The finest available mind candy

If ever any of you suffer the illusion for a moment that you are smart, I advise you to spend 18 minutes in the company of Clifford Stoll. It is one of a series of wonderful lectures on the TEDTalks website. TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) started off as an invitation-only closed conference for the exceedingly bright - the first, in 1984, included demos of the first Sony CD, the Macintosh, and lectures from Benoit Mandelbrot and Marvin Minsky - but has recently has expanded its programme to include a freely available public lecture series, consisting of these astounding little 18-minute nuggets. What a treat. I've just spent the last two hours watching Stephen Hawking explain his views on the nature of the universe, Amy Tan talk about her creative procress, Brian Green unravel string theory, Yochal Benkler riff on the economic impact of social computing... only 200 or so to go. Highly recommended.

My new job, by the way, has me working on an interactive film about evolution, so I have a feeling that this blog might start to document my online scientific and philosophical meanderings more than ever. In this spirit, my brother put me onto this rather neat little satire on YouTube, after I bought him The God Delusion for Christmas. And no, the irony of that last phrase is not lost on me.