Eindhoven graduate Yi-Fei Chen designs a gun for firing her tears.

Via Dezeen.

The Emoji System Simulator is part science experiment, part dynamic animation and entirely something to exercise your brain with. You choose a set of emoji - say trees, free and lightning - and establish rules for when one particular emoji is next to another - i.e. fire next to a tree turns the tree into fire. This reaction spreads across the whole canvas.

Sounds nerdy? It certainly can be. Look at this Chemspiral Gradient Reaction. The author goes into detail about how this simple cyclical reaction is similar to the building blocks of the shape of a given organism, like the spots on a cheetah. It's also mesmerizing to stare into.

via Don.

It's April Fools Day, so I am sure there will be no shortage of absurd, hilarious, ridiculous and dumb news items making the rounds. Unfortunately, there's none of that to be found here! I'm doing my best to stay on track for a relaunch on May 1st, which means no time for jokes!

On to the distractions!

• Tumbleweed on Treadmill - thank you @RossIngram, I agree; "What a time to be alive."
• Robert's Incredible Wheel of Fortune - I don't know what it takes to be considered a Master of the Wheel, but this guy has it all.
• How to Clean Up a House - from /r/YouTubeHaiku, here's 12 seconds of stupid video.
• Kevin Gates on Everything - there's some strong NSFW language in here but the gems of insight peppered throughout really make it worth it. "I got 99 attributes" is certainly my favorite.
• The Maker - I was going to say this was "clearly parody" but it's so on the nose, I wouldn't even be shocked if it was legit.
• Pick up the Phone - a classic from waverly flams. Sometimes it's good to revisit the archives.
• Edible Miniature "Dougnut" - I've seen these videos before and there's something so transfixing and bizarre about them. I equally respect the sheer talent of making something so tiny and the complete absurdity of the undertaking.
• Tumbleweed on Treadmill - just revisit this and make sure you put it on loop. I suggest the classic Chad Pugh style Mashup Version.

For further distractions, I recommend this thread or this playlist culled from it.

Testing the Piagetian conservation tasks in children.

In 1927, Gestalt psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik noticed a funny thing: waiters in a Vienna restaurant could only remember orders that were in progress. As soon as the order was sent out and complete, they seemed to wipe it from memory.

Zeigarnik then did what any good psychologist would: she went back to the lab and designed a study. A group of adults and children was given anywhere between 18 and 22 tasks to perform (both physical ones, like making clay figures, and mental ones, like solving puzzles)—only, half of those tasks were interrupted so that they couldn’t be completed. At the end, the subjects remembered the interrupted tasks far better than the completed ones—over two times better, in fact.

Zeigarnik ascribed the finding to a state of tension, akin to a cliffhanger ending: your mind wants to know what comes next. It wants to finish.

On writing, memory, and forgetting: Socrates and Hemingway take on Zeigarnik in Scientific American, by Maria Konnikova

Lauren Bacall by Martin_Klasch on Flickr.

also on iainclaridge.net ...