Researchers at Edinburgh Napier’s Biofuel Research Centre have done something unthinkable - they have used Scotch to fuel cars instead of violence-filled weekends.

Well, not Scotch specifically, rather whisky manufacturing waste from Glenkinchie Distillery (The Edinburgh Malt). Whew, the culture dodged a bullet there.     But it's also a good idea.  Scotch is a $5.5 billion industry in Scotland and Edinburgh Napier hit on the idea that whisky by-products could be an excellent resource for developing biobutanol, a next-generation biofuel with 30% more output power than ethanol. 

To understand how it works, you need a quick primer on whisky.

If Big Science complains about U.S. budget skepticism in the future, they are going to have to answer questions about the James Webb telescope.  It is currently 3 years and $1.5 billion over budget with no end in sight.   The latest projection, 2014 and $5 billion, has been greeted with so much derision that even the people behind the project in government have demanded an outside panel to oversee the boondoggle.

The difficult thing about popularizing movements is that, in the beginning, you want recognition but as time goes on the interests of the movement may be divergent from the people involved in it.  

So it goes with the singularity.  In 1993, Vernor Vinge said "Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended."   But 17 years into that, only the most optimistic thinkers think substantial progress has been made.  Ray Kurzweil thinks so, but he said so in 2005 also, including a whole book called The Singularity is Near.