Just thought I'd share this:

Best Meteor Shower of 2007 Peaks Dec. 13
"What could be the best meteor display of the year will reach its peak on the night of Dec.13-14.

Here is what astronomers David Levy and Stephen Edberg have written of the annual Geminid Meteor Shower: "If you have not seen a mighty Geminid fireball arcing gracefully across an expanse of sky, then you have not seen a meteor."

...

There is a fair chance of perhaps catching sight of some "Earth-grazing" meteors. Earth grazers are long, bright shooting stars that streak overhead from a point near to even just below the horizon. Such meteors are so distinctive because they follow long paths nearly parallel to our atmosphere.

The Geminids begin to appear noticeably more numerous in the hours after 10 p.m. local time, because the shower's radiant is already fairly high in the eastern sky by then. The best views, however, come around 2 a.m., when their radiant point will be passing very nearly overhead."

The full article is at http://www.space.com/spacewatch/071207-ns-geminids.html

As I've said before I find meteoroids very exciting! I surely will be out watching for this meteor shower. Will you?

This is just a quick short blurb to share an interesting article at the Economist. Titled "The new wars of religion", I think the article maybe an interesting read to some of you especially given the recent religiously motivated bombing in the Maldives and the sudden bold and dramatic highlighting of religion in the Maldivian public life in the past few years. The article is part of a series of articles presented as a Special Report on Religion and Public Life which observes and comments on the events in various parts of the world with a focus of religion and politics. The rest of the special report does focus on several other important issues and angles and is well worth the read.

I am a worried spectator to the growing religious discord on my home soil and elsewhere because I tend to share Carl Sagan's concern that humans may, in their intense religious fervor, wipe out each other (or even the entire animal kingdom) due to mere differences of opinion on each others differing and unprovable claims regarding the supernatural. I think we humans have enough trouble as it is that we don't have to complicate matters further with self-righteous attitudes and treating the other as infidel scum (ripe for killing).

Have a read of the articles and feel free to share your thoughts here.

Whether you are a network engineer, a technician or just use computers for the occasional game and porn, the Internet Engineering Task Force's RFC 1925 is a must read. The Network Working Group supposedly produced this indispensable memo to document a few things about networking that almost every networking and computer training course happily skips on.

- Check out IETF RFC 1925

Howdy!

The work load has kept up its intensity and I've still got a million things left to do before university takes a break for Easter later this month. Added to that, I've had to face the dire consequences of a malfunctioning left eye for the past week or so. The eye has forced me to shove in time for regular trips to the doctor and have had to accommodate a crazy schedule for administering medication. Grr...

Anyway, I'm tuning in to share this particular article I stumbled on the New York Times today. Titled "Darwin's God", the article is a light read on the scientific research that is exploring the birth of the concept of God and how the persisting belief in God and religions may fit within the evolutionary processes that lead to the modern human cognitive machinery. The questions that both the adaptationists and the byproduct theorists are asking are, in my opinion, pretty valid and are questions to which we undoubtedly should seek answers to!

- Darwin’s God (on nytimes.com)

Enjoy.

Short entry. Just HAD to pass this on!!

- How to Isolate Amniotic Stem Cells from the Placenta, AT HOME

Placenta, anyone?