Mel Feynman & Paul Jobs
There are many things common to both Richard Feynman and Steve Jobs. Here's an interesting one, relating to their fathers.From "What do YOU care what other people think", Feynman accounts the following...
View ArticleFear
I couldn't help but notice how this text from 50 years ago applies to the current situation in Greece.However complex and solid it seems, civilization is actually quite fragile. It can be...
View ArticlemyTED: Favorite TED talks so that you don't waste your time
What do scientists do in their free time?I found out about TED in 2007, a few months after they started releasing the talks online for free (this was my first). Thankfully, only a few dozen talks were...
View ArticleThe Looper
So a movie is forcing me to write a new blog post after almost three months.(spoiler free)Very few movies get to blend together action, science fiction and great storytelling as smoothly and...
View ArticleΗλεκτρονική Ψήφος
Κρίμα. Σήμερα έλαβα στο email μου ένα από τα πιο τρανταχτά παραδείγματα της Ελλάδας αυτής που δεν θέλει να αλλάξει με τίποτα. Ο αντιπρύτανης του Πανεπιστημίου Κρήτης έστειλε το παρακάτω κατεβατό...
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Austin, Texas
Last week I had the opportunity to visit one of the weirdest city in the US, Austin in Texas. It's a 1.5M city in the heart of Texas, yet extremely different than the culture that surrounds it. Unlike...
View ArticleTesting Operating Systems
I have been a Windows user for quite some time now (since 1995, to be exact). The only other major OS I used was iOS when I got an iPhone in 2008. But lately, I am using on daily basis a Samsung Galaxy...
View ArticleIt was the church, stupid
I always wondered why modern astronomy didn't flourish in the sunny, warm climates of the Mediterranean during the renaissance and beyond.The birth of modern astronomy was dominated by Northern...
View ArticleTed at the Oscars
fxguide.com on how a digital Ted presented the sound Oscars last night:With five nominees in each category, 10 different outcomes were rendered (Tippett relied on Dell Precision workstations) in a four...
View ArticleApology to theists
I am an atheist.I used to think that believing in God or not was a choice. I admired people that didn't, and didn't care about people that did.Not anymore. I have come to think that believing in God...
View ArticleScience is not a democracy
In my last post I argued that believing in an anthropomorphic God is not a choice, where the two options are of equal value. This is because there is no reliable evidence yet on the presence of an...
View ArticleGame of Thrones and the United States of America
I started watching Game of Thrones recently. While it is a medieval fantasy world, I cannot avoid thinking that many practices depicted in the series have strong elements of truth from the actual...
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An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump
The are two reasons why I love the above painting by Joseph Wright of Derby from 1768.First, the painting depicts a scientific experiment. These air pump devices were common in the 18th century....
View ArticleSwitching to OSX
An interesting thing happened the other day.I forgot my MacBook Air 13" inside the aircraft on my flight back from Greece. I was using only Windows 7 in that machine.The laptop was thankfully retrieved...
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A Live Birth
Three weeks ago we had our twin girls born.I was inside the delivery room for the whole process of natural delivery, which lasted about 20 hours. The final 3 hours that included all the pushing and the...
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Kids, revisited
There is a not-so-visited spot along the river Thames that has majestic views of the Houses of Parliament. You get there by crossing the Westminster bridge right in front of Big Ben, and then, instead...
View ArticleOrganizing and preserving 10 years of digital photography
In the next month, it will be 10 year since I got my first digital camera, an Olympus C750UZ. Since then I went through a Canon S2 in 2007 and a dSLR Canon 500D/T1i in 2009. In 2008 I also introduced...
View ArticleΗ Ελληνική κουλτούρα της Τιμής
Στο πιο σημαντικό βιβλίο που ίσως έχω διαβάσει, το Guns Germs and Steel, ο Jared Diamond αναφέρει πως η εξέλιξη μιας χώρας είναι άρρηκτα συνδεδεμένη με το γεωγραφικό της περιβάλλον, ώστε η τωρινή της...
View ArticleWe all change
We all change.When you think about it, we are all different people, all through our lives.And that's OK, that's good, so long as you remember all the people you used to be.These are the final words of...
View ArticleBBC's Sherlock
BBC's Sherlock, a modern re-imagining of Sherlock Holmes, is probably the best British series out right now. It just completed its third season, and there are only 3 movie-long episodes per season.The...
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A Brief History of Painting
In this post I try to decipher the seemingly inexplicable art of painting, by identifying the original ideas used by the artists. For the purposes of this discussion, by “painting” in this text I refer...
View ArticleThe Case for Scientific Skepticism
The reason scientific skepticism developed is that the world is complicated. It’s subtle.Everybody’s first idea isn’t necessary right. Also, people are capable of self-deception. Scientists make...
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Travelling on a Backpack
Last month I went on a 10-day trip to Asia (Dubai, Singapore, Hong Kong). I wanted to test whether it was possible to have only a carry-on backpack with me instead of a suitcase, in order to minimize...
View ArticleTotality
If there is one thing I would like to say about experiencing a totality, it is this: a total solar eclipse is one of the very few things in life that no matter how overhyped they are, they provide an...
View ArticleTesla Model 3
A couple of weeks ago I had the chance to drive a Model 3. It was my first close-up experience with an all-electric car, and I would like to share my impressions. While I have been following Tesla from...
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