'Ums' and 'ers' help children learn - via NewScientist.com - An interesting study...It seems to indicate that disfluencies in speech have an unexpected benefit.  They help children learn by calling attention to when something important is said.  Saying "like" every other word still makes you sound retarded, though.
 
Carry Conditions and Firearm Safety - via ITSTactical.com - ITS Tactical is one of my favourite sites that I visit almost every day.  It's actually a little strange, now that I think of it, that I haven't linked to more of their articles in the past.  Anyway...check it out.
 
And last but not least, today there are two posts over at CoolMaterial.com that are particularly, well, cool...
Red Oak Burger Grilling Planks - Because meat cooked outside with fire just tastes better.
and...
Automatic Maratac Pilot Watch - Because sometimes the new hotness comes in a plain package.  Unfortunately they're sold out already.

Chemistry Kit Chemophobia - via Chemical & Engineering News - Meet the Chemistry 60: 60 Fun Activities With No Chemicals.  That's right.  It's a chemistry set.  With no chemicals.  The article says it best - "chalk up another victory for mass hysteria".

Obama sees no magic bullet to push down gas prices - via Reuters.com - Well, let's see...It's easy to TALK about energy independence, but where will the money come from?  Oh, I know!  Stop spending HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS OF DOLLARS fighting multiple wars and invest a bit into infrastructure, education, and research into domestic energy sources.
 
Washington teen fakes pregnancy as school project - via Yahoo! News - Not only is this a great prank, it also must have taken a lot of courage for this girl to voluntarily subject herself to the social stigma that goes along with teen pregnancy, all for a social experiment.  I hope she got an "A" on her project.
 
Why You Should Care About the iPhone Location-Tracking Issue - via Wired Gadget Lab - While this issue is being somewhat blown out of proportion, I still feel it's necessary to call attention to it.  If you use a cell phone at all, you need to be aware that data about your location could be collected.  Whether or not you're interesting enough for anybody to give a shit where you go and when you're there is dabatable, but that doesn't change the fact that this data is immensely valuable.  It boils down to this:  Never assume you are invisible or anonymous.
Now, storing a database with your whole location history in an unencrypted file right on the mobile device AND the computer you connect it to is not only bad data management, it's also a horrible practice from a security standpoint as well.  At a minimum I expect Apple will cover their ass and add an option to opt out of the location tracking, or at least add an option to wipe the data every so often.

Drawspace.com - If you want to learn to draw or brush up on some skills, heres a great library of tutorials.  Several lessons for Beginner, Intermidiate, and Advanced skill levels.

 Here's two links on the same story.
Police Pepper Spray 8-Year-Old in Colorado Elementary School - via AOL News
and,
Colorado police pepper-spray misbehaving boy, 8 - via Yahoo! News
When I first heard about this story but before I learned any details, my first reaction was to think this was another case of law enforcement using excessive force.  After hearing the details, I think this was probably one of the safer courses of action the police could have taken.  There easily could have been much more severe injuries to either the boy or the police officers if they had chosen to physically disarm him instead of using pepper spray.  I still think it presents a potentially dangerous precedent and could serve to desensitize the public to this kind of actions in our schools, but in this case it was warranted.
 
Non-Lethal Weapons That Still Hurt Like Hell - via ModernMan.com - Since we're talking about pepper spray, let's take a look at some of the other less-lethal weapons that are available.

Teen suspended for outing porn star school secretary - via thestar.com - Other than refuse to take the site down, which the school should have no jurisdiction over anyway, I don't see what the kid did wrong here.

Violent Video Games: Our Responsibility, Not the Courts - via PCMag.com - The bottom line here is that parents have a responsibility to be aware of and control whatever media their children have access to.  This extends beyond video games to movies, music, and TV as well.
 
Teen suspended for riding horse to school - via Boston.com - Another school official overreacts to an innocent stunt.
 
How the AK-47 Rewrote the Rules of Modern Warfare - via Wired.com - As firearms go, the AK-47 is one of the most widely recognized in the world.  Here's an interesting article on it's history and engineering behind a design that's been in use for over 50 years.
 
Foo Fighters Reunite, Krist Novoselic Joins the Band - via PrefixMag.com - The surviving members of Nirvana are back together and making a new record with the help of Butch Vig, who produced the iconic album Nevermind.  While it would be nearly impossible to top the success and historical significance of Nevermind, this new record might be so good that it cures cancer.  True story.    -  p.s.  Nevermind is going to be 20 years old in 2011.  I feel fucking old.

Student, 20, named Mexico police chief - via News.com.au - I hope I'm wrong, but my crystal ball is telling me that this girl is going to wind up getting herself killed.  The idealism of youth is unfortunately not bulletproof.
 
Man facing 10 year prison sentence for downloading Simpsons porn - via Nerve.com - Child pornography is disgusting and those who produce and distribute it deserve every friend they make in the prison showers.  That said, since the Simpsons is a cartoon then no actual children were victimized or abused in the production of the images in question.  I don't understand how this guy could have been prosecuted on child pornography charges, let alone how his lawyer could have allowed him to enter a guilty plea.
 
Woman stabbed classmate in anger management session - via SeattlePI.com - You know you shouldn't laugh, but you also know you want to.  It might be time to fire the person teaching conflict resolution here.
 
Physicists Discover Universal "Wet-Dog Shake" Rule - via TechnologyReview.com - You can sleep a little easier tonight, one of the greatest scientific mysteries has been solved.  According to this article researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a mathematical model to solve for the ideal frequency of oscillation for a wet dog to shake itself dry.  Who funds this shit?

Creationism lives on in US public schools - via NewScientist.com - Creationism, or "Intelligent Design" as it has more recently been rebranded, has no business being taught in our school systems alongside evolution.  The treatment of creationism as a legitimate scientific theory is an offence to scientific principle.  There is empirical data to back up evolutionary theory.  The collection and interpretation of that data is how the theory was developed in the first place.  There is no such support of "Intelligent Design" anywhere.  What people choose to teach their own children at home is their business, even if it's hocus-pocus nonsense.  In a school system where other people's children are being taught the same things only facts and theories that can be backed up with actual science should be taught.
 
First All-Digital Science Textbook Will Be Free - via Wired.com - This is a fantastic idea that will unfortunately be extremely difficult to get off the ground.  Producing a book of this kind and keeping it up to date will undoubtedly prove to be extremely expensive, so "free" is unlikely to work.  Not to mention the resistance it will encounter from people responsible for choosing textbooks who have been getting kickbacks from publishing companies for years.  I hope this takes off, as it would remove a substantial financial burden from college and university students.  I spent less on the new laptop I bought a couple months ago than I spent on books in one semester when I was in college, and textbook prices don't go anywhere but up.
 
Pilot refuses full-body scan, pat-down - via CNN.com - All of the privacy issues aside, folks...he's a pilot.  If he wants to take over the plane he's already in the cockpit BEHIND A LOCKED FUCKING DOOR!
 
How to opt out of the TSA's naked body scanners at the airport - via NaturalNews.com - This one is not so much a "how to" as it is a description of what happens when you decide not to subject yourself to the backscatter or millimetre wave x-ray machines and go for the "enhanced pat-down" the pilot in the previous article refused.
 
U.A.E. defends no-marks discipline ruling - via CBC.ca - In the United Arab Emirates, they can build the shit out of some skyscrapers, but their human rights policies are fucking stone age.  Considering it's possible to break ribs and cause internal bleeding without ever leaving a visible external mark, the concept of being able to beat your wife or children as long as you don't leave a mark is absurd.
 
Allow Students to Carry Guns on College Campuses? - via AmericanFreePress.net - "Freedom to be safe and secure is a fundamental human right.  If someone threatens to harm or kill you or your loved ones, you have the right to defend yourself.  Carrying a firearm aides in facilitating this self defence." said the guy who lives in Canada, where law abiding citizens can only own handguns for target shooting and it is essentially impossible to get a concealed weapon permit.

Interview: Trent Reznor discusses The Social Network soundtrack - via DrownedInSound.com - Interviews with Trent Reznor are always interesting.  If you can get past the (very) many spelling and grammar mistakes in the transcript you won't be disappointed with this one.  Among other things, the interview touches on the creative process of scoring the movie, the philosophy behind free (and pirated) music, and my personal favourite, the concept and implementation of Facebook itself.  It's a bit out of context but here's a quote - "I don't think it's actually executed that well.  The layout's kind of foolish and the processing is terrible...he [Zuckerburg] was in the right place, at the right time, with a functional tool."  Hit the link for the whole transcribed interview.

Outrageous School Punishments - 10 Examples of Punishment Gone Too Far - via DegreeScout.com - I've commented here before about disciplinary actions taken by school officials.  Here's a list of 10 that are notable for how far overboard they went.  To reiterate what I've said before - Schools have no business interfering with what their students do outside of class time and off school property.  School officials have no right to physically repremand or punish a child.  Strip searches?  Nope.  Last but not least, this "Zero Tolerance" bullshit has to stop...see number 3 where a six-year old boy was suspended for making a gun shape with his thumb and index finger.

Race China to the Moon, Stop '1000 Pearl Harbors,' Says Controversial Candidate - via Wired.com - Yup, another interview but a completely different topic.  Here a political candidate argues the extremely alarmist idea that China could use Cuba to stage a second "Cuban Missile Crisis" resulting in the "1000 Pearl Harbors" from the title.  He also states that a new moon race is necessary to maintain technological superiority over China.  The bit about "1000 Pearl Harbors" goes too far, but I'm with him on the moon race part.  Diverting the money that would be necessary for such an undertaking into the branches of science involved would be hugely beneficial to everybody.  Think about it - A Second Space Age.  Why does it have to be a "race", though?  The benefits of sharing the research burden with China seems to be a better plan.  Draw your researchers from the best and brightest of a larger candidate pool and split the costs between the two countries.  Even better, let any country that wants to shoulder some of the cost participate.  Science doesn't care about borders.

Voodoo Software Removes Objects From Video In Real Time - via PopSci.com - Take a look at this video.  I'm still skeptical.  If it's real you can never believe anything you see on TV ever again. 

The changes to the video shown wouldn't be that impressive, except this apparently works in real time.  I need to see this for myself. 

Maybe they can use it on the "footage" from the new moon landings...

Just kidding.