The latest video by Kurzgesagt is about the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs, and is brilliant as usual. This frame made me pause and ponder on a side-track:

Doesn't the Burj Khalifa tower look surprisingly large compared to mount everest? It isn't even a fair picture, because the mountain does not rise 8.8km out of the ocean, but "only" about 3.5km above the surrounding valleys.

Thus, climbing Burj Khalifa (which is a thing people do) just five times is the same height as climbing Everest from base camp. Disregarding the lack of oxygen at high altitudes and that the tower is much steeper.

Human-made structures start to approach the size of mountains, pointing up, not only down.

Holy shit! I just realized that the Kurgan in Highlander is played by the same actor as the asshole sergeant in Starship Troopers! Clancy Brown.

The Critical Drinker does a good job in his videos of explaining why the latter film is great satire and why Highlander does not need a remake.

I spent most of the day planting trees in the forest and I'll do the same tomorrow. This video (in Swedish) shows how it's done.

Three more YouTube-videos I enjoyed recently:

• xkcd's "Map Projections", animated
• Duct tape space suit
• Robin Hanson discusses his model of grabby aliens with folks from FHI, including Nick Bostrom.

Wanna watch me chopping wood for ten minutes? Here you go!

My tool shed and workshop is rather narrow, so when I borrowed my neighbour's table saw the other day, the first thing I did was to build a cart on wheels/castors for it, to be able to rasily move it out of the way. At the same time I made my workbench mobile the same way and ensured that the height of the two matched, so that the bench can serve as an outfeed-table for long pieces from the saw.

This Video served as the main inspiration for the cart, but I simplified it even more and skipped the drawers for a plain storage shelf underneath the saw. I can recommend Steve Ramsey's Youtube channel throughout; I have watched quite a few of his videos and found them both instructive and entertaining.

I love this kind of trick. It's non-obvious, at least to me, and such a nice illustration of the cleverness that craftsmen and DIY-folks have.

The only time I tried tiling myself was last summer, around our old kitchen stove. It came out quite ok, but not perfect.

This presentation is quite mind-blowing. The full title is What Bodies Think About: Bioelectric Computation Outside the Nervous System and it shows almost incredible results of what happens when you influence the communication between cells, notably not neurons. Limb regeneration, double-headed worms, memory remaining after the brain was cut off!

In case you don't already know these, here are a few of the Youtube channels that I can wholeheartedly recommend, not just for their recent videos but also they backlog. List in no particular order.

Two Minute Papers, enthusiastic computer science paper summaries.

Kurzgesagt, fantastically animated science topics.

Stuckman's film reviews.

Welch's Intro to Machine Learning covers both the math and the hands on implementation.

Nerdwriter, more about film.

CGP Grey, fast-paced knowledge about things you never thought you wanted to know.

Terminator Genisys Trailer – Paradox Edition
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oe2Agl3bJAc

Die Tagesschau hat eine schöne Kurzdoku (4 min) über Olof Palme und warum man hierzulande gerade wieder mehr von ihm hört.