Explanation: Are square A and B the same color? They are. Are too.

To verify this, click here to see them connected.

The above illusion, called the same color illusion, illustrates that purely human observations in science may be ambiguous or inaccurate.

Even such a seemingly direct perception as relative color.

Similar illusions exist on the sky, such as the size of the Moon near the horizon, or the apparent shapes of astronomical objects.

The advent of automated, reproducible, measuring devices such as CCDs have made science in general and astronomy in particular less prone to, but not free of, human-biased illusions.

Important in any version of science. Pretty slick, eh? (original image and text via previously mentioned APOD)

Criminal law already knows that "eye witness" accounts are...well...fallible, at best. Who else needs to learn this?

I have been a college football fan for...well...at least since high school, so 15 good years.

Today, flipping through the box scores to see what the final results were from yesterday, I saw:

ND 35
NEV 0

And I thought:
"Huh...didn't know North Dakota played football."

Google has enabled sports calenders that you can subscribe to. Now, along with Google Sync enabled for iphone (which I happen to be having a couple issues with, but I'm sure will get ironed out), I have exactly when and where the Gators (or any other NCAA team, as NCAA is the only football worth watching) play on my Google calendar and my phone calendar, synced and updated as times change.

Bonus: the default color for the Gator calendar was orange. Intentional? I'm willing to bet that it was.

Oh, and as a less exciting usage, google sync can be used to keep family members up to date on happenings, meetings, plans, etc. Just share your calendar with them, and make them able to either view or view+edit, and they can see what you've got going on in a glance or add a new event.

edit: There's an issue with google calendars' implementation of the sports calendar, or something like that. An alternative is to subscribe to yahoo's calendar for the team you want, using a web address. Here's the vital one you're going to want:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaaf/teams/ffa/ical.ics

google calendar->settings->import calendar->add by url, then put the calendar you want in there. Slightly more complicated, but the yahoo calendar includes a whole time of the game, rather than a 1 hour slot for the beginning of the game. I'm sure google will get their sports calendars correct soon enough, but there you go in the meantime.

Valerie Elizabeth is challenging women all over with her "Little Black Dress" challenge. She has been wearing for the entire month of August the same dress every day and is showing us all -girls and guys- how with a little creativity we can still look well without going overboard in spending on new clothes. This is an awesome initiative. You can check out her diary on:
www.societystylist.com
www.elligrace.com

You probably don't know how to use commas. Your best bet is to stop doing so. You can probably stand to underuse them.

That will be all. ;)

Oh...this book is cool. Check it out....

It looks we actually have a chance this year! And by the way....its interesting to see that the pageant is also caring not just about physical appearance....

That picture is misleading. I meant the fantasy football that 10 million people play, the fantasy football that costs US employers around $8 billion per year in lost productivity:

Consultancy Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc cited a recent report that suggests the average fantasy football player spends 5.2 hours online each week participating in such games, which are offered by ESPN, CBS Sports and Yahoo Inc, among others.

Challenger pointed to another report that found 60 percent of fantasy sports fans spent more than an hour each day just thinking about their fantasy team.

"There are some people who probably wait until the workday is over to strategize, make trades and manage their teams, but many are probably doing at least some of their team tasks from the office," Chief Executive John Challenger said.

When I was an engineer, the only that curbed my fantasy football strategery during work hours was my realization that God was my boss. Without that, what's stopping you?

Last year, my team featured AD (All Day, from his Sooner days, is better than "AP"), Turner, Anquan, Andre Johnson, Hines Ward, Kevin Smith, and Greg Olson (whom I later packaged with an injured Tony Romo to get Tony Gonzalez and the surprisingly serviceable Tyler Thigpen). Suffice it to say, I won my league.

I'm glad Vick and Favre are back even though they may hurt the Bears chances. But when should they be drafted in a 12-team league? Anyone wanna talk sleepers?

Kids being kids, with the freedoms of the suburbs:

This music is from a song called "Requiem for a Tower" which was redone for a LOTR: Two Towers trailer. It can make anything seem epic. I wash baby bottles to it.

At the risk of sounding old-fashioned, or too conservative, or too much of a prude....it seems to me there is something quite disturbing about a movie that celebrates lying in such a "fun" way......Not that this is the only movie in which lying is celebrated, its just that this is quite up front about not so much the benefits of lying, but rather the downside of truth.....

On the other hand...it makes for a great discussion with people.....

How do we defend in light of this, that the only grounds for true freedom is truth......?

This is stuck in my head. Note that Auto-Tune is not dead, it actually is used well. (Do I need to give a language warning?)

When the Sony Walkman was launched, 30 years ago this week, it started a revolution in portable music. But how does it compare with its digital successors? The Magazine invited 13-year-old Scott Campbell to swap his iPod for a Walkman for a week. Read the rest here.
Great article! A few takeaway phrases:

You can almost imagine the excitement about the Walkman coming out 30 years ago, as it was the newest piece of technology at the time.

Having said all that, portable music is better than no music.

Alright, quiz time.
1) Name the most interesting thing in this image (from an American perspective).
2) Name the thing that SHOULD be there, but isn't.

Answers after the break...see if you can guess beforehand. Points will be awarded.