andrewducker

Is the washing machine one of the most important inventions ever?

As a new mom I can state without even watching the video that the answer to this is OH MY GOD YES.

Actually, even before I was a mom that was true. Washing stuff by hand *sucks*.

I'm seriously amused by the 28 Dates Later blog. I shall be following this one!

Dommy_nick

Could watch this for a lot longer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwf9LoS9Xt8

That was really neat.

... but how do they do that one? Where are the pillars going?

Wow -- here's how:
http://www.kajima.co.jp/english/tech/kcd/index.html

Cut a column, insert a jack, repeat. Lower all jacks slowly until whole building is down.

Here's more detail on Andrew's original link:
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/01/08/news/razing-skyscrapers-from-the-inside/#.UR-T9JHRFu4

which is upper floors being demolished under cover of the roof. The interesting thing there is that the lowering cranes use regenerative braking to recover some of the energy of the material being lowered to the ground -- which I think is pretty damned aweseome.

David Brin used to do a riff on the importance of the iron bedframe, which held the mattress up off the floor so death in childbirth plummeted. Also correlating with the end of the male fashion peacock, since with more women surviving, there was less intense competition.
(All garbling of the thesis my own.)

I can't find the article - why does holding the mattress off the floor reduce death in childbirth?

I heard him do it verbally at least twice; I don't know if it was ever published.

off the floor = less infections = less death in childbirth = alters sex ratio

It didn't occur to me that a raised bed would lower infections.

Now available at: 28dateslater, because that's the only way I read feeds. :D

Thank you!