LAURA LAINE
Rated • 11 reviews • graphic design, arts, illustration • lauralaine.net
by Laura Laine
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chrysallis
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Kitsune Noir
by Laura Laine
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Wired 15.01: Untangling the Mystery of the Inca
Rated • 5 reviews • anthropology, linguistics, incas • wired.com
If centuries of scholarship are to be believed, the Inca, whose rule began 2,000 years after Homer, never figured out how to write. It's an enigma known as the Inca paradox, and for nearly 500 years it has stood as one of the great historical puzzles of the Americas. But now a Harvard anthropologist named Gary Urton may be close to untangling the mystery.
His quest revolves around strange, once-colorful bundles of knotted strings called khipu (pronounced KEY-poo). The Spanish invaders noticed the khipu soon after arriving but never understood their significance - or how they worked.
Once, at the beginning of the 17th century, a group of Spaniards traveling in the central Peruvian highlands east of modern-day Lima encountered an old Indian carrying khipu that he insisted held a record of "all [the Spanish] had done, both the good and the bad." Angered, the Spanish burned the man's khipu, as they did countless others over the years.
Some of the knots did survive, though, and for centuries people wondered if the old man had been speaking the truth. Then, in 1923 . . . read more at the page
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Dinobuzz: Dinosaur-Bird Relationships
Rated • 2 reviews • paleontology, birds, science • berkeley.edu
Are Birds Really Dinosaurs?
Cool site.
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Marevna
Rated • 1 review • painting, marevna • anyateixeira.co.uk
Marie Bronislava Vorobieff-Stebelska
Marevna (the nickname reputedly having been given her by Maxim Gorky after a Russian fairy sea princess) was a cubist painter who is internationally noted for convincingly combining elements of cubism (called by her "Dimensionalism") with pointillism and - through the use of the Golden Ratio for laying out paintings - structure. She tends to be accredited with having been the first female cubist painter. Though having lived the greater part of her life abroad - her formative years as a cubist painter in France and her mature years in England -, she is often referred to as a "Russian painter". Her name is included in the "artcult" list entitled "Judaica". From her relationship with the Mexican cubist painter and later muralist Diego Rivera in Paris she had a daughter, Marika Rivera (born 1919), who herself went on to become a professional dancer and film actress. [ftp]
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Penguin Dispatch 4: How to Study a Penguin Egg | Science...
Rated • 1 review • biology, nature, birds, penguins • smithsonianmag.com
Watch them hatch!
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http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jlUCqDb...
Rated • 1 review • crime, australia, wildfires • google.com
The survivors burn also, in grief and mourning.
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Duped and Clueless: How Easily We Fool Ourselves |...
Rated • 1 review • cognitive science, psychology • livescience.com
Do you always get what you ask for? A new study finds that when you don't, you might not even notice the difference.
Swedish researchers showed a pair of female faces to 120 volunteers for 2 seconds and then asked them to choose which one they thought was more attractive. The researchers then asked the volunteers to explain their choice.
The trial was repeated 15 times for each volunteer, using different pairs of faces, but in three of the trials the faces were secretly switched after a decision had been made.
Surprisingly, not only were a large number of the volunteers oblivious to the switch when ultimately allowed to take a longer look at their choice, they were actually able to gave detailed explanations for why they preferred the face that, indeed, they had actually rejected.
It would be asking for an apple and then explaining exactly why you wanted the banana you got instead. [ftp]
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Birds &Climate Change
Rated • 2 reviews • activism, environment, news, birds • audubon.org
- Nearly 60% of the 305 species found in North America in winter are on the move, shifting their ranges northward by an average of 35 miles. Audubon scientists analyzed 40 years of citizen-science Christmas Bird Count data -- and their findings provide new and powerful evidence that global warming is having a serious impact on natural systems. Northward movement was detected among species of every type, including more than 70 percent of highly adaptable forest and feeder birds. [ftp]
