For their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change:

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr.

funny
Bush "wins" the Presidency but dubiously, starts a pointless war and everybody hates him
Gore wins a Nobel Peace Prize

no writer could ever get away with it -- the shear chutzpah of reality

Al Gore Wins Nobel Peace Prize 2007

British author Doris Lessing has been awarded this year's Nobel Prize for Literature.

huzzah

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Author Lessing wins Nobel honour

Stuart Baker-Brown, 43, a photographer and writer based in Dorset, was diagnosed with schizophrenia in 1996. On World Mental Health Day, he delivers a unique personal insight into how his condition has nurtured his artistic expression.

i don't have schizophrenia but i have had schizophreniform psychosis (the difference being the duration of my episodes [under 6 months]) and a lot of those experiences go into the poetry i write

BBC NEWS | Magazine | A beautiful mind

Australian-led scientists have designed a new space habitat that might one day allow astronauts on the Moon or Mars to be 90 to 95 per cent self-sufficient

Self-sufficient space habitat designed | COSMOS magazine

A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.

The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.

"Techniques that took years to develop are now ineffective and worthless," said Rita Katz, the firm's 44-year-old founder, who has garnered wide attention by publicizing statements and videos from extremist chat rooms and Web sites, while attracting controversy over the secrecy of SITE's methodology. Her firm provides intelligence about terrorist groups to a wide range of paying clients, including private firms and military and intelligence agencies from the United States and several other countries.

The precise source of the leak remains unknown. Government officials declined to be interviewed about the circumstances on the record, but they did not challenge Katz's version of events. They also said the incident had no effect on U.S. intelligence-gathering efforts and did not diminish the government's ability to anticipate attacks.

While acknowledging that SITE had achieved success, the officials said U.S. agencies have their own sophisticated means of watching al-Qaeda on the Web. "We have individuals in the right places dealing with all these issues, across all 16 intelligence agencies," said Ross Feinstein, spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Rita Katz and the SITE Institute have been mentioned on MemeStreams often.

Looks like someone at the White House toasted SITE's humint...

Leak Severed a Link to Al-Qaeda's Secrets

Horology is the formal term for the science of timekeeping. Both clock and watchmaking have seen many significant technological advancements in modern times as they progressed from the early days of the spring powered clock up to IBM’s Linux Wrist Watch project. Most advancements in horology in the modern era have focused on three areas: 1) accuracy 2) miniaturization and 3) source of power.

a linux wrist watch - i want one (even if it is a bit ugly at the mo)

WatchPart.co.uk Supplying Watch Parts » 12 Major Technological Innovations in Modern Horology

A few weeks ago I sat down with an interviewer from the British Broadcasting Company who asked me 10 questions about democracy. I was only one of many who were being interviewed for a series of programs and films that bear the general title “Why Democracy?” Starting today — October 8 — what the producers call “the world’s largest ever factual multi-media event” will be transmitted on television, radio and online in more than 200 countries with a hoped-for audience of 300 million. The intention is to “spark debate” and provoke a massive online discussion.

I thought I’d do my part by rehearsing some of the questions along with the answers I gave and invite readers to respond with their own answers or with criticisms of mine.
...
The final question put to me was, “Whom would you vote for as President of the World?” I know whom I’d like to vote for. Someone wise, learned, strong, courageous, compassionate, authoritative, incorruptible, inspiring, capable and good-looking. No one living (or dead) came to mind, so I settled for a fictional character, Atticus Finch, at least as he was played by Gregory Peck. (Morgan Freeman in any number of roles is another possibility.)

huzzuh for Atticus Finch

Why Democracy? - Stanley Fish - Think Again - Opinion - New York Times Blog

A great number of indicators describe the movement of a society from freedom to authoritarianism. One of these is the number of public figures (politicians, scientists, writers, journalists and so forth) that the authorities bar from various media and scientific publications. I will label this number the "hush-level" indicator (HL). The higher the HL - that is, the greater the number of prohibited names - the closer is the given society to authoritarianism.

Name dropping, Russian style - International Herald Tribune

Modern conservatism begins with Edmund Burke. What Burke articulated was not an ideology or a creed, but a disposition, a reverence for tradition, a suspicion of radical change.

nice
although i'm an odd beast a center-left democratic socialist/liberal who exhibits a certain dispositional conservatism

The Republican Collapse - New York Times

Brewing update:

Today, Clint and I are brewing pumpkin brew. This is by far my favorite brew we do all year round, mainly because of the aroma of roasted pumpkin. Last time we brewed this, it was an absolute hit (as in, the keg was empty a few hours after we kegged...I didn't even get any...damn house parties), so I am looking forward to trying this.

In secondary : Paulaner Hefe clone and a high gravity belgian beer....oh yes.....winter is going to be good.

edit this is nanochick's post i just recommended it
sort it out Decius 8-)

Beer beer magical beer