Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×

Submission + - First Hard Evidence for the Process of Cat Domestication (sciencemag.org)

sciencehabit writes: Cats have been part of human society for nearly 10,000 years, but they weren’t always string-chasers and lap-sitters. Ancient felines hunted crop-destroying rats and mice for early farmers, and in return we provided food and protection. At least that’s what scientists have long speculated. Now, they can back it up. Cat bones unearthed in a 5000-year-old Chinese farming village indicate that the animals consumed rodents and that some may have been cared for by humans. The findings provide the earliest hard evidence of this mutually beneficial relationship between man and cat.

Comment Re:Do they turn up in the downloads? (Score 3, Informative) 163

Facebook has an option to download all your data. Do these texts turn up in these downloads as well?

You know they don't. Who you search for, your browsing habits and clicks, none of that turns up either.

I do not know what purpose this 'download all your data' option serves, but it is certainly not there to give you the option to actually download all data facebook has on you: it is something ridiculous like your name, your birthday and a couple of other useless stuff. It does not even include the messages you have sent and received.

Comment Re:Upper limit on planets? Lower limit on stars (Score 1) 129

Wikipedia says that at 13 times the size of juptiter you get something that can ignite and you get a brown dwarf.. How that is calculated is beyond me..

From hydrostatics: the more mass you build up, the higher the pressure --and the temperature-- becomes in the core, and then you reach a point where the temperature is high enough to start fusing stuff up (as per definition of 'a star'). This, for hydrogen, happens at some mass limit or other which is at around a few Jupiter masses.

It is a back-of-the-envelope calculation really, though there are a few other, more sophisticated models, around.

Submission + - Row over US mobile phone 'cockroach backpack' app (bbc.co.uk)

arisvega writes: A US company that has developed an "electronic backpack" that fits onto a cockroach allowing its movements to be controlled by a mobile phone app has defended itself against cruelty claims.

For the "electronic backpack" to work the cockroaches have to be placed in icy water to subdue them before sandpaper is used to remove the waxy coating on the shell of the insect's head.

An electrode connector and electrodes are then glued on to the insect's body and a needle is used to poke a hole in their thorax in order to insert a wire. Their antennae are then cut and electrodes are inserted. A circuit is attached to their backs, and signals are received through a mobile phone app allowing users to control the cockroaches' movements to the left and to the right.

The Roboroach weighs 4.5g and is compatible with most mobile phones. It overrides the insect's antennae making it turn left and right at the flick of a switch.

Comment Re:Wtf? (Score 2, Interesting) 453

Who does this? 27 year old here. If one of my employees did this during a meeting with me I would say something like, "Excuse me, was my meeting interrupting your important phone conversation? Perhaps we can reschedule the meeting around your social life. Would 8PM suit you?" (sarcastically)

Did you consider that the call can actually be more important than "your meeting"? Personally, I assume that if during "my" meeting someone texts or answers a call, then there is a reason for that. And I believe that because I respect the people I am having the meeting with, as they -I assume in good faith- respect me, and they would not divert their attention elsewhere, if it was not for a reason.

If you are not confident in your leadership skills, it is natural to put a grumpy sour face when someone is audacious enough to fiddle with their phone during "your" meeting.

Bottomline, don't be a fucking Nazi.

Slashdot Top Deals

The most difficult thing in the world is to know how to do a thing and to watch someone else doing it wrong, without commenting. -- T.H. White

Working...