Archive for the ‘Science & technology’ Category
Are you hooked to your digital devices? Do you fancy a ‘digital detox’?
August 4th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Fifteen million UK internet users have undertaken a ‘digital detox’ in a bid to strike a healthier balance between technology and life beyond the screen, according to major new Ofcom research. The study of 2,025 adults and 500 teenagers reveals how our reliance on the internet is affecting people’s personal and working lives, leading many to […]
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A review of “Seven Brief Lessons On Physics”
July 30th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
When I studied physics at school half a century ago, the universe was explained by the steady state theory but now the Big Bang theory is very much the consensus, while I was taught that there was nothing smaller than electrons, protons and neutrons but now we have discovered quarks, gluons, neutrinos and more. It’s […]
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Word of the day: indexical
July 29th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
I’ve been reading a short, but fascinating, book titled “Seven Brief Lessons On Physics”. In the process, I came across a word which was new to me: indexical. I have learned that, in linguistics and in philosophy of language, an indexical behaviour or utterance points to (or indicates) some state of affairs. For example, ‘I’ […]
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Depressed by the Brexit decision? Look at the bigger picture: we are entering a new Renaissance
July 27th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Many of my friends and colleagues are – like me – still shocked and saddened by the decision in the recent referendum that Britain should leave the European Union. But there has never been a better time in human history to be alive, as I have tried to explain in my most recent column on […]
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So just how fast is the world’s fastest computer?
June 22nd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
The answer is a mind-numbing 93,000 trillion calculations per second. The computer that can do this is the Sunway TaihuLight which is installed at the National Supercomputing Centre in Wuxi in China. You can learn more here.
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Does big data have to mean Big Brother?
March 17th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Over the past 13 years, I’ve written a regular column on Internet issues and I have just contributed my 90th piece. It’s on big data and the power of the algorithm – you can read it here. If you fancy dipping into any of the previous columns (you can see how far and fast things […]
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Remembering the sky-high achievements of Eric ‘Winkle’ Brown
February 23rd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
One of my many interests is aviation which is why on my web site I have a section on aviation and a section on aviation films. So I was saddened to hear of the recent death, aged 97, of the legendary – but not so widely known – Eric Brown, a British test pilot known […]
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Why is it called the Zika virus?
February 14th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
The Zika virus, discovered by Scottish virologist Alexander Haddow in 1947, is named after the forest where it was found. The forest is located on the equator, close to Lake Victoria in Uganda. “It is a global epicentre of pathogens and viruses,” says Louis Mukwaya, head of the entomology department at the Ugandan Virus Research Institute […]
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I don’t want to spoil your day – but have you ever heard of Dark Winter?
January 31st, 2016 by Roger Darlington
I’m currently reading a cracking – and very long – novel called “I Am Pilgrim”, the debut work by Terry Hayes. It’s a thriller centred on a bio-terror attack on America. The text mentions a bio-terrorist simulation exercise called Dark Winter which turns out to be true. Operation Dark Winter was the code name for […]
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Is it necessary, indeed is it even possible, to give your body a detox?
January 30th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Around this time of year, several of my friends tell me that they are on a detox and seem astonished why I explain that I actually I don’t believe detox is necessary or even possible. Don’t take it from me. Listen to Edzard Ernst, emeritus professor of complementary medicine at Exeter University: “If toxins did […]
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