Guest Thinkers — August 12, 2011

Instant Etna action: How volcano monitoring has changed in the 21st century

We heard earlier today that Dr. Boris Behncke thought that Etna was heading for its 10th paroxysm via his Twitter account – and I posted about it here in Eruptions. A few hours later, sure enough we could all watch the eruption live on webcams from anywhere in the world – and discuss it with other volcano enthusiasts and experts. Dr. Behncke came back midday with stunning close-up images of eruption earlier in the day and posted them on Flickr. By the end of the (work) day here in Ohio, the NASA Earth Observatory had posted a MODIS image of today’s activity at Etna … and all before it even shows up in the news.

And that, my friends, is how volcano monitoring operates in the 21st century.

Top left: Etna erupting on August 12, 2011. Webcam capture from Eruptions reader Diane Germany.

a computer generated image of a human brain.

Thinking

The great free will debate featuring Michio Kaku and Steven Pinker

Who — or what — really controls your mind?

Building destroyed by the Halifax Explosion. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

The Past

The largest accidental explosion of all time

More than a century ago, Halifax suffered an accidental blast one-fifth the size of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

a collage of photos of a man with a hat and a book.

High Culture

6 great books with wildly unreliable narrators

Dive into the twisted truths and concealed realities told by literature’s most unreliable narrators.

a group of five matches on a pink background.

The Well

Signs you’re burned out — and how to bounce back

If you don’t feel better after the weekend, the “burnout paradox” could explain why.

▸

7 min

—

with

Laurie Santos

Starts With A Bang

The trick to instantly identifying JWST images

If you can identify a foreground star, the spike patterns are a dead giveaway as to whether it’s a JWST image or any other observatory.

Up Next

Culture & Religion

Lack of Authority Behind Lawlessness in U.K.

From Scotland, Stuart Waiton claims that not only has there been a lack of policing and assertion of authority shown by police in the recent U.K. riots, that’s been the case for years.