Don't forget numerous slide rules and other mechanical devices. There was also a plethora of card sorting machines around the late 19th to early 20th century (such as the ones IBM famously sold to the Nazis). Ada Lovelace's contributions to computing (being the first programmer) were recognized by the DoD as well: systems were standardized on the "Ada" computer language for quite a while.

The Computer History Museum (http://www.computerhistory.org/) has a great open gallery that has a load of historical computers available, and is definitely worth a visit if you're in the area. It's even going to get one of those Difference Engines for display, albeit last I checked it was late b/c of construction issues.

So a man should know how to clean a bolt-action rifle, but not know how to properly aim and fire one?

Swarmbotics is pretty big these days, and one of the neat er asepcts of it is the "modular robotics" bit. I saw a guy from Georgia Tech who demo such a system that was composed of large #s of smaller robots. It was smart enough to recognize when bits of itself were failing, eject them, and rebuild itself to continue. It could also figure out how to change its shape, and say change from a snake-like configuration into a legged one. Think of the T-1000 from the Terminator series, except really really primitive.

It's a wheat flail, used to thresh grain (seconding or thirding a couple of the other answers above).

It has also been used as a weapon in various cultures across the world. In East Asian martial arts, it's referred to as a "two-sectional staff." In Chinese martial arts, the two sections can either be varying lengths, like the staff pictured, while the Okinawan nunchaku often has the two segments be shorter, and of equal length.

Damn, this would be nice to have around the CS lab...

Love how he says "real Klingons..."

Perhaps the most interesting tidbit from the article: "Caffeine can kill people in relatively small doses. The median lethal dose for an adult human is around 10 grams, or approximately one third of an ounce."

Now we'll have to wait for a murder-mystery author to use death-by-caffeine in one of his/her novels.

This is pretty similar to the assessment Thomas Barnett came up with in his study of "Core" and "Gap" countries, where he essentially the Gap states are the failed ones where you will likely see future conflicts occur.

I think one of the biggest differences from Barnett's thinking is how Russia is high up there in the instability rankings. I think he holds the belief that the other Core states (such as the US, EU, and Australia) wouldn't let a nation as important as Russia fall into anarchy.