Alexander Graham Bell’s Kites.

Tetrahedral Kites!

Although best known for developing the practical telephone — for which he became the first, in 1876, to secure a US patent — the Scottish-born inventor Alexander Graham Bell is also noted for his work in aerodynamics, a rather more photogenic endeavour perhaps, as evidenced by the wonderful imagery documenting his experiments with tetrahedral kites. The series of photographs depict Bell and his colleagues demonstrating and testing out a number of different kite designs, all based upon the tetrahedral structure, to whose pyramid-shaped cells Bell was drawn as they could share joints and spars and so crucially lessen the weight-to-surface area ratio.

[…]

Bell began his experiments with tetrahedral box kites in 1898, eventually developing elaborate structures comprised of multiple compound tetrahedral kites covered in maroon silk, constructed with the aim of being to carry a human through the air. Named Cygnet I, II, and III (for they took off from water) these enormous tetrahedral beings were flown both unmanned and manned during a five year period from 1907 until 1912.

The delightful images below have mainly been sourced from three places: Bell’s own private journals, which meticulously log his progress not only with text but also with numerous photographs pasted into the pages (from 1903–104); a couple of articles (from 1903 and 1907) in the National Geographic Magazine; and the Bulletin of his Aerial Experiment Association, which he led from its beginning in 1907 until it disbanded in 1909.

There are so many photos, I just grabbed one at random, The Public Domain has oodles of photos, and links to all the sources!

Word Wednesday.

Subvert

Transitive verb.

1: to overturn or overthrow from the foundation: Ruin.

2: to pervert or corrupt by an undermining of morals, allegiance, or faith.

– subverter, noun.

[Origin: Middle English, from Anglo-French subvertir, from Latin subvertere, literally, to turn from beneath, from sub– + vertere to turn.]

(14th Century)

It was “an evil of such magnitude as to threaten the moral, social and national life of our country,” the handiwork of publishers with “diabolical intent” to “weaken morality and thereby destroy religion and subvert the social order.” – The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America, David Hadju.

Word Salad Wisdom.

Bill Day.

James Robison is one of the Tiny Tyrant’s “key spiritual advisors”.  While shilling his new book all about Jehovah and Trump, he gushed all over the place about the amazing wisdom of the Tiny Tyrant, which showed through…Twitter.

Robison revealed that he had urged Trump not to try to speak in religious terms but to simply let his “personal growth” reveal to the world the way in which his faith in Christ has changed his heart, insisting that the nation is witnessing this spiritual growth in the increase maturity of Trump’s tweets and his treatment of women.

Increased maturity? Let’s keep in mind that the man is in his 70s, might be a tad on the late side for blooming. Let’s look at some of that astonishing maturity:

“With all of the Fake News coming out of NBC and the Networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their License? Bad for country!”

Mmmm. I’m reminded of Phil Hartman’s Frankenstein sketches.

“I have been with him in so many settings,” Robison said, “with so many different people, including on the plane and in the car, watching how he treats everybody. It is absolutely one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. He is so respectful and then he’ll get up and be like [Muhammad] Ali, punching everybody out, knocking them out and they’ll think, well, he doesn’t have love. Well, did you ever think maybe love knocks out the enemy that is hurting all the people that need that love? So that’s what he is doing, so yes, what he is accomplishing and what must be accomplished is an answer to people’s prayers.”

Uh, so now it’s Trump who is answering prayers? What did he do, knock ‘god’ off his perch? Generally speaking, people who get punched, in any sense of the word, aren’t feeling loved.

“He just needs to keep doing what he is doing,” Robison continued. “He is just getting wiser every day, his tweets are getting wiser. And by the way, doing those tweets, he is doing the thing that every leader is going to have to do—you have got to communicate directly with the people you love, directly with the American people and you have got to be able to do it around a biased, totally anti-God, anti-Christian-biblical-worldview media. You have to talk continually to the American people and, God bless him, he’s doing it and I think that his tweets will become wiser and wiser … As he walks out the power of scripture and the truth that wisdom offers and the incredible wisdom that makes possible unbelievable correction and restoration, if he’ll just keep doing that and then just share his heart, more and more you are going to see continuous wisdom. I watch it every day.”

Uh huh. Let’s have another gander:

“…We cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!”

Would it be possible for that ‘god’ of yours to teach Donny the rules of capitalization?

“…approvals of The Keystone XL & Dakota Access pipelines. Also, look at the recent EPA cancelations & our great new Supreme Court Justice!”

That’s not coming across as love, wisdom, or any other good thing to me. Just the overwhelming damage done by a fucking idiot.

Robison claimed that he has sown a deep seed of faith in Trump and “he’s very, very responsive. The ways he respects [Rex] Tillerson, [James] Mattis, the ones around him, [Mike] Pompeo, Ben Carson, the people he’s put there. I’ve watched him honor his assistants that have been with him 15 or 20 years and talk about him maybe not respecting women, I’ve never seen a man treat women behind the scenes any more respectfully that I’ve watched him treat them when I’m around him. And he’s not doing it for show.”

That’s interesting. It’s in news stories all over the place, about the Tiny Tyrant mocking Pence and his beliefs; and I’d guess you aren’t listening to women who have had the distinct displeasure of dealing with Trump over the decades.

RWW has the story.

Jim Bakker Says…

“Don’t mock Jim Bakker!” Why? Oh, Jehovah will get you if you do, because that’s Jim’s best buddy.

Saying that he is sick of people mocking him because some of his prophetic warnings have not yet come true, Bakker bellowed that “when God says something to you, you don’t always know the exact time it’s going to happen. [So] stop beating up the prophets because God says, ‘Woe unto you when you beat up on the prophets.’”

When anyone can declare themselves a prophet, pull shit out of their arse, and make their best guess, there’s isn’t much else to do but make a mockery of it all.

“God is speaking to his people,” he continued. “The only ones who probably aren’t talking to God these days are mean people in America, people who just are anti-Christ.”

Oh. Well, put me down as an anti-Christ meanie. If that god of yours is talking to most everyone, doesn’t that put you self-styled prophets on the cheap side? Dime a dozen and all that?

“If you don’t want to hear it, just shut me off,” Baker said. “Especially you folks that monitor me every day to try to destroy me. Just go away. You don’t have to be there, you don’t have to hear it. But one day, you’re going to shake your fist in God’s face and you’re going to say, ‘God, why didn’t you warn me?’ And He’s going say, ‘You sat there and you made fun of Jim Bakker all those years. I warned you but you didn’t listen.’”

Perhaps, given your sensitivity, you should send up a shout to Jehovah to harden your heart, Jim. That godmonster of yours is good at that one. Perhaps you could teach it how to thicken your skin. Seems to me you’re being terribly self-centered, and don’t you christians love claiming persecution? I won’t be shaking my fist in Jehovah’s face, Jim, because it doesn’t exist. If it did exist, I’m pretty sure “made fun of Jim Bakker” wouldn’t even make the cut for the sin list. I just know you cry frustrated tears over not having a god that would send bears along to eat up all us anti-Christ meanies. Perhaps that’s your ticket, Jim – get people to make fun of your bald head, [2 Kings 2:23-34] and maybe Jehovah will come through with the bears. Or something.

There’s video at RWW.