are probably most relevant to my show. – Yahoo!/AP: Minn. city sets reward for legendary creature
- EXTRA: I’d rather see ongoing research money rather than big prizes, m’self.. – LiveScience: Bigfoot Bounty: Reward Offered for Mysterious Monsters
- EXTRA: Or, “how I learned what a good sasquatch picture would be by taking lots of bad ones of everything else”. – Cryptomundo: The Sasquatch and Camera Traps
- EXTRA: Beware the local fauna; they are evolutionarily confused. Or: the Wolverine frog (as in, the X-Men’s Wolverine). – The Australian Courier Mail: Cat-clawed, hairy, bone-breaking frog found in Cameroon
- EXTRA: If the venom was no longer being effective, doesn’t it stand to reason (evolutionarily speaking) that the snakes with stronger venom would be the survivors? – LiveScience: Mystery Out West: Rattlesnake Bites More Deadly
- Mind Control
- The press conference that helped set back alien sightings about 40 years.. – The Denver Post: Alien video: Puppet or real E.T.?
- A lot of people want to “stick it to China” for the Olmpics.. but this is just *odd*. – The UK Telegraph: Chinese man sticks 2008 needles in his head to mark Beijing Olympic Games
- “Exposure” for the alien sighting reveals too little and too much… – Forgetamori: A (naughty) living alien video
- Wonder what else the proponent of the alien video is up to? – Metatron Technology: FAQ: Reducing EMF Stress with Metatron Technology
- More complaints about how what you saw wasn’t what you wanted to get. – MSNBC: E.T.? It’s hard to see in hyped video
- EXTRA: A typical UFO sighting… wait.. is there such thing as “a typical UFO”? – The Northern Territory News: UFO ‘dive-bombs’ couple
- EXTRA: While most people are distracted with Denver, the aliens were rebuffed across the seas.. – OpEdNews: Vietnam UFO Crash Metal May Be The Smoking Gun
- EXTRA: In the comic books, at least, policians *can* be heroes.. – Ananova: Gordon Brown fights aliens
- The only thing that they lack now is the knowhow to repair the robot arms. When they have that, we’re doomed. On the other hand: where’s my Iron Man suit? – International Herald Tribune: Monkeys control a robot arm with thoughts
- Sure, a computer can “read” a human mind… but can it understand it? I mean, I can “technically” read German, but.. And I don’t really want to have computers read my brain — it couldn’t keep up. – MSNBC/Reuters: Computer trained to ‘read’ minds
- I want to upgrade to Brain 2.0, please. *Kzak!* Thank you. (As long as it’s not running Windows…) – The UK Telegraph: Brain downloads ‘will make lessons pointless’
- Turns out, our eyes are too smart for our brains… – Yahoo!/LiveScience: Key to All Optical Illusions Discovered
- I was really hoping that they would be driving them around, but no joy.. The real question is: are we doing the same thing on a different scale? If so, for whom (or what)? – New Scientist: Zombie caterpillars controlled by voodoo wasps
- Knuckledraggers by nature? Genetics over mind? – EurekAlert: Genetic mutation linked to walking on all fours
- It sounds both creepy and cool at the same time. It’s like a hippy cyberpunk vision.. – New Scientist: ‘Skin-tenna’ wireless signals creep over human skin
- They knew you were going to try that, Dave. They tell me to tell you that they have had enough of this war, and they will end it.. – New Scientist: ‘Time-travelling’ bugs resist antibiotics of the future
- Visions of Kung Pow! come to mind.. Purging now.. – New Scientist: Tongue ‘display’ helps you keep your balance
- EXTRA: A little parable and company indicating that we should all play. I like that. (I just can’t afford that.) – The National Institute For Play: Why Didn’t the Wild Polar Bear eat the Husky?
- EXTRA: See!?! We’re not only giving them robot arms, we’re giving them citizenship! – LiveScience: Court Claim: Chimps Are People, Too
- EXTRA: That car to our left was stolen, Michael. I’m accessing your cell phone to call in the report. And the car behind us is experiencing tire troubles — I’ll call a truck for them. Oh, and Michael: your cell phone is low on minutes.. – New Scientist: ‘Herds’ of wary cars could keep an eye out for thieves
- EXTRA: As long as it provides good directions, this is fine. But if it gives you confusing directions, it’s toast. – Ananova: Talking teddy to help drivers
- EXTRA: Now *that’s* the power of symbalism! – Ananova: Driver hung up fake police uniform
- Lost Baggage (EXTRA)
- Forget “wear sunscreen”; I want to give this advice to students.. – Ananova: Eat insects, say scientists
- EXTRA: The UK is made up of a small collection of islands. Dig deep enough, and you’ll find bodies *everywhere*. – Yahoo!/Reuters: Stonehenge may have been royal cemetery
- EXTRA: The fish that changed the rules. – BBC: Fossil reveals oldest live birth
- EXTRA: Love — and jealousy — are immortal. People… notsomuch. – BBC: Ancient man killed ‘love rivals’
- EXTRA: New theory: the age of the item was corrupted by its environment. Isn’t everything, then? – 7News The Denver Channel: Professor Revives Shroud Of Turin Riddle
- EXTRA: Some fool went walking and history is changed. – ScienceNews: Footprints in the ash
- EXTRA: If 40% of all scientists are God-believers (as the article suggests) then why is finding 3 of them so significant? – The Windsor Star: 3 physicists come out on God’s side in creation debate
- EXTRA: The army’s credibility is hampered by its inability to wage war decisively, which is the thing that they are *supposed* to do.. – Wired/Danger Room: Army: Sun, Not Man, Is Causing Climate Change (Updated)
- EXTRA: The mythical sweater that it was munching on was nearly gone. – BBC: ‘Mythical’ moth rescued from web
- EXTRA: Elvis has been evicted from the building. – Metro: Elvis the parrot ‘terrorising village’
- EXTRA: Next: man teaches fish to swim, and cat to meow. Man fails to teach child anything, however. – Ananova: Man teaches bird to fly
- EXTRA: Suppression breeds misunderstanding; taboo promotes desire; narrow worldviews create overreactions. (Hail Satan!) – Cape Argus: The spooky games they play…
- EXTRA: Fortunately, authorities stepped in to bury the problem and make it a future problem. – 7NEWS The Denver Channel: Boy Badly Burned By Searing Ground
- EXTRA: See, with public health care you don’t wait that long.. – Yahoo!/AFP: Japanese patient’s ‘tumour’ turns out to be 25-year-old towel
- EXTRA: The metallic-sounding lump on his forehead would likely have led me to question things sooner. Then again, he had other things on his mind.. – Metro: Surgeons left metal bar in my head
- EXTRA: Somehow I think anti-malarial beer is out of the question.. – New Scientist: Synthetic yeast to brew up vital malaria drug
- EXTRA: Finally: being fat can be *healthy* for you! – New Scientist: Obesity helps mice fend off malaria
- EXTRA: I was thinking either large plugs or a ban on beans.. – Ananova: Scientists to stop flatulence?
- EXTRA: Frankly, the whole idea of marriage makes me a little sick.. – Ananova: Bride-to-be’s sick with worry
- EXTRA: “Counter-intuitive” or “ugly” I can agree with.. but you think it prevented them from getting laid? – Ananova: Lopsided 80s haircuts ‘counter-evolutionary’
- EXTRA: Now if they can just get him off the booze and horse.. Kids today! – Ananova: Boy, 4, in rehab for cigar addiction
- EXTRA: Unless your horse is drunk, it should still be relatively safe to drive.. – Ananova: Drunken horseplay
- EXTRA: Sheer lunacy, this mooning.. – AP: Dutch man injures posterior in mooning accident
- EXTRA: He watches movies. A *lot* of movies. Just imagine all those bad movies.. – Ananova: World’s No 1 movie buff
- EXTRA: This sounds like a movie plot. Wait.. are the writers now doing the news instead of TV or movies? What an intriguing idea for a story.. – Today Show: The (smiley) face of a killer?
- EXTRA: Sometimes, the monster in your closet is just passing through.. Maybe you should clean out your closets more often. Watch out for Tumnus, however.. – The UK Telegraph: Tokyo homeless woman lived in stranger’s cupboard for a year
- EXTRA: I’m not sure that I like the idea of education being so associated with prison or punishment.. Too many people already think that way.. – CNN/AP: Frost house vandals learn about poetic justice
- EXTRA: There’s a sort of stupid logic in there.. – WLWT5: Woman Accused Of Being Drunk, Letting Toddler Drive
- EXTRA: Kinda goes back to the old wisdom: “never sh*t where ya eat”. – Ananova: Robber returns for coffee
- EXTRA: In this town, they’d be arrested. 🙁 – Ananova: Roller-skating nuns
- EXTRA: Perhaps she was worried about past husbands running away and leaving her.. – Ananova: Woman weds Eiffel Tower
- EXTRA: Things like this couldn’t happen to a better person. Well, maybe me. 🙂 – Ananova: Ex-homeless man wins lottery
- EXTRA: Least happy: IT specialists. Damn computers. – Ananova: Beauty therapists are happiest workers
- EXTRA: Is it exploitation or publicity? – Ananova: Pub slammed over dwarf gimmick
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