Tag: Metrology
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Metrology day 2022, AI version
Today is Metrology Day, but I’m trying to go for Entertainment and Enjoyment this year, so here’s a gathering of AI-generated nonsense from CookingFlavr.com. Is A Meter Long? A meter is a unit of length that is used to measure the distance between two points. The meter is also used as a unit of weight.…
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Amazing graph
Cited by Batya, this is an AMAZING graph. It’s the percent of NYTimes headlines occupied by each president from Wilson through Biden. Most of the chart is rational and expectable. Presidents who made more news (wars, depressions, scandals) got more headlines. Unexpectedly there’s not much D vs R difference**. Aside from the regularity, the chart…
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Keinpeilempfänger
Fifth in a vaguely defined series on obscure secret electronics, after SCR-268 and Tenzor and Peilempfänger and Kleinstpeilempfänger. = = = = = American Radio Library has uploaded new issues of the British Post Office Engineering Journal. Why did the GPO have an engineering research facility? Because the GPO managed ALL communication in Britain. It…
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Bellyaches and quakes
One of the stories in Frank Edwards’s non-UFO books illustrates how real science gets suppressed or forgotten, then turns out to be correct in the light of later discoveries. He tells about Bob Barr of Oakland, who reliably predicted earthquakes by his belly. Bob could distinguish a specific kind of activity in his gut that…
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Winged metrologists
I bought several of Frank Edwards’s books on UFOs and other subjects. Near the end of his short life he was following the model of Hix and MacHarrie and Nesbitt, producing a set of books and short radio features on historical and scientific oddities, well beyond UFOs. All of these ‘Fortean’ writers were presenting known…
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Peilempfänger
Part 3 of a vaguely defined theme on obscure spy equipment. Part 1 was the first American radar. Part 2 was the Russian Tenzor portable spy rig. Today I’m featuring a Kraut portable direction finder or Peilempfänger. (Peilen = take a compass bearing; Empfänger = receiver.) It’s not as interesting as the other two, so…
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Always a thrill
Coral and Jim Lorenzen developed a network of independent UFO observers across USA and South America. Their organization knew what was happening, and thus knew when the media was choosing not to report what was happening. Immediately after Sputnik a large number of media reports came to the surface, and the media went supernova after…
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Constants and variables 171
On 3/11/2022 Obersturmbannführer Inslee started another brief reprieve from ballgags. Finishing the current two-year contract, 3/11 to 3/11. It doesn’t matter a whole lot to me, because the buses are still strangling me, and the stores weren’t enforcing the rule. The change does allow a better measurement of public insanity. Previously, Obersturmbannführer Inslee gave us…
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New GenRad toy, 1/2
I started collecting GenRad equipment as a sort of tribute to proper analog measurement, and as a specific apology to GenRad itself for favoring Bruel & Kjaer during my time in academia. GenRad equipment was solid, rugged, easy to handle. BK was Danish, with the typical Kraut qualities. More precise than anything else under precise…
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New GenRad toy 2/2
Last year I bought an incomplete GenRad octave analyzer, as part of my overall move back to analog stuff. This machine is especially rare and useful, so it’s worth fixing. The microphone is missing, and I’ve been watching Ebay since then, hoping to grab up the mic or another ‘parts car’. So far no mic,…
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The muddlers are worse than the cancellers 2
Following from here. This morning the anti-cancellers are weeweed up about: Apparently it wasn’t a real cancel, just a postponement of class coverage, so again this is more muddling than cancelling. Fact: FREEDOM OF SPEECH IS A MYTH. Censorship is permanent and normal. If you go back 1000 years in Russia and in England/America, you’ll…
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Randomly related
Random crap, vaguely related to previous random story about the bitcoin rapping power couple… Some smart observers have concluded that the bitcoin racket is the male equivalent of MLMs. Most MLMs are explicitly aimed at women, selling cosmetics, weight reduction, and cooking supplies. Bitcoin is selling pure numbers. Competition is based on X > Y…
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Constants and Variables 169
More from the trust-inducing 2/2/51 news report, which was ordinary mainstream CBS output at the time. This story deserves respectful verbatim transcription. Note the literary level as well as the content…… = = = = = With all the troubles that beset us, and perhaps more to come, this is an inevitable corollary. The AP…
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How to create trust
It’s easy to say that trust requires truth. But truth is an asymptote, not a binary on/off measure. In any area of life we try to get closer to a useful set of facts and observations, but we never hit the plateau. Here’s a better and more achievable rule: In science and in journalism, trust…
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Neat graph
The Tonga eruption sent out a shockwave in the air as well as an underwater wave. A meteorologist in Iowa created an animated graph showing the wave passing over the entire US from west to east, based on sudden changes in barometer readings.
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