Delicious LiveJournal Links for 7-17-2010

[andrewducker]

• Romantic rejection stimulates areas of brain involved in motivation, reward and addiction
  (tags: love relationships brains psychology)
• Dinosaurs Must Die - some nice comments detailing why the music industry can die and I won't give a damn.
  (tags: music industry)
• Motorola Droid X Already Sold Out
  (tags: android mobile_phones usa)
• The 16 most intelligent sci-fi films ever made. Anyone recommend some better ones?
  (tags: scifi movies)
• Rumour of the day: Sylvester McCoy could play Bilbo Baggins
  (tags: DrWho thehobbit)
• Women with high-pitched voices go nuts over men with deep voices
  (tags: women men attraction)
• Great News Everyone! Apparently nobody is paying to read The Times online!
  (tags: internet business media journalism murdoch)
• An open letter to proponents of Scottish independence
  (tags: scotland independent Europe)
• National break-up day
  (tags: funny relationships)
• Last month was the hottest June recorded worldwide
  (tags: temperature globalwarming)
• David Cameron jilts the environment
  (tags: environment uk conservatives politics)
• Crime fell 43% under Labour, now at lowest level since 1981
  (tags: crime politics uk)
• Pioneering software cuts train delays in EU
  (tags: software transport)
• My Fault, I'm Female - a collection of stories of sexism experienced by women.
  (tags: feminism sexism)
• Plain english explanation of algorithmic complexity and Big O notation
  (tags: algorithms complexity math programming performance)
• Parasites and pathogens may explain why people in some parts of the world are cleverer than those in others
  (tags: intelligence development disease iq health biology science)

Comments

[cheekbones3.livejournal.com]

Flash Gordon of course!

[anef.livejournal.com]

I'm not so sure that it is great news that nobody's reading the Murdoch news. If nobody will pay for decent on-line journalism, where does that leave us? Not saying that the Times is decent on-line journalism, mind.

[andrewducker]

Well, as far as I'm concerned 3/4 of the UK newspapers vanishing would be a positive step. The number of people reading things that don't actively make the world a worse place is very low.

Maybe we can find a way of subsiding newspapers, but I find it very unlikely that people paying for subscriptions is going to do it.

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

The 16 most intelligent sci-fi films ever made.

WTF is Donnie Darko doing in there?

Anyone recommend some better ones?

Tarkovsky's Solaris for a start, or Brazil if that counts as sf.

[andrewducker]

I liked Donnie Darko, althought I wasn't nearly as gone on it as some people were.

Brazil definitely counts.

[andrewhickey.livejournal.com]

While I'd love to see Sylv as Bilbo, I don't think it's going to happen. Saw him at two conventions last year, and at one he was walking with a stick and the other needed a motorised wheelchair to get to the event, though could walk short distances with the stick. Now, it may have just been a temporary thing (though these were 6 months apart) but it suggests to me that he'd not be in particularly good shape for such a strenuous, physical role. I hope I'm wrong though, both because he'd be good in the role and because I hope he's OK...

[spacelem.livejournal.com]

Oh dear, I didn't know about that! I really hope he's well enough to play the part.

On the other hand, Bilbo does mention a liking for using a walking stick in The Hobbit, so it's possible they could manage.

[autopope.livejournal.com]

I read the Johann Hari piece about Cameron and environment policy with increasing worry until I stubbed my toe on some prime cherry-picking.

The bit about John Browne being in charge of Cameron's cuts agenda is deeply misleading: it's true that "he was the head of BP, until he was forced to resign in 2007 because he was shown to have lied in court testimony", but what Hari doesn't say is that it wasn't work related -- he was gay and in the closet at the time, and trying to stay in it, hence the lawsuit in question.

I'm annoyed. I now can't take anything else in Hari's article at face value without fact-checking, which I don't have time to do, because he's undermined his entire thesis with a sloppy smear (which surely wouldn't be necessary if Browne is as evil as he seems to think).

[andrewducker]

Oh, gah. That's very annoying. I hate it when people nominally on the same side as me engage in that kind of thing.

[autopope.livejournal.com]

Me too. (In case you were wondering where I'm coming from, I'm inclined to be deeply suspicious of conservative greenwashing.)

[andrewducker]

I'm also very sceptical of it. Happy to be proven wrong, of course.

[missedith01.livejournal.com]

I always had a soft spot for Close Encounters.

[blackmanxy.livejournal.com]

So the criterion for an intelligent sci-fi film is that the plot is based loosely on a topic that could be discussed intelligently, or that the film features details related to such a topic, even if the film doesn't bother exploring them in any meaningful, intelligent fashion? Talk about setting the bar low.

[andrewducker]

Pretty much.

I've read intelligent Sci-Fi, and no movie I've seen has ever come close.

[d-c-m.livejournal.com]

Motorola Droid X Already Sold Out
(tags: android mobile_phones usa)

I LOVE my Droid X!!!!!