February 25th, 2010
admin
Imagine having a box in your backyard the size of a power transformer. This box would be filled with hundreds of little fuel cells that would power your house for cheaper than your electric company. If all goes well, the future could be here within a decade.
A startup called Bloom Energy has built an amazing SUV-sized box designed to do just that. It’s filled with thousands of solid oxide fuel cells pumping out electricity with only a minimal carbon footprint. The cost currently is $800,000, but the company hopes to get the cost of the device down to a few thousand dollars within a decade. Ebay purchased the device recently and claim to already have saved a couple hundred grand off their electricity costs.
A device like this could really alleviate the growing problem of our decaying power grid.
60 Minutes covered the amazing device this past weekend, and it’s definitely worth a watch.
February 24th, 2010
admin
The Wall Street Journal today has an absolutely wonderful article about the evolutionary characteristics of the human body.
A 2009 Gallup poll found that 44% of Americans believe that God created human beings in their present form within the past 10,000 years. Many of them also think the human body is perfectly designed.
But most scientists—including biologists, anthropologists, paleontologists and geneticists—see the 21st century human body as a collection of compromises, jury-rigged by evolution as our ancestors adapted to changing conditions.
“In many ways, we are maladapted for modernity,” says Stephen Stearns, a Yale evolutionary biologist. He and others in the field are urging medical schools to include more evolutionary thinking when teaching doctors about modern diseases.
Everything from our imperfect spines, our little toe, and the evolutionary explanation of the appendix are all covered in this article. It really made me think. What will the human body be like 20,000 years from now?
Very interesting Infoworld article about the new software strategy being deployed by Microsoft’s chief software architect, Ray Ozzie.
It can’t be easy being Ray Ozzie. Microsoft’s chief software architect is just 18 months into the job as Bill Gates’ handpicked successor, yet depending on whom you ask, his tenure will either signal a bold new era for the company or mark the beginning of its terminal decline.
Toyota’s troubles continue to worsen. After being ridiculed for the past several weeks as producing “deathtraps”, leaked corporate memos are now beginning to appear.
The New York Times today reported that in 2009, Toyota knew about the unintended acceleration issue. The company saved themselves $100 million by limiting the recall to only the floormats of 2007 Camry’s and ES 350s.
In other words, Toyota looked to help their bottom line by sacrificing their goal to always “do the right thing.” It appears that not only did Toyota cost themselves billions by doing a much larger recall now, they’ve also lost much of the credibility they used to have.
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