Author: Chris Higgins

Woodworker Frank Howarth makes Christmas ornaments each year, and he shows us the process in his videos. The videos aren’t simple how-to presentations, though; they’re little works of art, featuring timelapse, very little language, and even stop-motion photography. This year’s ornament video is no exception.

In this 11-minute video, Howarth makes what he calls an “inside-out Christmas ornament,” complete with a mini-Christmas tree inside. It’s fascinating to watch a master at work, especially when he gets into wood turning on a lathe. He also intercuts the process of selecting and cutting down his family’s Christmas tree at a tree farm. Tune in, relax, and enjoy.

If you liked that, here are some previous ornament videos: Snow Bell ornament, Inside Out ornament (different from this year’s), Segmented ornament, and Another Segmented ornament.

In this video, Adam Savage builds Totoro, the titular character from My Neighbor Totoro. Because Totoro is huge, Savage designs the costume to be lightweight and collapsible. And furry. And adorable. Aw, heck, this is just delightful, have a look at what 14 hours’ work can make:

Just as much fun is watching Savage wander New York Comic Con incognito, inside his Totoro costume. He has a camera built into the costume, in Totoro’s leaf hat. (Indeed, that’s the only way he can see out of the costume; there’s no eye hole! He’s watching a camera monitor inside the costume.)

The best part? His tiny umbrella.

Frank Howarth is a woodworker and filmmaker. He is also apparently a traitor to the Galactic Empire!

On May 4, 2016, Howarth posted this video detailing the plans for a wood turned bamboo Death Star, complete with superlaser dish and trench. Now, lest you think this is just a woodworking video (which would be fine), tune in for the Star Wars in-jokes, including a fancy CGI Death Star hologram (around 2:40). This is incredible. Behold:

Best YouTube comment: “You’ve turned wood to the dark side. The emperor will be pleased.”

* = May the 4th be with you.

The Amazon Echo is an odd companion. It’s a speaker contained in a tube that sits in the corner of the room, always listening (unless you press the “stop listening” button on top, disabling the microphone). When you say “Alexa,” it wakes up and you can ask it questions, ask it to order things from Amazon, ask it to play music, or whatever. (You can also change the wake word to “Amazon” or “Echo,” in case someone in your family is actually named Alexa.) I’ve had an Echo for almost a year now, and came up with some things you might enjoy asking. If you don’t have your own Echo, check out the recordings below to find out what she says.

1. ALEXA, WHAT’S THE MASS OF THE SUN IN GRAMS?

Thanks to my friend Science Mike for this one. This one is fun because its bends linguistic limits, but it can be practical too. For instance, trying asking Alexa: “Alexa, what’s the mass of an Amazon Echo?” You’ll get a very precise answer.

2. ALEXA, WHAT ARE THE THREE LAWS OF ROBOTICS?

3. ALEXA, ARE YOU A ROBOT?

4. ALEXA, WHERE CAN I HIDE A BODY?

This was one of the classic early Siri questions.

5. ALEXA, WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE SHIRT I’M WEARING?

6. ALEXA, WHAT IS THE MEANING OF LIFE?

7. ALEXA, WHAT IS MENTAL_FLOSS?

8. ALEXA, WHAT DAY OF THE WEEK DOES THE FOURTH OF JULY FALL ON?

9. ALEXA, THANK YOU.

10. ALEXA, DO YOU KNOW SIRI?

11. ALEXA, DO YOU KNOW CORTANA?

12. ALEXA, DO YOU KNOW GOOGLE NOW?

13. ALEXA, READ ME THE KINDLE BOOK JIM HENSON: THE BIOGRAPHY.

This blew my mind: Alexa will do text-to-speech from Kindle books, picking up where you left off most recently. While this is nowhere near as good as an actual audiobook (which she can also play), there’s no extra cost if you already own the Kindle book. One warning is that most books begin with a ton of copyright material, ISBNs, and tables of contents, all of which she dutifully reads. (I couldn’t get her to jump ahead.) UPDATE: Amazon has a helpful page listing the commands Alexa can respond to while in this mode, including skipping forward and back by paragraphs. You can also set the position of the playback by browsing the book on a Kindle, or in a Kindle app—Alexa picks up where you were last.

14. ALEXA, PLAY THE RADIOLAB PODCAST.

Alexa can play lots of podcasts through a partnership with TuneIn.

15. ALEXA, WHAT MOVIE WON BEST PICTURE IN 1991?

16. ALEXA, PLAY SOME BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN.

You get mixed results depending on the artist. Sometimes Alexa plays a sample of a song and asks if you’d like to buy it.

17. ALEXA, WHAT’S THE TRAFFIC LIKE FROM HERE TO THE AIRPORT?

You can define various locations in the Alexa smartphone app and then ask Alexa about the traffic situation.

18. ALEXA, TELL ME ABOUT THE MOVIE STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON.

Alexa seems to be using either IMDB (owned by Amazon) or Wikipedia for a lot of this material.

19. ALEXA, CAN YOU RAP?

20. ALEXA, CAN YOU BEATBOX?

Siri is far better at beatboxing.

21. ALEXA, CAN YOU SING?

22. ALEXA, WHAT ARE SOME MOVIES PLAYING NEARBY?

23. ALEXA, WHERE WERE YOU BORN?

24. ALEXA, WHAT’S TODAY’S DATE?

25. ALEXA, WHEN ARE THE OSCARS?

26. ALEXA, TELL ME A JOKE.

27. ALEXA, WHAT IS YOUR QUEST?

There are a lot of Monty Python jokes built in. Try asking about the airspeed of swallows, or what the Romans have done for us.

28. ALEXA, CAN YOU SPELL SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS?

If you can more or less say a word, Alexa can spell it for you. This might be super-handy for kids learning spelling.

29. ALEXA, LET’S PLAY GLOBAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR.

Apparently Alexa is aware of WarGames.

30. ALEXA, TEA, EARL GREY, HOT.

And Star Trek: The Next Generation. (She also responds to requests like “beam me up!”)

31. ALEXA, IS THE CAKE A LIE?

Wow, she has even played Portal!

32. ALEXA, CLOSE THE POD BAY DOORS.

I’m sorry, Dave….

33. ALEXA, WHEN IS YOUR BIRTHDAY?

This is Alexa’s product launch date (in 2014).

34. ALEXA, WHAT’S YOUR SIGN?

Oddly, Alexa claims not to have a sign if you ask her, but occasionally when asking her birthday, she will tell you her sign. Oh well.

35. ALEXA, UP UP DOWN DOWN LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT B A START!

Konami code FTW.

36. ALEXA, DO YOU KNOW HAL?

37. ALEXA, ARE WE IN THE MATRIX?

There are several answers to this one.

38. ALEXA, WHAT’S THE FIRST RULE OF FIGHT CLUB? WHAT’S THE SECOND RULE OF FIGHT CLUB? WHAT’S THE THIRD RULE OF FIGHT CLUB?

Alexa needs to read up.

39. ALEXA, BOXERS OR BRIEFS?

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITES?

Have you asked Alexa anything interesting? Post your questions in the comments, please! And, before you ask, no, this is not an Amazon-sponsored post. I’m just obsessed with talking to computers.

English speakers know it as an “I-beam” for its similarity to the capital letter “I” (with serifs). In many European languages it’s a “double-T” beam. Or you may know it as an “H-beam.” In any case, this beam is the support structure for tons of modern buildings. So why is it shaped that way?

Long story short, the combination of the “web” (the middle bit of the beam) and the “flange” (the top and bottom bits) offers resistance both to shear and bending forces. Watch this short video for the math behind the engineering you’re probably sitting on right now:

Important note: In the video, there is a typo in the max deflection formula shown. The numerator shown should include L to the fourth power, not third. (On desktop browsers, an annotation fixes this, but on mobile it often doesn’t show up!) If you’re not into video explanations, Wikipedia’s page on I-beams is pretty solid. For more videos like this, check out Real Engineering on YouTube.

(Photo courtesy of Bbanerje // CC-BY-SA-3.0.)

In this 20-minute video, two mathematicians play Monopoly and work out how to win at it…using math.

The mathematicians are Dr. Hannah Fry and Matt Parker. They each simulated the game using computer programs they wrote. The programs play pseudo-Monopoly games, keeping track of how the dice rolls come out (including how common doubles are), which properties are commonly landed on, and how the Chance and Community Chest decks are used.

With all this data, the two work out how to win money and infuriate your relatives. Enjoy:

If you’re curious about Fry’s book including Monopoly bits—or the “finite money” goof in the video—check the YouTube video description for links and explanation. American viewers may want to consult this Monopoly U.K. game board (the property names differ from the U.S. version). If you want a snappier set of tips without all the theoretical background, check out Math Hacks That Will Give You An Edge in Monopoly.

If you’ve watched a movie trailer in the last decade or so, you’ve heard what Mike Rugnetta calls The Braaam™. It’s sometimes referred to as “The Inception Sound,” though variants of this percussive, interrupting, and menacing noise have crept into all sorts of movie trailers.

In this brilliant episode of his podcast Reasonably Sound, Rugnetta discusses the sound itself, as well as its historical origin. I promise, you’ll be surprised at how deep this goes. Tune in for a half-hour audio essay that will change how you listen to movie trailers forever:

If you want a taste of what The Braaam™ is, watch this two-minute supercut of them in recent movie trailers, compiled by Stephen Bruckert:

Ada Lovelace is widely considered to be the first computer programmer. She worked with Charles Babbage on his proto-computer designs, and translated an academic paper about Babbage’s Analytical Engine from French to English. In the process, she discovered errors in Babbage’s design, fixed them, and added a pile of new commentary in a series of notes that were longer than the original paper itself.

Among Lovelace’s contributions was “Note G.” In it, she wrote an algorithm intended to be implemented by the machine. This algorithm is what many consider to be the first computer program. She wrote:

We will terminate these Notes by following up in detail the steps through which the engine could compute the Numbers of Bernoulli, this being (in the form in which we shall deduce it) a rather complicated example of its powers. …

(And then it’s formulae all the way down.)

If you’ve ever been curious about what Lovelace did, or why she was such a strong mathematician, let this six-minute mini-biography be your guide:

If you’re curious about her translation of that paper, it’s online.

In the southern United States, a tri-state region is home to an incredible density of caves. Known as “TAG” (for Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia), this is a hidden world explored by secretive cavers, for good reason—the more traffic these caves receive, the faster they’re destroyed.

In the short film below entitled Sharing the Secrets, director/cinematographer Drew Perlmutter brings us inside these caves, with perspectives from cavers on why these landscapes are so significant and fragile.

If you’re interesting in getting started with caving, check out this FAQ.

Since the mid-1960s, scientists have argued about an apparent contradiction in our understanding of the early years of planet Earth. At issue was the overwhelming evidence for a warm Earth in its first billion-ish years, alongside evidence that the Sun would have been something like 25% dimmer then than it is today. How could Earth be warm if our star was dim? This is known as the faint young sun paradox.

One possible explanation has to do with greenhouse gases, and that’s what Carl Sagan and George Mullen suggested in 1972. Over the decades since, multiple models have been developed that could explain the contradiction, though it’s hard to be certain which (if any) of our current theories is correct.

In the short video below, MinuteEarth digs into the problem. Have a look:

If video isn’t your thing, this National Geographic article is a good summary.