Thursday Technopole Taxis

A Lesbian Reporter Walks Into A Pray The Gay Away Convention

When my article about the conference came out, we got complaints from both sides. Some readers said I gave too much space to the ex-gays.

 Others said I was too critical of Christian theology and included too many quotes from the protesters. My editor Michael told me if I’d pissed off both sides, I’d done my job. But I wasn’t convinced. I knew I hadn’t been objective.

I was on the side of the protesters and in the article I’d purposely given them, not the ex-gays, the last word.

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Could Mars Have Been Destroyed During The Angelic Wars?

The Atlantic has a story that explores what may have destroyed the Martian atmosphere and ocean.

The question of whether there is life on Mars is woven into a much larger thatch of mysteries.
 
 Among them: What happened to the ancient ocean that once covered a quarter of the planet's surface? 

And, relatedly, what made Mars's magnetosphere fade away? 

Why did a planet that may have looked something like Earth turn into a dry red husk? 

“We see magnetized rocks on the Mars surface,” said Bruce Banerdt, the principal investigator of the InSight mission to Mars, which is set to launch in March. 

“And so we know Mars had a magnetic field at one time, but it doesn't today.

 We would like to know the history—when that magnetic field started, when it may have shut down.”

 http://digg.com/2015/pluto-ice-water-blue-skies

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Some People Are Not Too Bright

The Martian is a smash hit movie that made $100 million worldwide during its first weekend.

 The science and engineering depicted was, with certain notable exceptions, near perfect. 

The cinematography and special effects were so well done that one could almost imagine that Ridley Scott sent Matt Damon and a film crew to Mars to shoot the movie. 

In fact, perhaps the film was a little too good. Buzzfeed took a stroll through social media and discovered that many people think that The Martian is based on a true story.

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Old Jerry Gets To The Frontlines

The EFF reports a spot of bright news from California: Governor Jerry Brown today signed into law the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act.

 CalECPA, says the organization, "protects Californians by requiring a warrant for digital records, including emails and texts, as well as a user's geographical location.

These protections apply not only to your devices, but to online services that store your data.

Only two other states have so far offered these protections: Maine and Utah."

The ACLU provides a fact sheet (PDF) about what the bill entails, which says:

 SB 178 will ensure that, in most cases, the police must obtain a warrant from a judge before accessing a person's private information, including data from personal electronic devices, email, digital documents, text messages, and location information.

 The bill also includes thoughtful exceptions to ensure that law enforcement can continue to effectively and efficiently protect public safety in emergency situations. 

Notice and enforcement provisions in the bill provide proper transparency and judicial oversight to ensure that the law is followed.

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 Skimboarders watch the tides, nothing new here...

You'd think Tide prediction would be quite easy, it comes in, it goes out. 

But of course it's driven by gravity between the moon and earth and there's a lot more to it. 

Today, computer models make this easy, but before computers we used incredible analog machines to predict the tides.

 The best of these machines were the deciding factor in setting a date for the Allies landing in Europe leading to the end of the second world war.

 From the Hackaday story: "In England, tide prediction was handled by Arthur Thomas Doodson from the Liverpool Tidal Institute. 

It was Doodson who made the tidal predictions for the Allied invasion at Normandy.

 Doodson needed access to local tide data, but the British only had information for the nearby ports.

 Factors like the shallow water effect and local weather impact on tidal behavior made it impossible to interpolate for the landing sites based on the port data.

 The shallow water effect could really throw off the schedule for demolishing the obstacles if the tide rose too quickly. 

Secret British reconnaissance teams covertly collected shallow water data at the enemy beaches and sent it to Doodson for analysis. 

To further complicate things, the operatives couldn’t just tell Doodson that the invasion was planned for the beaches of Normandy. 

So he had to figure it out from the harmonic constants sent to him by William Ian Farquharson, superintendent of tides at the Hydrographic Office of the Royal Navy.

 He did so using the third iteration of Kelvin’s predictor along with another machine. 

These were kept in separate rooms lest they be taken out by the same bomb.

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 We ex hippies love VW

Today VW's Michael Horn is testifying to Congress and has blamed the recent scandal on engineers saying: "It's the decision of a couple of software engineers, not the board members." 

However, 530,000 cars in the U.S. will need to be recalled for significant engine modifications, not a software fix.

 Only 80,000 Passats are eligible for the software fix. 

There is no word on the effects these modifications will have on the cars' performance, fuel consumption, etc. The BBC reports: 

"The issue of defeat devices at VW has been a historic problem, points out a Congress panel member questioning VW US chief Michael Horn.

In 1974, VW had a run-in with US authorities regarding the use of defeat devices in 1974, and in December 2014 it recalled cars to address nox emissions."

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 This seems like a disaster in the making to most of us.

Volvo has announced it will accept "full liability" for accidents when one of its cars is driving autonomously. 

It joins Mercedes and Google in this claim, hoping to convince regulators that it's worthwhile to allow testing of such vehicles on public roads. 

Volvo's CTO said, "Everybody is aware of the fact that driverless technology will never be perfect — one day there will be an accident.

 So the question becomes who is responsible and we think it's unrealistic to put that responsibility on our customers."

 Of course, this is limited to flaws in the self-driving system. If the driver does something inappropriate, or if another vehicle causes the accident, then they're still liable.

 It's also questionable how the courts would treat a promise for liability, but presumably this can be cleared up with agreements when customers start actually using the technology.

http://money.cnn.com/2015/07/17/autos/google-self-driving-car-injury-accident/

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You just might not want to upgrade your iphone right now...

Apple is splitting the manufacture of the A9 processor for its iPhone 6s between TSMC (~60%) and rival Samsung (~40%) — "and they are not created equal," writes Andy Patrizio. 

For starters, Chipworks noted that Samsung uses 14nm while TSMC uses 16nm.

 A Reddit user posted tests of a pair of 6s Plus phones and found the TSMC chip had eight hours of battery life vs. six hours for the Samsung. 

Meanwhile, benchmark tests from the folks at MyDriver (if Mr. Patrizio's efforts with Google Translate got it right) also found that the Samsung chip is a bigger drain on the phone's battery, while the TSMC chip is slightly faster and runs a bit cooler. 

So how do you know which chip you got? 

There's an app for that.

But I don't know what it is at the moment...

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Frisbee was very big in the 60's and 70's.

This guy has mastered the art!

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