Calling these 100 photographs photographs that changed the world is overselling them. But they are really good photos.

Just watch this amazing demo.

This guys loves to chase storms.

The empire that was Russia.

I would love to be able to stay awake 36 hours without the jitters. Apparently with new drugs we will be able to do that.

United States represents 4.6 percent of the world’s population, but houses nearly 23 percent of humanity’s prison population.

Then they could have built these amazing buildings.

I’m thinking serious about buying a new computer. Tom’s Hardware has an article about overclocking a dual core $130 processor to 4.1 ghz (from 2.66 ghz). It’s tempting.

From Dubner and Levitt in the NY Times:

[Anders] Ericsson and his colleagues have thus taken to studying expert performers in a wide range of pursuits, including soccer, golf, surgery, piano playing, Scrabble, writing, chess, software design, stock picking and darts. They gather all the data they can, not just performance statistics and biographical details but also the results of their own laboratory experiments with high achievers.

Their work, compiled in the “Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance,” a 900-page academic book that will be published next month, makes a rather startling assertion: the trait we commonly call talent is highly overrated. Or, put another way, expert performers

From Slate:

Elizabeth Dole sounded desperate last week. Trying to inspire dispirited Republicans, the head of the party’s Senatorial Campaign Committee wrote a fund-raising letter urging the GOP faithful to rally, because if Democrats seize power they will “call for endless investigations, congressional censure and maybe even impeachment of President Bush.” It’s a sad truth of politics that if you can’t inspire your voters with a positive vision, you scare them.

But then along came House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to say that, yes, Sen. Dole is exactly right. In a Washington Post interview, Pelosi outlined her plans if the Democrats take control of the House. She started promisingly, vowing quick action to raise the minimum wage, roll back parts of the Republican prescription drug law, implement homeland security measures, and reinstate lapsed budget deficit controls. It was Contract With America lite