In praise of atheism, London’s domestic wind turbines, biometric scanners in Scottish school…

• 1 – getting my atheist on
  “The last couple of years I’ve been pleased to see an outbreak of out-and-out criticism of religion, not just for the bad things religious folks do in the name of religion, but for the silliness and harmfulness of religion itself.”
  (tags: rationality reason argument respect mutual public debate criticism atheism belief faith religion)
• 2 – sea.net
  “…what “a permanent presence in the ocean” might look like, if that “presence” consisted entirely of man-made submersibles.” Good stuff at BLDGBLOG.
  (tags: underwater science labs geobiological stations research submersible man-made presence permanent ocean)
• 3 – Horses may have been tamed in Kazakhstan
  “Evidence from soil inside the remains of a 5600-year-old horse yard indicates that the ancient Botai people of Kazakhstan were among the earliest to domesticate horses.” Borat apparently unavailable for comment.
  (tags: history archaeology domestication training horse people Botai ancient Kazakhstan)
• 4 – The Latest Fashion from London: Domestic Wind Turbines
  “Domestic wind turbines are gaining in popularity in Britain, where some 80,000 homes now use small renewable power generation units to provide energy for residents…” Excellent. Start the revolution in your own home.
  (tags: popularity resources power energy renewable turbine wind domestic London UK)
• 5 – Reconsidering Viking on Mars
  “…if the Viking scientists had known these results thirty years ago, they would have interpreted Viking’s work differently [...] we can’t discount organic molecules in the soil, which probably houses 1,000 times as many organic molecules as Viking d
  (tags: molecules organic discredited test results lander Viking life soil Martian Mars space)
• 6 – Scottish school is first to use palm-vein biometrics
  “The cafeteria [...] has gone cashless and students are buying lunches by holding their hands over a palm-vein recognition unit produced by Glasgow-based Yarg Biometrics. It’s the first school to use the system.”
  (tags: technology privacy surveillance security system payment scanning palm biometric cafeteria school Scotland UK)