Settlers destroy natural spring used by Palestinians for farming near Salfit
Here’s the thing, and the thing is this: There is no negotiating partner for Palestinians to talk to. Not a one. What is Joe Biden doing in Jerusalem right now? Absolutely nothing useful.
Some pissed off DVD watcher really wanted to just get to his Matrix, I guess. Can’t give an attribution here, because I don’t know who did it, but this thing has been floating around the webosphere all day it seems, and I love a good graphical display of an issue. Marketing bloat is to DVDs what software bloat is to Windows.
The Skeptical Science blogger has created an iPhone app to aid your climate change/global warming debates with your friends and family sticking up for the anthropogenic CO2 emission status quo. Now you can scroll down and access a database of known popular arguments and find your response. I’m always keen to see knowledge outsourcing services in action. Why know what it is, when you know where it is?
I like science apps because it lets me pretend my iPhone is more like a tricorder. I’ve got a few psychology reference apps that have come in mildly handy for course work and the stethoscope thing is a nice party trick, but not really the potential spyware its touted to be. Brain tutor is fun with its 3D-esque fly-around mode, as who doesn’t want to jet through the the ossipital lobe on occasion?
The information on the Skeptical Science App is good. It looks to be a copy of the blog’s own database of Frequently Awful Quotes about the subject, but what’s even more intersting is the sort of emerging crowdsourcing intelligentsia part of the kit. When you encounter one of the arguments, there’s an option to upvote it, which lets the app keep track of the most commonly employed rhetoric.
Currently the information is simply stored on your phone in the “My Reports” panel,” though there’s plans to make that data shared amongst users, which to me seemed like an obvious thing. The blog indicates they’re working on a heat map display of where people are encountering arguments. I’d be more interested in seeing the raw numbers, though. I mean, am I really going to check the heat map before going out and think “well, it looks like Tooting is a hotbed for contention around Naomi Oreskes’ study on consensus! Let us make the requisite preparations.”
It would also be useful if the reports option had a place to include new arguments and memes, as The Lobby is effective at trickling them down to their unwitting advocates. I like the app; it’s an interesting read on the tube ride home, but I don’t know how it would go over in a debate with a person somewhere if you pulled out your gizmo and suddenly started reading at them. Good to have handy I guess for comment wars on the web, though.
The problem with i.imgur.com stuff is you never know who makes it. Thanks to whomever is responsible.
an effective message at a fraction of Dave Cameron's budget.
Residents of the West Bank village of Bil’in have proven that innovative resistance can move walls. For a second time the village has won a ruling against annexation attempts by a nearby settlement via a wall that that is under construction well outside of Israel’s internationally recognized borders. People there continue to draw from whatever western Pop culture dishes out to keep the issue in the media. Last Friday, Palestinian demonstrators splashed on some blue paint and offered their own 3D rendition of Avatar as they marched against armed Israeli soldiers. Brilliant.
— Bil’in weekly demonstration reenacts the Avatar film (ISM)
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“Political tags, such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth, are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.”
Sharing is What Makes the Web Work. Fight Spam! Ping Me!
