Tonight on NYE Check Out People's drinks--it may tell you what their politics are

What your favorite drink says about your politics--see chart on WashPo 

National Media Research Planning and Placement LLC; Washington Post

"If you see someone at your New Years party tonight drinking Kendall-Jackson or Robert Mondavi wines, that person is highly likely to vote, and they’re likely to vote Republican. Someone who savors a Chateau Ste. Michelle Merlot, one of Washington State’s top producers, or Smoking Loon, they’re likely to cast ballots for Democrats." WashPo

NASA released the first full map of the planet Mercury, This Year

NASA: released the first full map of the planet Mercury, This Year

BusinessInsider

Here is How Keys Work

Here is How Keys Work (and AK47, Sewing Machines)

Ebaumsworld

Apple vs Google: Show to Spotlight In-Car Digital Race: Smart Cars. You may also pick between cars as you did Iphones vs. Androids.

Apple vs Google:  Show to Spotlight In-Car Digital Race. Now you may also pick between cars as you did Iphones vs. Androids. 

Washington Post

WSJ: "Technology giants Google Inc. GOOG -0.80% and Apple Inc. AAPL -0.99% are about to expand their battle for digital supremacy to a new front: the automobile.

Next week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Google and German auto maker Audi AG plan to announce that they are working together to develop in-car entertainment and information systems that are based on Google's Android software, people familiar with the matter said.

Apple had announced last June "iOS in the Car" initiative. So far [Apple] has the support of BMW AGBMW.XE -0.23% , Daimler AG DAI.XE -0.40% 's Mercedes-Benz division, General MotorsCo. GM -0.61% and Honda Motor Co. 7267.TO +0.70%"

This Picture Maps Emotions On Your Body. Love and Happiness Are The Warmest (and probably the most addicting)

This Picture Maps Emotions On Your Body. Love and Happiness are the most stimulating--(and probably why the most addicting). 

NPR

Hot colors show regions that people say are stimulated during the emotion. Cool colors indicate deactivated areas.

The team showed the volunteers two blank silhouettes of person on a screen and then told the subjects to think about one of 14 emotions: love, disgust, anger, pride, etc. The volunteers then painted areas of the body that felt stimulated by that emotion. On the second silhouette, they painted areas of the body that get deactivated during that emotion.

NPR

The Economist’s country of the year: Uruguay

The Economist’s country of the year: Uruguay

: 

Gay marriage is one such border-crossing policy, which has increased the global sum of human happiness at no financial cost. Several countries have implemented it in 2013—including Uruguay, which also, uniquely, passed a law to legalise and regulate the production, sale and consumption of cannabis.

Better yet, the man at the top, President José Mujica, is admirably self-effacing. With unusual frankness for a politician, he referred to the new law as an experiment. He lives in a humble cottage, drives himself to work in a Volkswagen Beetle and flies economy class. Modest yet bold, liberal and fun-loving

Other considerations:

Readers might expect our materialistic outlook to point us to simple measures of economic performance, but they can be misleading. Focusing on GDP growth would lead us to opt for South Sudan, which will probably notch up a stonking 30% increase in 2013—more the consequence of a 55% drop the previous year, caused by the closure of its only oil pipeline as a result of its divorce from Sudan, than a reason for optimism about a troubled land. Or we might choose a nation that has endured economic trials and lived to tell the tale. Ireland has come through its bail-out and cuts with exemplary fortitude and calm; Estonia has the lowest level of debt in the European Union. But we worry that this econometric method would confirm the worst caricatures of us as flint-hearted number-crunchers; and not every triumph shows up in a country’s balance of payments.

The Economist

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21591872-resilient-ireland-booming-south-sudan-tumultuous-turkey-our-country-year-earths-got

How much of religious history was influenced by mind-altering substances? There Was An Experiment Done.

Religion as a Product of Psychotropic Drug Use

How much of religious history was influenced by mind-altering substances?

1962 Marsh Chapel Experiment : Following the service nearly the entire group receiving psilocybin reported having had a profound religious experience, compared to just a few in the control group. This result was therefore judged to have supported the entheogenic potential of hallucinogenic drug use. 

In Hindu Sanskrits vedas there is frequent mention of soma. In these episodes soma is described as a plant from which a drink or potion could be produced that was consumed by the gods, giving them fantastic powers which aided them in their supernatural feats.

Rigveda:

We have drunk Soma and become immortal; we have attained the light, the
Gods discovered.
Now what may foeman's malice do to harm us? What, O Immortal, mortal man's deception?

For example, what is the true identity of the drug soma used by the gods in the ancient Hindu Vedas? Or the identity of nepenthe, the "drug of forgetfulness" mentioned in The Odyssey? 

One famous example that has been widely discussed is the Marsh Chapel experiment. This experiment was run by the Harvard Psilocybin Project in the early 1960s, a research project spearheaded by Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert.

On Good Friday 1962, two groups of students received either psilocybin or niacin (a nonhallucinogenic "control" substance) on a double-blind basis prior to the service in Boston University's Marsh Chapel. Results Above. 

The Atlantic

Welcome to the Space Industry Renaissance.

Welcome to the Space Renaissance. Your next vacation may be possible in a hotel…in space.

You bring Gold, its value. Fin Advisor: Why Gold Would Be Useless in an Economic Apocalypse

You bring value to gold. Give it an Economic Apacolypse and it'll be useless, says Fin Advisor

If there really is a collapse of the money supply it is difficult to believe that your briefcase of pretty coins will still have any purchasing power near $1 million. In the 1970s, Christian singer Larry Norman made popular the Apocalyptic song lyric, “A piece of bread could buy a bag of gold” based on Revelation 6:6. In The End, I’d rather not have bought as much gold as possible.

Atlantic

Reuters

One of the Least Productive Congresses of the Modern Era Accomplished these 5 things.

5 Achievements Of The 113th Congress (So Far)

TO KNOW: Congress passed 58 pieces of legislation through Dec. 25. this year. Underlined and bolded.



The 113th Congress, which just ended its first year, has come to be defined more by what it hasn't done than what it has. With two warring and ideologically polarized parties controlling either end of Capitol Hill, Congress has more or less become a quagmire for policy.

Still, one of the least productive Congresses of the modern era was able to accomplish a few things in 2013. Here are five of them:

1. Going Nuclear
After reaching the limits of frustration with Republican use of the filibuster, Senate Democrats ended the minority party's ability to use the tactic to block most nominations [or the so-called nuclear option]. For nearly a decade, whichever party held the majority threatened to change Senate rules so that most presidential nominations could move forward to an up-or-down floor vote with just a simple majority vote, rather than a supermajority.

2. Nation's Second-Most Powerful Court Expands

The filibuster crackdown led Senate Democrats to put four of President Obama's judicial nominees on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. This is considered second only to the Supreme Court in power. The addition of Obama's appointees to the appellate court brought to six the number of judges picked by Democratic presidents, versus four chosen by presidents named Bush.

3. A Budget Deal Was Spawned
In December, Congress passed a budget resolution. But the decades of increasing political polarization resulted in this being the first time since 1986 that Congress has been able to agree on a budget resolution. The two-year deal put off another government shutdown for at least that long, no small accomplishment in present-day Washington. 

***My note: [However, the debt ceiling will still be reached in February: Treasury Secretary Lew warns congress regarding the aforementioned: Link]

4. Congress Didn't Stop Completely
Almost, but not quite. Despite its dysfunction, Congress managed to pass 58 pieces of legislation through Dec. 25. That number made it the least productive first session for a Congress since 1973, the first year we have comparable data for, writes Josh Tauberer on Govtrack.us.

Monumental Legislation: Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act and Hurricane Sandy relief. Then there was a piece of legislation that renamed an IRS code section after a former senator.

5. More Famous People In Stone
OK, so it was a stretch to come up with five achievements for this Congress, given its notorious lack of productivity. More Capitol Hill statues doesn't really rank up there with major legislation, but immigration and new gun control laws didn't happen and the statuary accomplishments did. There were unveilings of statues of civil rights icon Rosa Parks and noted abolitionist Frederick Douglass; and a bust of Winston Churchill, the British bulldog of a statesman.

Saturn looks like a hand-painted ornament from Cassini this Holiday

PHOTO: Saturn's Holiday Closeup

"Just before Christmas, NASA released a photo of Saturn that we can't resist posting.

Here's how the space agency describes the image:

"The globe of Saturn, seen here in natural color, is reminiscent of a holiday ornament in this wide-angle view from NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The characteristic hexagonal shape of Saturn's northern jet stream, somewhat yellow here, is visible. At the pole lies a Saturnian version of a high-speed hurricane, eye and all. ...

"This view was acquired at a distance of approximately 611,000 miles (984,000 kilometers) from Saturn."

NPR 

FB Downfall--Those who are still on FB. Move on.

Era of FB Downfall--Those who are still on FB. Move on. 

Teens In The UK Are Calling It: Facebook Is Dead And Buried

"In a European Union-funded study on social media, the Department of Anthropology at University College London is running nine simultaneous 15-month ethnographic studies in seven countries to find out how teens were perceiving Facebook.
We read about what U.K. teens think on The Conversation:

What we’ve learned from working with 16-18 year olds in the UK is that Facebook is not just on the slide, it is basically dead and buried. Mostly they feel embarrassed even to be associated with it. Where once parents worried about their children joining Facebook, the children now say it is their family that insists they stay there to post about their lives. Parents have worked out how to use the site and see it as a way for the family to remain connected. In response, the young are moving on to cooler things.
Instead, four new contenders for the crown have emerged: Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat and WhatsApp."

BusinessInsider

Imagine if Trees Gave off Wifi Signals (IMG)

Imagine if Trees Gave off Wifi Signals...

Wiki is a better research center for cancer tests: see what this teen boy did.

Wiki is a better research center for cancer tests: see what this teen boy did.

"While on summer break in 2011 at age 15, Jack Andraka made a breakthrough in cancer detection that had eluded pharmaceutical companies and legions of PhDs.

Using information he found on Google and Wikipedia (which he calls “a teenager’s best friend”), Andraka, who lives in Anne Arundel County, came up with an idea for a diagnostic test for pancreatic cancer that he says is 168 times faster, 400 times more sensitive and 26,000 times more economical than the medical standard.

Video

Currently, to screen the blood of a patient at risk for pancreatic cancer, doctors must send vials to a lab, where it is tested for elevated levels of a biomarker. Cancer researchers and practitioners say that these tests, which are 60 years old, aren’t reliable. They often don’t show any abnormalities even when the cancer is advanced."

WashingtonPost

See this Snow Artist's Snow Art

See this Snow Artist's Snow Art

Best (and funniest) Plant Ever

Scottish Christmas Parade in Old Town

Scottish Christmas Parade in Old Town 2012

Amazon drones. USPS Responds, Then Amazon responds by appealing to dog owners.

Amazon drones. USPS Responds, Then Amazon responds by appealing to dog owners.

Christmas Message from Edward Snowden

Christmas Message from Edward Snowden: 

"A Child Born Today Will Grow Up With No Conception of Privacy at All" 

While there may be no explicit omniscient Big Brother, it seems as though humans want to be tracked. Privacy seems to not be such a gem we fight for. As we walk through our lives we record our moments on social media within minutes. Do we even want, care for Privacy? 

Edward Snowden: “A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all,”  “They’ll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves — an unrecorded, unanalyzed thought. Privacy matters; privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we want to be. 

Great Britain’s George Orwell warned us of the danger of this kind of information. The types of collection in the book — microphones and video cameras, TVs that watch us — are nothing compared to what we have available today. We have sensors in our pockets that track us everywhere we go.

If only this Chinese concept of Train that never stops could be applied to the NYC Subway.

If only this Chinese concept of Train that never stops could be applied to the NYC Subway.

Here is how to take a picture of an ultra-magnified snow flake.

Do you like snowflakes? Here is how to take a picture of an ultra-magnified snow flake.

"No two snowflakes are alike, they say. And yet: We rarely get proof of that. Our eyes perceive snow not as individual, idiosyncratic crystals ... but rather as uniformly fluffy flakes. And! When we try to get a better look at the true intricacy of snow by capturing one of the flakes ... the thing melts. Snow is a cold and fickle thing. 

Unless, that is, you are a photographer in the tradition of Wilson Bentley—one of the photographers who specializes in the highly technical art of snowflake imagery. The photographer Alexey Kljatov is one of those. And his Flickr page is full of close-up, highly magnified shots of snow flakes—dainty structures whose variety hints at the mind-boggling range of the humble, ephemeral flake.

And: You could take similar shots! If, that is, you have a fancy camera, some household tools, and a DIY attitude. You need, first of all, a glass surface, lighted by either an LED flashlight or natural light. (In the latter case, you need a dark background that will maximize the visibility of the flakes: Kljatov likes dark, woolen fabrics.) "

The Atlantic

TX and Europe: If you drive four hours in Texas. You're still in TX.

TX and Europe: If you drive four hours in Texas. You're still in TX.

XO Ricky Rajani @RickeeeRajaneee

Darwin may be Extinct. Darwin is a Frog and it looks like a Dead Leaf.

Darwin may be extinct. Darwin is a frog and it looks like a dead leaf. 

                                                                                         Stringer/Chile/Reuter

Can we all just take a moment to appreciate the Irony that the Berlin Wall now has a fence to protect it.

Can we all just take a moment to appreciate the Irony that the Berlin Wall now has a fence to protect it.

SPORTS FANS: Christmas Colorways (KICKS) from Nike. Introducing LeBron 11, Kobe 8, and (Kevin Durant) KD VI

SPORTS FANS: Christmas Colorways (KICKS) from Nike. Introducing LeBron 11, Kobe 8, and (Kevin Durant) KD VI

http://www.nike.com/us/en_us/c/basketball

Quick Humorous Interludes

Cheers, baby. Japan knows how to do pranks. Christmas present idea: Clever Lottery  .

Now turn on ‘This Street’ or the ‘Other street’--In Nova Scotia

This Is What Happens When You Pour Molten Aluminum In An Ant Hill.

This Is What Happens When You Pour Molten Aluminum In An Ant Hill. You get art.

A Bitcoin was Stolen Virtually on Bloomberg TV.

A Bloomberg TV Host Gifted Bitcoin On Air And It Immediately Was Stolen But there was a happy ending. 

This was a Big Tree. And Now it looks like China.

This was a Big Tree. And Now it looks like China. 

Credit card companies put you in a category. Which one are you? And, then tweet it. #HumbleBeginnings

Article: Credit card companies put you in a category. Which one are you? And, then tweet it. #HumbleBeginnings

WashingtonPost

Congratulations, D.C. taxpayers: You own a strip club.

Congratulations, D.C. taxpayers: You own a strip club.

"The District's Office of Tax and Revenue has seized the Stadium Club, a steakhouse and gentleman's club popular with professional athletes and hip-hop artists and the home for a reality show called "Strip Club Queens," in order to pay off the debts of owner James Redding. Redding operated TruOrleans restaurant on H Street NE until September, when the city shut that troubled venue down over more than $100,000 in unpaid sales and use taxes. Redding never paid his debt, the city says, so it moved to seize his assets – including Stadium Club" WashingtonPost

Update: It used to. 

Clown vs. King burger marketing. Well done BK.

Clown vs. King burger marketing. Well done BK.

Canada has so much pride in their sports and government.

Canada has so much pride in their sports and government. 

Subliminal messages in corporate logos, including Amazon, FedEx, Baskin Robbins.

Subliminal messages in corporate logos, including Amazon, FedEx, Baskin Robbins.

And Best Answers.Ever.

And Best Answers.

Cool Puns.

Cool Puns. And Best Answers.

Leonardo DiCaprio Fans: Leonardo DiCaprio Character Matrix: Why 'Wolf Of Wall Street' Seems So Familiar

Leonardo DiCaprio Fans: Leonardo DiCaprio Character Matrix: Why 'Wolf Of Wall Street' Seems So Familiar

HuffingtonPost

Dum Dums Mystery Flavor: Finally Revealed!

Dum Dums Mystery Flavor: Finally Revealed!

"According to Mental Floss, Mystery Flavor is created when the same candy equipment is used to make two different flavors. Rather than shut down production and clean out the machine between batches, the company keeps the lollipops that combine a little of Flavor A and a little of Flavor B, wrapping them up and marketing them as Mystery Flavor. Pretty ingenious, right."
TheKitchn

Children, we figured out the amount of money to make you eat what is good for you

 Children, we figured out the amount of money to make you eat what is good for you: 

It costs $1.72 to get a kid to eat an apple under the current default system, and would cost about 35 cents if kids were offered a small reward for doing so.

Heres a video of China’s moon landing. Jade Rabbit.

Heres a video of China’s moon landing. Jade Rabbit. 

This was the math behind the Powerball lottery .

This was the math behind the Powerball lottery .

The expected value of spending $2 on a Powerball ticket is actually  -$1.58 when you ignore the jackpot. That's right, the expected value of playing when you ignore the jackpot is negative. 

And while the probability that you in fact win the jackpot is outstandingly small — 1 in 175,223,516 to be precise — the jackpots can grow outstandingly big, which makes it so that at some point, you can actually get a positive expected value.

For instance, when we last looked at Powerball the jackpot had reached a whopping $600 million. If you look at it in the most rudimentary form, your expected value for playing Powerball was not only positive, but also pretty attractive. Because of the ludicrously high jackpot, people could expect to gain about a $1.78 after playing. 

Walter Hickey / BI

One complicating factor, however, is the fact that when you factor in the probabilities of split jackpots, you will decrease that expected value. 

The probability that the winner will have to split the jackpot is also really significant.