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The author of Skulls in the Stars is a professor of physics, specializing in optical science, at UNC Charlotte. The blog covers topics in physics and optics, the history of science, classic pulp fantasy and horror fiction, and the surprising intersections between these areas. -
Author Archives: skullsinthestars
Just how well can an elephant paint, anyway?
Via noob.us, I found an intriguing video which has been making the rounds. An elephant in Thailand named Hong has been taught to paint – really well. Watch the video, be astonished, then go below the fold to be brought … Continue reading
Posted in Animals
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Dennis Wheatley’s The Devil Rides Out
A lot of fascinating books pass unjustly from immense popularity to relative obscurity as time passes. I just finished reading one such book, The Devil Rides Out (1934), by Dennis Wheatley. Wheatley (1897-1977) was an amazingly prolific author who wrote … Continue reading
Posted in Horror
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Talking parrots, vocabulary canines, and tool-using crows… Oh my!
Just a quick note: a friend of mine pointed me to a very nice National Geographic article on animal intelligence, which can be read here. The article discusses the well-known case of Alex the parrot, but also discusses other surprising … Continue reading
Posted in Animals, Science news
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Event horizons in water flow: the math!
In a previous post, I discussed recent research which demonstrated the creation of an artificial ‘event horizon’ in a fiber optic cable. In that post, I described how a river speeding up as it goes towards a waterfall has an … Continue reading
Posted in Mathematics, Physics
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The Linkin’ Log: March 14, 2008
Just thought I’d point out a few interesting science posts around the web, for those who might not have stumbled upon them: Blake Stacey at Science After Sunclipse is doing his best to shed readers with an excellent, but mathematical, … Continue reading
Posted in General science
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A pair of heart-warming stories
We live in a world that’s pretty crappy sometimes, and the current world political situation just makes things look even bleaker. It’s so nice, then, to occasionally see a few stories that can warm your heart and make you feel … Continue reading
Making optical ‘black holes’ in a laboratory?
My attention was recently drawn to this article (h/t Personal Demon and StumbleUpon) in Scientific American: a group of researchers have concocted a relatively simple way to generate an ‘event horizon’ in an optical fiber, analogous to those found in … Continue reading
Posted in Optics
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Solomon Kane and Robert E. Howard’s religious beliefs
Now that I’m thinking of Solomon Kane, I thought I’d do a brief post about the character, his adventures, and the clear influence Howard’s religious beliefs had on both. Solomon Kane is a 16th century English Puritan, warrior and wanderer. … Continue reading
Posted in Fantasy fiction, Robert E. Howard
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Solomon Kane movie?
I put this in the category of things I found that I wasn’t looking for: it looks like a movie based on Robert E. Howard’s Solomon Kane is slated for release sometime in 2008! My blog title, of course, is … Continue reading
Posted in Robert E. Howard
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The Camera Obscura and a neat optical illusion
I thought I’d muscle in on Swans on Tea’s turf for a post and discuss an interesting optical illusion that is based just as much on optics as on the idiosyncrasies of the eye itself. While stumbling through StumbleUpon.com, I … Continue reading
Posted in Optics
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Skulls in the Stars 