Science Museum Blog

"Some 5 year olds could use a gourmet meal. Giving them a mass-produced TV dinner is no different than sedating them with opiates* and pouring garbage on them instead of being a parent." * the more things change the more they stay the same: https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/the-addictive-history-of-medicine-op…

Also: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Belville * https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/ruth-belville-the-greenwich-time-lad… Via a weblog from the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation: * https://rntfnd.org/2025/03/09/the-greenwich-time-lady-sold-time-from-1…

Can we stop pretending like being fashionably ill is a new problem plaguing our youth? This is a phenomenon that has happened before in history - Tuberculosis was seen as crazy fashionable during the romantic period, and could be part of the reason that things like pale skin, thin bodies, and fragility are STILL seen as fashionable to this day[1]. Maybe we're seeing something similar happen here? [1] https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/tuberculosis-a-fashionable-disease/

This whole sticking a tube down someone's throat without proper qualifications or equipment seems pretty dicey. Would an old fashion wooden iron lung work better? It's pretty primitive technology that doesn't seem too difficult to build. https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/a-wooden-iron-lung/

There's also a Gyrotrain http://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/louis-brennans-gyro-car/ and this much more detailed wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyro_monorail

>he was batshit insane and probably a failure by the standards of modern productivity gurus Newton was notoriously involved with the Royal Mint (for decades, I think) and efforts to maintain sound coinage, and it's conspicuously left out of your list of odd things he did. It isn't exactly about "productivity", but your overall tone seems like you're presenting him as unsullied by capitalism, finance, "bean counters", and other mundane things. https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/isaac-newton-and-the-royal-mint/ Actually, reading some of this sounds like Newton may have had some good insights into management for productivity: "he encouraged the Mint’s engravers who were responsible for engraving coin designs on to the master punches (the tools used to make the coins) to take on private work outside of their contracted working hours. Newton recognised that this would enable them to improve their skills, making their engraved designs of a much higher quality and thus more difficult to replicate by the counterfeiters." I think you could spin him as an icon of productivity, an early forerunner, if you so desired.

An upvote to those who upvoted this, every bit shows that more people are becoming acquainted with Heaviside's works. BTW, a factoid just occurred to me that some may not know, which is that the earth's ionosphere—those ionized layers ≈100-200km above ground that reflect radio waves—is called the Heaviside layer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennelly%E2%80%93Heaviside_layer. ...And now some trivia straight from the almost-completely-useless information dept: somewhat strangely, the Heaviside Layer features in the musical Cats. It's at the point where Macavity the Mystery Cat tries to escape to the Heaviside Layer: https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/cats-and-the-heaviside-layer/ https://www.themarysue.com/cats-heaviside-layer-real/ "Up, up, up past the Russell Hotel Up, up, up, up to the Heaviside layer Up, up, up past the Russell Hotel Up, up, up, up to the Heaviside layer" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKH63cRJ3p4 Methinks, Heaviside would not have approved (but then, that's rather presumptuous of me).

>EVs have been in existance for almost a decade and now EVs have been in existence for nearly as long as ICE vehicles have. The 1867 World Exposition had an electric cycle and you had electric taxis in London in 1897 [1] and by 1912 there were 33,842 electric cars registered in the United States [2]. In the 50's you had Deutsche Post of the GDR using electric delivery vans (I believe an electric vehicle was being used in either London or Paris much earlier than that for postal use but I'm having a hard time finding a link, I swear I've read about it before though). Even Anderson Electric Car Company produced something like 13,0000 'Detroit Electric' cars int he early 1900s. Even the Apollo-era LRVs (lunar roving vehicle) were EVs (for obvious reasons). EVs are old-school, the only new-school thing about them is lithium battery chemistry. I genuinely don't think EVs are going to catch on any time soon. - They're far more expensive than ICE vehicles as there aren't a whole lot of used EVs but there are tons of used ICE vehicles at vary price levels. - John Q Public can't do much to repair an EV and has to take it to a mechanic, yet even something like an engine rebuild can be done in someone's garage if they are so motivated. I've never taken a single minute of mechanic training yet I've helped 4 different friends pull engines with borrowed hoists and do major work to them and without YouTube, only printed manuals for vehicles, I've done plenty of other work to my own…