Spin – the movie

Saw this on Shaul B’s blog “free thought”.

[Click here to watch, if the video doesn't show]
Made me think of the old paradoxes connected with free-will, pre-destination, time travel and the like. How far do the consequences go? What would happen if you were to fiddle with natural cause and effect?
More down [...]

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Cyborg beetles

An article I saw in Technology Review. A researcher named Michel Maharbiz at the University of California, Berkeley has fitted out giant flower beetles like the one on the right with electrodes and a receiver. He can then fly them from a remote control connected to his laptop.
Dr. Haharbiz is very proud of his creations that [...]

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Recycling in Jerusalem

I just came back from the new Jerusalem recycling center . Not many people there, just the guy who looks after it and he looked kind of bored. He was very helpful. Looks like he has loads of time on his hands.
The center is opposite the Herzog Hospital in Givat Shaul on the road that goes [...]

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Yom HaAtzmaut cleanup

Today is Yom HaZikaron (memorial day) which is held the day before independence day – Yom HaAtzmaut.
Much has been written about this almost impossible juxtaposition of grief next to rejoicing. The idea is that in order to rejoice we need to remember those who enabled our independence. A very beautiful idea and one that focuses [...]

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Why we do mitzvot bein adam le-haveiro

I am currently reading a book by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks – “To Heal a Fractured World, The Ethics of Responsibility“. I enjoy very much Rabbi Sacks’ writing as he is a big rationalist a thoughtful philosopher and a great writer.
I read a passage yesterday in chapter 8 which is about darkei shalom (ways of peace) which is Judaism’s [...]

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Great minds…

By coincidence Climate Progress had a post yesterday about environmental action by faith communuities in the US. I looked at one of the links – lo-Watt Shabbat. Not amazingly exciting. I’m looking for an halakhically acceptable solution for wasting less electricity keeping an urn of hot water and a hot-plate heated over Shabbat.

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Patriotic Religious Green

Why are religious people so often so totally ungreen? A post appeared recently on the “Beit Shemesh List” decrying the total lack of awareness in Ramat Beit Shemesh for civic cleanliness. The post was worded in a haredi rhetoric style but embedded in the post are a point that I have thought about for a while:
We [...]

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Australian Fires

Today I read that around 150 people have been killed in the bush fires in Australia. Some gruesome stories and some frightening pictures.
Australia is currently in the middle of a drought and now record temperatures in Victoria on the one hand and flooding in Queensland on the other. On the other side of the globe, [...]

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More on the drought

A video article from JPost.com.
As usual, after years of neglect and short-sighted mis-management there is a government enquiry going on about how come we don’t have any water.
Unfortunately this doesn’t mean that anything is actually being done about it. As I blogged a couple of days ago, we are going to start paying considerably more [...]

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Drought

Israel is officially in a drought. As if we needed anyone to tell us that. The level of the Kineret today is at -214.37m which is over 5.5m from its maximum and although the winter had an early and promising start it hasn’t rained seriously since. Our local weather station at Kibbutz Tzora is showing a pitiful [...]

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