But seriously Leo, not a day over 530…

Born April 15th, 1452 in theregion of Florence, Italy, Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, or Leo as his close friends called him, grew from the illegitimate son of a notary and a peasant into a legitimate baller. Apart from his famous paintings, he was the epitome of the Renaissance Man: inventor, engineer, sculptor, military architect, code-breaker, buggerer of boys, philosopher, master of topographical anatomy and internationally recognized genius. I could make a list of his radical inventions and plans, notes and journals that are still used today, but that’s why we have wikipedia.

And by the way, happy Pesach er’rybody.

Forget flying cars, time travel, cures for cancer, energy conservation, Gb’s of info implanted in your brain, NOW IS THE TIME FOR SEXBOTS!!!!!!!1, says David N.L. Levy, author of Love and Sex with Robots: The Evolution of Human-Robot Relations.
Here’s some quotes:

“Love and sex with robots on a grand scale is inevitable.”

Hmm… why?…

“Love with robots will be as normal as love with other humans, while the number of sexual acts and lovemaking positions commonly practiced between humans will be extended, as robots teach us more than is in all of the world’s published sex manuals combined.

Levy claims that just as we love our cars, our computers, our iPods, it is quite probable that we will also fall in love with sexbots, despite the lack of emotional intimacy. No doubt, women have taken to battery-powered sexual enhancement products as never before. So robot-sex is just a natural extension of a vibrator. Grateful for the immense physical pleasures attained from their robot-induced orgasms, women will be enthralled with their virtual lover’s love-making skills.

Waitaminute. I don’t think that’s a proper comparison. A good one would be like the bimbo that you had fantastic sex with and didn’t really care about. He/She was just hot, but nothing compared to the one that broke your heart, right? One point for love!

Men, on the other hand, will lust after sexbots for purely physical reasons. They may, however, use the sexbots in exploring their feelings on a deeper level.

PSH! Ya. Right. Have you ever heard of a guy exploring the Internet for love advice after jerking off to bangbus.com? I predict men would rather explore the possibility of their sexbot making them a pastrami sandwich.

How far off are we from making lifelike sexbots with artificial skin and everything? Not far, my friend, not far at all. In fact, Korea’s Axis is already making them. They’re called Honeydolls and they go for about $7,000 a piece (of ass!).

Buzznet, the pop-culture based social media site partially owned by Universal Music, is currently winning at the internet, acquiring two of the internet’s most popular music websites, Idolator and Stereogum over the past couple of months:

Buzznet says its mission is to  have the web’s largest music community as well as the most robust.  Idolator will continue to maintain its own editorial direction under founding editor Maura Johnston.
Scott Boyd, Buzznet’s general manager, says “This deal also perfectly complements our recent acquisition of Stereogum, the web’s most popular music blog, and will provide Idolator with more resources, enabling Maura to continue building upon the blog’s great success.”
Nick Denton, founder and publisher of Gawker Media said, Buzznet is the “natural acquirer, and will be able to make more of Idolator than we could.”

Wank. IMO Buzznet is on some day late, dollar short kind of shit(even though their last round of funding was to the tune of $25 million) but then again, what do I know?

It’s not as if most reasoning humans couldn’t have foreseen the day when science would tamper with the chain of life so drastically, but now there seems to be unmitigated technology to clone a human child.

Scientists used the the procedure to create baby mice from the skin cells of adult animals, and have found it more efficient than the revered “Dolly” technique - the process forged to create the world’s first cloned being, a sheep named Dolly.

Unlike the Dolly technique, however, the procedure is so simple and efficient that it has raised fears that it will be seized on by IVF doctors to help infertile couples who are eager to have their own biological children.

One scientist said this weekend that a maverick attempt to perform the technique on humans is now too real to ignore. “It’s unethical and unsafe, but someone may be doing it today,” said Robert Lanza, chief scientific officer of American biotechnology company Advanced Cell Technology.

“Cloning isn’t here now, but with this new technique we have the technology that can actually produce a child. If this was applied to humans it would be enormously important and troublesome,” said Dr Lanza, whose company has pioneered developments in stem cells and cell reprogramming.

“It raises the same issues as reproductive cloning and although the technology for reproductive cloning in humans doesn’t exist, with this breakthrough we now have a working technology whereby anyone, young or old, fertile or infertile, straight or gay can pass on their genes to a child by using just a few skin cells,” he said.

The technique involves the genetic reprogramming of skin cells so they revert to an embryonic-like state. Last year, when the breakthrough was used on human skin cells for the first time, it was lauded by the Catholic Church and President George Bush as a morally acceptable way of producing embryonic stem cells without having to create or destroy human embryos.

However, the same technique has already been used in another way to reproduce offspring of laboratory mice that are either full clones or genetic “chimeras” of the adult mouse whose skin cells were reprogrammed.

Comforting to know that George W. Bush backs yet another potentially cataclysmic moral and ethical can of worms. Either way, this is something that should be scaring the hell out of everyone. I’ve seen Star Wars waaaaay too many times to ignore the threat of an army of clones. Granted, the ones forged by scientists might be more calculus-savvy, and not so much Jengo Fett, but the potential is frightening.

…in like the last hour! It’s like 1996 all over again!!11 Turn your office speakers up and lambaste your coworkers in  American English, British English, even Indian English. Seriously try that shit NAO!

It has long been rumored that organ transplants bring with them certain personality traits of their original owners, but two recent cases seem to add credence to the theory. First  is the case of Sonny Graham, who after receiving the heart of suicide victim Terry Cottle, went on to not only marry Cottle’s widow, but to also eventually commit suicide in the exact same fashion as Cottle had, 12 years earlier. Even more bizarre is the case of Claire Sylvia, a middle aged mother who received a donated heart from an 18-year-old boy who died in a motorcycle accident. In her new book, Change of Heart, Sylvia notes some of the unexpected side effects of her transplant operation:

Now that I could eat like a normal person, I found, bizarrely, I’d developed a sudden fondness for certain foods I hadn’t liked before: Snickers bars, green peppers, Kentucky Fried Chicken takeaway. As time went on, a strange question crept into my mind. Although I hadn’t thought much about my donor, I was acutely aware that I was living with a man’s heart - and I wondered whether it was conceivable that this male heart might affect me sexually.

Until the transplant, I had spent most of my adult life either in a relationship with a man or hoping to be in one. But after the operation, while I still felt attracted to men, I didn’t feel that same need to have a boyfriend. I was freer and more independent than before - as if I had taken on a more masculine outlook. My personality was changing, too, and becoming more masculine. I was more aggressive and assertive than I used to be, and more confident as well.

I felt tougher, fitter and I stopped getting colds. Even my walk became more manly. “Why are you walking like that?” my teenage daughter Amara asked. “You’re lumbering - like a musclebound football player.” This new masculine energy wasn’t limited to my walk. I felt a new power that I associated with strength and vibrancy.

Both cases, of course, are a long way from proving anything about the theory of cellular memory, but it’s certainly food for thought, eh?