blanketfort

[learn] - How to Teach a Child to Argue

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights animated.

The Art of Complex Problem Solving

[learn] - Duelity

Frans Lanting's lyrical nature photos | Video on TED.com (download or watch fullscreen)

How to fix a broken butterfly wing - Live Monarch Foundation - youtube (thanks joel!)

GOOD: Vampire Energy - youtube - unplug your microwave! (via)

The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard - cartoons and guilt!

Absolute Zero | A Sense of Scale | NOVA | PBS

An Interactive Database of Ideas - BusinessWeek

Growing up online | FRONTLINE | PBS

NASA Bubbles (via)

[learn] - Happy Pi Day!

repeat after these 57 people... 3.14159 26535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510

Pi is exactly 3! (and more, at Here's a slice of π | MetaFilter)

How to Celebrate Pi Day

BBC - 3.14 and the rest

TEDBlog: A non-trivial holiday

[learn] - E.O. Wilson: TED Prize wish: Help build the Encyclopedia of Life (22 minute video) (or download the 330mb version)

and the shorter interface demonstration at: EoL.org (4 minute video)

EoL will launch in mid 2008. It will incorporate information from the Catalogue of Life (1,008,965 species listed), amongst other sources.

(see also Wikispecies (100,000 species listed) one of the 9 official wikimedia sister projects, which might end up merging into one of these?)

e.g. the yeti crab:
at Encyclopedia of Life:– yeti crab
at Catalogue of Life:– yeti crab
at Wikipedia:– yeti crab
at Wikispecies:– yeti crab

[learn] - Explain it in 60 Seconds - the symmetry archive. minipiphanies?

A Lemon Battery with accompanying google videos, and all sorts of other home-education style videos for free from Hila Science Camp

BBC - Parkour craze reaches new heights with a 3-part flash guide to parkour moves to help you join in! Crazy Brits..

Psychology of bad probability estimation or "How to Do Precisely the Right Thing at All Possible Times". audio infotainment.

The Forer effect: "The Forer effect ... is the observation that individuals will give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that are supposedly tailored specifically for them, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people. The Forer effect can provide a partial explanation for the widespread acceptance of some pseudosciences, such as astrology, graphology and fortune telling."

Learn where you're headed (I always forget which one's which..)

The Highest Parachutist. Watch the 2 min video.

[learn] - NumberSpirals

bramcohen: The Quantum Duelist. best explanation i've read.

The Edge Annual Question - 2006: WHAT IS YOUR DANGEROUS IDEA? always inspiring and overwhelming. read a couple at a time.

Quantum computer works best switched off

Z Machine Sets Unexpected Earth Temperature Record (Z machine - Wikipedia)

Lemon Battery, including a google video demonstration.

The Highest Parachutist with embedded google video.

[audiobooks] - The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan (1968). one of the greatest books ever. this is the vinyl variant. (previously linked origin of title)

Greylodge also hosts audiobooks of
... Neuromancer by William Gibson (as read by gibson) and The Man in the High Castle By Philip K. Dick (bittorrent).

... the The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - The original radio series (Primary and Secondary Phases), The Tertiary Phase, and The Quandary and Quintessential Phases.

...Manufacturing Consent - Noam Chomsky and the Media (1993) (search for 'chomsky' at chomskytorrents for lots more audio and video)

...The Day the Universe Changed - James Burke (host of the tv show Connections)
also by James Burke, a fun, high-paced, 1 hr lecture on The Knowledge Web (gets rolling at about the 7 minute mark (streaming realaudio only))

... also lectures by Hunter S. Thompson - Boulder CO, 1977
and Douglas Adams - Parrots, The Universe and Everything

plus see How to enjoy audiobooks : Lifehacker

[learn] - The Power of Nightmares, downloadable/streaming 3part documentary from the BBC, for anyone who enjoyed The Corporation.
--UPDATE--
discussion and further links at On the politics of fear | MetaFilter.
alternate bittorrent downloads at Chomskytorrents: part1 part2 part3

I'll also re-mention: Frontline: watch online | PBS

Reith Lectures, a series of annual radio lectures given by leading figures of the day, and broadcast by the BBC. some historical and all recent lectures are available in streaming audio with full transcripts.
found via Ben Hammersley's: A moral imperative: "As Lord Reith put it: 'There are some people whom it is one's duty to offend.'"

Massey Lectures, the Canadian version. this year's was particularly good: Ronald Wright. A Short History of Progress. i very happily bought the 5-cd set. part one available online.

[education] - World History : HyperHistory

[watch. learn.] - What Barry says (direct link to 25mb .mov (produced by knife-party)) see also wikipedia entry for PNAC.

[reality] - hierarchies.org: Who Owns Who (yum).
and a wallpaper version of the adbusters sticker sheet.
and to put them all together: a fresh link to the big ten media conglomerates, the media ownership chart, and they rule.

[action] - How to Overthrow Corporate Rule in 5 Not-so-easy Steps

[learn] - Superb Timeline Posters. download or buy.

[learn] - American Museum of the Moving Image. flashanimations.

[learn] - the elements.swf singalong.

[learn] - the third place

[learn] - Emergent Democracy. The possible future needs potential tools. Adam adds a starting point

[learn] - Cello Teacher Training Manual.

[non-consume] - diamonds bad

[world] - modern anthro 101

[know thy history] - Deep Tried Frees

[suck squeeze] - bang whoosh

[insert] - MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences

[physics] - The most beautiful experiment

[teaching] - Right to Privacy? DiscoverySchool.com

[maintenance...] - Systems model of human behavior (Basics)

[nifty] - Parkinson's law[htg2] - Work expands to fill the time available. - "Civil servant A is overworked (this may just be illusionary or as a result of reaching his level of incompetence1). He has only a few options; he may leave, share his work with colleagues at the same level or appoint two juniors. It is important to note that he has to appoint two juniors. A single subordinate would very quickly assume almost equal status with A in their own minds as well as others and would therefore be a rival."

[refresh] - Educational Psychology Interactive: Maslow's hierarchy of needs

[inspiration] - Possible Moves

noodles, cycloids and squircles all the way down.

Top Ten Mistakes in Education. [I especially like the headings and the simple design of the pages in this site.]

The lovely theyrule2001 (play in this one for a while. lots to see: try adding companies) which is nicely integrated with open secrets

from the Journal of Mundane Behavior, a paper on Japanese social interaction in elevators, to add to my previous foray into things Japanese.