Molecular secrets of the "iron-plated snail" [collision detection]

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 10:00 AM PST

[the] "scaly-foot gastropod has its own tricks. To fight back, it long ago evolved a particularly cool defense structure: It takes the grains of iron sulfide floating in the water around it and incorporates it into the outer layer of its shell. " I have to agree with the person who posted this: "Beyond awesome. This is Darwinian evolution mixed with, like, Burning Man."

North Korea: Hundred-to-won [MetaFilter]

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 08:04 AM PST

"Last December, the government of North Korea unexpectedly revalued its internal currency, the North Korean won, at a rate of 100-to-1 and capped the amounts that residents could exchange old currency at 300,000 won (approx. $90 U.S. on the black market). This effectively wiped out many peoples' savings and killed the nascent market economy that had begun to emerge after a series of economic reforms starting in July, 2002." North Korea sucks. Big time.

Everything You Need to Know About Image Compression [Noupe]

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 05:57 AM PST

States Ranked by 'Religiousness' (Graph)

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 04:47 AM PST

"While it can be argued that correlation does not imply causation, the trends revealed by these statistics, in relation to IQ, impoverishment, divorce, crime and political beliefs seem too consistent to refute."