Alkemical Mirror: September 2009

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

LSD Research Resurgence

Erin Halliday, SF Gate:

Nearly 40 years after widespread fear over recreational abuse of LSD and other hallucinogens forced dozens of scientists to abandon their work, researchers at a handful of major institutions – including UCSF and Harvard University – are reigniting studies. Scientists started looking at less controversial drugs, like ecstasy and magic mushrooms, in the late 1990s, but LSD studies only began about a year ago and are still rare.

The study at UCSF, which is being run by a UC Berkeley graduate student, is looking into the mechanisms of LSD and how it works in the brain. The hope is that such research might support further studies into medical applications of LSD – for chronic headaches, for example — or psychiatric uses. [...]

In 1966, the federal government made LSD illegal, and by the early 1970s, research into all psychedelic drugs in humans had come to a halt, although some scientists continued to study the drugs in animals.

(What a Wonderful Place to Be)

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

goodnightvenom:whatshisname:(via evanmichaell)

goodnightvenom:whatshisname:(via evanmichaell): "

goodnightvenom:whatshisname:(via evanmichaell)"

Monday, September 28, 2009

Manzanar: America’s Concentration Camp

Manzanar: America’s Concentration Camp: "

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States government imprisoned more than 120,000 Japanese-Americans in remote camps spread across the Western states, far from their homes, for more than three years. They were allowed to bring little with them. Shopkeepers had to shutter their businesses. Farmers either had to sell their land in great haste and at a great loss, or trust neighbors to work their land while they were gone; many returned to find their farms stolen. In the years since Japanese interment, it has been lamented by pundits and presidents as a “national mistake” (Gerald Ford), “unjust and motivated by racism” (a bipartisan congressional committee in 1980) and worthy of a formal apology from Bush I, who distributed reparations of more than $20,000 to each surviving detainee.

While many of the former prisoners live on, there is little left of the camps. One exception is Manzanar, in the arid Owens Valley 200 miles north of Los Angeles, where some 11,000 Japanese-Americans were imprisoned between 1942 and 1945. Efforts to protect it have resulted in it being declared a national historic site, and what remains there is maintained by the National Park Service. I’d heard about Manzanar for years but had never seen it; on a recent drive through remote parts of eastern California, I decided to stop and have a look for myself.

lange

Pictured above: an historic vista of Manzanar during a dust storm, taken by legendary photographer Dorothea Lange. Dust was such a problem that prisoners often woke after a night’s sleep covered head-to-toe in it; knotholes in the floors of their hastily-constructed pine barracks let in the dust, the cold, and all manner of rodents.

Manzanar today is mostly foundations, but just wandering among them, you get the sense of just how massive a place it was — more than a mile square. These front steps once led into staff houses.

This looks like it was a raised garden of some sort. There were gardens throughout Manzanar, many built by prisoners with expertise in such things and copious time on their hands.

An old well:

Manzanar was set up much like a prototypical American town, albeit one surrounded by barbed wire and gun-wielding soldiers — it had a school, an auditorium, a Catholic church as well as a Buddhist temple, a newspaper, a baseball field, an orphanage, chicken and hog farms to supplement prisoners’ diets with meat, and other amenities. Ansel Adams visited the camp, and took this wonderful photo of schoolgirls doing calisthenics:

calisthenics - ansel

But life in the camp was far from normal. Taken from the homes they had known, prisoners lived in three dozen 20-by-100-foot tarpaper barracks, in tiny rooms separated by little more than curtains. Latrines were communal; there was no privacy. Depression and hopelessness quickly took hold amongst the prisoners.

Barrack_Row

The barracks were torn down soon after the camp was ordered closed in 1945, but the parks service recently rebuilt one of them. It looks unfinished, but it’s not — that’s how they were built.

The mighty Sierras, as reflected in the barracks’ windows.

After her imprisonment there, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston wrote:

You could face away from the barracks, look past a tiny rapids toward the darkening mountains, and for a while not be a prisoner at all. You could hang suspended in some odd, almost-lovely land you could not escape from yet almost didn’t want to leave.

Despite the mountains, reminders of their prisoner-hood were everywhere. Eight watchtowers equipped with searchlights and machine guns surrounded the camp. There were incidents — at other camps — of prisoners making a run for it and being gunned down at the barbed wire fences. This watchtower was rebuilt in 2005:

Though much of the camp has been reduced to its foundations, one remnant you still find everywhere, tangled in bushes and weeds, is barbed wire; as if there had been so much of it, taking it all away after the camp closed had been too overwhelming a task.

There was no starker reminder of what the prisoners went through, however, than the cemetery at Manzanar.

It is festooned with paper cranes, pennies, trinkets and notes from visitors. Some offerings, however, seemed less appropriate than others.

The grave of baby Jerry Nogata. Visitors make a habit of leaving toys for baby Jerry.

baby fix

This stone is marked only in Japanese.

For more, check out the National Parks Service website on Manzanar.

For more photo essays, check out my website.

Berkeley and DARPA: Cyborg Beetle Piloted by Remote Control

Berkeley and DARPA: Cyborg Beetle Piloted by Remote Control: "Via: Wired:

The creation of a cyborg insect army has just taken a step closer to reality. A research team at the University of California Berkeley recently announced that it has successfully implanted electrodes into a beetle allowing scientists to control the insect’s movements in flight. “We demonstrated the remote control of insects in free flight [...]"

Saturday, September 26, 2009

Confronted by LRAD Accoustic Weapons

Confronted by LRAD Accoustic Weapons: "G20 protests, Pittsburgh, 9/24

Video From G20 the Corporate Media Will Never Show You

Video From G20 the Corporate Media Will Never Show You: "

Kurt Nimmo

Infowars

September 25, 2009

In the videos here, we get an idea of what the federalized and
militarized police in Pittsburgh really think of the First Amendment.
The victims shown below are not government provocateurs or anarchists,
but middle class students.

Mindless Neo-Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is “Fake”

Mindless Neo-Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is “Fake”: "

Paul Joseph Watson

Prison Planet.com

Friday, September 25, 2009

Mindless Neo Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is Fake 250909top2

After the Drudge Report linked to the shocking You Tube
video of a G20 protester being abducted by military police in
Pittsburgh, hoards of mindless Neo-Cons flooded comment boards claiming
the event was “fake” or “staged,” citing all manner of ludicrous and
unfounded reasons in a desperate effort to deny the fact that America
is now a military police state.

As we reported earlier, the video shows an unmarked
gold Sedan pulling up to a side street as men in military fatigues
wrestle a protester towards the car. The protester is forced into the
car and kidnapped as the Sedan speeds off into a cloud of tear gas.

Debunkers attempted to attack the chilling gravity of
the video by firstly claiming the men were not from the “military,” as
if it even matters whether they are police, national guard, or marines.
We know for a fact that the Pittsburgh National Guard were training with the Army and the Air Force
in anticipation of the G20, namely on how to conduct crowd control, and
that active duty military personnel are on the ground in Pittsburgh.

However, scores of commenters on You Tube merely
dismissed the chilling video with throwaway lines like “FAKE…move on,”
as if their childlike response of denying reality could make the
monsters go away.

Here’s a selection of the comments currently appearing underneath the video on You Tube.

“Fake. Staged. Next…”

“it’s staged. Marines don’t roll up their sleeves.”

“No arms or insignia, and they drove off in what looked
like somebody’s grandmother’s car — this looks like a false flag op to
me, staged by a bunch of radicals to make the government look bad.”

Mindless Neo Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is Fake 250909top

Proof that the incident was by no means staged comes in
the form of a photograph taken of the same man under arrest laying on
the ground in plastic handcuffs. The men in military uniforms are
accompanied by uniformed riot police, proving that this was a genuine
and coordinated arrest and abduction. The men in military uniforms are
not protesters dressed up as Marines, as the Neo-Cons are bizarrely
claiming.

Claims that the men are wearing fake uniforms are also
completely debunked by the fact that official Associated Press photos
of “military checkpoints” in Pittsburgh show the same uniforms being
worn. See the images below.

Mindless Neo Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is Fake 240909pitt4

Mindless Neo Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is Fake 240909pitt2

Mindless Neo Cons Claim G20 Abduction Video Is Fake 240909pitt1

Other respondents on You Tube express suspicion at the alarming amount of comments claiming the video is “fake”.

“The behavior on this board is very suspicious. I see
way too many comments that this video is fake–these “skeptics” are all
over this hammering the point that this video is fake,” remarks one.

“One might expect a few “it’s fake” claims, but so many? Are there
that many supporters of the good work of the G20 leaders who? have the
time to make “retarded anarchists” on youtube videos. Or could it be
that the military goons have been directed to swarm this video to
attempt to discredit it?”

The authenticity of the video is proven by another You Tube clip
that shows footage from immediately after the kidnapping. A man wearing
a red bandana who was protesting the abduction is arrested and dragged
away by riot police as other demonstrators express their sock at the
events that are unfolding.

This proves that both men were targeted by the authorities, and that
the abduction of the first protester was by no means “staged” in any
way. In fact, it’s par for the course in a city that is under martial
law lockdown where the First Amendment is a criminal offense. The first
video also clearly shows uniformed riot police telling the man in the
red bandana not to interfere with the abduction of the protester,
proving that this is a coordinated kidnapping and not “staged” by
protesters as Neo-Cons are claiming.

Instead of displaying a knee-jerk infantile reaction, spitting their
dummies out and crying “fake,” these mindless Neo-Cons who deny reality
need to look themselves in the mirror, become real men again and
realize that the LRAD sound weapons and the ceaseless gutting of the
First Amendment is not
just aimed at “pinko commie” anarchists – the sound cannons and the
police state is also focused firmly on conservative activists and Tea
Party protests.

It’s time to grow up, grow a pair, and face the truth that America is now a militarized police state.

fuckyeahrocknroll:The Velvet Underground

fuckyeahrocknroll:The Velvet Underground: "

fuckyeahrocknroll:The Velvet Underground"

The Felice Brothers - Frankie’s Gun

The Felice Brothers - Frankie’s Gun: "

The Felice Brothers - Frankie’s Gun"

the avett brothers - nothing short of thankful

the avett brothers - nothing short of thankful: "

the avett brothers - nothing short of thankful"

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

The slow death of handwriting

The slow death of handwriting: "

Graphic saying 'The writing's on the wall'

Christmas cards, shopping lists and what else? The occasions in
which we write by hand are fewer and fewer, says Neil Hallows. So is
the ancient art form of handwriting dying out?

A century from now, our handwriting may only be legible to experts.

For some, that is already the case. But writer Kitty Burns
Florey says the art of handwriting is declining so fast that ordinary,
joined-up script may become as hard to read as a medieval manuscript.

"When your great-great-grandchildren find that letter of yours
in the attic, they'll have to take it to a specialist, an old guy at
the library who would decipher the strange symbols for them," says Ms
Florey, author of the newly-published Script and Scribble: The Rise and
Fall of Handwriting.

FAMOUS HANDWRITING

: King Henry VIII wrote this love letter to Anne Boleyn (pic: British Library)

: Jane Austen completed her last novel, Persuasion, in 1816

: In 1864, Lewis Carroll wrote his most famous work for Alice Liddell.

: Aged 16, Winston Churchill wrote to his mother Lady Randolph Churchill

: Jimi Hendrix's lyrics for Machine Gun were written in 1969

BACK
1 of 5
NEXT

She argues that children - if not this generation then one soon to
come - may grow up using only a crude form of printing for the rare
occasions in life they need to communicate by pen.

The way handwriting is taught has undoubtedly changed. At Ms
Florey's school in 1950s America, a nun beat time with a stick as the
class copied letters from the blackboard. It was not a place for
individuals. There was a right way to form letters and very many wrong
ways.

For much of the last century British schools ran in a similar
way. At my primary school in the 1970s, whole classes were devoted to
work being 'written up for best' and I remember a story coming back
unmarked because I had crossed out a single word. I wonder what my
teachers would have made of a James Joyce manuscript.

Crossing 7s

Many found the experience tedious, but for left-handers it could
be torture. Often they were forced to write with their right, while
their 'bad' hand was tied down.

More than a century of children turning out letters by the yard
produced a great conformity. In the 1940s Ealing drama, Went The Day
Well?, a contingent of German soldiers sets up camp in the English
countryside, disguised as Royal Engineers. One reason they get rumbled
is that a soldier writes a "7" with a line through it. "Why should they
form their figures in a continental way?" a villager asks.

If everything we do still had to be done by hand, there would not be enough hours in the day

Registrar Ruth Hodson

Send us your handwriting

These days, the shape of a child's ovals, loops and slants matters
less than what they write. 'Content is everything,' says Mark Brown,
head teacher of St Mary's Catholic Primary School in Axminster, Devon.
'The emphasis is much more on having a go, and expressing yourself, and
getting the ideas down.'

He says letter formation is still taught in the early years of
primary school, but the appearance of handwriting takes less of a
priority as children get older, provided it remains legible.

Some parents expect handwriting to be drilled in the same way
as they experienced themselves, but Mr Brown argues the content of
children's writing has significantly improved as a result of the change
in emphasis, and that they write far more at school than they will as
adults.

Scrawling

So once we leave school, does it really matter? Apart from the odd shopping list, do people still need to use a pen?

Some do. Registrars of births, deaths and marriages have been
recording life's significant events in their usually impeccable writing
since 1837.

Writer's hand: Not a word crossed out in this instance of Neil Hallows' writing

'All registrars are conscious that they follow a long and noble
tradition,' says Ruth Hodson, interim registration manager for
Peterborough City Council.

But even their fountain pens will soon barely be heard
scratching on the registers. Under a modernisation programme, an
increasing amount of the information is being entered directly on to a
computer.

Ms Hodson is unsentimental. 'If everything we do still had to be done by hand, there would not be enough hours in the day.'

But perhaps handwriting gains its greatest importance when it is
least legible. The reputation of doctors for scrawling was enhanced by
a study in the British Medical Journal which found medics' writing was
considerably worse than other healthcare workers or administrative
staff. Poor writing has often been blamed for medication errors.

Gwyn Williams, a junior doctor in Carmarthen, says that despite
technological advances, a great deal of clinical communication is still
handwritten.

Remember this?

'We have to write so much, on so many occasions, with the clock
ticking. The end result is so difficult to interpret that even I have
to concentrate on occasions to work out what [I have written].

'There doesn't seem to be any other logical way of doing it.
Typing clinical notes on a computer seems so cumbersome in the limited
time available that I can't see how it would work.'

In many jobs though, a person can go for months, even years, writing only the odd phone message in their own script.

Nevertheless, some employers still ask for a handwritten
application, or a sample of writing, although the Chartered Institute
of Personnel and Development warns employers they need to be clear
about the reason for that, to avoid accusations of discrimination.

10-page letters

There are those who see handwriting's slip in educational
priority and increasingly eccentric role in the workplace as evidence
that, in the West at least, we are forgetting an ancient art form.

A panic, perhaps, and one witnessed every time the dominant
style of writing changed or a new form of technology seemed to threaten
it. An early typewriter led the Scientific American in 1867 to marvel
that "the weary process of learning penmanship in schools will be
reduced to [writing] one's own signature and playing on the literary
piano".

Maybe
a couple of times a week [pupils] could produce something handwritten
that is judged partly on its legibility, or even its beauty

Kitty Burns Florey

But look at the decline in letter writing. The students I knew two
decades ago who knocked out 10-page letters during a morning in bed
have probably not yet written 10 pages of handwritten prose of any kind
this year.

For Ms Florey, the answer should start in the classroom. Not a
return to the nuns with sticks, but for children to value handwriting
by learning a simple, legible, attractive script from the start - in
her view a form of italic - and then keep reinforcing it beyond the
early years.

'Maybe a couple of times a week [pupils] could produce
something handwritten that is judged partly on its legibility, or even
its beauty.'

Adults too can improve their writing, in a matter of weeks with
a textbook and expert advice. Apple co-founder Steve Jobs has said that
if he had not taken a calligraphy course at college, he would not have
thought of putting multiple typefaces on the Mac.

Perhaps the best argument for keeping our pens is that
otherwise, in a society that is recorded in more detail than any which
came before it, we will leave plenty of data but very little of our
personalities behind.

Our descendants may struggle to read our letters, but they'll never even see most of our texts and e-mails.

SHOW US YOUR HANDWRITING

1. Here are three examples of handwriting, courtesy of the Magazine team (in ascending order of readability)

2. We've written the pangram: 'How quickly daft jumping zebras vex' and underneath our name and age

3. Now we want you to write the same sentence, with your name and age underneath

4. E-mail a picture or scan of your handwriting to yourpics@bbc.co.uk with the subject line 'HANDWRITING', and we'll feature as many as possible next week

MysteryQuest Evidence Raises Doubt Hitler Died In Bunker

MysteryQuest Evidence Raises Doubt Hitler Died In Bunker: "MysteryQuest, the History Channel's replacement for UFO Hunters, took the challenge of finding clues of Adolf Hitler’s death. There has been speculation that he escaped to South America, notably Argentina. Witnesses have said they had seen him around other parts of Germany. Regardless of the stories, there is no tangible evidence of a corpse belonging to Adolph Hitler. Hitler was known ..."

Monday, September 21, 2009

Enhancing User Interaction With First Person User Interface

Enhancing User Interaction With First Person User Interface: "

Though many computer applications and operating systems make use of real-world metaphors like the desktop, most software interface design has little to do with how we actually experience the real world. In lots of cases, there are great reasons not to directly mimic reality. Not doing so allows us to create interfaces that enable people to be more productive, communicate in new ways, or manage an increasing amount of information. In other words, to do things we can’t otherwise do in real life.

But sometimes, it makes sense to think of the real world as an interface. To design user interactions that make use of how people actually see the world -to take advantage of first person user interfaces.

First person user interfaces can be a good fit for applications that allow people to navigate the real world, “augment” their immediate surroundings with relevant information, and interact with objects or people directly around them.

Navigating the Real World

The widespread integration of location detection technologies (like GPS and cell tower triangulation) has made mobile applications that know where you are commonplace. Location-aware applications can help you find nearby friends or discover someplace good to eat by pinpointing you on a map.

When coupled with a digital compass (or a similar technology) that can detect your orientation, things get even more interesting. With access to location and orientation, software applications not only know where you are but where you are facing as well.

This may seem like a small detail but it opens up a set of new interface possibilities that are designed from your current perspective. Consider the difference between the two screens from the TomTom navigation system shown below. The screen on the left provides a two-dimensional, overhead view of a driver’s current position and route. The screen on the right provides the same information but from a first person perspective.

This first person user interface mirrors your perspective of the world, which hopefully allows you to more easily follow a route. When people are in motion, first person interfaces can help them orient quickly and stay on track without having to translate two-dimensional information to the real world.

TomTom’s latest software version goes even further toward mirroring our perspective of the world by using colors and graphics that more accurately match real surroundings. But why re-draw the world when you can provide navigation information directly on it?

Nearest Tube is a first person navigation application that tells you where the closet subway station is by displaying navigation markers on the real world as seen through your phone’s camera.

As you can see in the video above, the application places pointers to each subway station in your field of vision so you can quickly determine which direction to go. It’s important to note, however, that the application actually provides different information depending on your orientation.

When you hold the phone flat and look down, a set of arrows directs you to each subway line. Holding the phone in front of you shows the nearest subway stations and how far away they are. Tilting the phone upwards shows stations further away from you.

Making use of the multiple perspectives naturally available to you (looking down, looking ahead, looking up) is an example of how first person interfaces allow us to interact with software in a way that is guessable, physical, and realistic. Another approach (used in Google Street View) is to turn real world elements into interface elements.

Street View enables people to navigate the World using actual photographs of many major towns & cities. Previously, moving through these images was only possible by clicking on forward and back arrows overlaid on top of the photos. Now, (as you can see in the demo video below) Street View allows you to use the real-world images themselves to navigate around. Just place a cursor on the actual building or point on the map that you want to view and double-click.

Augmented Reality

Not only can first person user interfaces help us move through the world, they can also help us understand it. The information that applications like Nearest Tube overlay on the World can be thought of as ÒaugmentingÓ our view of reality. Augmented reality applications are a popular form of first person interfaces that enhance the real world with information not visible to the naked eye. These applications present user interface elements on top of images of the real world using a camera or heads up display.

For example, an application could augment the real world with information such as ratings and reviews or images of food for restaurants in our field of vision. In fact, lots of different kinds of information can be presented from a first person perspective in a way that enhances reality.

IBM’s Seer application provides a way to navigate this year’s Wimbledon tennis tournament more effectively. Not only does the application include navigation tools but it also augments your field of vision with useful information like the waiting times at taxi and concession stands.

Wikitude is an application that displays landmarks, points of interest, and historic information wherever you point your phone’s camera. This not only provides rich context about your surroundings, it also helps you discover new places and history.

These augmented reality applications share a number of design features. Both IBM Seer and Wikitude include a small indicator (in the bottom right corner of the screen) that lets you know what direction you are facing and how many points of interest are located near you. This overview gives you a quick sense of what information is available. Ideally, the data in this overview can be manipulated to zoom further out or closer in, adjust search filters, and even select specific elements.

Wikitude allows you to manage the size of this overview radius through a zoom in/out control on the left side of the screen. This allows you to focus on points of interest near you or look further out. Since it is dealing with a much smaller area (the Wimbledon grounds), IBM Seer doesn’t include (or need) this feature.

In both applications, the primary method for selecting information of interest is by clicking on the icons overlaid on the camera’s view port. In the case of IBM Seer, different icons indicate different kinds of information like concessions or restrooms. In Wikitude, all the icons are the same and indicate information of interest and distance from you. Selecting any of these icons brings up a preview of the information. In most augmented reality applications, a further information window or screen is necessary to access more details than the camera view can display.

When many different types of information can be used to augment reality within a single application, it’s a good idea to allow people to select what kinds of information they want visible. Otherwise, too many information points can quickly overwhelm the interface.

Layar is an augmented reality application that allows you to select what kinds of information should be displayed within your field of vision at any time. The application currently allows you to see houses for sale and rent, local business information, available jobs, ATM locations, health care providers, and more. As the video below highlights, you can switch between layers that display these information points by clicking on the arrows on the right and left sides of the screen.

Layar also provides quick access to search filters that allow you to change the criteria for what shows up on screen. This helps narrow down what is showing up in front of you.

Interacting with Things Near You

First person user interfaces aren’t limited to helping you navigate or better understand the physical space around you -they can also enable you to interact directly with the people and objects residing within that space. In most cases, the prerequisite for these kinds of interactions is identifying what (or who) is near you. As a result, most of the early applications in this category are focused on getting that part of things right first.

One way to identify objects near you is to explicitly provide information about them to an application. An application like SnapTell can identify popular products like DVDs, CDs, video games, and books when you take a picture of the product or its barcode. The application can then return prices, reviews, and more to you.

This approach might eventually also be used to identify people as illustrated in the augmented ID concept application from TAT in the video below. This proposed application uses facial recognition to identify people near you and provides access to digital information about them like their social networking profiles and updates.

While taking pictures of objects or people to get information about them is a more direct interaction with the real world than typing a keyword into a search engine, it only partially takes advantage of first person perspective. Perhaps it’s better to use the objects themselves as the interface.

For example, if any of the objects near you can transmit information using technologies like RFID tags, an application can simply listen to how these objects identify themselves and act accordingly. Compare the process of inputting a barcode or picture of an object to the one illustrated in this video from the Touch research project. Simply move your device near an RFID tagged object and the application can provide the right information or actions for that object to you.

This form of first person interface enables physical and realistic interactions with objects. Taking this idea even further, information can be displayed on the objects themselves instead of on a device. The 6th Sense project from the MIT Media Lab does just that by using a wearable projector to display product information on the actual products you find in a library or store.

Though some of these first person interfaces are forward-looking, most are available now and ready to help people navigate the real world, “augment” their immediate surroundings, and interact with objects or people directly around them. What’s going to come next is likely to be even more exciting.

The next time you are working on a software application, consider if a first person user interface could help provide a more natural experience for your users by bringing the real world and virtual world closer together.

About the Author

LukeW is an internationally recognized Web thought leader who has designed or contributed to software used by more than 600 million people. He is currently Senior Director of Product Ideation & Design at Yahoo! Inc., author of two popular Web design books, and a top-rated speaker at conferences and companies around the world. You can follow Luke on Twitter at lukewdesign or by using RSS.

Alkemical Mirror