Random Linkage 2008-Oct-01 PM
Wednesday, October 1st, 2008- The Golden Compass author Philip Pullman on the futility of book censorship
The inevitable result of trying to ban something – book, film, play, pop song, whatever – is that far more people want to get hold of it than would ever have done if it were left alone. Why don’t the censors realise this?
- Bizarre medical condition (via boingboing):
An Australian woman is blind three days out of every six because her eyes involuntarily shut and she cannot open them, a report has said.
- Medical equipment from ancient Rome (via boingboing gadgets):
The earliest mention of the rectal speculum is to be found in the treatise on fistula by Hippocrates (iii.331): “…laying the patient on his back and examining the ulcerated part of the bowel by means of the rectal speculum…”
