brney - Slashdot User

Pope Urges Priests To Go Forth and Blog 284

Posted by kdawson on Sunday January 24, 2010 @04:52PM from the heavy-content-filtering-at-the-seminary dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "Pope Benedict XV, whose own presence on the Web has grown in recent years, is urging priests to use all multimedia tools at their disposal to preach the Gospel and to engage in dialogue with people of other religions and cultures. 'The spread of multimedia communications and its rich "menu of options" might make us think it sufficient simply to be present on the Web,' but priests are 'challenged to proclaim the Gospel by employing the latest generation of audiovisual resources,' says the Pope. The message from the Pope, prepared for the World Day of Communications, suggests such possibilities as images, videos, animated features, blogs, and Web sites and adds that young priests should become familiar with new media while still in seminary, though the Pope stresses that the use of new technologies must reflect theological and spiritual principles. Many priests and top prelates already interact with the faithful online, and one of Benedict's advisers has his own Facebook profile. So does the archbishop of Los Angeles. The Pope adds, 'I renew the invitation to make astute use of the unique possibilities offered by modern communications. May the Lord make all of you enthusiastic heralds of the Gospel in the new "agorà" which the current media are opening up.'"

Scientists To Breed the Auroch From Extinction 277

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday January 21, 2010 @12:18AM from the back-by-popular-demand dept.

ImNotARealPerson writes "Scientists in Italy are hoping to breed back from extinction the mighty auroch, a bovine species which has been extinct since 1627. The auroch weighed 2,200 pounds (1000kg) and its shoulders stood at 6'6". The beasts once roamed most of Asia and northern Africa. The animal was depicted in cave paintings and Julius Caesar described it as being a little less in size than an elephant. A member of the Consortium for Experimental Biotechnology suggests that 99% of the auroch's DNA can be recreated from genetic material found in surviving bone material. Wikipedia mentions that researchers in Poland are working on the same problem."

Comment Not sure 'impassioned' is the right word... (Score 1) 2

by brney on Saturday January 09, 2010 @06:25PM (#30710114) Attached to: Programmers Need To Learn Statistics

For such an impassioned statistician, the author sure makes a lot of sweeping generalizations about the knowledge of programmers without providing much empirical evidence.

Submission + - SPAM: Golden ratio discovered in a quantum world

Submitted by

FiReaNGeL

on Friday January 08, 2010 @01:06AM

FiReaNGeL writes: "Scientist have for the first time observed a nanoscale symmetry hidden in solid state matter. By artificially introducing more quantum uncertainty the researchers observed that the chain of atoms of cobalt niobate acts like a nanoscale guitar string. The first two notes show a perfect relationship with each other. Their frequencies (pitch) are in the ratio of 1.618, which is the golden ratio famous from art and architecture. The observed resonant states in cobalt niobate are a dramatic laboratory illustration of the way in which mathematical theories developed for particle physics may find application in nanoscale science and ultimately in future technology."
Link to Original Source

Comment Did no one read Peopleware? (Score 1) 620

by brney on Tuesday January 05, 2010 @11:56AM (#30655650) Attached to: IT Workers To Get Fewer Perks, No Free Coffee

Because we've been down this road before. Cutting employee benefits and perks earns you lower productivity, poor morale, a high turnover rate (which will cost a business more than free coffee ever will), the loss of talented workers, and at worst the retention of desperate incompetents who can't find a job anywhere else.

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