Various

• An interesting article on hardware purpose-built for n-body simulations.
  
  
• A while back there was much discussion on who was the biggest geek based on some silly quiz which asked, among others, whether one preferred RPN. Well, here's the modern day incarnation...how much joy would you experience if you could only use LaTeX in your comments? What's that? LaTeX is for sissies, you only use TeX? Oh what's that, markup in general is for sissies you communicate in binary? I present the geek's pissing contest.
  
  
• If nothing else, perhaps George Bush's time in office might demonstrate how much the actual person in office can matter opposed to just voting for a party.
  
  
• So we're going to the moon, eh? Lots of discussion flying back and forth..."don't take money away from science to fund it"..."why not just go to Mars?"...Well, now I hear that Steven Squyres (he of Roving Mars fame [a good book, by the way]) says:
  

  
  The best way to explore Mars is with humans.
  

  
  I don't know what assumptions go into a statement like that, but I sure would have thought that, of all people, he would believe that machines provide the most bang for the buck. Maybe he means "explore" in a very particular way...as in having a person there!
  
  On a related note, there's a slightly amusing spoof of Mars on Phil's site.
  
  
• Some interesting comments on the tenure process by the tag-team of Chad & Rob. I don't have much to add (or subtract).