] After 30 years of work, Saint Louis University
] researchers have genetically engineered a common cold
] virus to fight cancerous cells while leaving unaffected
] healthy ones. They received a patent for this research
] and clinical tests on humans will start soon, according
] to this news release.

this may've already gotten some meme coverage, but it's still dope. sounds promising...

Fighting Cancer With Common Cold?

] Sony Corporation today announced the development of
] dramatically enhanced motion of Sony's humanoid robot,
] enabling integrated motion control for walking, jumping
] and running.

...

] Sony will continue to utilize the QRIO platform for various
] technological advances, leading to outstanding entertainment
] robots highly suited to the co-existence with humans and to the
] development of various technologies which can be applied to other
] Sony products.

I, for one, welcome our new QRIO masters. Kidding, but man, sure seems like remarkable things are happening in the robot world.

Sony Global - Press Release

] Each year less light reaches the surface of the Earth. No
] one is sure what's causing 'global dimming' - or what it
] means for the future. In fact most scientists have never
] heard of it.

interesting science

Guardian Unlimited | Life | Goodbye sunshine

You know it's true. How many televisions do you have? Do you even know? How many channels do you get? Do your kids refuse to watch black-and-white programs? No one had a VCR in 1970. Now 240 million of us do, but VCRs are history now that Wal-Mart is selling DVD players for $29.

some really good points in here. he stops short of making a prediction, though... is the consumption glut going to drive us into a cedit-card-debt induced implosion, or will western culture maintain and spread its desire to have Stuff to fill every nook and cranny of its double mortgaged homes?

Fortune.com - Value Driven - Admit It: You, Too, Are Paris Hilton

] Democrats who live in the nation's capital - and want to
] vote for Joe Lieberman, John Edwards, John Kerry, Richard
] Gephardt, or Wesley Clark - are out of luck.
]
]
] All five asked to be removed from the ballot for the
] January 13th non-binding D.C. primary, citing concern
] about whether the District should vote before New
] Hampshire and Iowa.

hah! i wonder how many will vote for "Vermin Supreme"?

DC primary ballot lacking candidates

] Sen. John F. Kerry's campaign spokeswoman is deeply
] unhappy with the New York Times' chief political
] correspondent for quoting her criticism of Howard Dean.
]
]
] The reason? The Massachusetts Democrat's team made the
] attack in an e-mail to reporters that contained a note
] asking that it be treated on "background," attributed
] only to a Democratic campaign. Adam Nagourney refused to
] go along.

Kerry's campaign sinks to ever deeper lows. He's already 6th (last among the credible candidates) in many polls, but he's going down screaming, taking potshots at the front runner as if he still has a chance, but trying to do it anonymously. Please, this is the kind of shit that kills interest in politics. Make your opinions attributable or shut the fuck up. Period.

Cutter claims that her "Truth Squad" is all about exposing the facts in this race for the public record, all the while sending pre-formatted attacks to the journalists she has cowed into printing them anonymously...

Stephanie Cutter -- getting a deserved smackdown

Grokker takes the data culled by an online search and organizes it visually into categories that enable you to quickly dig deeply to find the exact site or information you need. The application that works on top of many different databases, including the all-important Google.

sounds like someone finally grasped some key issues with data mining for ordinary humans. Now, I want it to have the ability to do the same thing for my files.

We're talking about a personal knowledge manager now, but, as we start filling up our 40, 80, 120 gig drives, we're gonna get more and more lost in that data sea. I already have trouble finding things, and i try to follow a relatively strict hierarchical model (which has it's own problems...). Broad support for proprietary file formats is a stumbling point here, as are binary data (music, movies, images), but the future of your "desktop" is a smart interface to your data... semantically indexed and organized and available within one query and a click. maybe groxis will lead us there?

[edit] They should try to steal less from Aqua for their web site, by the way, especially since they don't even have a MacOS version yet.

also, Java? It's possible that this is one of the 2% of Java programs that aren't infuriatingly slow, but, i have my doubts.

Going Deeper than Google

] LIN: But there is the opportunity now to interview
] Saddam Hussein to find out about weapons of mass
] destruction, if in fact they exist and where they are.
] Clearly, this is going to be useful to the United States
] and the war on terror.
]
] SHARPTON: Well, if we went to war to get an
] interview, I don't think that's what we were told. We
] went to war because we said we knew there were weapons.
] Not that we wanted to capture and interview him to see if
] there was weapons.
]
] We all know Sharpton can't (and shouldn't) win the
] nomination, but I hope whoever wins puts him in the
] cabinet as Secretary of One-Liners or something.

Ha!

The Talent Show: The rapier wit of Al Sharpton

] The bad news for the Dems: Their nominee could emerge
] somewhat battered, and Republicans will recycle the
] attacks they're mounting now.

thank you. maybe the candidates will use their brains and tone down the anger level of the infighting.

there's a ton of good stuff in this column... some speculation and some fact... all worth reading.

Dean on the Griddle (washingtonpost.com)

were the wright's really first? this site says:
] The first flight was by a twenty-five year old New
] Zealander, Richard Pearse on March 31, 1902.

and this (http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/12/10/brazil.santosdumont.reut/index.html) one mentions:
] Ask anyone in Brazil who invented the airplane and
] they will say Alberto Santos-Dumont, a five-foot
] four-inch (1.6 meter) bon vivant who was as well
] known for his aerial prowess as he was for his
] dandyish dress and high society life in Belle Epoque
] Paris.

Richard Pearse : New Zealand Pioneer Aviator (1877 - 1953)