Weird

Revelations, mysticism, cognition and mountains

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(via) At last! we can understand why revelations occurred on mountains:Why revelations have occurred on mountains? Linking mystical experiences and cognitive neuroscience by Arzy S, Idel M, Landis T, Blanke O. Med Hypotheses. 2005;65(5):841-845.

The fundamental revelations to the founders of the three monotheistic religions, among many other revelation experiences, had occurred on a mountain. These three revelation experiences share many phenomenological components like feeling and hearing a presence, seeing a figure, seeing lights, and feeling of fear. In addition, similar experiences have been reported by non-mystic contemporary mountaineers. The similarities between these revelations on mountains and their appearance in contemporary mountaineers suggest that exposure to altitude might affect functional and neural mechanisms, thus facilitating the experience of a revelation. Different functions relying on brain areas such as the temporo-parietal junction and the prefrontal cortex have been suggested to be altered in altitude. Moreover, acute and chronic hypoxia significantly affect the temporo-parietal junction and the prefrontal cortex and both areas have also been linked to altered own body perceptions and mystical experiences. Prolonged stay at high altitudes, especially in social deprivation, may also lead to prefrontal lobe dysfunctions such as low resistance to stress and loss of inhibition. Based on these phenomenological, functional, and neural findings we suggest that exposure to altitudes might contribute to the induction of revelation experiences and might further our understanding of the mountain metaphor in religion. Mystical and religious experiences are important not only to the mystic himself, but also to many followers, as it was indeed with respect to the leaders of the three monotheistic religions. Yet, concerning its subjective character, mystical experiences are almost never accessible to the scholars interested in examining them. The tools of cognitive neuroscience make it possible to approach religious and mystical experiences not only by the semantical analysis of texts, but also by approaching similar experiences in healthy subjects during prolonged stays at high altitude and/or in cognitive paradigms. Cognitive neurosciences, in turn, might profit from the research of mysticism in their endeavor to further our understanding of mechanisms of corporeal awareness and self consciousness.

Wow! we have a good connection/pattern here!

A huge inflatable ball

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Zorb seems to be a cool thing:

You can roll in it, run in it, ride in it, sit in it, slip in it, slide in it, lie in it, lounge in it, leap in it, live in it, swim in it, sin in it ... Jump in it, jam in it, move in it, groove in it, laugh in it, love in it. You can rotate, meditate, agitate, mutate, cogitate and invigorate in it. (...) How does it work? That's a person in the middle of this big ball. They've got about 700 mm of air between them and the ground - that's about 2 feet for you metrically challenged folks - and this air cushion keeps them safe as they hurtle down the side of a hill at speeds of up to 50 kilometres per hour. The Zorbonaut is strapped into a harness and rolls down the hill. This gives you maximum G force as you tumble head over heels.

Duct-tape activities

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People like me interested in doing weird things with duct tape might have a glance at what the Duck Tape Club does: Duck Tape Book Mark, Duck Tape Bracelet, Duck Tape Cell Phone Case, Duck Tape Flip Flops, Duck Tape Folder, Duck Tape Pencil Holder, Duck Tape Pop Can Holder, Duck Tape Rose Pen, Duck Tape Shoelaces... Besides, the hall of fame is pretty good too. My favorite is the duct-tape hammock:

Using a photocopier to generate fractals

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People interested in weird visuals/sounds should have a glance at what Noah T. Vawter does. First his interests are strikingly interesting:

I like strawberries, ocean waves, ballroom and Latin dancing, suspenseful movies, photocopied collages, projecting trippy programs on walls, creeping around in the dark, swimming, changing my clothes multiple times in the day, pulling the covers over my head, barbecuing cheeseburgers and shish kebabs, picnics, tromping through the woods, telling ridiculous tall tales and pizza pizza pizza.

. Second, his work is very intriguing, judging from his portfolio. My favorite is certainly the one using a photocopier to generate fractals:

Maywadenki's project: Compare oneself to a fish

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I am crazy of MaywaDenki's projects. Maywadenki is an art unit produced by Nobumichi Tosa. It was named after the company that his father used to run bygone days. One of his very intriguing creation is NAKI:

Maywa Denki’s products started with NAKI Series in 1990 when Nobumichi Tosa came across the personal question, “Who am I?” He adopted the following methods to try to solve this: Compare oneself to a fish, and the world to a small sea where a fish lives, then, ask oneself “Who am I?” to find the answer from the point of a fish. With the theme of “one item=one message,”create a product to express the answer. Give each one of 26 products an alphabetical model number. Examine the results as a whole and feel the total image of one’s self. This process is just like fishing. The fish (=the idea) swimming in the sea (=chaos in one’s brain) is landed onto the real world with the fishing technique (=reason) and fishing tackle(=mechanical engineering skill). Nobumichi tried to understand the undersea world (=himself) by analyzing 26 fishes caught from the sea.

For instance here are 3 products:

  • A fish-shaped button with LED eyes that glow.
  • Do-it-yourself fish-scale tattoos. Hit slap and bruise your skin on the arm with a scale stamp. Non-permanent.
  • An extension cord shaped like a fish skeleton, with a male plug at its head and a female plug at its tale. Licensed to the registration of a design.

Cognition and public toilet design

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It was certainly one of the most intriguing paper topic at HCII 2005 few weeks ago: Cognitive Aspects of Public Toilet Design by Jo-Anne Bichard, Julienne Hanson and Clara Greed.

This paper reports ongoing EPSRC1- sponsored research to understand how ‘away from home’ (public) toilets feature in disabled people’s participation in urban public life. After tracing the origins of accessible toilets, it will examine the technological responses currently in use in many public toilets and evaluate these designs with respect to people with cognitive disabilities. The paper concludes by pinpointing challenges that need to be resolved by designers, before the goal of ‘an inclusive public toilet of the future’ can be realized.

Here is the classical "BS8300" model: Even though the topic appears to be weird, it raised relevant question related to cognition, usage of space and affordances:

The inclusive design of an ‘away from home’ toilet superficially presents itself as a mere technological affair, where successful design can be reduced to a matter of ‘getting the specification right’. In reality, wherever the designer attempts to intervene in the design process, the inclusive design of public toilets unveils undamental social processes that not only regulate relationships between different user groups but also cross the boundary between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour. As ccessible toilets become more commonplace there remains a danger that the needs of the more visible disabilities will be accommodated but that the requirements of people with a hidden disability such as impaired cognition will be overlooked, thus denying them equality of opportunity in accessing public life.

I am sure some folks will be interesting by the "Inclusive Design of Away From Home (Public) Toilets in City Centres" part. Perhaps the toilet audit tool would be relevant for them to do ratings.

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Star Wars "Pants" Lines

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Funny stuff for summer: Star Wars "Pants" Lines:

I recently received an e-mail containing several Star Wars quotes that sounded funny when a key word was replaced with "pants". I do not know who first came up with the idea or who originated the forward. When I got the e-mail, I spent a good hour thinking up additional quotes:

  • I find your lack of pants disturbing. --Darth Vader, SW
  • General Veers, prepare your pants for a ground assault. --Darth Vader, ESB
  • Lock the door. And hope they don't have pants. --Han and Luke, SW
  • You are unwise to lower your pants. --Darth Vader, RJ
  • * I recognized your foul pants when I was brought on board. --Leia, SW

A kit to turn your doberman into a poodle

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(via) Careful: Ultra-weird stuff! There is now a kit to turn your angry do into a poodle: Ultra Poodle Disguise Kit for Dobermans™. It's done by attackchi. Here is how it works. First you have to unwrap your kit, let your dog sniff everything.

Besides, the faq is hilarious (Is this an anti-government website? How did Attackchi come up with the disguise kits?). Plus, the further developments are compelling:

A new range called Slimline Disguise Kits™ will be released. These kits will include a fabric body suit that will be connected together with concealed zippers. Suitable for smaller/stockier sized dogs. (...) We also plan to do some online surveys, your help will be needed to gather some data. We may also need clowns that have squeaky shoes (preferably strong and lace up). The survey will be online in the next few days and the results in by late July 2005.

An horrible "Mind Molester" gizmo

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A crazy device: "Mind Molester" (via)

The "Mind Molester" is an instrument of creative electronic harassment. It is an electronic chirping device that can drive your victims nuts trying to figure out what it is and where it's at. You can drive someone crazy in their own house or disrupt an entire office. Your victim(s) will become obsessed, awaiting the next chirp to try to determine its location, completely disrupting their normal activities. Just connect this device to a 9-volt battery and plant it in an appropriate location. The "Mind Molester" produces a one-second electronic chirp about once every 4 minutes. Due to the chirp's duration, frequency, and sound characteristics, it's a very, very difficult, time-consuming, frustrating and maddening task to locate the unit. And even if they find it, they'll have no idea what it is. The number of effective locations to plant the "Mind Molester" is limited only by your imagination. Of course, this device is for use on deserving subjects only. Size: 1" x 1.75". Chirp frequency: 2000Hz.

Definitely weird... and horrible. Their tagline is atrocious. Who would use this?????

Urinal innovation

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A weird innovation: for people like me who always wondered why there is a fly in European urinals, here is the answer, thanks to Seth Goldin:

pparently, the folks who run one of the big airports in Europe became famous because of a clever idea they installed in the airport men's room (click on picture for details... this is a family friendly blog).

Apparently, the tiny silk screened image dramatically increases the quality of aim and thus the cleanliness of the bathroom.

Great innovation to increase the urinal shooting abilities, did some people ran ethnographical studies to come up with this?!!!

Inflatable sculptures

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I just ran across very intriguing inflatable sculptures, found here. This is connected to a project called 'Storker'.

The STORKER PROJECT is a species propagation movement by STORKER seeking to incite select individuals from the public at large, perhaps you. If while passsing by one you feel strange sensations in your nipples or fingertips, adopt the infant, breast feed, and give it plenty of pTLC. It will gradually mature to a full size Tape Man or Woman to co-habitate with you and eventually take you to the Glazed Paradise (or possibly oust you from your home).

Why do I blog this? I am a great fan of inflatable stuff, especially in urban environments. Connected pasta: I already tackle this issue, check this huge inflatable plastic bag and this office in a buckle