- From Ensor’s Curiosity Shop, Nightmares of Gruesome Beauty (nytimes.com)

James Ensor, The Entry of Christ Into Brussels (1889)

The Jacksons Variety Show, Episode 1, Part 1

Model Variables:
1. life expectancy: 78 (US average 78.11)
2. birthrate: 2.0 / fertile female (maximum children per female)
3. fertility: if (sex == female AND fertility_minimum_age < age < fertility_maximum_age )
4. fertility_minimum_age = 25, fertility_maximum_age=30
5. begintime = 2009, endtime= begintime+n years (e.g. 500)

Initial Population by Sex and Age

Size of Population over Time

Median Age of Population over Time

Sex Ratio of Population over Time

Larve is an application that simulates population reproduction and the evolution of inheritable characteristics under environmental conditions. Larve is an abbreviation that means Live Artificial Reproduction and Virtual Evolution.

The originating question or problem definition: how can non-reproductive homosexual behavior be persisted succesfully in a population where reproduction takes place via hetero-sexual fertilization, assuming there exist genes that inherit or influence homosexuality.

The thesis: homosexuality is genetically inherited in a population because it promotes certain homosexual/single sex bonds or single sex group cohesion (army, priesthood, sports, educational, professional, power groups, etc.) that are advantageous for the reproduction and prosperity of that population.

Concept of proof: Create a model or virtual simulation of a real population, allow the viariation of the genetic, behavioral and environmental values between competing populations, and measure the competetive advantage of different values over a certain period of time.

By default Eclipse 3.2 which is packaged with Ubuntu 9.04 and can be installed using the Synaptic Package Manager runs with the GNU Compiler for Java, GCJ JVM and not the JVM provided by SUN. Additionally, Eclipse for Ubuntu is missing jUnit 4 due to legal restrictions on its use of Java 5, and it is disabled, causing import problems that prevents updating software or installing new features.

1. change java sdk
To check which java sdk is available:
sudo update-java-alternatives -l
Set the java-6-sun as the default java sdk:
sudo update-java-alternatives -s java-6-sun

2. download the x86 32bits version for linux of Eclipse Galileo, extract the archive and copy it to /usr/local/bin/eclipse-3.5
http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/

3. set JAVA_HOME in .bashrc
#configuration for java
JAVA_HOME=”/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.6.0-sun”
export JAVA_HOME
PATH=.:$JAVA_HOME/bin:$JAVA_HOME/jre/bin:$PATH
export PATH

4. create a startup script, copy it to /usr/bin and make sure the username:group permission are 755 for the correct user
#!/bin/bash
PATH=/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun-1.6.0.13/bin:$PATH
/usr/local/bin/eclipse-3.5/eclipse

5. add the /usr/bin/eclipse script to the desktop menu via the >System>Preferences>Main Menu option which will create a desktop configuration file ~/.local/share/applications/alacarte-made.desktop

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Icon[en_US]=/usr/local/bin/eclipse-3.5/icon.xpm
Exec=/usr/bin/eclipse
Name[en_US]=Eclipse Galileo 3.5
Name=Eclipse Galileo 3.5
Icon=gnome-panel-launcher

or create a desktop configuration file /usr/share/applications/eclipse.desktop

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=Eclipse 3.5 Galileo
Icon=/usr/local/bin/eclipse-3.5/eclipse.xpm
Exec=/usr/bin/eclipse
Categories=Application

Alacarte is a menu editor for GNOME desktop, it implements the XDG menu specification.

- Telescopes: Cosmic Vision (nationalgeographic.com)

Americano Radio
- A Prairie Home Companion
Garrison Keillor’s voice is as American as apple pie. Since 1974 he’s been telling stories from the (fictional) Minnesota town of Lake Wobegon every Saturday on his radio show A Prairie Home Companion.
- Car Talk
Tom and Ray’s lousy radio show about do-it-yourself car repair.
- Joe Frank

To customize the number of rows and columns of opera’s speed dial option:

1. in the address bar type opera:about to locate the .opera configuration directory;
2. close opera to prevent it from editing the config files we need to adjust;
3. open the speeddial.ini and add the size configuration somewhere in the file:
[size]
rows:3
columns:6
4. start opera.

- Treasury’s Got Bill Gross on Speed Dial (nytimes.com)
Bill Gross, bond fund manager at Pimco which is owned by German insurer Allianz, is one of the private investors whom the Obama administration enlists to help bail out the nation’s ailing banks in order to revive the economy. That effort is known as the Public-Private Investment Program, or P.P.I.P..
- The emperor’s new clothes: If It’s Too Big to Fail, Is It Too Big to Exist? (nytimes.com)
- Trying to Gauge the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) Rebound (nytimes.com)
- Frank J. Low, Who Helped Drive Field of Infrared Astronomy, Dies at 75 (nytimes.com)
- Atlanta Is Making Way for New Public Housing (nytimes.com)
American socialism: “… the market can function to create housing and the role of government should be to move people into the market.”
- From the Ashes of ’69, a River Reborn (nytimes.com)
The Cuyahoga River in Cleveland was known as “The Mistake by the Lake” after the river caught fire in 1969. The fire was extinguished in 30 minutes and caused just $50,000 in damage. But it became a galvanizing symbol for the environmental movement, one of a handful of disasters that led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and to the passage of the Clean Water Act.
- Beekeepers Keep the Lid On (nytimes.com)
- NYC Beekeepers Association
- Just Food

- Hard Times for New England’s 3-Deckers (nytimes.com)
- In Recession, Strategy Shifts for Big Chains (nytimes.com)
- Destroying Levees in a State Usually Clamoring for Them (nytimes.com)

- Murder: New York City
- International Nuclear Safety Center, Nuclear Power Reactors: WORLD MAP (insc.anl.gov)