Pierre de Fermat's birthday (today is August 17)

Today is Pierre de Fermat's birthday, so i decided to post 3 cool things about him. :)


!. the guy was born in a museum! is that cool or what?
2. he was a lawyer and a mathematician (i dunno, it seems to me like that is an unusual combination)
3. he was given credit for "early developments that led to infinitesimal calculus, including his adequality. In particular, he is recognized for his discovery of an original method of finding the greatest and the smallest ordinates of curved lines, which is analogous to that of the then unknown differential calculus, and his research into number theory." (wiki)


HAPPY BIRTHDAY Pierre de Fermat'!

Lions

Lions are one of the four big cats in genus Panthera, and a member of the family Felidae.  Some of the males  are more than 250 kg, and they are the second largest cats in the world, the first being the tiger. Wild lions live in sub-saharan Africa and in Gir Forest National Park in India. However, they used to live all over the world, in fact, they were the most widely spread large land mammal besides humans. They were found in most of Africa, from southern europe to india, and in the Americas from Yukon to Peru. Lions are now considered a vulnerable species as they have seen a population decrease of 30 to 50 percent in the last 20 years that may be irreversable. The cause of the decline is not fully understood, but habitat loss and coflict with humans are most likely doing a lot of damage.

In the wild lions live 10-14 years, but can live longer than 20 in captivity. Male lions rarely live longer than ten years in the wild because of the constant fights with other males. A pride of lions usually consists of related females and offspring, and a few adult males. Groups of females hunt together, preying on wildebeast, impalas, zebras, buffalo, and warthogs. lions are typically predators though they will sometimes scavenge if the opertunity presents itself. Lions don't generally hunt humans, but some have been known to.

Lions spend most of their time resting - about 20 hours per day. Lions can be active at any time, but their activity peaks after dusk with socializing, grooming, and defecating. they have some bursts of energy off and on through the night hours until dawn when most og the hunting takes place. They spend about 2 hours every day walking and 50 minutes eating.

Human-like robots: not just science fiction anymore:

Isaac Asimov's (author of "I, Robot") world full of robots working alongside humans may not be as far away as most people think -  but in real life the robots will look and act (somewhat)  like humans - not machines. Roboticists are working on making robots look and act more human, and are further along than people suspect. there is already robots in testing that can look as much (if not more) like a human as Data from Star Trek TNG.  There are many possible uses for such machines such as doing chores around the house, babysitting, and giving speeches for people on their absence. Of course, fitting them into our daily lives may be difficult as they would creep people out at first, and no matter how much they deny it, many people are afraid of change. Will we be working alongside robots and talking to them as if they were human in the upcoming decades? Perhaps, but there is still a lot of research to be done.

opinions

note on opinions:
opinions stem from personal experience/memories.
personal experience is controlled by ambition
the amount of ambition one has has to do with their ego
ego begins with one's creativity capacity.
the more creativity capacity one has, the more ambitious they will be, which in the end controls many of their actions and opinion is stemmed from personal experience
media influence also has some effect on one's creativity capacity and therefore affects opinion


what is the significance of opinion? different people would answer different things; this shows how complex our brains actually are. you design your own answer.

Could you be an astronaut?

Read this and find out!

There are three types of astronauts: Pilot Astronauts, Mission Specialists, and Payload Specialists. Pilot astronauts are either mission commanders or pilot of the space craft. To be a pilot astronaut, you have to be an United States citizen, have at least a bachelors degree in engineering, physics, mathematics or biology, and have logged one thousand hours of flying time in a jet aircraft. There are also strict physical fitness requirements. A mission specialist works with the commander and pilot, helping with shuttle operations such as monitoring the crew's use of fuel, water and food, conducting experiments and participating in space walks. A mission specialist must be a United States citizen, and have at least a bachelor's degree in engineering, physics, mathematics or biology, and have three years of related professional experience. The third type of astronaut is the payload specialist. These astronauts are not official members of the astronaut corps. They are professionals in physics or biology and skilled in working shuttle equipment.

Sharks

how would you like to be swallowed by this guy?

There are more than 350 different kinds of sharks, and they range in size between 9 in. and 45 ft. 

Sharks have skeletons of cartilage, which is lighter and more  flexible than bones. Sharks' scales are called denticles, and are like sharp teeth and are rough and jagged - they feel like sandpaper. They have five different kinds of fins; caudal, anal, dorsal, pelvic, and pectoral:

Sound travels faster through water than air, hence the shark uses sound to locate prey. However, they use their eyes as well, though not as much. A shark's sense of smell is amazing, they can smell blood from about a mile away.

There are many rows of teeth in a shark's mouth. The front teeth are easily lost, then are replaced by new ones moving up from behind. 

Don't worry, sharks don't mainly prey on humans, in fact, if a shark attacks a human, it's almost always an accident. For instance, If a shark is really hungry and sees you moving, it might mistake you for a seal, but that usually never happens. All that stuff on movies about people being attacked by sharks are all over exaggerations. Another time that a shark might attack you is if it is trying to check you out. Sharks have nerves in their teeth, and they literally bite something to see what it is.  

NASA picks potential landing site on Mars

AP Photo/NASA

A color-enhanced image of the Gale Crater -- one of four proposed sites for the landing of the next Mars rover. After years of poring through images from space to decide where to send the next Mars rover, it comes down to four choices.

After years of poring through images from space and debating where on Mars the next NASA rover should land, it comes down to four choices.

Scientists in the close-knit Mars research community get one last chance to make their case this week when they gather before the "judges" -- the team running the $2.5 billion mission that will soon suggest a landing site to NASA, the ultimate decider.

The stakes are high. Location is everything when it comes to studying whether the red planet ever had conditions that could have been favorable for microbial life.

The upside is that all four candidates are relatively free of dangerous boulders and other hazards that would pose a threat to rover Curiosity upon landing. The size of a mini Cooper, Curiosity is scheduled to launch in late November after a two-year delay.

With no real engineering showstopper, scientists are haggling over the scientific merits of the locations and trying to convince the rest of the tribe why Curiosity should land at their preferred spot.

"All four of these places are compelling places on Mars to study. There's not a loser among them," said landing site scientist Matt Golombek of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, one of the meeting's leaders.

But as in any contest, there can only be one winner in the end. Here's a look at the final cut:

-- Gale crater located near the Martian equator possesses a 3-mile-high mound of layered mineral deposits.

-- Mawrth Vallis is an ancient flood channel in the Martian northern highlands that is rich in clay minerals.

-- Eberswalde crater in the southern hemisphere contains remnants of a river delta.

-- Holden crater, close to Eberswalde, is the site of water-carved gullies and sediment deposits.

The shortlist was culled from nearly 60 hopefuls in a selection process that began in 2006. Some scientists broke up into teams to pore over close-up images snapped from the eagle-eyed Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for the various locations and presented their findings at meetings. After technical woes pushed back Curiosity's launch, the community regrouped and considered more places.

Research scientist Steve Ruff of Arizona State University stayed on the sidelines for much of the debate. No longer.

He said he will make a pitch for Mawrth Vallis, the only spot where Curiosity can conduct science experiments as soon as it lands. For the other three sites, the rover would need to drive outside its landing zone to reach interesting targets.

Mawrth is the sole locale "that contains the scientific goodies," Ruff said.

It can be slow going to get to a destination. Just look at the driving record of the twin Mars rovers, which took months to trek several miles (kilometers).

"You could eat up a substantial portion of your mission just driving where you want to go," said Ruff, who called it an unnecessary risk.

Astronomer Jim Bell of Arizona State University, who goes back and forth between favoring Gale and Eberswalde craters, agreed it was chancy, but thinks it's worth it.

"We won't be putting on blinders and heading east or west without stopping," said Bell, who is part of the mission's camera team. 

There's a clear pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but there are also some neat things to do along the way."

Planetary geologist John Mustard of Brown University was disappointed when the site he was rooting for, the Nili Fossae region, a series of deep fractures in the Martian crust, was rejected because it was deemed too dangerous to land.

He now supports going to Mawrth because he thinks it's the most diverse.

"It's not a one-trick pony. You've got more than enough compelling outcrops that one can test," he said.

After the community input, the team will meet in private to mull over the pros and cons of each site and eventually recommend one to NASA. The space agency has the last say, but it usually follows the advice of its researchers. A final decision is not expected until late June or July.

Smithsonian geologist John Grant, who is co-chairing the meeting, said he hopes there's more clarity about the strengths and weaknesses of the final four.

"There's a big investment in this rover. We want to make sure that it goes to the best possible site."

-fox news