"China’s reserves were last surveyed in the early 2000s, and the US reserves in the 1970s. China does not possess, as the United States does, vast deposits of surface-minable coal. More than 90% of China’s coal comes from underground mines that can be as much as 1,000 metres deep, presenting increasing engineering challenges. We strongly suspect that the current reserves figures are too optimistic. The coal is certainly there, but — like the majority of coal elsewhere in the world — most of it is probably destined to stay put."
"More than 700 new species are described each year in Europe — four times the rate of two centuries ago."
— European bounty for taxonomists : Nature : Nature Publishing Group
Splits for Bay State 2010
I qualified for the Boston Marathon today. Thought I’d write down my splits before deleting them from my watch.
- 7:00
- 7:05
- 7:14
- 7:08
- 7:09
- 7:13
- 7:10
- 7:05
- 7:19
- 6:57
- 7:04
- 6:56
- 7:02
- 7:08
- 7:02
- 7:07
- 7:12
- 7:07
- 7:13
- 7:15
- 7:20
- 7:27
- 7:59 (took a piss in the woods)
- 7:38
- 7:45
- 7:50
- 1:29 (last 0.2 miles)
I got pretty damn tired there at the end and slowed down a lot.
Chrome’s StopBadware integration backfires on Google…
Follow social people for disease tracking. Makes sense.
(via Instapaper)
Well written piece that covers many of the promises and insights of whole genome sequencing
(via Instapaper)
I just shaved (with a razor) for the first time
Observations:
- I’m bleeding a LOT.
- I can’t feel my face.
- I feel like Lyle Lodwick.
- I should have looked up how to do this before I started.
I still have never shaved with a razor. I really need to man up and learn
Just in case there are people who follow my tumblr that are at the ACS conference, I’m giving a talk tomorrow. You should show up.
If you aren’t attending, it might be videotaped and put online, if so, I’ll be sure to share.
Best iPad wallpaper ever
"What do we mean by time and space? It turns out that these deep philosophical questions have to be analyzed very carefully in physics, and this is not so easy to do. The theory of relativity shows that our ideas of space and time are not as simple as one might think at first sight. However, for our present purposes, for the accuracy that we need at first, we need to be very careful about defining things precisely. Perhaps you say, “That’s a terrible thing－I learned that in science we have to define everything precisely.” We cannot define anything precisely! If we attempt to, we get into that paralysis of thought that comes to philosophers, who sit opposite each other, one saying to the other, “You don’t know what you are talking about!” The second one says, “What do you mean by know? What do you mean by talking? What do you mean by you?,” and so on. In order to be able to talk constructively, we just have to agree that we are talking about roughly the same thing."
— Richard Feynman
Usain Bolt takes to the decks for crowd in Paris (via itnnews)
just a ridiculous man
Pretty awesome, 150 genes to say whether you’ll live to 100.
